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!

Aberdeen Days

Every year in the town Michael grew up in they have a celebration for something, I'd imagine it was for being an awesome town. There is free breakfast in the park in the morning. Pancakes, eggs, sausage, hashbrowns, juices, all sorts of good stuff. And the food was really great, all you can eat, although after 2 pancakes that big I was more than stuffed. There is a parade down main street, lots of vendors set up selling stuff all day, a plane that drops ping pong balls on main street (this was way cool and some of the balls had prizes), and a fish fry at the end of the day. I have to say I'm pretty darn impressed with the festivities of the day, especially for a town with less than 2000 people. We got to spend time with Michael's parents and his good friends the Milletts. It was really really hot that day too.

There was a tractor and car show. 

Can you see the ping pong balls? They are right on top of the people. 

The guy in the yellow in the back of the truck is Michael's dad!

Of course Michael got some candy! Some people threw ice pops and bouncy balls, which was interesting, I just wanted the candy!

Apparently this climbing thing at the park is super cool. 

So I had to do it too... got halfway up and got really scared! It was really shaky and I'm higher up than it looks!

Ivan had to do it too. 

That kid is always photo bombing us!

This is Michael's best friend Ben and Ben's daughter Emma. Ivan and Emma are only a couple months apart and love hanging out with each other, especially if they get to chicken fight. I also really liked that I got both sets of grandparents in the background. 

The Falls of Twin City

Or is it just the Twin Falls of the city? Or the city of Twin Falls? Take your pick.

In the midst of our drive home from Boise where we bought our car, we had a little car trouble. Thankfully, Michael has some friends in town there and we were able to stay with them until we got the car fixed. And the guy we bought the car from payed for a large portion of the repairs. The bad thing about it was we were on our way back on Saturday, after any mechanics was closed so the soonest we could even get the car looked at was Monday, with work to do on it after that it was going to be a while before we could drive the car again. We stayed with Michael's mission friend Logan Lusk and his wife Heather. We went fishing and hiking with them. It was good fun.

This is our sweet new car. 2004 VW Passat

We dropped the car off at the mechanic's and headed home. Every time we drive south of Pocatello I see a sign for the City of Rocks. Sounds cool right? I always want to go there every time I see that sign. So since Michael was skipping school that day anyway, we might as well continue our scenic drivery. 

Right about now I'm getting a little nervous about just how scenic this will be. . . 

This one is called the Devil's Crack or something like that. That white spot on the rock is a person, if that helps add any idea of size. 

After we left Ivan had a huge explosive diaper. And we'd been in the car all day. For the sake of his bum, we decided to stop at this other place, can't remember the name now, and let Ivan air out. (Michael says it's called Massacre Rocks.) We were the only people there so we let him crawl around naked. He seemed to enjoy it. 

There were these beautiful wood peckers all over the place!

Scenic Drive to Boise

We found this car on craigslist for an awesome deal. Comes with snow tires mounted on their own rims, roof rack, bike rack, low miles, loaded interior to include leather and a sunroof, and it's a Volkswagon. The price was good and the return on fuel saved compared to either Michael's car or mine was quite the deal breaker. my car is pretty much on its last leg and to be responsible, we decided we should replace it before it got to that point, especially since Michael's car doesn't carry a carseat well and smells bad. We chose to get rid of my car because we could actually sell it for a reasonable amount and Michael's car isn't going to get any more out of it now so waiting wouldn't hurt. Now the only downside to this wonderful deal is that the car is located in Boise. That's a 5 hour drive if it's direct. And we would have to drive 2 vehicles home. And it was in the middle of the semester. So we packed up and headed out. Now instead of taking the 5 hour direct route, we chose the scenic route. And oh boy, was it scenic!

Direct Route

Route we took. You can see the direct route, just the interstate, by the yellow line below. 

Now what makes the scenic route not so direct is that there are a ton of mountains in central Idaho, which is why there isn't really an interstate there. Driving on mostly highways, lower speed limits, mountain roads, and lots of scenery, yep that's what I'd call a scenic drive. We did take the direct route home, that made more sense with both of us driving in different cars. Oh, the scenic drive added an extra 2.5 hours to the trip. Ivan didn't appreciate that.

First scenic stop on the route: Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve. I wouldn't exactly call this place a pretty stop, but scenic for sure. If you ever want to see what the moon looks like, go to that place. Michael told me they did some astronaut training there, not sure if he was serious, can't ever tell with that kid, but it would make sense. It was really, really windy there. Always is, every time we go. And I don't mean a nice breeze, it's like a super wind. A tornado without the cyclone.

Proof of the wind. 

Real pretty, right? Still a pretty cool place to say you've seen it. Oh, for those that don't know, Craters of the Moon was made by lava flow. All the black stuff is lava rock and there are even tunnels made out of this stuff. 

This is in Carey, ID

The radio station called this place the Magic Valley

Ketchum, ID

Antelope! Probably my favorite to see in the wild. 

Redfish Lake, Stanley, ID

A rock! Ivan was pretty good most of the trip. He slept a lot. Ate a couple bottles. Played with some toys. And slept some more. He was wearing a different outfit when we were in Arco.... Thank you blowouts. Gotta say, I'd rather have a poop blowout than a tire blowout.

This is pretty close to Idaho City in the woods there. That tan part across the way is where the road is. 

Some reservoir right outside Boise. 

That sums up the drive there. Absolutely loved Stanley. I have never seen a more beautiful place. Even compared to Glacier in Montana, I'd say Stanley, ID is my favorite beautiful place. We finally got to Boise about 8 or 9 hours after leaving Rexburg. We did stop somewhere for lunch and let Ivan crawl around and get some energy out. When we got to town we went to the hotel, checked in, then went on a search for food. It was just before 9 and a lot of places were closing. I also have this thing where when I visit somewhere I want to eat somewhere I can't eat at home. You know, you're visiting somewhere new, everything about it might as well be new. So we went to the Westside Drive In. Apparently this place had made it onto the show Famous Dines and Drives or whatever it's called. We tried the "famous" dish at this place which happened to be deep fried finger steaks. Oh and it was weird! I did not like it. To add to it, Michael didn't like it! That's really saying something. Thank goodness we had plenty of tater tots and we got some popcorn from the hotel market. You remember earlier when I said I changed Ivan's outfit? Well, I stuck his poopy outfit in a grocery bag to keep it from smelling up the car. I also stuck his dirty diapers in a grocery bag because it's not like there are trash cans in the middle of the woods. So when we got to the hotel, we took the grocery bags and tossed them in the trash, not even thinking there were clothes in one of the bags. Dang it! We threw away one of Ivan's cutest outfits! The funny thing is, when I realized this (the next morning) Michael searched through the garbage cans for those clothes! What a good man. He didn't find the outfit, oh well.
We went to check the car out, turned out to be everything we hoped for! Well, except the guy hadn't stored the tires right so only 2 of the snow tires were actually usable. Oh and it's beautiful. We feel like real people when we drive it. Like real grown-ups. And since Michael and I both had our previous cars without making payments, we were able to save some money and put up a fairly good sized down payment. We just got our house paid off as well, so instead of adding another debt to our list we just traded what bill we were paying.
On our way back we stopped in Twin Falls, about halfway home. Michael has a friend there that he met on his mission so we were able to visit with him and his wife. They took us stergin fishing at 2 in the morning. We did catch a fish, but the rules with these guys are so weird. You can't take them out of the water and they are definitely strictly catch and release. So by the time I got out of my seat and down the cliff side to see the fish better it had gotten away. Slippery little buggers. Then we were able to go to the ice caves of Shoshone. Now since this place made it onto the map we were using, including our gps, you would think it's gotta be something really awesome. Here I am thinking it's going to be like the caves back east where there is a real building and gift shop set up with cave tours being between 15 and 30 dollars a person because the cave is well lit and the walkways are safe. Instead we get there and wonder if this really is the place.

The inside looked like a really really old house that hadn't been cleaned in ages. And the people were really scary! They were all missing some teeth, and I don't know how that correlates to cannibals, but that's what I always think of. Missing a couple front teeth? Must be a cannibal. See? rational. The guys all had beards and long hair, like a Lynard Skynard thing, or Duck Dynasty. And they were wearing old army camo, that always makes people look homeless and a bit scary, admit it. It really didn't help that we get there and are debating whether we should go in and get eaten or just leave and find something else to do and a guy walks out, looking as described above and comes straight to our car! I felt a little confronted and my first instinct was to lock the car. The guy turned out to be harmless, as far as I know, and just wanted to know if we were trying to go on a tour because a group was leaving right now and the next wouldn't be for an hour. We hurried and got our coats and joined up with the group. The cave is just a lava tube that got some water in it somehow and since caves stay the same temperature year round, it has ice in it year round. The tour guide kept telling us he had so many stories to tell that he just didn't have time to tell them all and didn't tell any. Ok. The lighting was really bad inside the cave. Caves are dark by nature and the roof of the cave was only about 10 feet high. They had some spot lights, really bright spotlights pointed toward the walkway at just the right angle to be in your eyes and actually inhibit your sight more than help. And the lights were spread a little too far apart and made dead spots with no light between the bright spots of too much light. The walkway was a boardwalk about 2.5 feet wide suspended by cables attached to the roof of the cave. It was rickety and swayed with every step. And it was wet and slippery from the ice drippings. The boards were a little too far apart and your foot could have easily slipped through the crack. The distance between the boards and the ice was only have a half foot, so not a far drop. At the end of the 50 feet deep cave, we got to stand on the actual ice, which wasn't as slippery as the board walk. Then the tour guide turned the lights off and we got to see the "rock show." This was a literal rock show because they had a shadowbox with a couple rocks inside it that glowed in the dark. While the lights were off the tour guide told us the names of each of the rocks... repeatedly. Then we left the cave. At the mouth of the cave the guide made us look in every direction and would ask, "what do you see?" I saw nothing but a bunch of lava rock. Then he said there was some sort of snake shape in the lava tubes and he made us look at each spot he was pointing until we all said we could see what he saw. Pretty sure we just agreed so it could be over with. Ahh, the best 20 bucks we ever spent. 

See what I mean about the lights? 

That water looking stuff on the ground is ice!

This is more of what I was expecting. This is an ice cave just outside of Rexburg that isn't owned by anyone and doesn't cost anything to get into. The ceiling is covered in really cool looking ice crystals and all of what we're laying on is ice. You can see why I was so disappointed.

 And that concludes the festivities of the trip. After that was just the drive back to home plus a stop in Almo, Idaho to see the City of Rocks... I almost forgot about that part. To be continued...