California, Here I Come!

Well, not much new here... I'm just in San Diego on a business trip. But don't get too jealous. My trip involves standing on an uncomfortable carpet for 2 days and pawning off free stuff to social studies teachers from across the country. At least the convention center is pretty!

Today we went to the San Diego Zoo and tonight we're going to some pretty restaurant for din. Hopefully Dan will post some pics about our trip to New Haven a few weeks ago while I'm gone (hint, hint!).

Things I'm grateful for:

DAN
How could you not love this face? Dan's the best. He's fun, funny, happy, and a very loving a sweet husband. I'm so grateful for him everyday!


THE GOSPEL

The gospel has blessed my life in countless ways. I think what I appreciate most about it is the peace that it brings to my life. I'm grateful I was raised in a home where I was taught about the plan of salvation and my purpose here on earth.


FAMILY AND FRIENDSThese guys are the best! I love them all so much. My family is just fantastic and we have so much fun together! It will be exciting to be "complete" as far as in-laws go come January, 2008! (Although he was welcomed into the family picture prematurely... Good thing things worked out!)



THE EARTH

It's a beautiful place and I'm so glad that we've gotten to see so much of it. We're still quite a bit shy of seeing all 50 states, though. That's our next goal.

Those are just a few things that I thought of. I'm just grateful for this time of the year where everyone is so focused on what they've been GIVEN. We're really blessed.

My first attempt...

I'm not a seamstress. I don't think I will ever be a seamstress. But for four hours Thursday night, my mom and I worked to finish this baby blanket I made for my old college roommate's baby shower on Saturday. I did some more work on it Friday. I hope she liked it okay!

Congrats, Katrina! You're going to be a great mom and I'm so excited for you!

Let's Go Wahoos!

Dan and I got to go to the Virginia v. Wake Forest football game last week. It was our last UVA football game ever! (Unless we come back in the future.) It was an absolutely beautiful day and we had a great time. Thanks, Kimber, for the extra ticket!

SHAKE OF THE SUMMER UPDATE

After all of our travels this summer, I forgot to publish my winner for the best shake of the summer. As of Houston, it was a dutch chocolate shake at a place called Amy's. After our trips to Utah and California, I would say it's a tie between the chocolate shake at In-n-Out Burger (man, would it be nice to live near one of those...), or a hole-in-the-wall introduced to me by my brother called Crazy Otto's Diner in Lancaster, California. The shake was massive and fabulous. If anyone still cares to say they know of a better chocolate shake, I would be more than happy to test it out with you!

P.S. I don't know why the font and the picture are so massive. Sorry.

Back during freshman year at Brigham Young University, I had a roommate who, when she showered, would put any hair that fell out on the shower wall. At first, I thought that was pretty disgusting (No offense! You know I love you!) but after a while, I realized that the idea had merit. She was doing her part, as one of six girls, not to clog the shower drain. I'm sure the drain still got clogged multiple times due to the rest of us, but we could never point fingers at her!

Later on, I recall having a discussion about people putting hair on the walls in the shower. I think the other people I talked to about it also found it gross. But by that time, I was hooked. I just put my hair on the side of the shower wall while I'm showering and then afterwards throw it away. I'm telling you - it's great! You definitely have fewer problems with drainage... or so I thought.

So Dan and I have been living in the same apartment in on-campus family housing for the past two years. During that time, we have never clogged the shower drain. NEVER. I would like to think that it's all thanks to a handy tip I learned from my roommate back in the day. But just this past week or two, our tub has been getting clogged. Slowly, but surely, clogged. It would always eventually drain, but it took forever. This Sunday is was so bad that we decided something must be done, but we weren't about to do it ourselves, so we reported the problem to maintenance first thing on Monday (one of very few perks associated w/ renting). Apparently they came yesterday. Dan came home from school and called me at work "Uh, Kristen... maintenance came and unplugged our drain. They left the remains in the toilet. Do you want me to save it for you to see?" My response, "Heck, yes!" I couldn't wait to see. At 5 o'clock, I flew out of work and ran to the bathroom of our apartment to see this:

****[PICTURE REMOVED DUE TO EMBARASSMENT FROM THE AUTHORS. Just picture a toilet with a huge HUGE nasty hairball that is disgusting. If you would like to see the actual image, please email one of the authors. We will send it to you upon request.]***

So much for doing my part to keep our drain from clogging! This thing was massively disgusting! I couldn't believe that maintenance decided to put it in our toilet, no less! But there it was in all of its glory. We were afraid to flush the toilet for fear that it would clog that, too, but it went down pretty smoothly. (Dan's note: Since this is family housing, and we already have no lack of our predecessors' hairs clear-coated to our floor, I wouldn't be surprised if some of this hairball was made before we moved in.)

Just wanted to share. And here are a few pictures of our pumpkins.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

We've got a gross post coming, so be on the lookout.

Yesterday was the ward Trunk or Treat. Earlier this week, Dan gave me a $20 spending limit for costumes and told me that he would wear whatever I brought home. SWEET! Here's what I picked out:

Angels. This was probably the only time I'll ever get Dan to wear furry, glittery wings and a headband. But the bonus was it only cost $12! And I'm sure our future children will get some good use out of them. But unlike daddy, only the girls. There were some other really great costumes and the chili and cornbread were fabulous. I made my mom's Agoura First Ward Chili Cook-off winning recipe, but it brought me no such luck.

After the dinner, the kids had a trunk or treat in the parking lot. Dan and I created a cardbaord wall to cover the trunk once it was open so that Dan could lay inside our car and hand out candy from holes cut in the cardboard.

Most of the kids liked it. We only made one child cry. (This picture doesn't do it justice. I used the flash.) So kids walked up to the holes and said, "Trick or treat" and this bloody hand would reach out with a piece of candy. Many kids were too afraid to take it. We made the older kids stick their hands in there and once they did, Dan would grab it and growl. Good times. Dan even scared the bishop's wife pretty bad... We're saving the cardboard for next year. The people of Houston don't know what's comin'.

And an aside - I just finished reading Ender's Game. Aside from the fact that it's science fiction and for children ages 10 and up, I REALLY liked it. Ender is now in contention with Bear for future boy's names.

This week has been pretty fabulous - aside from work and school. So pretty much just Friday through Sunday have been fabulous, but that's good, too! Friday Dan and I headed out to the Virginia State Fair in Richmond.
Much to our excitement, there was a demolition derby that night! I had my eye on the Master of Disaster. In his heat, he came out victorious. Dan picked the car that ended up flipping over. What can I say, I've got an eye for winners (hence marrying Dan, right?). I guess that means that Dan doesn't... but only when it comes to demo. cars.

So we watched the demo derby for a while and then went to a lot of animal tents. I felt bad for the pigs (read the sign above them)

and was astonished to see a chicken with hairy feet. Who knew? This chicken is more like that huge one from Seinfeld that fights Little Jerry.

At the end of the night, I wanted to try either some fried oreos or a fried candy bar but the oreos were too expensive and the candy bars were sold out. Has anyone every tried them before? How are they? I think I'm going to have to look up a recipe online and give it a try. Most definitely. Let me know if you want an in on that.

Saturday, my dad and I took pictures of my sister and her fiance, Craig, for their announcements. Some of them turned out pretty cute. I love to take pictures and was excited to be able to help. In exchange, they brought me a huge tub of my favorite thing in the world (aside from Dan and Moosetracks ice cream) - Cox's creamed honey from Shelly, Idaho. It is amazing. I'd consider that a fair trade.

And lastly, I've loved spending time with Dan and watching General Conference. I do admit that I fell asleep briefly a few times, but I really loved the talks that were given and love the push that they give me to try and be a better person. Such a wonderful time every 6 months!

Yesterday Dan and I went on a hike off of Skyline Drive to Little Calf Mountain. It was really short and pretty easy - just a little steep on the way up. Unfortunately, our camera batteries died so we didn't get any pictures. But the good news is that we got into the park free because it was National Public Land Day! Who knew?

So since we don't have any pictures, here are some from when we drove up the Blue Ridge Parkway to watch the sunset a week or so ago.

And last weekend we went to the Farmer's Market so here's a shot of some peppers. There was a guy there selling pictures and he had a beautiful one of Delicate Arch at Arches National Park, but it was too expensive.

And here is one of only 3 pictures I shot while in Bowling Green, Kentucky. It's such a cute little town but the stoplights take forever and were driving me nuts!

Speaking of nuts, I once rode the bus in Utah to go to Wal-mart or something and the bus driver was hysterical. At first, I thought everything was normal. Then the driver turns to this guy who's sitting in the front row and says, "Excuse me, have you seen any squirrels around here?" The man tried his hardest to ignore the driver... "Have you seen any squirrels around here???" The man finally responded, "Uh... no. Why?" And then the bus driver, in this crazed maniacal voice says, "Because they're after me! They think I'm nuts!" I was laughing SO hard.

Anyway, that's about it from here. I'm supposed to take my sister's engagement pictures this week. I'm a little nervous about that. Hopefully they won't turn out as badly as these:

Boo. Boo airports. So I had to leave this morning for a business trip to Bowling Green, Kentucky. Only problem is the Bowling Green doesn't have a commercial airport. So I booked a flight from Charlottesville to Nashville through Charlotte. Then I was going to rent a car to drive up to Bowling Green. I was supposed to get in to Bowling Green around 3:30. It's now 4:30 and I'm stuck in Charlotte because my second flight got canceled after we sat on the tarmac for two hours. So now, the earliest flight I can get to Nashville leaves here at 7:45 and I won't get in to Bowling Green until around 11. Sweeeet. Boo airports. I'll write a more chipper post later.

WayneLanes - bring it on.Today is our fabulous friend Sarah's birthday so yesterday, a group of us went and got our bowl on down at WayneLanes in Waynesboro, Virginia. Dan and I had tried to go to WayneLanes before, but realized once we got there that there was a tournament going on and the alley was pretty much booked for the rest of the day. Not to mention, it was so smokey that you couldn't see from one end of the room to the other. But alas, it was Sarah's birthday so we thought we'd give it another try. When we got there, we noticed that they have been smoke-free since August! We were pretty excited.

Bowling was a lot of fun. I just wish I were good at it. Our camera batteries died right as the party was getting started, so here are some of the shots we got before our camera gave out...

The sweet smell of success. I think Dan got 105 or something.

The agony of defeat. (She actually did really well. I just thought this picture was good.)

Thank you, WayneLanes. Thank you.

WHITE ROCK FALLS TRAIL

Well, despite the fact that no one publicly said they wanted to accompany us on our next outdoor excursion, we got three brave souls to join us on today's adventure - White Rock Falls Trail. The falls were described in our brochure as "40 foot White Rock Falls set in a spectacular hemlock shaded rock grotto." Well, we were pretty excited about that 40-foot waterfall... until we saw it!

But wait, you ask... where's the water? Let's take a closer look.
Oh, yeah. So needless to say, we (we mostly meaning Dan) were pretty bummed that there wasn't enough water to go playing around in, not to mention jumping in. So we climbed around on the rocks a bit, ate grapes, and Katy painted a beautiful watercolor. Although the "falls" weren't what we expected, I thought the hike was really pretty. On the drive up we also saw plenty of deer and squirrels. It was nice to get out and enjoy the great weather! Thanks to Katy and the Menssens for keeping us company. It was a lot of fun.

Katy climbing.

Dan the whitey between Kimber and Mike.

My little sister and her boyfriend are officially engaged! Yay!

Kristen and I are planning on going on a hike this Saturday morning. Right now, we're looking at leaving around 7: 30 or 8 a.m. and going on the White Rock Falls Trail. It looks like it's probably a 45 minute drive from C'ville, and it's a 1.7 mile hike, each way (3.4 miles total). The information we have says that it goes by (maybe through?) a couple stream valleys to a couple groups of falls, one of which is 40 feet. Nothing says there are good swimming holes, but if there are, I'll probably stop at them for a little while. This brochure does say it's "great for kids, but there are several dangerous drop-offs." Let us know if you're interested in going this Saturday morning!

So Kristen and I have decided that we're going to go on hikes more frequently this year. Thanks to a tip from Katy (this is where I'd insert a link to Aaron and Katy's blog, if I knew what the heck I was doing), we picked up a brochure on 15 cool hikes within a short drive of Charlottesville from that outdoor store in Barracks.

Today, we hiked the St. Mary's River trail. It's about an hour hike each way, 2.5 miles, to the waterfall.

So we got there, and above the falls, we ran into some local kids who said you could jump off a ledge into a pool by the waterfall. These kids were diving head first off another rock, probably 8 feet down, into a gap about 4 feet wide. They were crazy, but it did look fun. So here's a picture of the place by the waterfall that they recommended we go check out.

It didn't look too bad from down below in the water.

But it looked pretty bad once I got to the top. It was hard to see where the edges were, it was only about 8 feet deep in the deepest spot, and it felt pretty high when I started looking down. After 15 tense minutes of contemplation, with onlookers saying things like "do it," "don't do it," and "I'm not stupid enough to do it," and with Kristen looking at me like it might be our last moment together, the situation ended anticlimactically with me going back down. The long way. I missed having Kristen's brother, Kirk, there to jump first, just to convince me that I probably wouldn't seriously hurt myself.

So if anyone else wants to go jump first sometime, hopefully it would help me work up the guts to go too. Or, if you're just interested in going on one of our future hikes with us, let us know.