R.A.I.N.

Do you ever have those days, or you just do something that reminds you of being a kid? It was nice weather today, and then as soon as Stephen finished his test it started raining. I found myself kneeling on our couch staring out the window. This just reminded me of being a little kid and wanting to play outside while it was raining. (It also reminds me of Dr. Seuss...)

family reunion

We had a blast at our family reunion in Island Park. We had so much fun, that I forgot about my camera! I was going in wanting to take lots of pictures, and came out with only a couple from Yellowstone.

We left on Friday and stayed at a cabin in Island Park. Because we didn't get there until about 6, we just ate dinner and got everything unpacked, talked and got caught up with everyone.

On Saturday we left around 8:30 a.m. to go to Yellowstone. Both Stephen and I have really wanted to see a bear every time we go, but never have. With talking to my aunt, we found out that she has seen a couple of them, so we figured she was good luck...she was. We Finally Saw One!!! That made our day! The rest of the day was filled with walking trails, looking at buffalo, watching Old Faithful, you know, the usual.

Sunday we went to church at 9:00. We forgot our church clothes, so we were kind of hesitant to go. Stephen didn't even bring a pair of jeans. My cousins said that they have been before and if we wore jeans we would fit right in! Stephen borrowed some jeans and we went to church. When we got there both chapels were completely full, so we sat outside on the grass. There were probably 200 people out on the grass. There were speakers out there so we could kind of hear what was going on. When some other cousins came out of the other chapel, they said the bishop said there were about 2000 people there! Crazy! The rest of the day was filled with going to Big Springs, Mesa Falls, dinner, games, talking, etc.

The plan for Monday was to go rafting down the river. Although that sounded fun, the water was cold, it was windy, and there were lots of clouds covering the sun. Instead of going (and possibly complaining about being cold) we went back to Rexburg for a BBQ. We spent the afternoon with good friends, good food, and nice weather!

How was your Fourth of July Weekend?

Hallelujah!

This weekend is filled with lots of good stuff!!! Last Monday we went to Bishop's house to FHE and we had a lesson on the tender mercies we get each day. Since then I have really been trying to recognize each tender mercy instead of just letting the days go by.

Saturday we woke up and it was just another Saturday. Walked out of our room and the flying ants were back. (Yes, our apartment was sprayed last Saturday, the ants showed back up Tuesday....) I told Stephen that I was going crazy living with these flying ants all day long! (He's on campus most of the day, while I am at home...) Well, it was a beautiful day outside, so we went to the park. Let's just say that I needed to get out of the apartment! Stephen was reading his book, while I was taking in the sun and people watching (one of my favorite things to do).

At 2:30 there was a water war. I would say 600+ people showed up for this war. I thought it was funny to watch! It was so nice spending time outside watching some very interesting people! We got lots of sun and lots of free entertainment!

The back of Stephen's legs. He was on his stomach reading his book...

We came back and went to play tennis again for a little bit. After like 30 minutes the sun was really hurting my sunburn, so we left. At 7:30 we went to Comic Frenzy on campus and loved it. The last one we went to wasn't as good as it had been, so we haven't been for a while. Meagan and Jaron invited us to go, so we decided this would be a good time to try it again. Stephen was laughing non-stop, and we all know that his laugh is contagious!

After, we decided to go to BRC's frozen custard. When we got there they were setting up a large screen for an outside movie. Although it was windy and a little chilly, the movie was good!

Today, I woke up around 8. Went out of our room, and there was a NEW trail of ants. We bought some new pesticide spray yesterday, so I decided to try it out. As I was spraying the trail, I noticed there were a lot more right below this vent than normal. I decided to try to open it up and see if that's where they were coming from. As soon as I started unscrewing the screws, ants just started dropping out. Of course, I freaked out and just started spraying like crazy to kill them. I got Stephen up to come help me kill these things!

We took the vent off, and look what we found...

This picture does not even do justice what we could see. There were literally thousands of ants crawling in this space. Some had wings, some didn't. Luckily this new spray works better at killing the ants than our last one. They died on contact! We found their home, and now they will be out of ours!!! Hopefully we can get an exterminator to come sometime next week to make sure they kill the home and get the ones that we couldn't! I can finally breathe again and not feel like I am going crazy with the ants!

Good things this weekend:
SUN
park
comic frenzy
BRC's
outside movie
FOUND WHERE THE ANTS
WERE COMING FROM!!!!

A Spider Man

Yay! We finally got someone from "A Spider Man Pest Control" to come and spray our apartment and get rid of those flying ants! We've had them for about 2 weeks, and were getting so tired of them! In total we had between 200-300. Glad that's over with...hopefully!

Another good thing....ONLY 5 MORE WEEKS OF SCHOOL! This is my last semester taking classes. For fall, I'm going to try to substitute teach or find some full time job. And during the winter I will be student teaching!!! I graduate in April! Stephen graduates next July. I can't believe we are so close to being done!

CLEAN!

Since my Practicum class ended Friday, and Monday was a holiday, today was my first free day! That was my only class Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Today I decided to be productive and deep clean our apartment! Sorry I don't have a before picture, but as you can see in the after picture, it is clean! I started with our bedroom, and Friday I will work on our spare room. We started it a couple of weeks ago, so it shouldn't be too bad!

On another note, we had a bunch of winged ants show up in our living room yesterday! We killed all the ones that we saw (which was a TON) and then sprayed our window sill and door to make sure that they would die before they inside our apartment. Today, we woke up and there was more! Today, they weren't in the middle of our floor though, they were on the window sill and in our curtains. SICK! Hopefully we will be able to get an exterminator to come and get rid of these!

Cottage Cheese

So, on the 20th Sonic started a special. Buy one real ice cream shake, get one free. Well, we thought this was a good deal, so Thursday night we went to get one. We got there and asked which ones were included in the deal, and after about 5 minutes we finally ordered two shakes. Right before she told us our total she said, "Oh, I forgot. Our ice cream machine is broken." What?? She let us sit there and decided which ones we wanted and it was broken? Oh well.

Then, Friday night we thought that we would try it again. (The deal lasts until the 27th.) So, we called 1st to make sure it was working! They said it was and so we went and ordered. After we got them, we started to drive off (because we just went through the drive-through. I took a sip of mine and it had a lot of chunks in it! It felt like I was drinking cottage cheese (and I don't like the texture of cottage cheese!!!) Stephen tried his and his was the same way, so we pulled around to tell them. Apparently they already knew that this happens! They said they got new ice cream that doesn't work with their machine, so they are getting a lot of angry customers! Wouldn't it have been nice to know that before we ordered it and paid for it? haha We were able to return them and get our money back.

Sorry that was a long story, just thought I would share!
Enjoy your weekend!!!

Weekend Getaway!

This weekend was such a nice weekend! Stephen found out early in the week that he didn't have any tests or homework assignments this weekend, so we were able to make plans! Friday, after I got done with my weekend homework, we went up to Island Park and stayed at a cabin with Nate and Kate Wright, and Brian and Jaclyn Robbert. Saturday morning we drove to Bishop's cabin and had breakfast. It was so good! Then, we went to Big Springs for a little bit! It was gorgeous there! The water was so clear, and the fish were big!

Around 1:30 Stephen and I drove up to Yellowstone to enjoy the rest of the day!

We saw a ton of these deer and a ton of buffalo!

As soon as we entered the park we saw the bald eagle!

Picture of us in front of a waterfall randomly on the side of the road. There was a very deep valley below. (This was so pretty, but you can't really tell in a picture...)

This is a yellow-bellied marmot. It came up right next to us and just started eating what little grass was around. We were talking and moving and it didn't seem to bother it!

This was a thermal area. It was interesting because it was kind of chilly, but when we got out of the car we were surprised how warm it was! All of the white is like ashes or something...

Overall it was a very good weekend! The weather was wonderful (it didn't start raining until we were on our way home from Yellowstone)!