muscle building

This morning I rolled the wrong way and got BOOTED out of bed by none other than my lovely wife Sara. It didn't take me long to figure out why I received a booting out of bed and not the usual kick or knee jerk. I had to take a picture - nice calves eh? We have been working out everyday by climbing up the hill to campus. There are 7 sets of 10-18 stairs until you get to the top. We trudge it everyday and so far it seems to be paying off (at least physically). But really classes aren't as awful or excruciating as I anticipated they would be. I have lots and lots of homework but luckily my work is in a slow spot so I don't have tons of work from my job to do also. We were able to swing some sweet deals on textbooks (if you consider saving 30 dollars on a 140 dollar textbook a deal). We both have hard math classes. I am in Calc 3 and Sara is in Math 1050. I'm hoping we will be able to help eachother out. Sara is in chemistry and even though I took the class before I will be of no help to her. That class kicked me so hard in the pants that I still can't sit down when I think about that class. In fact as I'm typed this I had to stand up and walk around for a minute. The one important and smart class we signed up for together was okay there's two - billiards and institute - not necessarily but very likely in that order. I am in a lot of classes that seem like a repeat or are retarded. I have to take a drafting class and they won't let me test out of it. It's on basic 3d modeling which I have taken 4 classes from bridgerland on. I don't anticipate myself attending that class on a regular basis except for to hand in assignments or take tests. I also have two classes that I took in civil engineering but they don't count for mechanical. They even have the same class name and I doubt we'll learn anything different from the civil classes. Silly huh?

jam, injuns, demolition derby

Hey this is Sara updating the blog, mixing things up.
Well this weekend was so much fun for us. We spent yesterday and this morning in Laketown. I really enjoyed spending time with Freds parents, everytime we get a chance to go up I realize what great people Fred has for parents. I am just so proud to be their daughter-in-law and I know that its a rare thing to have such loving in-laws and I am really grateful for that. So here in the breakdown of our trip. We got there saturday morning and I got to witness such a faith strengthing moment as Fred gave his mother a blessing. Then we got to pick raspberries and I learned that bee's do not automatically attack you as soon as your arm is in range. I picked very peacefully and cautiously with about a million bee's hovering around me, what a blast. Then me and Fred got a hands on training session on how to make raspberry jam from Freds mom. That was so fun and I was really amazed at how much patience Kathryn had for us as Fred asks her a ton of questions and then I (totally not paying attention) asked the exact same ones because we both made a batch of jam.
Then me and Fred took a little adventure to see the "Indian" which is a rock formation just outside of town. It was pretty cool looking and the real adventure was climbing up to get a better look. Thats right straight up a rocky mountain. Once we got there we found probably the smallest lizard I have ever seen and it was so cute. Fred tried to pick it up and I am sure he must have crushed some of its vital organs because it didn't move for a long time and when he set it down there was a weird bump on its back like on of its ribs were broken. But luckily it was not dead. Then we had the task of climbing down the mountain, about half way was when I realized that it was kind of stupid to climb up in the first place as I kept seeing visions of me taking one wrong step and falling all the way down.
Next we did some target shooting which was very hot but fun. After that we got to go to the Laketown Demolition Derby with Freds dad. It was so much fun watching the awesome wrecks. They had this weird four wheeler race where the object of the race was to knock the balloon off the other contests while on a four wheeler. Its was so dangerous and to everyones surprise no one got hurt. But the rest of the Derby was awesome and we had a blast hang out with Ken. Then we got home and Fred tried to set up a web cam for his folks while conferencing with Marianne over the phone. Eventually it did work and we got to see Marianne with her baby boy. His is so cute and doesn't wake up for anything, it was so funny to see her move him around and he didn't even open an eye. Today has been pretty chill as we have been trying to soak up whatever laziness is left from the summer and wait for the dreaded first day of school tomorrow. Oh well this summer has been pretty fun and it will be nice to use my brain. again.

Deer!

This weekend we went up to the Major's cabin in Park City with Keith and Danielle. We had a blast getting there as you can see. We stopped to get some supplies at some ghetto grocery store and what to my wondering eyes should appear but a pink pig!

When we got there we played some serious Settlers of Catan and Jungle Speed. Now that (Jungle Speed) is an intense game! It's like war where if you match cards then you grab a totem pole in the middle. But the hard part is that all the cards look the same sometimes it's an octagon, square and octagon on one card which doesn't match your card because it's a circle, square, circle. Very confusing. When we got done my brain was freaking out about to explode.

On the way back we saw a deer cross the road and discovered it was a buck. Not a dinky 2-point though, it was a huge 4 point! Then it went down the hill to another deer which we foolishly assumed would be a doe. But it was another huge 4 point. The pictures are kindof bad and I only got a picture of one but you can get a gander at it's humongosity.

Back at home the crops are doing well. The corn is about ripe and the pumpkin is about to become a pumpkin instead of a flower. The other day though I found a root right in the middle of the garden about 2 inches down. I dug a little further and found it was this huge beast! It took me 3 days, 10 gallons of water, and an 8 foot 2" pipe to pry it out. I am considering mounting it on the wall next to my awesome deer horns. It took about as much effort to get them both. Our sunflower is not doing so well. I transplanted it from the shade to a place that is more sunny and when I did it almost died. It's still alive but it is growing whichever way it wants to.

the last days of summer

It's official summer is just about over for us. I don't know who decided that it officially ends on September 21st because it just as well be the dead of winter when school starts. We're in denial that it's actually going to happen except that we have forked over tons of money for tuition. Even with Pell grants we got worked over pretty bad. We aren't even talking about buying books. That's forbidden around here.

Our friends just gave us their extra copy of Settlers of Catan which if you've ever played that it is extremely addictive. We played that last night til 1:00. One set of friends got us hooked on it then this other couple who are moving to DC gave it to us yesterday. Every time you play you can use a whole new board. It reminds me of risk but not as monotonous or long.

See that? My bossman gave me business cards the other day! I have been meeting with potential customers in Rock Springs in addition to working on site there. I don't go tracting, though. I have been working the members pretty hard.... The company I am contracting for manufactures pressure vessels for the oil and gas industry. So, these other companies come into the office a lot. The office I work in is right by the door so if the manufacturing company employees are busy guess who they talk to while they are waiting- me! So I chat for a while then give them a brochure and my card. Hopefully it will produce more customers for us. But, as fun as it is to give them to people related to the business I find myself using them in other less productive ways. For instance my friend said he got a new phone and needed my number again. I could simply tell him the digits or call him and then he would have it stored in his phone but that is just too easy and not as much fun. So, what do I do? I pull out my business card and give it to him. I think I'm having too much fun with these babies.

Sara got an invitation to a baby shower yesterday so she'll be jamming there next week. It is the first we've got from someone in the ward. Perhaps this means we will have more friends/victims in the ward since our others moved to DC.

Home sweet home

Last night I got back from Rock Springs. It was just going to be the 2 days but ended up being 3 that I was gone. I went to Big Piney on Tuesday then drove 2 more hours to get to Rock Springs to the hotel. (I i figured that would be better than leaving Logan at 4:00 to get to Rock Springs by 8:00.) Rock Springs was for the most part easier than I thought but I'm glad I spent a lot of time at home practicing with an evaluation copy of the software. Then when I was there I was supposedly going to be using their software but their software lock wasn't working. So guess what system I used? My own evaluation copy. They were fairly impressed that I came that prepared and liked that I knew the software as good as I did. I still have a long ways to go but it would've been bad news if I hadn't practiced. They gave me 20 drawings to revise which they figured would take me around 4 days to complete (2 days this week and 2 days next week). Well I got those done in a day and a half and ended up having to go to the shop with a pipefitter and sketch my own drawings. Word from my boss is that they really liked having a real drafter on-site who knows what they are doing. The plant manager in Rock Springs basically asked my boss to give me a raise too! We are excited about that.

It sure wasn't fun to be away from Sara though. I ate at IHOP one night and had a lonely lonely big bacon omelette. Delicious but lonely. What made it worse is that I had a huge hotel room. Since we booked so late we took the last non-smoking room available. It had 2 queen sized beds, a 27" TV and a fridge and microwave. All that just for me. They had a pool and hot tub available which I almost went to but when I got close I saw a bunch of creepy old men in there and got so scared I decided to retreat to my room.

Back at home Sara is doing awesome in her job. She sets goals every night for how much she will collect from the customers and she has been setting them high and reaching or nearly getting them every night. She really likes not having to run around and be a grumpy manager's gopher girl too.

Last weekend we also went to Bear Lake. We learned that coming at 3:00 is never a good idea because it gets really windy and gives you sand burns in uncomfortable places. We tried to have fun nonetheless. At night we went fishing and caught 15 catfish with Dad. Then we went to Laketown, ate some greasy burgers and oh-so-delicious ice cream and raspberries while jamming with Frank and Amy who were there to pick up Ava and Koben. Sweet sweet goodness. Oh and when we were there we got a wedding gift- $19.38. That's right nineteen dollars and thirty-eight cents. Weird huh? Not really it was from a friend. That's just the kind of guy he is. Now if only we can firure out what item to purchase that costs exactly $19.38.

Rock Springs

I just got off the phone with the plant manager in Rock Springs and it looks like I will be going after all. I have to be there 8 AM Wednesday and will be there til Thursday night. I wish I could take some time off for fun (sneaking to Denver or meeting between) but I will be training a new on site employee in Rock Springs during the time I am off. Initially I was going to be there for 3 and up to 5 days but now it's just 2. I hope that is enough time for me to be trained on the software. The really good thing about this adventure is that I will be making extra pay and overtime which we need for school and books this fall.