Good News

It's been a few weeks but guess what... Nick got his elk! Yay!!! I would post some pics but for some reason my computer won't recognize my SD card. Oh well! I don't really think many people would like them anyway. I didn't get any before Nick's dad started gutting the elk. Kinda greusome. So yeah, I decided to go hunting with Nick for once this year and it just turned out that he got his elk that day. It was my first time being on a hunt where someone got something. I didn't know how it would be to be around an animal that someone had just shot but it wasn't that bad. In fact, I was just thrilled at the fact that we would be able to fill our freezer and I could see a little more of my husband this fall. It's been really busy the last few weeks. I keep thinking that we should have some time to relax but then I think about everywhere I have to go and everything I have to do. I finally have a good night off tonight but Nick is on a camp out with the scouts. I hope he doesn't freeze too bad. Yikes! It's cold outside!
On another note, I have great news! My parents decided that it was time for me to get their piano so on Wednesday Nick and I went to pick it up and it's home now. I was never a pro at playing but I wasn't too bad. Now I'm really out of practice and I feel like I have to start all over again. I also think that having the piano will help me sing more. I don't do that as much as I used to either and it makes me sad :( I'm super excited to have it though. I know that I will benefit from it a lot if I just take the time to play whenever I can.
Well, just thought I'd pop in and give a quick update. Happy holidays to everyone!!

Weekend of fun!

I have to admit that it can get pretty lonely and boring being a hunter's widow. In fact, Nick is out hunting right now. Oh, well! At least it gives me time to post new entries. If Nick were home all the time, you'd never get to hear from me. I got to have Nick home this last weekend and I was so sick of being in the apartment so I treated Nick and I to a fun weekend away from home. I was originally going to surprise him with a trip to Alaska but the flights were full so I took the second best place in the world (where I've always wanted to go) and we went to England instead!!!

Okay, so maybe we didn't actually go to the England across the ocean but we stayed at the Destinations Inn in Idaho Falls in their England suite. It was a lot of fun. Here are some pictures of our way cool room..

When you walk into the room there's a drawbridge that we had to walk up to get to the rest of the room.

We had sparkling apple cider waiting for us. Yummy!

This was the coolest part of the whole room. First you see a regular bookshelf...

...then it opens to a secret passageway...

...which leads to the bathroom! So cool!

We drove to look at the temple across from the river. This is close to the spot where Nick proposed to me.

The next day we were going to go to the Tautphas Park Zoo, but they were closed. What in the world?!? We noticed this huge pumpkin patch on the same road, though so we decided to stop. It was so awesome! I've never been to a pumpkin patch before. We found some really good pumpkins to carve and don't worry, we'll be sure to take some pictures once they're done.

Pumpkins, pumpkins, pumpkins, and more pumpkins!! They probably had about 10 acres of just pumpkins!

We stopped in Blackfoot on our way home and went out to dinner with my mom and dad. We went to a Mexican restaurant called El Mirador. Yum! I would definitely recommend it. Make sure whatever your order is "al a creme".
We both had a very enjoyable time. Who knew a trip to England could be so fun?

The weekend wasn't over yet, though. Nick had church meetings all day on Sunday so I spent my time finishing up some projects that I started at Enrichment last week.

This is my countdown calendar for Christmas. It's on the back of a cookie sheet with cute magnets for each day.

See? Underneath the magnets are fun things to do for the day. Too bad I got a non-stick cookie sheet, though. My days are already falling off. I'll have to see if I can find some better glue to fix it.

And this is my nativity. Isn't it cute? I think so.

Doing these projects makes me wish it was Christmas already and it's not even Halloween yet. I guess that's probably a good thing, though because I'm nowhere near being ready for Christmas. There's so much to do! I look forward to all of it though!

Halloween Party

We had our annual Halloween party a little early this year. It was a lot of fun. We all brought a scary dish for dinner and roasted hot dogs, bobbed for apples, ate donuts on a string, decorated cupcakes, and just enjoyed ourselves.

I couldn't convince Nick to dress up but I went as a butterfly. What do you think of my makeup job?

Farewell Summer

I know summer has been over for a while but I wanted to post some more pictures of our fantastic summer to give it a proper farewell and get me ready to welcome in the upcoming holidays.

For the 4th of July Nick and I went to Driggs to spend time with his family. He's been wanting to take me to the hot air balloon festival ever since we got married and we finally made it this year. We got up extra early and drove to the fairgrounds to watch everyone fill up their balloons and get them ready for launch. It was really impressive to see the whole process.

Nick got this picture on his cell phone and it was one of my favorites.

It was really cool to watch the balloons float right over us.

I really enjoyed the balloons and would highly recommend it to anyone.

We went fishing at Chesterfield Reservoir and had no luck, so we drove over to Toponce Creek and Nick tried his luck there while I took some pictures of nature.

For Nick's birthday in August he chose to go up to Pack Saddle Lake. We borrowed my Dad's 4 wheeler and Nick's family joined us. We rode the 4 wheelers down in and roasted hot dogs on the fire. We enjoyed fishing and then a little bit of swimming. Not too much swimming though. The water was freeeezing!!! and I'm not talking about "cold at first, but you get used to it". I mean it was like "go in for 30 seconds and come out numb." Ouch! We had fun anyway. We made good use of the fire warming up after the swim.

Look at all the little fishy's!

Cousin Billy and daughter Larissa (she out-fished everyone) , and Nick's Dad

We went 4 wheeling up Blackrock canyon while we were still borrowing my Dad's 4 wheeler and I'm not sure I've never seen so many wildflowers in my life. It was so pretty!

What a stud!

Have you ever seen a mountain goat in Swan Valley? Me neither. In fact Neither Nick or I had ever seen a mountain goat in the wild at all until we saw this big guy on our way to Driggs a few weeks ago. It was pretty cool to stop and watch him for a little while. He didn't even seem to care that we were there.

This is my new toy. Isn't it pretty?? This is my first gun. Nick was pretty excited when I decided to finally get one. I decided to go with a shotgun because I like to skeet shoot and I'd kind of like to go bird hunting someday. I've actually had it for about a month but last weekend was the first time I took it out and shot it. So far I like it and I'm sure I'll like it even more once I get more used to it.

Well, that pretty much concludes our summer. Although we had a ton of fun it's kind of nice for it to come to an end so we can have some relax time before all the frantic (but very enjoyable) holidays start. Happy fall to everyone!!

Our Story...

Halloween is always an exciting time of year for me. Not only do you get to dress up, eat candy and have lots of fun with parties and stuff, it's also the time of year that Nick and I met. Most people know that we met at a Halloween party so we always like to do our own little "anniversary" celebration. Here's our story...
Although we met in October, our story begins in the middle of August. My family was getting together one Thursday evening to celebrate a special event; I had received my mission call and it was time for me to open it. I was so excited when I opened it up to see that I was going to be serving in Manchester, England. Wow! I was set to leave on December 7 and I couldn't wait. For the next couple of months I prepared as anyone would to go on a mission. I had no idea what was in store, though. I spent a lot of time with friends from the Institute and was invited by one of them to go to a Halloween party that his friend was having in Arimo (a little podunk town south of Pocatello), of all places. It was on October 22 (I still have the invitation). I dressed as my wardrobe layering pants, shorts and a bunch of colorful shirts. I looked quite interesting. At the party we played a lot of games, one of which was a scavenger hunt which I soon gave up on because I was having no luck. I went to sit in the kitchen and found a really cute guy in there with his friend. We struck up a conversation and talked about his and his friend's missions for a little while (I "accidentally" forgot to tell him that I had a mission call). Everyone came in after a while and we started another game. It's kind of hard to explain but he ended up "killing" everyone sitting in between us so he could sit by me. Isn't it sweet! I, of course, didn't know that at the time. At the end of the evening we exchanged phone numbers. The next week I called him and invited him to go to the Institute Halloween dance with me and some friends. We went as Napoleon Dynamite and Deb. It was awesome! He wore a suit and everything. I wish I had a picture because if you knew Nick, you would never believe it. Well, we started seeing each other more often and after a couple of weeks I finally told him about my mission call to England. I was afraid it would scare him off and I didn't want that to happen because I was starting to really like him. I was surprised to learn that he already knew and he still wanted to keep seeing me. Over the next couple of weeks things started getting more serious.I met his family and 2 days later on November 22 he proposed across the river from the Idaho Falls Temple. It was very sweet. I had been praying about it before hand and I felt that getting married was the right thing to do so I gave up the mission. I had a different mission in mind. We were married on January 14, 2006 in the Idaho Falls Temple. It was beautiful and I'll never forget that day in my life. It was definitely the best so far. I'm so glad to have Nick as a husband. He treats me with the best respect and love I could ever ask for. I love him more that anything!

Some Engagement Pictures...

Our Wedding Day

My masterpeice...

So, I've been planning on on painting the front of our camper since last summer and today I finally decided to get to it since I had nothing better to do while Nick was gone. I had no idea how it would turn out because I've never done anything like this before in my life. I was pleasantly surprised though at how well I did and it didn't take as long as I thought it would either; only a couple of hours. I should have taken some before pictures but, oh well, I think it turned out pretty great. I even had some random guy drive by as I was finishing and tell me that it was "really pretty." Now I think I'll try to tackle some more fun painting projects in the future and I won't have to be so scared to do it... I just didn't know I had it in me!!

Me time

It is officially hunting season and I am a hunter's widow. Nick left earlier today to go archery hunting for elk and he'll be gone all weekend. I had been thinking about all of these things that I could do while he was gone... watch chick flicks, go shopping, paint my nails, take a nap, etc. (all that fun stuff that men don't like to do for some reason. Hmmm... maybe it's the same reason that I'm not that into hunting.) Well, thus far, I haven't done any of those things and I don't really feel like them right now so here I sit...