Birthday Weekend

So, Saturday was my birthday and we planned a motorcycle trip to Monticello, Utah, to attend the LDS temple there. The trip was great. Here is a quick summary:

Thursday, September 25: We left West Valley at about 5:00 and drove to Spanish Fork for our first stop. We had dinner at The Little Acorn, at the mouth of the canyon. We then drove to Ferron.

Friday, September 26: We left Ferron, along with Andrea's parents and sister, McKayla.


Since McKayla was cramped on the back of my bike (Andrea's brother's bike), we made a lot of stops at rest areas or view points.


We made a brief stop at Arches National Park, but did not go past the visitor's center.


At the visitor's center we watched a video of the Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. After the video ended, I had to do a little performance on the stage.


We then drove a few miles into Moab for lunch. After Moab, we made a stop at "Hole in the Rock." I decided not to use their bathroom.


We finally arrived in Monticello and rushed over to the temple to make the 5:00 session.


Saturday, September 27 (My Birthday): That morning outside the hotel we saw wild turkeys.


We decided to take another path back to Ferron, so we took off and went towards Blanding and then onto Hanksville. We passed some beautiful canyons, some Native American ruins, and Lake Powell.


Here is a picture of me and Andrea's parents riding.


And a few other random pictures:




It was a beautiful ride and a more pictures can be seen here.

Sunday, September 28: We went to church in Ferron again. We have spent more September Sundays in Ferron then in our home ward. They didn't even recognize us as visitors--we said the open and closing prayers.

We then drove back to WVC. Spanish Fork Canyon was cold, but we missed the rainstorm. Thank goodness.

Well, that was our trip. It was a great time. Thanks to Jarom for letting us trade his bike for our truck for a few days.

Another Samoan Memory

I found this posted on a friends blog



Ahh.. the memories!!!

Mark's Birthday Celebration

Mark's birthday is on Saturday. We originally were planning on going to NYC and Baltimore to celebrate. I had a work conference scheduled out there, so it was perfect timing. But, minutes before we were getting ready to book our flights - the conference was cancelled.

I really wanted to do something fun and exciting for Mark's birthday - since we're sans children. So, after asking Mark what he wanted to do a couple times, he came up with a most brilliant idea.

We are going to Southern Utah for his birthday.

We're leaving today. We'll go home to Ferron tonight. Tomorrow morning we'll go to Moab and then to Monticello. Saturday we'll take our time returning to Ferron. Sunday we'll come back home to the Wasatch Front.

Oh yah - and we're doing this little tour on motorcycles.

See ya in a couple days!

Four Month Anniversary

Today is our four month anniversary. I was reading over our blog yesterday - and I was just beaming. Mark has made my life so rich, so happy. I'm so blessed! It was worth the wait for Mark.

Mark - I love you! I hope you have a wonderful day!

I love you too, even if you try to destroy my alarm clock with a pillow

Our 100th Post

This is our 100th post. So, we're each going to write 100 things that we love about each other.

HAHAHAH! Just kidding. We won't torture you like that.

But, we did want to share some more personal information - stuff about “us” that isn't yet public knowledge. Mark just noted that we just missed our 100th day of marriage a couple weeks ago - and it would have been cool to have this post then. But, oh well!

Our Daily Traditions

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Andrea

We play SlugBug - religiously. I almost always win - because I make Mark drive everywhere. Therefore, he is more distracted watching the road while I have time to scan the landscape. We've made a rule that the VW dealership in Sandy is off-limits. Also, the old Beetles are worth two "slugs" and the new ones are only worth one. Our "slugs" are gentle--we don't really punch each other.

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Mark

We also play a license plates game. We started out trying to be the first to identify license plates from states outside Utah. Eventually it has morphed into a point system: 1 point for states from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean; 2 points for states between the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi River; and 3 points for states from East of the Mississippi. I then said 5 points for a plate from Mexico or Canada; 100 points for European license plate; and 1,000,000 for American Samoa (see previous post). Andrea That’s why I was so stinking excited about seeing it on Saturday!

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Andrea

“What did you like about today?” That’s what we ask each other every night after the lights are out. Usually Mark asks me first – but sometimes I ask him first. Mark started this tradition the day after we got married. It’s one of my favorite things each day. It actually calms me down and gets me in a really good place. It also makes me happy to be part of Mark’s happiness.

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Mark

While driving home from Ellensburg in June, I came up with a new car game: Services. When you pass through a town, you have to be the first to identify the local services. You have to find 5 different fast food restaurants, 5 different hotels, and 5 different gas/services stations. We mostly played it driving through Boise, Idaho. Andrea But it’s a good, tough game. You should try it.

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Andrea

We hold hands when we pray. We don’t hold hands with guests when they come – just with each other. They can hold hands if they want. Simply put, it is so nice to pray together, whether it is our morning prayer, over a meal, an evening prayer, or about something we have been seeking guidance.

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Mark

We also kiss after we pray. I like that. That started soon after we started eating together when we were dating.

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Andrea

Mark cooks me breakfast almost every morning. Since we get up at the same time, and since I take longer to get ready – Mark just takes care of me by getting me something to eat while I’m still fixing my hair. Sometimes it’s really extravagant, and sometimes it’s really simple. I love all of it. I know – I TOTALLY lucked out. But this is also why I try to cook something nice for him Saturday mornings.

A Sensational Saturday

We had a sensational Saturday. Really - we did.

We had German pancakes for breakfast. I haven't cooked one of those for ages.


We made a pasta salad to take to a tailgate party. It was delicious.


Mark drove us (on the motorcycle) to Provo without killing either one of us.


We got free t-shirts. We immediately changed our attire to sport the new look.


We had fun at the tailgate party and ate LOTS of food. And some divine salsa.


We played a beanbag toss game - and lost terribly three times. But, we had fun.


I saw an American Samoa license plate. (I will tell you the significance of this soon.)


The BYU team did the Haka. This is new to me to see the football team do this.


The couple in front of us were interesting: he was mega-sized and she was pocket-sized.


Mark's nephew, Justin, was one row behind us to our left. He was "handsome."


We got sunburned. And my neck was cooking. So, I improvised to prevent further damage.


BYU ROCKED UCLA! 59 to 0. That's right--it was wild!


Most of the action happened on our side of the field. We must be good luck.


Mark copied my headgear. His sunburn is still painful. Poor Honey.


Mark drove us back home without any problems. I'm glad he's getting confident.

Utah State Fair 2008

Mark and I went to the state fair on Wednesday night--and we had a riot!

Food
First things first: get some food. There were two things I desperately wanted at the state fair: a foot-long corndog and a carmel apple. We got the foot-long corndog. But, we couldn't bring ourselves to pay for the carmel apple too--too much money.

Mark got a really great bbq turkey sandwich dinner from a Sanpete County booth. His dinner came with corn on the cob. He saved me a few rows and I found it to be perfect for my taste, which is: not too old!
Horses
One of the events at the fair this year (I think every year) was the draft horse pull. Those are beautiful horses. Huge. And, strong. And, ready to pull! Most of them were excited to pull as fast as they could as soon as they were hitched--which in some cases happened in reverse order (meaning they took off without the sled). We didn't stick around too long to find out how much the winner could pull, because we wanted to get to the tiger show. But, we did see the horses pulling 5,000 pounds. Zoiks!
Tigers
We went to the 7:30 show of the Tigers of Marcan. It sounds exciting, huh? Well, it was. I mean, it's not like the tigers were eating live chickens or dancing the waltz. Their attention spans were pretty short. But, they did some great things like all got on their stools at the same time, they lined up according to color, and they did some great jumping tricks.

There are apparently four color variations naturally for tigers: (1) snow white - white main color with very pale gray stripes, (2) white - white main color with black stripes, (3) golden or strawberry - a light orange background with darker orange stripes, and (4) bengal (or "regular") - orange background with black stripes. They had (1) (they actually had 3 of about 30 known), (2), and (4) color variations at the show.
Mullet Spotting
We figured the state fair was as good of a place as any to seek out mullets. The contest was on from the moment we stepped through the gates to the time we left. I found the most mullets (three). And, the best single mullet: long, scruffy, and greasy.

Mark won the contest, though, because he spotted a matching mullet set. Yes, ladies and gentlemen: matching mullets. The man and the woman obviously were a pair. It was amazing, simply amazing.
Livestock
We visited the livestock barns and got great joy out meeting the animals. First we saw the fowls. Then we saw the goats. Then the dairy cows (what was left of them--they must have all done their gig and left town). Then the beef cows (only half of them were left in the barn too, maybe that's what they were using for hamburgers at the fair). Then we looked at the sheep. And lastly, the pigs. We saw one pig that probably weighed 800 pounds.
The Zipper
We decided we had to do at least ONE ride at the fair. So, after great humming and hawing, we decided that we'd grit our teeth and spend the $10 to get 10 tickets - or 5 for each of us. Five tickets were required for each person riding the Zipper: our ride of choice. When they started loading the pods, we noticed they didn't ask the riders for tickets. We thought, "Huh...sweet!" And, they indeed did not ask for our tickets. Woohoo! Free ride!

I knew I'd be okay on the ride, I've done the Zipper before and I've done "scarier" rides at amusement parks before as well. But, it still unnerved me when Mark started immediately trying to rock our pod over. As soon as the machine started going, though, I started laughing my head off. Well, not literally, as it was firmly held in place by all the padding. But, I enjoyed it so much and had to prod Mark to laugh along with me. (He wasn't nervous, he was just trying to get the thing to spin! Too much concentration.)

Because we got on free, we took our chances and lined up again for another go on the Zipper a few minutes later. This time, sadly - they took our tickets. But, we laughed as much as the first time and thought our 10 tickets were well spent.
The Magician
The final thing we participated in at the state fair was a magician's act. And, actually - Mark got up on stage. Some of the magician's tricks were pretty good (his final one). Some of them - well, it wouldn't take much to figure them out (writing down the "thoughts" of a participant). And, some - they were pathetic (a "knife through the heart" trick).

The magician's final stunt was to have 12 volunteers come up on stage: 1 flipped through a phone book and picked a number; 3 wrote down the number and verified its accuracy for the audience; and 8 (including Mark) revealed the number (1 held the dash). Mark was so brave, I'm sure he was scared of the audience, but I think he managed well. heheheh.....
Exhibits/Booths
Some of the exhibits we looked at included the photography, the county displays, and the various arts/crafts. Some of the booths we checked out were the cowboy hats, the Jamaican-type hats, the carnival games, and the market place junk.

Peach Days

Sadly, Ferron Peach Days does not highlight peaches. I know - "Huh?" But, it's because there used to be a lot of orchards and such...and now there isn't. But, Peach Days is the longest standing Utah city celebration.

Friday night we went to the FREE dinner. That’s right, Ladies and Gentlemen, the town hosted a FREE dinner for anyone who was willing to come to the rodeo grounds. We had grilled marinated chicken, a big pile of salad (with fresh garden tomatoes), a baked potato, and a brownie. To drink: lemonade or water. It was delicious. And so worth every second we stood in line (which was only about five minutes).

Saturday morning, there was a breakfast down at the new fire station. This one wasn’t free, but you got buffalo sausage. (Not that Ferron is known for buffalos….)

Right after the breakfast was the parade. According to Mark, the best parade in the state is the Orangeville parade, but Ferron is a close second. Our grocery bag was approximately three pounds heavy with candy by parade’s end.

My little sister, McKayla, was in the parade twice – once as a Peach Days royalty, and once as a San Rafael Bulldog Student Council member. She looked so pretty.

In the middle of the day, instead of going to do the other Peach Days activities, we did our own thing. We played softball. Since I still have a bum knee, I just reffed. But, Mom, Dad, Anthony, Leigh, Dustin, Teresa, McKayla, and Mark all played. We played only two bases because each team didn’t have enough players to man a whole field.

After we gorged ourselves on my mom’s Navajo tacos, we headed down to the rodeo grounds again. This time: Demolition Derby. While we waited for the derby to start, Mark and I spotted rednecks like unto ourselves. I won the Mullet Spotting contest. I saw this kid, about 12 or 13, who had this beautiful/scary mullet: fluffy on top like Billy Ray Cyrus used to have, long and bleached in the back.

We picked cars. Mom’s won the “Prettiest” and it actually won the contest too. Teresa’s car ended up getting turned over. It was awesome. Some day, Mark will get that posted on Youtube for your viewing pleasure. (I have had it posted for a few days now... silly Andrea)



My car was a lemon. But, not quite as much as Dad’s car.

We got a family picture in the bleachers, to prove we were all there. Poor Broyde got bit/stung by a wasp/whatever-that-thing-was twice on the cheek. I think he was recovered though.

Sunday morning we all went to church together. Following church, we took a quick couple group shots. This one was my favorite of us.

It was a great Peach Days/Family Reunion weekend!