Peru... ahorita vengo!

So fittingly, I just posted my 30 before 30... one of which is climb Macchu Picchu. I have officially booked tickets to go in September with Katie and Brit. I am so excited! y por eso I thought I should blog about it! Now, I better go practice my spanish to prepare for the journey!

30 before 30

So when I was in Salt Lake for Tarina's baby shower, they were asking about my 30 things to do before I am 30. So I thought I would make it a post since it was originally just on a post it on my desktop that I deleted once already, so now it will be permanent. I do still have one spot open, so any suggestions would be great! Here you go if you care to know, not in any special order:

1. Go to a movie solita
2. Go out to a sit down restaurant solita
3. Finish a Full Ironman race
4. Read the Bible from cover to cover
5. Learn Spanish (Cuernavaca 12.08)
6. Hike the Narrows
7. Climb Macchu Picchu
8. Leave the country every year
9. Visit 2 more continents
10. Take a woodworking class
11. Plant a garden
12. Take a cooking class
13. Read the Book Of Mormon in Spanish
14. Visit Yellowstone
15. See Aurora Borealis
16. Kiss in the rain
17. Go backpacking
18. Read Jesus the Christ
19. Go to a yurt (11.08)
20. Take a hot air balloon ride
21. Take Piano Lessons
22. Bench 160 again
23. Go abroad for a service project
24. Zip Line
25. Get an hour massage
26. Go Skinny Dipping (12.08 zihuatenajo :)
27. run a sub 6 minute mile (we can do it, Sarita! You already help me accomplish one thing on my list ;)
28. Take a photography class
29. Get my 1 year of food storage
30. ???????

So there you go...I tried to have a good mix of easier/cheaper ones and some that were a little loftier so that I could actually get them all done before I am 30. I think I can do it. I have already completed a few, and a few more are in the works.

Turning the leaf... again!

Well maybe this time it will stick.. We shall see. But at least it makes me update this thing every time someone gives me a hard time about not blogging :)

Well, it has been a rough transition home from Mexico but I think I am finally getting back into the groove, but still hoping for a great opportunity to be able to live in Latin America for a little while. A ver...

Well since being home I have taken a photography class with my friend Brittany. It was great fun. We had some photo shoots (which should get started again, Brit!) and here are some of the fruits of that labor... oh and we also had some guy ask us to take photos of his cab in a few months... huh?




Here is my sexy picture... Brit just took the picture at the right moment... Not planned at all. I think it is really funny! and I just realized I think it looks better in color... oh well, I am too lazy to change it.





So some other fun updates... This same friend, Brittany as well as one of our other friends Katie are planning a trip to Peru to climb Macchu Picchu and other fun. Brit and I are also going to do either the St. George Ironman or the Cour de'laine ( I just realized I have absolutely no idea how to spell that city ;) we have to check on a few things before we officially register. I am working quite diligently to get to my 30 things before 30...

Dia de La Virgen Guadalupe

Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe

Desafortunadamente time does fly

So I am almost done with week 2... I don't like that Idea at all. Not one bit. A lot has happened since last post. I visited the Robert Brady Museum which has incredible art collection and the house was amazing. And blue eyes in this place can get you a lot and the guides let me sit in one of the chairs AND use flash photography :) I have also learned my way around town a lot more so my freedom has increased tremendously. I went to an old folks home to observe therapy and felt completely overwhelmed. It was like my third day here and the therapist spoke really fast and was using PT terms which I have NO clue what those are in spanish, then it was group therapy, so while the PT is talking to me in technical terms the patients are all trying to talk to me too and they are little old and pretty severe here so I would probably have a hard time understanding t hem in english let a lone spanish. Then i spent the rest of the session holding the hands off a woman with Alzheimers because she kept hitting her nurse while she was trying to move her legs to do the exercises. It was fun. Went to another school for kids with disabilities and have been going for the last week. I LOVE IT! the kids are so cute. I am to see if it is okay if I take photos. I watched Twilight dubbed into Spanish, ate popcorn with lime juice and hot sauce, learned to make Chile Rellenos, went to the markets ( very busy but fun), got a "novio" then talked him out of that, visited Taxco and bought some fun silver Jewelry, went swimming in pools filled with river water, met my ward, bore my testimony in spanish, met a weird guy in the Centro that wouldn't leave us alone, Went to a relief society Christmas Card exchange. I will know I am fluent in Spanish when I can hang with a bunch of Mormon Mexican women and follow the conversation. They were all talking loudly at the same time and REALLY fast. I was totally lost. But I mentioned to one that i like the CD and she gave it to me... seriously these people are amazing. I am loving the cheek kisses too. I don't even know these people and the come up to me kiss me on the cheek and say mucho gusto. I also met this lady who has some amazing PT connections. I won't go into it because it wouldn't mean anything to most of you, but it was very cool for me. And I came home today and saw there were roses on the kitchen table and went up to my room and Paula had put some in my room too. Tan amable! Then I just got home from an agriculture expo in a local park for local buisness with dancers and music and I bought some fun stuff. Well here is the diatribe and the link to the photos is below. Life is good, I am learning a lot and I am still waiting for the Spanish to click... Hopefully soon. I have had spanish phrases in dreams...

Mexico city trip

Home Sweet Cuernavaca

So now that I am finally here life is pretty much awesome. So don't be surprised if I move back with in the near future to live here for a year. You all will just have to come visit! The family I am staying with consists of Paula and Angel, their son Miguel his wife Teresa (Terry) and their 2 kids Paulita (12), Angel (10). They also have 3 college students living here, Marianna(22)-studying medicine, daniel-administration, Raul-I don't know, I can't really understand him AT ALL!! He talks so fast and mumbles a bit; deadly combination. Daniel, Raul and yo went to the tienda last night and "we" were talking and he just kept laughing at me and putting his head in his hands... not really much comprehension... but ALOT of communicating :) So when I finally able to understand Raul I will know I have come a long way. But the house has 3 stories, the top is storage mainly but there is a little bit of "rooftop" living! They run and upholstery business out of the house. They sell upholstery materials to upholstery companies. So there is a lot of fabric and a lot of foam laying around.

They are possibly the nicest people I have met. They just want to do everything they can to make me comfortable etc... Paula walked me to school for the first day and it is a little bit of a walk and she is an older lady, took me on my first bus ride. Miguel drove me around downtown on Sunday... Just very gracious. They are also very good about talking slow and explaining things to me and helping me with my homework. Daniel has been very helpful too. We had a very long discussion about the adjective scary and apparently people can't be scary that can only make you scared... Hmm who knew!

So some highlights... everyone has been very complimentary of my spanish (except Raul... but it is my personal mission to get him to not think I am an idiot! Vamos a ver), and paula and miguel said I don't really have an american accent when I speak. YEAH!! And Yesterday I was at the table talking to Paula, Terry and Miguel and were chatting about relationships, which Mexicans are all about this kind of stuff. It has only been a few days and I have already been asked if I am dating someone, what kind of boys I like, been told at my age I should know about penises. Anyway, our conversation continued and I was able to make a couple of jokes in Spanish and I made them laugh. :) Not really that big of a deal but it made me feel like

From Boise, to SLC, to San Francisco, to LA, to Mexico City and Finalmente a Cuernavaca!

So apparently all of my international travels need to start out being adventures, just to keep me on my toes. This is fair warning to any of you that want to travel internationally with me in the future… Be prepared for anything. The quick version for people like my dad: lots of missed or delayed flights, back and forth from various terminals within the airport due to people telling us different things, meeting a Irene after missing our flight to Mexico city due to the fog in San Fran who became my travel buddy through this adventure, finally making it to Mexico City and spending about 5-6 hours waiting in the airport since I missed the last night bus to Cuernavaca. So there you go, if you don’t like detail you can stop reading now. For those of you that are a fan of details here you go… I have a little time to kill, it’s only 2:45 am. So to start off the trip, my flight from Salt Lake was delayed due to fog in San Francisco (Words of Wisdom: Never fly into San Francisco if it can be avoided). They kept telling us not to worry about catching our connection because everything was delayed… that worked out well. So we get into San Francisco and they herd all of us on International flights into this line and run us through the airport. This is the point at which I meet Irene and decided to stick together since we are the only ones going to Mexico City. We arrive at the gate they herd us to and we get funny looks because it is apparently not the right gate for us. We had been rerouted to LA and needed to leave security and go to the domestic terminal and to “hurry because the flight leaves soon.” So again more racing through the airport. We try to go through security and they won’t let us because they didn’t print out new tickets for us… Right. So back we go to United ticketing thinking our flight leave in T-5 minutes. We are then in line for about 15 minutes and finally we are helped and luckily we had like an hour. So we finally get out new tickets to LA and we are allowed through security. I have never stripped so much in one day… maybe this will help with my naked thing… vamos a ver ☺ I think from there we got on that flight ok, it is all kind of a blur. We were told once we land in LA to go to Mexican airlines because they need print off our tickets. So we wander through the airport to find the shuttle that takes us to the international terminal where we are told we need a paper ticket from United before they can do anything. We then wait about 15-30 minutes while she checks to make sure once we get to United they won’t send us back. And to top it off, it took them a few tries to find my reservation. So I was nervous for a while they hadn’t transferred my flight... minor details. So back to the shuttle, back to United, back in line for approx 45 minutes. We get our tickets, the attendant sends out an alert for our luggage, and we get back on the bus, back to the international terminal, back to the Mexicana counter for our boarding passes and back to not being able to find my reservation… We finally get our boarding passes, stop to eat because at this point it is about 430pm and I last ate about 7am. Then through security once again and to our gate just to find out our plane is about an hour late which puts us into Mexico City around 1230 am. And the last bus to Cuernavaca is at 1130pm. I still haven’t been able to contact my host family due to the whole flight issue and I was supposed to arrive in Mexico City at 545pm. So thanks goodness for Irene, she talked to my host family while we were waiting and worked our plan for them to meet me Sunday morning around 830 am when my bus arrives in Cuernavaca and I would just kick it in the airport until 640 when it leaves. Meanwhile, we can’t get ahold of Irene’s daughter who lives about an hour and a half away and was also planning on being to the airport around 545. I sent her a text earlier about the original delay but we were just hoping she got it… so we finally board the plane and arrive in Mexico City and jumped for joy when all of our bags made it!!! We found the bus counter, I bought my ticket, then finally got in touch with Irene’s daughter who had been waiting for over an hour. It is tricky calling international cell phones. Irene asked multiple people and all of them told her different numbers to dial before actual number… finally someone was right and she was able to head to her final destination which leaves me writing this enormously long diatribe about my excursion to Mexico City. It was beautiful to fly in at night though. The city is HUGE and all the lights… it was pretty amazing. Well there you go… Hope you enjoyed! I am sure there are more fun adventures to come and according some of you, this is only the beginning of my Mexican adventures… ☺

NKOTB... the Good ol' Days

So I was ashamed to admit it but I think I am ready to own up to the fact that I went to the New Kids on The Block Concert... and LOVED IT! It reminded me of my childhood or New Kids pajamas and their TV specials along with a lipsync in high school to the Right Stuff. Also, during that fun filled weekend, I ate at Ruth's Diner with Jesse and Nate, visited Erin and Dougie at work, Jesse made us all look like idiots in the process... Typical :) I then went and spoke spanish all afternoon with little brooksie which was absolutely awful :) Then met up with my bro to check out the Body World Exhibit and talked the poor kids ear off and rushed off to the concert where I met up with Mindi, a friend from work and her sister. Then spent all day Sunday hanging out with my Aunt, Uncle and Cousins. Pretty all around phenomenal weekend! Here are some pics to prove it:


Jesse and Nate being inappropriate... not that surprising.


My boys... they mocked me mercilessly about this photo for the record

The other photos won't upload to here is the post so far... I will add concert fun when the pictures decide to upload.

Goin' Yurtin'

(brit in front of our home away from home)

So I am trying to turn over a new leaf and be better about updating blogs... not bad so far but this is only about week 2... time will tell. But this last weekend a group of us wen to a yurt. Yes a yurt it is a mongolian tent. The original plan was to snowshoe in but we don't have that much snow yet so a cold hike sufficed. It was about 2.5 miles in. We made some potato soup which we then ate in bread bowls, hiked around, took some photos then hiked out to go hit up some hot springs. Sorry, no hot spring photos and then hiked back. It was kind of an adventure hiking in the dark. We then had hashbrowns, sausage and halloweenies... breakfast of champions. Then headed home Sunday morning. It was a great trip! Brit and I had blast just randomly taking photos and we all ate way too much licorice!


The most beautiful scenery I have seen when taking a whiz...

Some scenery pics... Brit and I have a little too much fun with our cameras.







Brit inside the yurt on the comfy futon that would become our bed.


Meghan and Jacob settling in... Sorry I was too caught up on taking picture of the scenery that i didn't get Mike or Aaron in photos :)

Re-Cap: Project Play

So Project Play was a project we were working at work. We raised money for adaptive play ground equipment for a local park. We then had a big carnival consisting of a camel with incontinence, hot dogs, a pony, bounce houses, football players, hockey players and all sorts of games.

It went really well and it was great to see the kids be able to play on the playground in their wheelchairs or with their walkers. It was a success I would say but I am quite happy to have it over with. I now have a lot less stress... and time to catch up on paperwork :)

Re-Cap: Nothing says Happy Birthday America like hitchiking, tide pools, aquariums and the Oregon Coast

The Crew (back to front): Mike, Brittany, Cat, Allison, Aaron, Jacob, yours truly


Good times climbing on rocks and fallen trees. It was so pretty! Good thing we were hitchhiking so we had all the time in the world to explore.


Multinomah Falls


Aren't Brit and I cute...and a little cold. Not much swimming in the ocean happened but fun none the less. We went running on the beach and found great tide pools which stopped our run a little short... what are you gonna do?

Girlie Weekend!

So I was chastised this weekend for not updating my blog...so here you go. An update. I was also informed that most people just look at photos and read the captions. So in an effort to update more frequently I am from here on out posting only photos with brief captions which hopefully obtain enough info to appease inquiring minds. And this will in turn lead to more frequent blogging... here goes nothing!


So I decided for sleeps sake to drive down on Saturday morning instead and was able to witness a beautiful sunset which I of course had to stop and photograph... it had to happen.


And the girls (minus ger. bets, chrissy and shmam). It took about 20 minutes to get this photo... Mellie just didn't want to show off that model smile... what can you do. Thanks, girls for a great weekend. It was so good to see you! And Wein, thanks for the gorilla suit... AWESOME! LOVE and MISS YOU ALL!

Who am I?

You Are Belle!

Intelligent and kind. Your beauty goes much further than your apperance. Also, you make judgements of people based on their personality and not their looks. Attaining all the knowledge that you can is one of your major goals in life, but you are also a person who can make things happen.

Which Disney Princess Are You?

Good thing because Belle is totally my favorite :)
Here is the website if you want to know who you are...
http://www.greatestjournal.com/quiz.bml?Q=16354

Jump Creek

So life has been kind of crazy lately... lots of good fun to be had but not much time to blog about it. So here you go. A few weeks ago and friend of mine, Jacob and I went on a little adventure to Jump Creek. We got a little lost on the way but it made for some fun times.

We saw some amazing birds of prey... I think they might have been falcons but I am not really sure. But one thing I am sure of is they were quite majestic.

We then ran into some pretty field which need to be photographed along with the Jeep in its element. :) So then we decided to get back to our actual reason for the excursion but found some fun rocks to climb on. So we stopped of course. As we were heading to the rocks Jacob questions "I wonder what decaying cow would smell like?" I naturally was quite perplexed until I glanced to my left to see a sectioned, skinned cow by my side. I was taken aback originally until the PT in me became quite intrigued by the skeletal structure and the spinal cord etc... that could be seen. So Jacob then received an anatomy lesson. We also found other bones on the rocks which were sooooo small. It was pretty cute. Jacob found a humerus and then i found the Ulna so I showed him how the elbow joint worked on mini bones. It was awesome!


We also ran across a little town and played in the school playground which was like one building and a barn for the gym with giant tractor tires filled with sand... I personally loved the character of their mailboxes.

We finally found our way to Jump Creek where we did some swimming but only a little because it was quite cold. Went for a hike to try and catch the sunset, tried to avoid rattlesnakes. Well I did. Jacob thought it was cool and wanted to get closer and hear it rattle. Boys... After the sunset we headed for home but needed some sustenance so the logical place would be the local bar. Quite the characters. The bartender was very nice and gave us some suggestions for other places to see in the area as well as places to be wary of local po po as they are little sticklers on speeding.

The Road Less Traveled

So last weekend my friend Brittany and I decided to go hiking. It was a nice day, the sun was shining... perfect conditions for a nice 2- 3 hour hike... Ideally but if you are us you can't just go about a normal up and back hike. So we get to the top and decide to try a different way down. At this point we are pretty sure the trail will loop back to a spot where the trail split. We just start walking and talking a realize that the trail seems to be leading us to Lucky Peak reservoir with is about 14 miles away. So we decide that our original loop hypothesis is wrong and that we should then veer off the beaten path and hike in bush in the direction we need to go. So as we are climbing up and down the faces of large hills our conversation of course turns to snakes... are there some here, is it warm enough for them to be out. are there rattlers... and oh right we don't have snake bite kit.

So I am leading and in the midst of this conversation see something slither in to a nearby bush. And this is just the beginning. So Brit starts leading and we are little freaked out so she grabs a stick a begins to poke each bush as we approach and I am meanwhile clapping and stomping and attempting to do my part to warn the looming snakes that 2 big bad humans are on their way. I hope you all are picturing Troop Beverly Hills right now.

Then not more than 2 minutes later Brit jumps due to another snake sighting. And strangely enough we do have cell phone reception so Brit's boyfriend called to tell her about his marathon when a couple of birds hiding out in the bushes decide to ascend to the sky at which point Brit screams into the phone and we both jump back and just stand there to let our heart rates level out. So we continue on our merry way crossing rivers, ascending and descending various hill to finally make in back to a trail.
It kind of looks like I am doing a version of the potty dance...sorry about that :)

Thinking we have finally arrived to safety when a few hundred feet down the trail Brit grabs my arm to avoid another snake crossing the trail. We then proceed to walk on the trail and again second guess our trail and climb to the top of a hill to get a better perspective when we discover our original trail as well as the fact that we were never on the wrong trail; that the trail actually did loop around like we thought and none of that was necessary... but a fun adventure. So we start to head back down after a now 6+ hour hike (luckily we were well stocked with food and water and jackets... and who know but cell service so if worse came to worse we were prepared). As we are almost down the mountain we run into another slithery friend. This on however was just sprawled out in the middle of the trail. So what is the next logical thing to do... exactly throw rocks at it to get it to move. This tactic was a complete failure as the snake didn't even bat an eye even when struck with aforementioned rocks. We even threw a large stick which ended up leaning on this snake and still nothing. So we figured after all of that we were safe but we still walked slowly by with stick in hand between us and the snake. Then we walked back down the trail and stopped by a nearby pizza place and devoured cheesy garlic breadsticks that were supposed to be "to-go." So there are my fun escapades for a Saturday afternoon. I think is exactly what Robert Frost meant. I also think this could easily be utilized for a church lesson or talk...And remember a snake bite kit are everyone's friend.

When Worlds Collide

So Memorial Day definitely brought with it some great memories as Brooksie, Mellie, Spencer, Chrisy and Thayne came from Utah world to visit my Idaho World. I think they were all a little skeptical of what the great land of potatoes could have to offer but I think they were pleasantly suprised.


We started off the weekend heading to the farmer's market on our bikes where we walked around tried a lot of samples bought some bread and chocolate BBQ sauce... to die for BTW. We then partook of our spoils then headed to the Bruneau Sand dunes where sand managed to creep in places that sand should not be creeping but we had a good time practicing our acrobatics... watch out Cirque Du Soleil here we come. Sunday of course was observed my church going, looking at the temple and walking the green belt which is a path along the Boise river. Then Monday we went to the North end which is pretty similar to SLC's avenues. We had a nice breakfast then went to a near by park and climbed the hill to see a beautiful view of the "City of Trees."

All in all a pretty great weekend. Here are a couple of things I learned:
1. Thayne has an incredible peanut butter obsession... I have never seen someone eat nor get so excited about peanut butter.
2. Spencer has absolutely no qualms with rolling down a sandy hill and spending the rest of the day with large amounts of sand in various crevices.
3. You are never to old to act like a 13-year old girl
4. Biking is much more fun when you are in a bike posse.
5. Peanut butter filled pretzels, chocolate covered pretzels, and various nuts and banana chips don't stand a chance around this crew.
6. You people should come visit more often :) Hint, hint... okay so not really hinting but you get the idea.

Thanks for a great weekend!

Chi-town

So this last weekend I took a fantastic trip to Chicago to visit a college friend, Scott Gunther. It was a blast! Here is the picture run down of the trip:

This was downtown Chicago. The ribbons were a symbol of all the children that have been abused. And the building in the back is one of Scott's favorite buildings in Chicago.


This is the side of the Chicago Tribune building. They have pieces of famous structures from all over the world. Like the Great wall of China, the Parthenon etc... So here are pieces from the Salt Lake Temple and Craters of the Moon here in Idaho.

And of course watching the Cubbies play at wrigley field. The totally killed the pirates. It was really. They have the old school scoreboard where you can see the people in side changing the score... what a job.


and of course "the Bean" in Millennium Park. It is pretty cool. I think you can see my reflection as well. Well there are some glimpses into my fun in Chicago!!!

Next big purchase

So I have been slowly trying to acquire some things to allow one (that being me) to furnish a house when that comes to fruition. I have been looking at some cute ones...so I have a new ambition to try to furnish this future dwelling as cheaply and funkily as possible and demonstrated by the dishes. One of the ladies I work with knows how to reupholster so I have been looking for cool, cheap couches that I could reupholster.I stopped by the thrift store by my house and lo and behold outside the store were these beauties. I sat in them and it was all over. I did send a picture to my friend Brittany to make sure they were cool ugly and she agreed and the rest is history. And for the record, they both fit into my car. Subarus ROCK!