The Birds!

A bald eagle

Michael went on a school field trip with the Wildlife Society. They went to Camas wildlife viewing area to see birds in migration. All of the ponds/ lakes at this place were dried up. No water means no birds. They did get out and walk around for a bit. While they were walking, Michael made his bird noise, you know, the one that sounds like an eagle? Yea, it was epic. A whole bunch of bird nerds and you make a noise like that? There were several people that stopped and were looking all through the sky for what made the noise and a bunch of people that just tried to name what bird it was without even looking, I guess they were trying to sound smart... Michael never told anyone that it was him and I doubt anyone actually thought it was him. So after his disappointing trip, he came home and convinced me we should still make the day a good one. Without further ado we headed up to Harriman State Park.

same bald eagle

The big white ones are swans and the little black ones are coot. Coot can swim but don't have webbed feet, they kinda wiggle their whole body to move on the water.

Giant turkey vulture

We bought this national parks pass last February that gets us into any national or state park in the country. That really came in handy for Glacier and a billion trips to Yellowstone. We also use it when we go to Harriman, since it's a state park, it's included. But there's that stop when you first enter the park where you're supposed to get out and pay and write down your license plate number and all that and we always feel like we're stealing or sneaking in when we just drive right past it. Still makes me nervous even with the pass with us.

Teton Mountains

I couldn't decide if these are 2 different kinds of swans or if some of them are just really dirty. Maybe the whiter ones are girls. 

 Great Grey Owl

My mom got us this super awesome baby backpack thing for Christmas last year so we could include Ivan in our hiking adventures. Boy have we used the life outta that! The frame is aluminum, so lightweight, and it expands to let the kid have more room. Ivan doesn't exactly need more room, since he hasn't really grown at all, but with his winter coat in, it's pretty difficult to squish him into the smaller seat. The only bad thing about making the seat bigger is that it loses the restraints... That sounds weird calling them restraints.

Not quite sure what my face is doing here...
Looks like an angry smile.

The seat belts? We'll use seat belts. I thought that might be an issue at first, but he was pretty well contained with the fluffiness of his coat. So we hiked a couple miles and saw a bunch of birds, mainly swans, geese, ducks, and coot (coots, ceet, cootsen?). At one point we were away from the water and in the woods, so we couldn't even see the water and we heard this strange noise. To me it sounded like hooves running. I thought, sweet maybe we'll see some elk! Michael thought it was antlers either against trees or other antlers. He thought, sweet maybe we'll see some elk! We kept hearing this noise over and over. Now I'm thinking it's the horses in the corral, but we were too far from it to hear them. We get back to the lake and find out how stupid we were. It was just birds flying really close to the water! The weather was pretty nice and we had a lot of fun. Ivan was good, and boy that sure makes all the difference. The height of that backpack puts his mouth right by your ear. You can't just let him cry or you'll go deaf! Thank goodness for graham crackers.

Pelicans

Muskrat! Look at his cute little foot!

Swans, geese, coot. 

Our trip Saturday was so good we went back on Wednesday. We brought Ivan again and hiked a lot farther than before. We hoped to see more of the four legged creatures and only lucked out with a couple creatures. We did have an issue with Ivan's shoes though. He has these really super cute cowboy boots that are my absolute favorite. They zip up the side (easy to put on) and keeps his little legs warmer because his pants get pulled up at the ends in the backpack. He wasn't quite as happy as the last trip and kept rubbing his boots against whoever was carrying him. Rubbing enough to get the boots off his feet. This was kinda annoying, but ok as long as whoever had Ivan was walking in front. I should have just taken his boots off and called it good, he had socks on and it really wasn't that cold. On our last half mile of the trail I decided to walk beside Michael and Ivan. Ivan thought it was hilarious if he could see me. We played peek a boo and I tried everything I could to keep that boy entertained. Then Michael, with his eagle vision, spotted an animal in the field beside us. The animal was quite camouflaged and I was really impressed he saw the animal at all. We still haven't quite decided if it was a wolf or a coyote. He was huge - leaning more towards wolf, alone - could be either animal, his coloring was gray with some red - more coyotes that color but could still be a wolf, and his conformation was more like a wolf - like his ears being a little smaller and snout not pointing up at the end, big thick body.

A beaver bit me!

Beaver dam. We waited around for a bit to see if the little guy would come back. No such luck.

Just after getting a picture of that guy, we heard a chorus of coyote calls. It was amazing! I haven't heard anything like that since moving out here. In Tennessee coyotes are as common as dogs and just as brave as one, they'll almost walk right up to ya. We used to hear them all the time at my parents house. That's also why you have to get your dog's rabies shot every year there but only every 3 years here. There must have been 8 or 10 coyotes though. Oh, and that wolf thing we saw didn't respond to the coyote calls so we really think it was a wolf. Just another 50 feet up the trail, Michael spotted a fox!

Don't look too hard, it's real blurry. The red stuff is the fox. You can see his head in the middle and tail towards the bottom left. 

This little guy was super hard to see because of the wooden fence and the barn and stuff. He looked right at us then ran into the barn. I think foxes are so cute. Ivan dropped his shoe again, and again I put it back on him. We veered off the trail to get to the car sooner and the second we got to the parking lot I noticed Ivan was missing a shoe. It was just getting to the point of dusk and getting harder to see. Ivan was tired of being in the backpack and Michael and I were both tired of walking. So being the manly man he is, Michael ran back a half mile or so (back to where we saw the wolf and even a little farther) looking for the shoe. Did I mention his boots were brown with some camouflage on them? Yea, super hard to see on the ground. I even took Ivan's other shoe and put it on the ground just to see what it would look like. Part of the reason we went back to Harriman that day was because the weather was calling for a good bit of snow the next day and throughout the weekend. Wednesday was out last chance to be there. So if we didn't find the shoe right then before we left, we probably weren't going to find it. I parked the car facing the part of the woods we came out, turned the lights on and searched all over the woods for the shoe. We left the trail, remember? So I couldn't remember where we walked and where we didn't. 20 minutes later Michael comes huffing and puffing out of the woods with no luck of finding the shoe. By then it was too dark to see and we didn't have any flashlights. The last time we left the trail we lost out binoculars. Now I have one cute cowboy boot and one cute little boy with 2 feet.

See the cuteness of the boots?!

We did go back on Friday to try and find the shoe, but it had snowed and there was no finding it then. Guess we'll just go back in the spring and hope and pray it's there. I would just replace the shoes, but I can't find them anywhere and I bought them for a dollar at a yardsale. They cost 20 bucks easy from a shoe store. But at least we saw some animals!

Silver Lake

We're Fighting

I really really really really love my husband. I could not have found a better match for me in the whole world. Every day I spend with him I'm still surprised by the likeness of our thought processes and personalities. He is absolutely amazing. He makes me laugh every single day. He gives the best foot rubs ever. He's considerate and kind. He's a very generous and giving. He even surprises me a little with just how generous he is. He's ready and eager to serve others. I don't even know how many times he's plowed the neighbors' driveways or walkways. He's a great dad. He knows and anticipates the right thing to say at the right time. Did I mention how funny he is? When he moved out to TN to be with me, he would often say "we're fighting." Now to the average relationship this might sound a little weird and probably even offensive. Michael and I don't work like that. When he says "we're fighting" it usually brings on the response to make him laugh or something like that. So we tickle each other or start saying random off the wall things and it makes things fun. Michael would like to think he's not sentimental, but I know how he really is. He won't ever say it, but he's sentimental about the trips we take together, our adventures, because that's what really matters. The memories, the fun times we've shared together, and all the laughs we've had along the way. It's not about the stuff with him, it's really really not about the stuff. I mean, we live in a trailer, obviously not about the stuff. I really love that guy. He's so good to me and most of the time it's just second nature for him to treat me like that. It's inborn, innate, automatic. There have been many times that I act like a woman, you know, dropping hints and subtly saying I want something without ever actually saying I want it. I hate that. I hate it when I do that, it's poor communication and most of the time you don't get what you want in the long run anyway. Why waste all that extra effort? But Michael picks up on those hints and responds the way I want him to. So much for getting rid of that habit with all that positive reinforcement. I'm so stoked to spend the rest of eternity with him. I'm excited for how and where our lives have brought us to this point. I'm happy. I'm genuinely, absolutely, positively happy. I can't think of many times in my life that I've been able to say that. We've been through some rough times, like last year when we were both working and going to school and taking care of an infant. And I know without a doubt that I can always turn to Michael for support any time I need it. I love how readily he comes to me when he needs encouragement and how well he lets me do my job as his wife. I love how he directs our family to the things that are right and what we should be doing and teaching in our home. I love the beautiful babies he makes, well I helped too. I love how he smells, is that weird? I think we should all be chemically attracted to our spouses and Michael sure makes that easy. I love how being with him makes me a better person. I absolutely love the crazy things he does. I love sharing my life with him. Michael Wampler, you are my favorite. Happy Birthday!

Ivan's Birthday

Ready for the guests to arrive!

Today is Ivan's first birthday! Wow, I can't believe he's one already! I can't believe I have a one year old already! I feel old, well, not that old. We invited a few friends over the weekend to celebrate Ivan's birth. All his friends from church are girls, go figure, but he does have a friend his age that's a boy who lives next door. We had tons of food. It must be a Roney thing, my mom always had tons of food at any kind of gathering, formal or not, and I always seem to do the same. Thanks mom! We even had quite a few presents for the little guy. He didn't care too much about opening the presents, but he sure liked the toys he got. He got some cute pj's, a bunch of toys, and cake. I made him a funfetti cake, cuz it's delicious. He really just played in most of it instead of eating it. It was a pretty fun time.

The spread. This isn't even all of it. I made dirt and sand pudding cups with gummie bears too.

a few thoughts

There's just been a few things on my mind lately. First, I haven't blogged in such a long time that the whole set up of the site is totally different. You know it's been a while when they change the whole website!

Second, I'm not going to continue numbering the thoughts. That's a lot of remembering and keeping track of stuff.

Ivan is walking like a pro these days. He took his first steps July 21, the day after graduation, and decided he wanted better balance before he continued any of that. He was getting pretty good at balance, but not near brave enough to walk more than 3 steps. When we left him with Michael's parents for our Glacier NP trip, he decided to show off. Once we got back we couldn't stop him! Now walking is all he wants to do. He holds his arms up next to his chest like a T-rex and hobbles around like a zombie. Very cute.

I have decided that I have the cleanest toilet ever. I mean it. With the current events of my life, my face visits the toilet quite often. And I'm not sure about you guys, but nothing feels better than ice cold porcelain on my face right after I puke. Ahh, that's the stuff. And if my face is gonna touch the toilet, it had better be clean or that would give me another reason to puke.
That being said, I'm pregnant! 

This is how we announced it to the world... on Facebook. So now let's answer some FAQs of this go-around.

Was it planned? Well, that's always an interesting question. I'm gonna be blunt, no I'm not, I just typed it and it was too much! Yes, this baby was planned.

Are you excited? Yes! We are very excited!! Ivan has no idea, but he loves other kids, so I'm sure he's stoked as well.

How do you feel? It depends on the day. I started getting morning sickness the day I was 6 weeks, same as with Ivan. The nausea is different though. I've been super nauseous then I eat and I'm totally fine or I throw up and I'm totally fine after. It's actually been kinda nice. Until Sunday. Oh man... Sunday. Michael thinks I was sick with the flu or something, and it was bad. I didn't eat anything all day Sunday or Monday. I got up to get a drink at one point and woke up on the floor with Ivan crawling all over me. That was interesting. I've been having some pain in my lower abdomen, not sure what that's all about. My main point in telling people that I'm pregnant already is that I feel like crap half of the time and sleep the other half. So if people tell me congrats, then I feel even more excited and time passes faster. Works for me.

When are you due? I'm not exactly sure on that one. We haven't been to the doctor yet, I'm still super nervous for doctors again and I want a better experience than last time, so I'm shopping around. I am 8 weeks and 4 days along though, according to my calculations. So I think I'm due early April or late March.

Cravings? I haven't really had any cravings yet. Although I do feel the need to eat more nachos. And anytime any ready-to-eat food comes near my way or enters my line of sight I think I want it. However, typing about food right now is making me pretty nauseous.

Aversions? Raw meat of any kind super grosses me out. Changing Ivan's poopy diapers makes me puke every time.

Do you want a boy or a girl? Michael and I both really want a boy. We want a friend for Ivan to play with and somebody who can wear all the same clothes that we already have :]

What does Ivan think about everything? At first he thought the sound of me throwing up was really scary and he would start to cry. Now that he's a little more used to it, he thinks it's pretty funny. Other than that, he has no idea.

I mustache you a question...

... but I'll shave it for later.

It has been a long running joke with my classmates that one our teachers needs a mustache. We started it a long time ago, I think the first semester we were all together. Now it's just a funny thing that we just do. So of course, as our journey together was coming to a close, we could not help ourselves but get mustaches and take pictures with them.

Did I mention that we're graduating?! Woo hoo! From left to right: Lisa Colman (ring leader of the mustaches), Elyssa staker, Julie Brown, Mallory Rolz, Monica Young, me, Dr Dredge, Megan Ferguson, Sister Baeze, Kelly Sharp, Bailey Dill, Paige Mousely, Amanda Correy, Haley van Wagoner, Brooke Richins. Man, that was hard to remember everyone's last name since half of them got married after I met them. 

I can't remember why I'm not wearing my robe. . . The heat, the claustrophobia, I dunno, I probably just wanted to show off how awesome I look after having a baby! :]  Oh and black robes are for those graduating with bachelors and blue for associates.

Ok, the joke with this is that our only girl teacher, Sister Baeza, is really hated by most, if not all, students that take her classes. There is kind of an atmosphere of easiness with the classes taught at the livestock center and this teacher brought some pretty intense expectations and not a single ounce of pity. I really liked her as a teacher. She actually taught us and made us push ourselves to do more, definitely a lot more than any teacher I've had at this school. So all the students in the other classes would write her nasty emails about how mean she was and how her classes were too hard and how she made the Spirit leave the classroom, blah blah blah. One of those emails was sent to the chair of the department and the dean of the college. Yea, her 2 immediate bosses. So she had to reform some and become more "pink and fluffy" in order to not make the students cry after every test. The students in my group all thought she was pretty great. She has a real sarcastic sense of humor and once you get used to how she teaches, she's pretty awesome. When she wasn't being "pink and fluffy" we would call her "blue and prickly." 

Our graduating class, all 15 of us, had a get together with our families and each other  before graduation. 

This is my best friend Amber Holshouser. She graduated with  a bachelors in recreation management.

This is my other best friend Megan Ferguson. She graduated with my group with an associates in veterinary technology.

That's me! I graduated with an associates in veterinary technology. 

I'm writing this post in December and post dating it to July. When I walked for graduation I still had one more credit to fill; I had to complete a final internship. So technically I wasn't graduated yet. That being said, I was asked to speak at the December graduation. Yay I get to do it all again! Thank goodness I kept my cap and gown. Here's what I can remember of my speech:

Ok guys, put your books away, it's time for a pop quiz. I don't know about you guys but I'm so excited to never hear that again! Congratulations, you did it! This is it, end of the line, and the hardest part is almost over. Sure you just finished the hardest finals of your life, after all what makes finals harder than knowing you'll never have to do them again? But I'd say walking across this stage is the hardest part. You know, that fight or flight response kicks in and some of us just run right across the stage! There's almost an emptiness when you finish something that's taken you so long to complete. So what do you do now? Where do you go from here? Well, if you can follow this advice, or at least listen to it, you'll be golden. Don't for once think you're done learning, that's what life's all about. And don't think you're done being tested either. Sure, you don't have to go to the testing center any more, no more bubble sheets and essays, but life is full of tests. And believe it or not, you're ready. You're ready to learn, to be tested and to be proven good and worthy. A great man once told me that Rexburg is like a cow pie. There is an over abundance of spiritual encouragement here and a sense of security in knowing that most everyone that lives here believes in what we believe in. You're not going to find that anywhere else. But what happens when you take that cow pie, break it up, and spread it out? You make the grass greener everywhere you go. So what are you spending your time on? Is it spread out or all focused on one thing? Mahatma Ghandi said "be the change you want to see in the world." So be good at your careers, your jobs, be good at your church callings and don't ever forget to be good at your families. It is up to you, my fellow graduates, so I say again, "be the change you want to see in the world." 

My talk was supposed to be "no longer than 5 minutes." I took that direction a little too literally and probably only spoke for a minute and half, if that. The other student speaker that spoke before me also talked about cows and the main speaker that spoke after talked about being tested. It was really cool how well our talks all went together. I got to speak in the I-center. It was really scary. The podium is ginormous and the lights shining on you are so bright that I couldn't see anybody in the first 10 rows. The cow pie reference went over well, lots of chuckles and the speaker after me mentioned it too. The guy who spoke after me was awesome, I still can't stop thinking about the things he shared in his talk. Here's some of it:

Satan is going to tell you 3 things in life. 

1. The gospel is not true. 

You will receive with a surety the knowledge of its truthfulness by the Holy Spirit.

2. Ok, the gospel is true, but it's not for you.

You will attend church and follow the commandments and feel of the good that the gospel brings to your life.

3. Ok, it's true and it's for you, but you don't have to do anything about it right now.

Satan's easiest way to get to us is procrastination. Procrastination is not just the thief of time, it is the thief of our accountability and our virtue and we must do something now in order to save our souls in the future.  

When we were excused to go to our seats to walk with our classmates across the stage, I left. I had already walked the previous semester and didn't care to walk again. I can tell you though that I have never prayed so hard in my life than right before I spoke. I went to the bathroom before I took my seat and not 10 minutes later I thought I was gonna pee my pants! It was at that point that the Garth Brooks song Unanswered Prayers popped in my head and made me laugh as I walked very slowly to the podium. That's a good way to start a speech, right? Already laughing... 

Hidden Falls

We love hiking. We would do it every day if we could. We love waterfalls. We love mountains. We love wildlife. We love the outdoors. In fact, we love all of these things to much that they will probably be our deciding factor in where we end up living more than anything else. Sorry moms. And we enjoy the outdoors as often as we possibly can. This time around, we decided to take a friend with us, since she also likes hiking and likes us. We went to Teton National Park to hike around Jenny Lake. We've heard lots of good things about Jenny Lake and have been to the Tetons and through the park even a bunch of times, but have never done anything around this lake. The hike was a couple miles long, like 3 ish but you can cut it in half by riding a boat across the lake and walking only a short distance to the falls then back to the boat. Since we actually enjoy the walking aspect of hiking, we chose to omit the boat ride no matter how cool it looked. We had Ivan in his cool carrier backpack and started our walk. The scenery is simple stunning. I cannot believe how gorgeous the Teton Mountain Range is. It amazes me every single time we go. I'm so grateful to live close by and be able to visit pretty much whenever we want.

Ivan was not happy about being stuck in the back pack and he sure let us know about it. There were quite a few people on the trail, since it was the weekend and a really nice day, and I felt bad that Ivan was crying while we were hiking. But hey, that's better warning to the bears that we were coming! Parts of the trail were so heavily covered in berry plants that I expected a bear to be on the trail with us! Thank goodness they weren't ripe yet, and I sure wouldn't take this trail at any other time of year. Ivan eventually settled down. He's got to the point that he needs to be free to move and explore at his own pace. Too bad that doesn't keep up with mom and dad. I can't remember why, but we were on a pretty tight schedule that day, so we were really pushing the pace.

Hidden Falls

The falls were pretty, and very well hidden from the trail. We almost thought that these falls were called something else because the trail didn't go right to them. We got to see people that had taken the boat ride on the opposite side, which was neat, and encouraging because our view was better. On our way out of the parking lot we heard a noise like we had a flat tire, oh great. But they had just paved the parking lot and had one of those flappy things that marks the parking spots come loose. Thank goodness! I just pulled that thing off and we were good to go! On our way out of the park we spotted an antelope. A pretty close antelope too.

This is a moose! We saw him in Teton Village, just outside Jackson Hole. 

Jenny Lake

Our attempt at getting a group photo. That's our friend Katelyn!

Our antelope! I love these guys!