Death Valley

A lot has happened in January that I will recap in the next several blog posts. Here it goes:

After celebrating Christmas in southern California, we left the Geo there and rode home with Ty, Cambria, & their 3 kids in their van. The van was overloaded in the usual Hazard fashion. To make it more eventful, we decided to drive through Death Valley to miss the crazy New Years Eve traffic from S. Cali to Vegas.

You drive and drive on a flat open fields and then you see this:

(dropping down into that deep flat valley)
Death Valley is the lowest point in North America in contrast to Mt. Whitney (the highest mountain in the lower 48 states) being only a few hundred miles from it. Driving through, you can definately feel the elevation loss and see how low the valley really goes.
(Elevation: 100 feet below Sea Level)

The only other time I have seen signs like this was leaving the Dead Sea.

Death Valley vs. Dead Sea

only 1 has water

(leaving the valley)

Very cool place to go if you have the chance!

Dec 31

Skiing at June Lake

On Dec 30th, Donny's dad took us skiing at June Lake in central California in the High Sierra Mountains. It's about 3 1/2 to 4 hours from Donny's hometown. We woke up at 4 am to drive there. When we woke up we found Krystalee's boyfriend (who was visiting for the first time) puking in the bathroom. That's the 3rd person to puke this Christmas vacation! Donny & I went with Ty, Cambria, and their 3 year old Jeffrey as well as Donny's dad.

I didn't feel all that well either. I ended up having the stomach flu, but NOT vomiting (thank goodness!). After a stop for pepto bismal, my sister and father-in law wanted to down some too!

The drive was beautiful and we passed the places Donny took me right after we were engaged. I was really interested in going skiing at June Lake, because right before Donny and I got engaged, we went on a backpacking trip in the Sierra on the John Muir trail and we hitchhiked back to our car. We hitchhiked with nice older man who said he was conceived on June Lake. ha ha! After hearing that I really wanted to go there.

This trip was the second time I have ever downhill skiied. (I have been snowboarding twice before). I snow plowed the first time down and the runs after that were surprisingly easier than I thought. Although I didn't zoom down the mountain as fast as the teenagers, it was really fun. I might have been more daring if it wasn't starting to get icy. It was 70 degrees in California most of the time we were there. It was fun to do something different with Donny!

Tyson zoomed down the mountain. Grandpa and Donny helped little Jeffrey ski alot of the time. We ate lunch in the lodge and skiied some more. We got back to Weldon pretty late at night, but my father-in-law told some great stories that we laughed uncontrollably all the way home. Here's some pictures:

Christmas Day!

Here's how my Christmas went according to my sis-in-law:

Tralalalala La La lala

Yes, we celebrated it one day late aka because of me and Donny, mainly because of me because I was freaking out about paying our sales tax. We drove a GEO that Donny's brother Ty fixed up and sold to his parents, so gas was SUPA cheap. We left really late in the night, so we stopped in my favorite canyon by St. George and pitched our tent and "slept" in the canyon. We got there in the afternoon and Donny's family gracious let us celebrate Christmas the next day (26th), but then Sierra got the stomach flu and was puking in the night and was so sick she couldn't open presents. Then two days later, I woke up to Donny puking in the bathroom and Donny eats ALOT so he was puking for a longggggg time! and so I decided I had better be a good wife and go and see if he needed help even though I was so sleepy and I knocked on the door twice and he didn't hear me, so I went back to bed. . . . and the rest of Christmas I was HORRIFIED that I would get sick and wake up puking in the night, but alas, I didn't. It was a good thing!

Christmas in Boise

This year we had two Christmas'. Donny & I went to Boise to celebrate with my family and even better, my little sis who is a pilot and works every Christmas was able to come up so we celebrated it early. I haven't been home for Christmas for 2 Christmas' now, so it was nice. Donny & I taught our lesson to our Valiant 10's and then we drove to Boise. We celebrated Christmas on Monday, Dec 12th. We met up to take family pictures with my friend Tiff who's a photographer. She even brought her daughter Jess.

and here's my cute parents:

and then we had a big Christmas Dinner at my sister Heather's. Then we opened presents. I got a bear bell and deer warning from my sister Natalie. Donny gave me a GPS. My parents gave us a giftcard to Costco. I gave my mom a book about our trip to Hawaii together and some scrapbook paper that's perfect for her. I also gave my sister Heather a book of her wedding. I gave each of my siblings a picture of all of us from my wedding.

We also went bowling as a family and since Donny dislocated his shoulder, he bowled left handed and even won all of us the second game. It was a miracle!

We also spent one afternoon at Tiff & Doug's ranch and seeing their girls. Chad was also there. Emiline has grown so much and I was excited to see her, but she was napping the whole time I was there, so Tiff told me to go poke her to wake her up so I could see her. I poked her and she looked and me and asked, "Do you remember me?" and she did! I couldn't believe it. She was walking and talking. Cute girl. It's always fun to see Tiff and Doug.

I went to lunch also with all my sisters at Rumbi's.

Overall, it was a good time. Love my family!

Happy 30th to Me!

For all those ladies out there that are 30 or turning 30 soon, read this article:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/kate-middleton/8999811/Dear-Kate-Middleton-the-best-is-yet-to-come.html

For my 30th birthday, my friends Lynnette & Rachel took me to Applebees the night before my birthday. The next day, my friend Christine took me to lunch at Panda Express, gave me this beautiful painting of Christ walking on water in a beautiful frame (I can't think of anything better for me), went shopping at Tai Pan Trading (very bad, very bad store that I love), and looked at lights at Thanksgiving Point with Donny and my second family. It was a simple day, but lovely.

Turning 30 has a different feeling to it than my other birthdays. Before I felt 1/5 closer to dying, but all of a sudden I feel 1/3 closer to dying, but it could be 1/2 closer to dying actually. But turning 30 feels great! and I sure loved & learned a lot in my 20s, but I believe the best is yet to come!

All I want for Christmas

I don't know about you, but it's getting harder and harder to figure out what I want for Christmas. But here's some ideas:

--"The Egyptian Endowment" by Hugh Nibley (can find cheap ones at used book stores)

--other Hugh Nibley books (but I want the Egyptian Endowment most)

--Cricut (if you can find a sale ~$89) or less (sometimes you can find on ksl.com)

--"Reflections from a Mother's Heart: A Family Legacy for Your Children (Your Life Story in your Own Words." by J. Countryman, a used unwritten in copy (can find on Half.com for $4-9)
--a GPS

More ideas (as of today):

--a bear bell (a bell you attach to your backpack when you are hiking)

--a deer bell (a bell you attach to the front of your car that makes a high pitched sound that keeps deer from running into you)

--bear spray

--cute photo boxes (can buy at Micheals with 40% coupon)

Knottsberry Farm & Newport Beach

At the beginning of December, I had just gotten back from southern California to visit Donny's family for Thanksgiving, when my sister-in-law invited me to go southern California with her, all expenses paid. You see she is the assistant coach of the Provo High School x-country team and got to bring a guest. We left on Wednesday in a tour bus and after the coach's son fell in McDonalds & hit his head, we had to make a trip to the ER in Beaver. After a long night, we made it to our destination. The next morning, we went to Knottsberry Farm Amusement Park. Krystalee and I got vouchers for free food in the park (I never get food at amusement parks) and we rode all the big rides until we were sick. We got a picture with Snoopy, but decided it didn't look like him:

So we went back and got this picture. Even Snoopy wanted to see it.

The next morning, we went to Mt. Sac so the kids could register for their race and the kids got to practice on the course. I guess x-country in California is alot harder than in Utah. It was fun to see where Donny and most of his siblings ran x-country in High School at regional meet.

Afterwards, we went to Newport Beach to swim (well the kids swam, it was pretty cold). Me & Krystalee:




We talked to this older lady who was fishing and she "caught" some star fish.

That night KL and I walked around and went to IKEA and In & Out that was by our hotel. The next morning (Saturday) we headed home while the rest of the kids stayed to go to Disneyland. Overall, it was really fun and I'm glad I had the opportunity.

One of the ladies I met wrote down some of the funny things the teenagers said on her blog.