Cathedral Valley

On our way to Capital Reef National Park we stopped at the Scipio Petting Zoo, which I love! This seriously is one of the best petting zoos I have ever been too. It's free and you don't have to wait in a giant line (like at baby animal days).

 Once we made it to Capital Reef we first stopped to talk to the rangers at the Visitor's Center. They basically said we shouldn't do the drive because the road was bad and it had been raining, but we have an awesome car and decided to do it anyway. But, before the drive we had a nice rest in Fruita were it's super green and has lots of fruit trees and there are deer everywhere. I tried to get close to the deer, but they are still a little weary of people. 

Cathedral Valley Drive

The drive is about a 60 mile trip. We ended up doing the first half and then going back, because there had been rain and we didn't want to get stuck in the sand. We decided to be smart and safe. The rangers were wrong about the part of the road we went on though. We had no problems what so ever and we barely needed our 4 wheel drive. 

The temple of the Sun and Moon and Glass Mountain.

 Glass Mountain was pretty sweet, but it was more like a glass mound, the mountain part makes it seem like it should be a lot bigger. It was made of crystal! It was really cool, although the whole time I wanted to clean off all the dirt on it. :)

 The Temple of the Sun and the Temple of the Moon were really cool too. They were basically identical, besides their obvious size difference. 

 The sky was super pretty, because of the thunder storms that were rolling in. 

 We kept trading off turns on trying to capture a picture of the lightning at night. We had a long night of being too hot and not having our rain fly on and then it raining again and then it getting too hot and so forth. 

 Our little camp up against some rocks and out of the way of washes so we wouldn't get extra wet.

I was excited that we got a little mud on our car! 

 We went back to the sun and moon to take some pictures when there was more sun. 

We tried to get some photos of glass mountain glistening, but it was pretty hard. 

We called this little black rock valley thing Mordor (for Lord of the Ring Fans). 

 The Gypsum Sink Hole. It was a big hole. 

Just hanging out. 

 We ended our adventure in the little town of Torrey. We decided to stay in these awesome little cabins for 35 bucks.. It was just one little room, but had 2 beds and a small TV. There was a shared bathroom (with a shower), but no one else was there so we got them to ourselves. It was great! The rest of the trip was lazy and relaxing. We walked around town and got some good food and then we went home.

the 4th and stuff

The 4th of July!

We had a little different 4th this year. We didn't do any fireworks of our own...weird right? But we did do a BBQ up in the mountains and were able to watch EVERYONE'S FIREWORK SHOWS!!! We drove up to inspiration point and were going to hike to Ben Lommond, but we didn't quite make it. We stopped at a little out cropping between and sat in our camp chairs and watched magic happen. These pictures don't do it justice. I recommend everyone trying this at least once. It was way cool to see all the shows and everyone's little neighborhood fireworks. There were fireworks going off all over the place. It was hard to decide where to really look. It was just plain Awesome!

Flash in her spot. She really loves this spot.

Flash in our pretty backyard.

 Cow Appreciation Day!

 I got to dress up like a cow a few weeks ago and get a free meal from Chick-Fil-A. I went with the Atwoods. It was lots of fun and who doesn't like free food. Matt sadly had to work late and missed out.

 The New Kitchen. Most of you probably won't appreciate these pictures as much as those that were able to see our last kitchen. This is a definite upgrade.

My Color Obsession!

I am absolutely in love with turquoise and red together. I still love orange, but for some reason I am digging this combination. :)

 I spray painted these old chairs that I found at Savers. I got them both for 5 bucks. I already had the table and decided to make a cute patio set. I really really like it!

 I painted this awhile ago... I suppose that it was the start of my color obsession. I hope one day to decorate a little girls room in these colors. I already have some fun ideas.

I was super excited to find some bright skinny jeans for pretty cheap... and yes I went for the red and turquoise although I can't wear them together.

the haps

Well I haven't blogged for a bit. We are and have been in Ogden now for over a month. We are all moved in and loving our new basement. I especially love our kitchen. I feel like I am cooking more and keeping it clean better and I just like it. 

 Flash is adjusting well too. She has found a kind of funny spot to sit for a bunny. She sits for hours on one of our chairs under the  kitchen table. If I can't seem to find her she is usually on that chair. (pictures to come in another blog) 

We really like our new ward. Everyone has been super friendly and nice. I already have a calling. I am a primary teacher for the 7-8 year old kids. I actually taught them for the first time today and it was pretty fun. It's nice to teach so simply. I feel like I even learn more. Matt sort of kind of might have a calling... They asked him about one, but they hadn't released the other person so we will see. 

Work is going good for both of us. Matt is still enjoying his job. I actually had one job and now have a different one. For the first month I worked at a day care with Elementary aged kids in a summer program. It was fun at times and at other times it was not. I felt like I was constantly nagging and raising my voice, because kids can be mean sometimes.  I actually started losing my voice, because I wasn't used to talking to so loud. They just couldn't seem to stop hitting each other or saying mean things. So one day after work I decided I couldn't take it much longer so I started looking for something else and somehow I found something within about a week. I got a new job working with 1 little girl with autism. I started last week and I absolutely love it. It's just for the rest of the summer, so I will eventually need to find something else, but for now it is great! Oh and it pays much better, which is another bonus. 

Other then that not much is new with us. We have gone to Matt's Families cabin 2 times now, which has been fun. I like getting out and being in the mountains and not having a TV. It's very relaxing. We hope to go on a few little adventures through out the rest of the summer, but we haven't decided on what for sure yet. So we are kind of boring right now, but life is good. 

life changes

Matt and I are moving on in life...

We have a plan and that plan is actually falling into place. For those that don't know - We are moving to Ogden here in the next month. We had other plans and ideas, but none of them panned out. So Matt is going to be going back to school to get certified to be a teacher and get a Master's in Education at Weber State. It would have been nice to stay in Logan, but USU's program wasn't what we were looking for.

I am actually really excited about this change!!

The only thing(s) that I will miss are my jobs and all the people at them - so I guess I will miss a lot of things or people more like it. I wish they could just all come down with me. But, I do feel like this is the right thing for us right now. Everything has been falling into place, which makes it feel good and right.

The Plan =  Living with Matt's grandpa Wahlquist. He has a basement with it's own kitchen and entrance. And the rent is quite cheap - Thank you! We are excited for a kitchen that has more space and for a kitchen table. We are excited for a garden spot. We are excited to be closer to family. We are just excited!

Getting jobs for the summer: Well Matt has already got a job as well, so that's another thing that fell into place. A guy in his parent's ward needed more help with his work. So he will be starting work and moving down this next Monday actually. It's a construction type job finishing the duct systems in buildings and what not? I don't really know what he will be doing, but he is happy to be done with talking on the phone. I am still looking for jobs, but I have been given leads and help as well so we will see. My plan is to finish out the school year with my job so I don't leave them short handed and then head to Ogden then end of May. I think I might get a job working with people that are blind/visually impaired. It would be awesome to get this job because it's about a block away from where we will be living. I have applied and it sounds like they need more help so I hope that works out.

Weber State: Matt has been talking with them and figuring out when he will be able to start. He is supposed to take the GRE to get into the program, but to take it before the deadline and to able to study for it wasn't going to work out. They told him he could take a class in the summer to raise his gpa so that he wouldn't need to take it and then be able to start in the fall...but that would cost us about a 1000 or more just for 1 class. So he thought if they could wait for him to take a class why couldn't he apply and just have them wait for the gre to go through. So that is what we are doing. He has applied to the program and now he just needs to study up and take the gre. I guess we were taking the deadline too seriously. So it looks like we should be good for fall.

So that's about it. Now we are just kind of waiting for the month to pass. We will start slowly moving out and then we will begin a new chapter in our lives. I think I'm ready for it!

Spring BREAK

I made Easter Crafts (which is a pretty big deal - I am not much of a crafter)! These lovely eggs were a bit messy, but I think they turned out pretty cute.  All you need is some glue, fabric floss, and some water balloons.

 I got to hang out with my neice and nephew. We hung out inside for a little bit. Luke played with the sticky men on the wall and Claire got her nails sparkly. Then we went to the park, which was a blast! After that we watched some Curiuos George to cool down and rest.

 

 I made some delicious Sugar Cookies and finally used some of the cake decorating tips that Matt got me for my birthday. (Thanks Sam for the recipe!)

 And in the spirit of Easter and Spring time I took some pictures of Flash.

The rest of my break... I did some cleaning/organizing. Matt and I went to Baby Animal Days! We saw baby bears, turtles, goats, sheep, pigs, ducks, chicks, and bunnies. Matt held a black baby mini rex just like flash. I wanted to take the little guy home so Flash could have a baby.  Then we went down to see my Family - ping pong/pool tournament, chinese food, frisbee golfing, and our traditional Jesus Dinner with the whole family. We celebrated Easter day with Matt's Family. We got to do an Easter Egg Hunt & then eat dinner with the Wahlquists and go on another Easter egg hunt, where we got to moo like cows and bark like dogs. It was a good break and a good Easter!