Snow

Salem has had lots of snow this year....in one day we got all of this. It was crazy! I got stuck three times driving to work...it was an experience I would not like to repeat. But I did get to go home early from work for the doctors appt...which by the way went really well...so now we just have to wait till January 11 to find out what it is. It is difficult being patient (which is definitely not one of my strong points).

This is our front yard. I think it was just under 2 feet.



This is the picture on our deck.

Baby Ultrasound

We are having a baby!!! We are so excited!

On October 25, we went to our first doctors appointment. That is when we got this ultrasound. It is kind of difficult to see but if you look closely at the top middle the black is just fluid and there is a little one right under the black there. The doctor said at this time the baby is about the size of a cinnamon bear. In the picture it looks like its arm is up by the side of the head. The Doctor also said everything looks great. We got to hear the heart beat it was beating so fast-it was 179 beats per minute.

So we are due May 25. Right now I am 3 months along...which is nice because almost all my morning sickness has disappeared. Joel says we are having a boy that will look just like him...he will be surprised if we have a boy that has red hair...like I had.

BYU Game

We went to the BYU game with Candace and Aaron and family this weekend.
Here is the picture of Joel and I when we first got to the game outside the gate waiting to meet up with Candace and Aaron.

Here are two shots from the game...

In this one they are getting close to making a touchdown....

Here they just made it!

From our seats we had a good view of the Provo temple.

We didn't actually get a picture of all of us because our camera's battery died. Aaron did get one though. Here they are watching the game.

Here is a picture of Hailey and me. It was a beautiful day for a game.
We had the sun on us the most of the time.

Here is the last picture before the camera died...you can see the bunny ears from Hailey and Bryce :)

We had a great time and it was definitely a good game to go to.
BYU 55 to UNLV 7

Colonel Sanders and Wendy :)

Halloween is Joel's favorite time of the year to grow facial hair. So he hasn't shaved for a little over a month and then we decided what he can be with the facial hair that he grows.
This year it was Colonel Sanders from KFC. So I am Wendy from Wendy's.
Here is the final picture.

We have some friends that invite us to a Halloween party every year so we look forward to dressing up. This year was a little more difficult to get the costume together.
We looked all over for a white jacket at DI and Savers...nothing. So Joel decided I was going to make him one. That was the most frustrating and difficult thing I have ever made... Also I will never make another. I only had a week to make it. I also made the black tie...but that was easy. He looked really good! He also glowed all night at the party cuz of the black light.

My costume was really easy compared to Joel's. We love DI for great costumes.



We ran out of the white on Joel's hair so we had to run to Wal-mart in the middle so we could dye his mustache and chin. Here is the picture before we got more dye.

Joel loved being an old man...he acted the part really well. I didn't know a man his age had such sweet dance moves...but he showed me at the party.

We had a great time together getting ready and being at the party.

Pig Races

We went to the Burley fair this weekend. We had a great time! We walked around looking at the booths and they even gave us a free book inside the art building from the book club I think. I got a serendipity book called Maynerd's Mermaid. It is a cute story. I read it to the family later that evening.

We also went to the carnival...which is my favorite part of the fair! I rode on the Gravitron with my nephew Kaleb...it was crazy! I could barely walk straight afterwards but it was definitely fun. Then I went on the Tilt-a-wheel (I think that is what the name is) with my Dad and my niece Tasia. That one was a blast!! It is the kind where you can make it go really fast or slow depending on how you lean. Luckily my Dad and Tasia love it to go fast so we had a great time!

Also this year they had a new attraction at the carnival...the PIG RACES!!! Ever since I was little I loved pigs! They were one of my favorite animals growing up...we had a pig named Olga and she was my favorite. I would go and see her almost every day and she would let me feed her with my hand and she never bit me or even tried. She would let me feed her eggs by just tossing them into her big mouth. I also would give her water right from the hose when she was thirsty. Those are some good memories.... Anyways back to the pig races.

So we all got a ticket for the pig we thought would win. There were 4 (yellow, green, blue, and red). I picked green-my favorite color. So waiting for the race to start we just discussed what pig would win. Joel was sure it was going to be yellow his choice since it was on the inside lane.

The pigs were set loose...it was a close race! Green won!!! I was so excited! We were all cheering for our pigs. I loved it! Then they had another race....and Green won again!! This time they picked a raffle for someone to win a free shirt. I won the shirt. I was so excited!

Here is a picture of me and my new shirt....which is green and white!

Then on Saturday afternoon Joel and I went to the horse races.... I never knew Burley had horse races. But they do!! We spent most of our afternoon at the horse races. We had fun. Instead of betting and losing money we bet against each other on what horse we thought would win. 2 of my horses won 1st place! So now Joel owes me a massage and he has to mow the lawn this week. :)

Baby Horse

My parents horse Princess had a baby a couple weeks ago. I have wanted to go home to see it ever since it was born but I had to wait till the Burley fair...which was this weekend.
Here is a picture of the colt.

He is very energetic. My parents haven't quite decided his name but I think it will be Prince Charming since his mom's name is Princess. He is so beautiful!!

Here is a picture of my niece Tasia and I feeding the Star and Princess carrots. They LOVE carrots! So I brought a bag full for a snack for our drive and we only ate half of it and the horses ate the rest :)

Here is charming after he had ran around the yard... now resting.

Here he is again running around Star and Princess while they ate. He was running from me. I was brushing Star while she ate and Prince Charming was starring me down...it was cute.

The Saturday morning I woke up early and Joel wanted to sleep in so I got up and helped my Dad with the morning feeding. It was fun...It definitely made me miss the farm. It has been a while since we have been to Idaho and even longer since we have went out and helped with the animals. Joel really isn't a fan of it-especially of the horses. I will always be the farm girl that loves to work out with the animals.

Friday the 13th Surprise

When Mike and Mj came and visited they went to Ashley's Furniture store and got a great deal on couches. I told Joel we needed some nice couches in our living room. So we decided to go see what Ashley's had to offer. They showed us all their couches on sale and I loved these ones instantly. They looked nice and were really comfortable. They are actually the same ones Mike and Mj bought.

Here is a picture of the sofa.

So they were delivering our couches on Friday the 13th. As I was waiting for them to be delivered...there was a a knock on the door and I was excited thinking it was the couch guys. I open the door and there is a big flat box on the porch. It was this beautiful picture of the Oquirrh Mountain Temple!!! Mom and Dad Ricks gave us this picture for Joel's graduation and our sealing. Thanks Mom and Dad Ricks!! We love it!
Here is a close up of the picture.



Here is the combination of the sofa and love seat.

Joel's Graduation and Bat

Joel graduated from Mountainland Applied Technical College (MATC) this Thursday. We both were very excited!! Joel had been going to school there for the past 13 months every Mon-Thurs from 6 pm to 9 pm. This has made for a long year of seeing each other very little. He received his Composite Technician Certificate. He has been studying the same thing that he does at work. Here is a picture of him right before it started.

Here is another picture of him with his famous smile. :) He is holding his paper with his name on.

This is us just waiting.....

During the ceremony, I took a picture but it didn't turn out the lighting was so bad.
Here is Joel afterwards with his certificate holder. (He receives the actual certificate next week.)

Here we both are!! We were so glad to be done with this class...no more drives to American Fork everyday. Except we decided to celebrate and we went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner (which is in Lehi.) It was delicious!!!

For Joel's class his final project was something he could make that would be useful in his life and that looked good. I always told Joel I want a bat to protect myself for if someone broke into our house. So he decided to make a bat. Here is a picture of the bat he made.

The bat looks amazing!! It is made of carbon fiber and weighs about 20 ounces. I am really impressed how Joel decides he is going to make something and then he makes it happen.
Here is a picture of Joel with his bat.

After he graduated and his bat was graded we decided that we were going to see how well it works. Luckily we live right next to a baseball field. So we went and tried it out. Here Joel is ready for the ball...too bad I can't throw very well.

Here we both are...very excited that the bat works perfect!

Here is the video of the first hit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VhjqvkFI6w

Mike and Mj Visit

Mike and Mj came down and visited us this last weekend. We watched the kids while they went to Mj's cousin's wedding in South Jordan. We had a good time. I had to pull out all of my kids movies- which is only 6. We watched most of them through out the whole weekend. I discovered the kids love to try on hats. Here is a picture of Austin wearing Joel's hat.

He really liked wearing it. Here is a picture of Abby wearing the hat. If you look closely she has a big grin on her face. But when I bent down to take a better picture she took it off.

Then they found this hat from one of my porcelain dolls. Austin laughed really hard when he put it on...then was shy and took it off.

Abby looks pretty cute with it on...too bad she wouldn't smile with it on. Since we watched them they started to get pretty comfortable with me. Abby let me pick her up a lot (usually I never get to pick her up with out a dirty look.) She actually insisted for me to pick her up.
It was really cute.

Saturday afternoon we went on a drive up to Devil's Kitchen for a little hike. Here is one of the look out points over the valley.



The pictures are really dark because it was cloudy and started to rain. Here is Joel and I in front of the Devil's kitchen.



Here is Mike, Mj, Eli, Austin and Abby. They are such a cute little family.



Here is Abby and I. She was happy I was holding her just not about Joel taking the picture. She tends to give Joel that look a lot...it is hilarious! Also it was raining on us in this picture.



Here we are hiding under the tree and tickling Abby.

After we finished the 5 min hike, we stopped to eat our lunch. Sandwiches and watermelon and carrots. It started to rain more so we hid by the big tree. Which was probably not that smart because then it started to thunder. I don't remember seeing any lightning. We all finished our lunch except Abby who insisted on holding her lunch. Here she is holding it all so she can finish it before we left.



We had a great visit with Mike and Mj. Joel and Mike played games later that night and Mj and me went to the fabric store and sat around chatting. We got some black out material to make some black out curtains...so maybe when I finish those I will post it.

Camping

This weekend we went camping up Springville Canyon by Hobble Creek. We had a really good time it was a nice get away for the two of us since we had been so busy the last couple of weeks.



We went to the same place we went last year. I thought it would get a lot cooler up in the mountains which I guess it did since in Salem it was nearly 100 degrees and in the mountains it was about 75 degrees. It felt really nice but almost too warm to have a fire but we did anyways. We had some good food. We had tin foil dinners and raspberry cobbler for dinner. Joel made a log cabin with the briquettes. Here is a picture of it.



While we were waiting for the briquettes to heat up we were roasting starbursts...which are DELICIOUS!!



It was my first time to roast them and they were so good! Here is a picture right after Joel popped one in his mouth...they are so juicy!



Then later on in the evening we roasted marshmallows. Joel taught me how to make it golden and delicious. On our drive up I realized I forgot the flashlight...which I will never do again. So in the middle of the night I had to use our cellphones for light-which didn't work very well at all! We had some bacon and eggs in the dutch oven for breakfast. It was pretty good but, I think I need to practice cooking in the dutch oven more though. It was good to get away and spend sometime together ;)

Together Forever!!!

On July 2, 2010 Joel and I were sealed in the Oquirrh Mountain Temple. We have been asked why this temple...well there are a couple of reasons.

When we went to the Draper Temple open house the directions paper said there would be a temple over by the Bangerter Highway. It said the temple would be called Ogre Mountain. We thought that was funny and definitely unique-which put it in the ranking for our sealing. Then when the open house for that temple finally came we found out someone had just misspelled it (which wouldn't be hard to do). It was the Oquirrh Mountain Temple.

We went there one day and walked around before it was open and decided that we loved it. We took a lot of pictures. I think this is when we decided for sure it was where we wanted to be sealed.

Also when we went to the Oquirrh Mt. open house it was gorgeous inside. It has chandeliers in the shapes of stars (which are my favorite). It is considered the ring and star temple. This just helped reinforce that it was the temple for us to be sealed in.

This was a great experience and we loved having the family come. We missed the family that couldn't be there. We want them to be able to enjoy our experience also. So here are some pictures. The wind was blowing so hard we had to hide by the temple and couldn't go to far from it because it would blow my veil and dress. Thus there are lots of shadows on the pictures.



A picture in black and white.



We stood up on this ledge so you could see the beautiful yellow flowers.



A great example of how strong the wind was...it blew my veil up straight every time but usually the other person in the picture had to hold it down for me.

A picture with my parents.



A picture with Joel's parents.