April/May Wrap-Up!

Yet again, I’ve fallen behind in maintaining my blog. So… what happened in April/May?

April 25, 2008 – Mike’s B-Day Party: We celebrated Mike’s birthday in the Crown Royal room at club Allure. The Hard Rockin Johnsons played a good show. Mike’s cake… how should I put it, was absolutely crazy/amazing/graphic… there really are no words for it!

Birthday Boy!

Kandi, Ken, and Michael.

April 26, 2008 – Backyard Clean-Up: We had so many dead weeds in the backyard that they filled-up the back of the blue truck and we hauled them off to the Trans-Jordan Landfill.

WEEDS!!!

More WEEDS!!!

April 26, 2008 – Bryon’s B-Day Party: We celebrated Bryon’s birthday with dee-lic-ious hamburgers, a cleverly done and yummy graveyard cake, and ROCK BAND!!!! It is hard to say if I want to hear the song “Wanted Dead or Alive” by Bon Jovi again.

Basement Band.

Me and Michelle rocking out!

April 27, 2008 – Snowbasin MINI Rally: It was a sad day since our MINI rally leader, Karen (a.k.a. the Self Appointed MINI Queen), stepped down from being the club organizer. The drive to Snowbasin Resort and brunch at the Gray Cliff Lodge helped lift spirits; however, our fast and fun leader will be missed.

MINI cookies I made for Karen.

The drive.

MINIs at Snowbasin.

May 05, 2008 – Geocaching in Heber: We went geocaching with the folks in Heber Valley; the geocaching involved off-roading, hiking, and even a cache in the hot springs!

The four of us!

Mom and Dad heading up the hill.

May 09, 2008 – Local Wildlife: Deer, which were in the yard of a house in our neighborhood, were picked up by the Mini’s headlights. We were unable to get a good picture and I think the deer were freaked out by the Mini Cooper chasing them around the neighborhood. The next day we saw three deer trotting along the sidewalk, behind the house… here’s the kicker… in the afternoon – Huh? I thought deer bedded down during the day.

Fuzzy deer picture.

May 11, 2008 – Mother’s Day: It was a day of geocaching with Ma & Pa. Our goal was to find two puzzle caches located somewhere on the UofU campus. Both puzzles were based off of photographs taken on the campus. We were successful at solving and finding the final container of GC10TY0 – “University of Utah Photo Mystery”. Even after spending years on the UofU campus, the other puzzle turned out to be too difficult and we could not discern where the photographs were taken.

Ma and Pa figuring out the puzzle.

May 17, 2008 – International Gator Day: Marion invited us to join-in and become pseudo-Gators for the day. May 17^th was designed as a day when Florida Gators worldwide come together to volunteer and help out the community. The organization we helped out was Habitat for Humanity of the Salt Lake Valley. The organization helps homeowner families build homes, which are then sold to the families. The house we volunteered at was a duplex located in Salt Lake City. The building use to be a drug house, so it was razed and completely rebuilt. Our job was to paint and painting is what we did from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.!!!! Our foreman, Mike, informed us early on that his pet peeve was being asked: “What is next?” We met and worked with some great people. We even worked with two individuals who were going to be homeowners of homes build by Habitat for Humanity. These homeowners put in many hours of work on various Habitat for Humanity houses before they are told which house will be theirs. We hope that we will be able to help out next year!

The duplex.

Me and Marion.

Ken and Ryk.

Hard at work.

May 24, 2008 – Hornbeams and the Blaze:

“(Hooh! aah!) (Hooh! aah!)
(Hooh! aah!) (Hooh! aah!)
(Hooh! aah!) (Hooh! aah!)

(Well, don’t you know)
That’s the sound of the men working on the chain gang
That’s the sound of the men working on the chain gang”

We dug 9-foot diameter holes to plant four European Hornbeam trees. Our backyard should be deemed “the quarry”; rocks, rocks, and more rocks… Ken had purchased a pickaxe from IFA and it came in real handy for breaking up the ground to move. About half-way through digging the third hole, I told Ken, “This one doesn’t have any gold in it either!!! How are we going to pay for this house?!” Through the help of friends (and two weekends) we were able to dig four holes and plant two trees. Two? – sadly, two of the four trees are firewood. We are babying the two planted trees, hoping they will pull through. After some hard work and for the first time, we attended a Blaze game with friends, Ryk and Marion. The Blaze is Utah’s Arena Football League Team. That night they played the Chicago Rush and the final score was 51 to 48, with the win going to the Blaze. It was an exciting and crazy game; a front row fan was struck with the ball and had to be carried out on a stretcher!!!

The backyard...

Yep, they are heavy.

Yahoo! One planted!

End of game picture.

May 29, 2008 – Chelada anyone?: We attended the City Weekly Chelada Party at Port O’ Call with friends Michael and Kandi. Do I like cheladas? No… and, yes, I have tried one. The mariachi band was wonderful and it was the first time Ken and I have heard one live!

Michael and Ken with some dressed-up Coronas.

A Chelada.

The Mariachi Band.

Brown Hamster - a.k.a. The Acrobat

We have successfully managed to keep Brown Hamster alive for more than a month! By purchasing an expansion kit for his cage, we have greatly minimized his messiness. In addition, he is now showing off his acrobatic skills by climbing on the side of the cage, latching onto the lip of the water bottle, and positioning himself on top of the cage. He still lives in the extra bathroom and is no longer making any noise at night.

Brown Hamster with his new "Loop-D-Loop, Outhouse, Snap-on Comfort Wheel, Fun-nel Tubes and Rings!"

Brown Hamster's room.

April 19, 2008 - Volunteer Work - Salt Lake City Marathon

Ken, Marion, and I volunteered at the TNT Aid Station for the Salt Lake City Marathon this Saturday. It was tough getting out of bed at 4 a.m., but we managed to get there in time, before the runners showed up. We were stationed at the 8.0 mile mark on the half-marathon route (900 East 1700 South) and provided water, Gatorade, and encouragement to the runners. The TNT theme for the station was "Purple Cowboy/Cowgirl" and "Wanted - HEROES". [A littl' bit-o information: the Team In Training colors are purple and green and the TNT Marathoners and Supporters are our heroes, helping to find a cure for blood related cancers.] We had a great time. In addition, helping out the runners brought back memories of our marathon run in January.

(said with some twang)

Cowboy Ken mixin' up some of that there Ga-tor-ade.

TNT COWGIRLS!!!

That's right, we are writing on the road.

Cowgirl Marion and Cowboy Ken.

Hey, lets write in the intersection.

We are ready for the runners!

More TNT Cowfolk.

We even have TNT tattoos!

Posters of past and present TNT honorees.

Here the marathoners come...

... and there they go!!!

Our station was running out of water, so it was Lynor to the rescue!!! We were lucky that an Albertsons was across the street.

It was Sandi to the rescue, when our extra water started to run out! We had a lot of mayhem at our station: we almost ran out of water and cups, the Gatorade table toppled over (what a sticky mess), and the wind tried to blow away our trash bins and empty cups (cups were found over a block away).

April MINI Mid Month Rally

We finally made it out to a MINI rally this year! Despite the snow, the drive through the Cottonwood area was great. We made new friends and were brought up to speed on the latest happenings with our old friends. After the drive we ended up stuffing our faces at La Puente (ahhhhhh, yummy Mexican food, feel the burn)! Enough talk more pictures!!!!

Nice grill badge - I want one!!!

It's cold, lets drive.

More stormy weather up head...

MINIs as far as the eye can see.

All lined up after the drive.

WHAT'S UP? - April 08, 2008

Slacker? Maybe… So, there is this huge gap between my blogs; what has been going on? A lot! [No time = no blogging.] First off, The Hubby and I just recently moved into our first home! We’re now living in Bluffdale; yeah, yeah, “way-out-south”, that’s farmin’ country, the boondocks… I’ll admit, we’ve seen some deer near the house (near, as in across the street from the house).

DEER!!!!!

The commute to work has been spiffy; we take Redwood Road to Bangerter Highway to I-15. We’d been looking for almost a year before Ken came across this house while doing his internet home searches. The house is almost everything that we were looking for; I say “almost”, because our “want criteria” was for a home with a side garage and then we ended up purchasing one with a front garage… THE IRONY!!! The house definitely has some bonuses compared to the others that we were considering, including a landscaped front yard, fencing, and blinds. Our friends recently helped us move in a washer and a dryer; hooray, to the parents for purchasing new units and giving us the old!!!!! Sunday we moved the fish tanks over and had no casualties. Speaking of pets, we recently acquired a dwarf hamster as a birthday gift. Our hamster is aptly named “Brown Hamster”.

Brown Hamster
Age: unknown
Eye Color: Black and beady
Hair Color: Brown – duh
Likes: Dried carrots and sweet potato bites
Dislikes: Being removed from his mini TV hideout and cage cleanings

For those of you who don’t know about our pet naming history, somewhere our creativity ran out, and our fish were named “Brown Fish” and “Red Fish”. What is even stranger is that Brown Fish use to be “brown” but has since changed to a “gray” color. Brown Hamster is great, lives in the spare bathroom, makes a lot of mess, and feels the need to make a lot of noise in the cage’s rotating wheel. We have been playing GOD (as said by one of my co-workers) and have been keeping Brown Hamster’s light on during the night and turning it off during the day (to reverse his nocturnal schedule). That’s all for now... time to turn out the lights for us.