Honeyville Miracle

Yesterday I had the day off so I went and played in Logan with a my roommate and a few friends. We played all sorts of random, exciting games such as Assassin and three triangle. We only had three people which made it impossible to play four square, so we improvised :). It was some good times. So anyway, my roommate Jessica lives in Honeyville which is just North of Brigham City. It is a magical place let me tell ya! I was driving up there and the poor little Geo I was driving has a broken speedometer and no working air (hot or cold)... Except for when you're going Really fast ha ha. On the freeway the speedometer jumps up to 69 mph (and doesn't move from that spot) and the tiniest breeze blows through the vents. Well... I arrived at my roommates house and heard this noise. I soon figured out that it was air blowing out of the vents! Like a lot of air! I started playing with it and realized that it was suddenly working just fine!! I was so stoked! I don't know how it happened, but I sure think it's great! Well, there's my little Honeyville miracle :)

Day At The Zoo

My sister and her family came up Friday night and stayed overnight. The next morning we went to the zoo! I love the zoo so I was pretty excited. We had some fun times watching Lexie's reactions to the animals. She was pretty cute.

Chillin' in the stroller

My cousins Megan and Taylor. My aunt and three of her kids met us there.

Lexie did NOT like the carousel...

I thought this was pretty cool. That's a sloth relaxing up in the tree and if you look closely you can see an iguana (?) up above it.

Grandma and Lex. Isn't she just so adorable?! After awhile she wouldn't sit in the stroller so me and grandma ended up carrying her around. She was so funny! When looking at the animals she would say things like "cute cute!" and then when she started saying "bye bye" or "See you" we knew it was time to move on ha ha.

Matt, Mom, and Lexie sitting on the big elephant that squirts out water

I had to work at two that day so I left the zoo at one... TWO hours later... I Finally got home!! It was ridiculous!! I guess there was a big accident so the traffic was terrible! I was stuck in a hot car (no A/C) for two hours and ended up being an hour and a half late to work. I felt bad that I couldn't be there because they were swamped, but they were understanding. The funny thing is, is that I called my family to warn them and so they took a different route. Ha they beat me home when they left like an hour and a half later!

Advice From the Wise

Twice this last week I have been given some great advice from the elderly and I thought it was good enough to share :). So this last weekend when I went down to Monticello, I saw my great uncle Buddy who had some wise words for me. He basically told me that boys are stupid and not worth my time... or something like that ha ha. Then he told me as he was leaving, to trip them....??

While working yesterday an 89 year old man came through my checkstand. He was very friendly and I remember numerous times that he's come in and told me all about fighting in the war and such things. This time, like Uncle Buddy, he got off on basically how bad boys are and how they manipulate and deceive to get things they want for the wrong reasons... ha ha I wish I could remember word for word what he said. His final words of advice to me were that I should kick these boys.

Ha ha pretty good advice huh?! Well you boys out there... watch out! I've been told to trip and kick you... so here's your warning :D ha ha ha... Old people are so funny.

Monticello Trip

Well this sure has been a busy/relaxing/long/fun weekend... in other words it was perfect! Filled with many hours driving in the car, lots of good laughs and conversations with family, and so much delicious food!! Friday night my family packed up and began the long drive down to Monticello for my cousin Kelvin's mission farewell. He is going to the New York, New York South Spanish speaking mission and we all wish him the best of luck! He'll be a great little missionary. Anyway so we arrived late that night at my Grandparents house. They however are not living in it at the moment... they are living in an assisted living place in Midvale, so my cousin and her husband are living there temporarily. They have to cutest little 6 month old who was just so happy and smiley! We had fun with her, and my cousin was a very good host. She took great care of us and fed us yummy food :) Thanks Kristalee! It was actually really weird for me to be staying in my grandparents house with no grandma and grandpa there... Grandma is usually bustling around worrying about us eating enough, being warm enough, sleeping well enough, etc. And the thing I missed the most was all of grandma's yummy treats... in particular the ice cream she ALWAYS had to offer us. And not only was it delicious but it also came from the "cute Schwans man" :)

My brother is really into climbing and has recently started a new sport called slack lining. He got it out Saturday morning and we all hopped on to try it. He makes it look way easy... but don't be fooled! It's actually really hard! The thing shakes like crazy when you're not used to it and it's so hard to just get up on it. We all had to cling to Chris to just stand on it ha ha.

Ha ha I love my mom's face in this picture! She was so funny.

No I'm not a pro... I also had to cling to Chris for the first couple times, but this time I tried it again and held on to the tree. I let go and only lasted for maybe one second before I started to fall.... Chris just captured a picture at the perfect moment :)

Following slack lining was lunch and then we drove out to jail rock to go repelling with Kelvin and a group of his friends who came down for his farewell. Sorry I didn't get any pictures... I didn't take my camera... Oops! I had never been repelling before though so I was quite a bit nervous standing there on top of the rock that was very high up. It was so scary walking over the edge, and then I looked down... that was a bad bad idea ha ha. I made it down slowly but surely and loved it! I went down once more and it was much easier and more enjoyable the second time. My two cousins and cousins' husband were pretty much crazy and did all sorts of stunts including cartwheels and spiderman crawls. Pretty impressive I must say! After repelling we went over to jail rock and checked it out for a bit then went back to Monticello. We all hung out at my aunt and uncles house just visiting and being entertained by the little ones. Chris and I tagged along with Kelvin and his friends later that night to go have a bonfire at Lloyd's lake. I had a fun time and his friends were all really nice and friendly. We had quite a hard time getting a fire started however because the wood was wet, so we stood there freezing for a while... but it all worked out ok :)

Kelvin did a super great job on his farewell talk and he will be a great missionary! The food afterwards was delicious of course and I had a lot of fun just talking with all my family members. My great uncle Buddy entertained a large group of us for a while with many great stories from his childhood that kept us laughing. Sunday was kind of a long day but quite enjoyable and relaxing. I love visiting Monticello! It's such a cute little town! I am pretty much a wannabe cowgirl... I love the country and wish I had been raised in that lifestyle with horses and what not. I'm drawn to small towns and love all open space! I have always looked forward to taking trips down to Monticello and hope to someday live out in the country.

Me and big bro Chris

We left Monday morning and stopped in Mapleton to have dinner at my sisters house with our whole family. I LOVE seeing my nieces! Oh and everyone else too... :) But they are just SO stinkin' cute! It was a lot of fun and once again, lots of yummy food! Goodness I feel like I've gained ten pounds just from this weekend!

Me and little Lexie Sue. What a cutie pie!

Lex is obsessed with babies and I swear that is all she ever thinks about. As soon as we walked in the door she was saying "Baby?" and she was always so concerned about the baby. She had to see where Taya was constantly. It's fun to hear her talking so much now, although difficult to interpret at times, but she's starting to say all of our names and it's so cute!

And here's little Taya who is just adorable and has Big Big dimples!

Antimony Mine

Sorry I have not updated my blog in... well, forever. I got sick for a few days last week and then just got busy working and such. So here's an update on the past week:

Last Monday I took the advantage of my day off to take a trip up to Brigham City to play with my dear roommates Jessica and Jenni. It was so good to be reunited with them and just sit and talk and laugh for hours. That afternoon our friend Todd took us on a hike up to a mine in the mountains just above Harper Ward. He told us that it had been mined for Antimony and guessed that they stopped mining it sometime in the early 1900's. The hike was probably only a little over a mile but man I sure had a hard time getting up the mountain! I must really be out of shape because it didn't even phase Jess and Todd.

At the top of the hill there are remains of a small building that looks out over the valley. Gorgeous View!! Then back a little farther and up the side of the mountain is the entrance to the mine. So COOL!!

Jenni, Jess, and Todd taking a break

So now here's some pictures of the mine:

We went all the way inside the mine, as far as it went, which actually wasn't too far at all. It was way creepy at first and super dark, but so awesome at the same time! I was a little hesitant in the beginning because I've never really ever been inside a cave-like structure (that I can recall) and I tend to feel a little claustrophobic at times... but this was cool and definitely worth it! My roommates got upset with me when I brought up the accident last year when the mine collapsed trapping many miners... I can't imagine why... ;) he he

Well other than my trip up to BC, not much else has happened other than throwing up and working... ha ha and yes they did happen at the same time... but don't worry, I'm better now! So there ya' go. An update on my exciting life.

Happy Mother's Day!

Wow... what an eventful day we had. First of all, happy Mothers Day to all those mothers out there (sorry I'm a little late). My Mom is just wonderful and I love her lots! She is an amazing example to me and has me taught me so many things. So in celebration of this day my brother and sister and their families came up. My grandparents were also able to join us, which was a lot of fun! Grandpa is getting old but he's still got his sense of humor. He's always entertaining us with the hilarious things he says. My niece Lexie is our other source of entertainment. She does/says the funniest things! She had a one track mind the entire day, and that was, "Baby?" She was so concerned about her little, almost three month old cousin Taya. She always had to see where the baby was at. However due to an unhappy, possibly sick infant Mike and Maridee left half way through the night.

Grandma and Grandpa Redd, and Dad

My sister has a few Baby Signing Time videos that Lexie loves to watch, so she has been learning all these little signs and it's so cute to watch her do them. One of which is "Bubbles." For an hour or so we all sat outside blowing bubbles, which created quite the mess, but it was fun to watch Lexie.

It started out as me blowing bubbles for her, but somehow turned into her doing it herself. Notice in the picture above how clean her dress is :)

The big boys were blowing BIG bubbles

She had a little bit of a hard time blowing the bubbles at first but she eventually got the hang of it. I wonder if bubbles taste good... Lex sure didn't mind eating a few ha ha.

This was just after she plopped herself down into a puddle of bubbles that had spilled. She officially had bubbles all over her bum, the front of her dress, her hands and arms, and shoes. Man I'm going to have to learn a lot of patience before I become a mom! Every time she dripped bubbles down her dress I would cringe at the sticky mess... My sister just said that eventually you get used to it.

The bubble crew. As you can see the dress finally just came off ha ha

For dessert we had chocolate fondue! Mm mm yum! It was delicious! Then after my mom left to take my grandparents home, those of us that were left played games for a couple hours. We love to play games and it was a ton of fun! Ha ha so we were all just sitting in the kitchen and my brother-in-law was getting Lexie ready to change her diaper... then randomly at the exact same time me and my sister both starting singing "Change a bum, Change a bum..." we stopped and just stared at each other freaked out! The weird thing was, was that it wasn't like it was an actual song we changed the lyrics too... it was just a made up tune that we sang exactly the same!! Ha ha wow it was so freaky! Then about an hour later, my brother was reaching behind him to grab a cinnamon bear. He spun back around and chucked it pretty hard at my face. I saw it coming and quickly opened my mouth not expecting it to go in at all, but then next thing I know it, there's a cinnamon bear in between my teeth. It's hard to explain but it was so weird! It had bounced around inside my mouth then came half way back out. It was funny because everyone else heard this sound, looked up and out of nowhere there is a bear caught in my teeth. Ha ha I caught a speeding cinnamon bear in my teeth! Ha ha well what a fun and exciting day!

Goodbye Logan

Well... my Freshman year is officially over :(. I am all moved home (not completely unpacked yet), and already extremely missing my roommates, friends, and Logan. Last Saturday morning we all woke up early and spent hours cleaning our apartment. It took forever because we had to pull out our fridge and oven and clean underneath... oh it was gross. My parents came up to take home some of my stuff and stayed for a little bit to help clean. My Mom's cleaning tips were quite helpful to all of us young inexperienced cleaners. Once all the dirty work was done it was time to say Goodbye... This was a lot harder than I was expecting. After many long hugs, promises to call often, and prolonged goodbyes, I finally got in my car and drove away. As I was driving home I couldn't help but feel overwhelmingly sad. I am really going to miss seeing my roommates everyday, staying up late talking, and doing crazy spontaneous things... but then I began to reflect upon all the fun adventures we had this last year. I realized that I had an amazing year filled with many new friendships and experiences, spiritual and emotional growth, new perspectives on life, and hours upon hours of laughter. I wouldn't trade this last year for anything and I am so grateful for the experiences I've had and the friendships I've developed.

Although I have been mostly sad to leave Logan, it will be a nice change to be at home closer to my family and old friends, and eat real food once again :). I have lots of fun things planned for this summer and I'm even a little bit excited to go back to work and earn some money. However despite all of those things, I'm glad that the summer lasts only a few months. I'm so excited to move back to Logan in the Fall, and find out what new memories and adventures lie waiting for me next year!!

Goodbye Logan...