Crafty like a Fox

This break has given me a little time to get some of my creativity out. I painted my knife block and recipe box to match, cow print, which totally fits my farm kitchen. I painted a picture frame and made a menu board out of it, thanks for the idea Natalie! I made a shadow box of my favorite Ivan outfit and his first shoes. I made a sign that says I-V-A-N, because my friend Megan made me a Tyler sign when that was supposed to be his name. Thanks Megan! I rearranged my living room. And I'm still in the process of painting my bedroom. One of the walls had wallpaper on it and I decided the job would be more complete if I removed the wallpaper. Silly me. I had no idea what I was getting myself into! So a week and a half later, I am still peeling wallpaper. We finally hung up our pictures in our collage frames we got a couple months ago. I painted this little chicken that I found at the DI and hung it up in the kitchen. It still needs some work. I think it looks like a turkey right now. Have to fix that.

In other news. I do have a few concerns. I am graduating this semester, in July! Yay. But so are most of my friends. And if they aren't graduating and moving back home, they are moving for other reasons. So come August, I'm not sure I'll have anyone left in Rexburg. This makes me worried because these people are the reason I stay sane in this place. I hate Rexburg. I love Idaho, but anywhere within a 25 mile radius of Rexburg sucks pretty bad. What makes it worse is that we just switched to a student ward and I'm pretty sure that the constant flow of people moving in and out will ensure my inability to make a friend that lasts for longer than a semester. Although I am ecstatic about this being my last semester ever of college and to finally have a degree, I have this huge weight of all my friends leaving hanging over me. And I'm the kind of person that will push people away before they hurt me. That means I won't have any friends in a lot less time than 3 months.

It's Official

We finally decided to add Ivan as a member of our family. We got him a dinosaur!

The story of the dinosaurs. When I graduated from high school, Michael and I had been long distance dating. He sent me a package as a present and sent a few random items. He sent a Big Hunk, a hair net, a heart paper weight, a toy car, a toy horse, a toy chicken (both of these were flashlights that made the noise of the animal when you squoze the tail), his favorite cd, a letter, and a toy dinosaur. The Christmas previous to this event, he bought a bunch of dinosaurs and gave one to each of the members of his family. Married couples got matching dinosaurs and Michael had one left over after every one got one, even after he had one. So he sent it to me. This meant nothing to me at the time because he hadn't told me about that yet, but it was a cute T-Rex and I kept it. 2 years after that, we got married. Now Ivan can be a part of our dinosaur collection and ultimately, a part of our eternal family.

Just ignore the fact that my T-Rex is missing a hand. Silly Chewy. Chewy was our puppy that chewed everything (so he found a new home). 

The End

As our semester ended, Michael and I were able to feel a huge relief and release. We were relieved that the worst semester of our lives was over and released from all the stress we were trapped in. While it took a while to be able to completely relax, for me anyway, I really did enjoy having a break and not having to do homework. I was able to go to work and come home and be done! I am so excited for the time in my life when I can just go to work, come home, and be done. We were able to plan a few trips for our break. We left Friday for Pocatello to hang out with Brenda and her manfriend Nelson. This was the first time we met him. We went to Senior Iguana's and got 2 foot burritos! Ivan is 25 inches long. A 2 foot burrito is 24 inches long. That burrito was as big as my son at 6 and a half months! Let me clarify, Ivan is 6 and a half months old, not the burrito. And the food was delicious. Usually quantity trumps quality in something like that, but man was it delicious. And reasonably priced. Looks like we might be visiting Brenda more in the future... While we were in Pocatello, we did a little exploring. Michael always gave me this weird vibe about Pocatello. This might be because it wasn't really much to look at when he was growing up, or that it's nicknamed Pokey, or that there have been some major drug busts there. Either way, I never thought very highly of Pocatello. Especially because of the Pokey reference. I, for one, would never like to live, or visit much less, a place that is nicknamed after a jail. Our exploring started at the Marriott we were staying in. A TownePlace Suites. It's really nice and intended for longer stays. There was popcorn (free popcorn!) in our room, with a microwave, fridge, dishwasher, and dishes provided for us. There was also a closet that connected to the bathroom, which made it hard to lock anyone out when there was an entrance to the closet... Then we drove around for a little while looking at the area. I was pretty impressed with what I saw. We went shopping too and Pocatello looks like a bigger place than Idaho Falls does, what with all the infrastructure being able to support more people and all. We saw some nice houses and visited some nice stores. It was fun.

We went swimming while we were there. Ivan loved the water, but not the temperature. 

Michael, Brenda, and Nelson. 

Oh, we got our grades back. Out of 7 classes I got 5 A's and 2 A-'s. I was pretty stoked! Michael did really well too, I think he got all A's and A-'s. Not trying to brag or anything, but I think that's awesome! Plus that semester was the absolute hardest with the vet tech classes. The material we were learning was hard and the new teacher was hard. It was difficult, but we made it. Michael decided to only take 6 credits the spring semester so he can still work full time and keep his sanity. I'm taking 14 credits, 13 of which I need to graduate and 1 that is just for fun so I can be considered full time. It's a soccer class, so it'll actually be fun. Yay for adventures!