Moab
A good friend of mine has this fantastic lifted red Jeep. He's the ultimate expert on Moab; he can tell you about every hiking, jeeping, biking trail open to the public. ( and some that aren't...) He took me down for the first time last may and I truly fell in love with the desert. I knew I had to go back there and see more, so when he invited me to come jeeping again this past February, I went for it. The weather was a little more chilly, but the sights, as always were worth it.
Here he is, the Master of Moab himself. Evidently, he's not afraid of the camera either.
Gorgeous, isn't it? I just love how peaceful and remote it is out there. It makes me feel like such a cowgirl!
My First Injury
February was jam- packed for me; it would hard to catalogue it all. But one incident cannot be ignored and that was my four wheeling accident. The first councilor in my bishopric is fairly well off and owns an extensive plot of land in the obscure city of Benjamin. He needed a fence built on his property, so he proposed that if the students in our ward would come and help him build it, he would build a bonfire and throw a huge party, with a hired band and fireworks. It was quite the soiree. I arrived early, but the job was done when I got there, so Brother O'Connell told us to entertain ourselves by taking out the fourwheelers. I climbed onto one with three other girls and we sailed off into the hills. At one point, we saw a ditch. Unsure how to navigate over it, the girl who was driving it decided that she needed to gun it in order to make it over. No such luck. We smashed into the ditch, and I, embarrassingly enough, flew off of it. Luckily-kay, no luck here, it was divine intervention, plain and simple- I land squarely on my feet. After recovering from the shock that I was still in one piece, I realized that my thumb felt all tingly. I looked down and it was purple, swollen and had a sickening bump at the base. After being rushed to the hospital, the doctors told me that I had at best, strained some ligaments, at worst, ruptured them. They called it gamekeeper's thumb. ( To my horror, I discovered that it got it's name from when gamekeepers would strain their thumbs ringing the necks of game birds. What a terrible name for an injury of a Vet!) I had my friend Jason take pictures of my thumb so I could document it (there ya go, Dad), but I didn't feel they did it justice. It truly was gross.
I actually did walk out of the hospital laughing, but it was for a good reason: After the doctor looked at my x-rays and diagnosed my hand, the nurses came in to wrap my hand in a splint 'til I could get in to an orthopedic surgeon. I guess the sleeves on my shirt were too tight, because they started stripping me down, right there on the hospital bed. It took a second before I realized that Jason was still in the room and sent him out before I became too obscene. Apparently the nurses thought we were married. We both got a good kick out of that one, and because he and I went right back to the party after ward, half the ward heard him tell the tale of his close call by the end of the night.
Ain't No Mountain High Enough
My closest friends at the beginning of the semester were all guys. I spent every single night in their apartments learning and observing, hoping to store away some kind valuable knowledge that would help me with my quest to understand men better. One lesson I did learn is that when it comes to men, hunger knows no bounds. At this time, there was only one novel franchise of the famous In-N'-Out burger, and it was four hours away in St. George. But this was no matter for my beefily besotted brethren; one night they developed a craving for the legendary burgers,and no other restaurant could appease them. We all hopped in the car and yes, we drove the whole way there, ate our food and drove back. I had never tried it before, so I was expecting this other-worldly dining experience. It turned out that I just disgusted everyone by picking my hamburger apart, and avoiding most of the vegetables. I've always been a picky eater, but nobody, besides my mother, has treated me like it was some kind of felony. You'd have thought I vandalized the Mona Lisa.
They say music calms the savage beast; I'd say In-'N-Out just might have the same effect.
My Illicit Livestock
There's an apartment of girls in my ward that I'm incredibly close to. One night, one of the girls mentioned that she would love to have a pet duckling. All the other girls agreed that would be the ultimate in cuteness and dropped it. However, because this particular young lady, Molly, was graduating, her room mate, Kimber decided to fulfill her wish and buy her a duck. Her apartment was also close with my best friend, Quinn. He knew that I have a knack for knowing where to purchase various critters, so he, Kimber, another room mate, Becky and I all piled into his car and went all the way out to Draper to find ducklings. (This was in April, just after Easter, so we counted ourselves lucky to be able to find them all.) Once we got there and saw those sweet little balls of fluff, we were toast. The sales woman there told us that she wouldn't sell them to us one at a time, so I did the only thing I could: I bought one for myself, as a companion for Molly's duck. Becky ended up buying one for herself and another future room mate, so we wound up with four peeping ducklings trying to jump out the box on the way home. We were responsible pet owners; We bought top of the line bedding and turkey feed for the wee darlings, we just kinda decided to over look the whole 'no pets allowed' rule at our complex. In the end, the ducks were more messy then we anticipated, and it caused strife in more then one apartment. As soon as they were big enough, I dropped them off at the botany pond at BYU. As I drove away from my little babies, I thought (somewhat ridiculously) how it must be in some measure how parents feel when they drop off their kids for college. I came to check on them every day for about a week before they stopped trusting me and letting me hold them. Now they've grown up to be beautiful white ducks. I quite literally have Empty Nest Syndrome.
This one was mine. I named him Sir Ferdinand the Bold. Ferdie for short.
These guys are the ultimate bath toys. Can you see why we had such a hard time controlling ourselves?
The Final Countdown
About sometime in April, Jason and Paul (my jeeping friend) decided to play a little game of Ultimate Frisbee against another group of BYU students. The twist was that we played at night with a glow in the dark frisbee and glowing wristbands. It was so much fun that we decided to make it a weekly event. By the middle of summer we had a group of at least twenty of us meeting at 9:00 on Tuesday nights and carpooling to a park in Springville. One night, when we were all bored, Quinn decided that he wanted to throw a frisbee around. We borrowed Paul's glow in the dark frisbee and he and Jason made up their minds that they were going to teach me how to use it. (at this point I was one of those of girls who squealed when they actually caught the frisbee and threw it straight up in the air, both in fear of the rapidly approaching stampede of men coming at mach 3 in my direction, and a sense of bewilderment from not knowing what to do with the blasted thing.) The boys spent the rest of the night running deals and coaching me on how to catch it. I made them proud. This last summer I made my first touchdown.
Lady in Red
I know there are women out there who dye their hair as regularly as they change their clothes, but this was a bold step for me. I had always wondered what I'd look like as a red head, and I made the mistake of mentioning that in front of the guys. Jason even went so far as to go online and find the right kind of dye for me. I figured that because I'm in college and I'm single, this was the best possible time to take risks and be experimental. Although I'd wanted to try it last August, I finally got the guts and the right dye this past May. Quinn wanted to be the one to do it, so I let him. He learned that he really enjoyed it, and Salon Q was born. He now expects me to come to him for all my hair dying needs. Too bad it'll never happen again, because I learned that I do not like myself as a red head.
Not one of my most flattering pictures. But I hope the younger generation will learn from my mistakes.
My Sister the Model
Something wonderful that happened this past May was when my oldest sister Sharon announced that she was expecting! My other older sister Charlotte had her daughter, Amelia Rose in February, and my family is crazy about her. I will only post one picture of her, since Charlotte's blog is plentiful with pictures of the wee darlin'.
This is my all-time favorite picture of her. Needless to say, we were all pleased to hear that Sharon would be giving her a cousin in 8 months time. However, Sharon's baby, due in the first week of January, has already become quite a star in her own right. Sharon worked for an advertising company up in Salt Lake City and became friends with many of her clients. When one them needed a pregant woman for one of their campaigns, they called Sharon up. She had a sizeable bump, but was still extremely pretty, which meant she was perfect for the job. She went through with it, but she's thoroughly embarrassed about the whole business, and for that reason I won't post any of the magizine ads and commercials that we've spotted her in. I am awfully proud of her, though.
Murder Mayhem
My summer was filled with the usual wonderful adventures: concerts, star gazing, drive in movies, kareoke, eating out, traveling to beautiful Moab once again, etc. But one of the most memorable events of the summer was my neighbor's bachelorette party. Her room mate threw a murder mystery party, which is something I always wanted to do. My role was the bride's mother, a selfish, snobby, manipulative, greedy, shallow aristocrat. As much as I didn't want to be associated with any of these traits, I loved my role! It turned out to be a really fun night.
Because it was an all-girls party, the male roles had be played by women. All though my role called for an indifferent attitude to my husband, Nicole made such a charming husband that I couldn't resist!
and finally,
My Piece De Resistence: SAN FRANCISCO!
My youngest sister, parents and I traveled to San Francisco this past Thanksgiving to visit my other younger sister Kaitlin. She's studying to be a fashion designer a the Art Institute out there. The first 9 months out there were really hard on her, but it looks like she's had some recent luck in finding a WAY nice apartment, awesome room mates, a stable job, and some great friends in her ward. I didn't expect to love San Francisco as much as I did. After seeing the sights, however, I came to the conclusion that while I wouldn't choose to live there, Kait's neighborhood was actually kinda cute and I definately wouldn't mind coming back as a tourist more often. I loved Fisherman's Wharf!
Of course, one of the major appeals of San Francisco is going to be : the Shopping! Ally and I spent several hours at the Port of San Francisco, which was full of cute little booths and stores like this one.
We got to visit the Oakland Temple. The grounds are really cool, but they don't stop in the ground floor. On top of the temple is a gorgeous garden and a view of the 5 bridges.
This is my beautiful, metropolitan, worldly younger sister. Quite a lady.
It was breezy day on the Golden Gate Bridge! Ally was quite unkind to take this picture of me.
This is the Antique Coin Operated Aracade on Pier 49. It was so adorable! I could've spent hours there! It's true that you can have a good time for a dime!
I had to show this luchidor who's boss!
It's a shame that you can't hear this crudely carved, vintage barbershop quartet sing, but Kait and Ally make up for any lack...
There you have it. I've had my heartbreaks and frustrations, but as you can see, I've had many grand adventures and great people in my life. This Christmas season, I can truly focus on my blessings and look forward to another exciting year.
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