Weekend Trip No 2

So this last weekend Tim and I went on another short getaway. This time we went down to Virginia it was a bit of a long drive but it was definately worth it. We went down because it was his grandparents 50th wedding anniversary and a large chunk of his family went there to celebrate.

On the way down we just happened to be driving right through Weston's mission so we decided to drop in and give him a little visit. It was awesome to see him and talk to him a little bit, he is doing so great in his new mission and I am happy for him to be having the kind of progress that he is. They have nine baptisms set up just for this transfer, it is crazy!

It is so crazy not seeing him, I feel like he has been gone for so long. In reality it has only been 13 months. It is so interesting to me how time goes by. When he left Tiffany was still pregnant with Emmitt and Sandra just found out she was pregnant. To me it seems like it has just been a blink of an eye, but Emmitt just had his first birthday and baby Jeff is crawling now. Then I think of Wes and can't believe it has only been 13 months. Its very interesting how the mind works. . . especially mine!

So, after spending about an hour with Wes and his companion (Elder Hansen) we set off for the second half of our long drive (about 7 hours total) and we promptly drove right into a huge storm. It was raining harder than I have ever experienced and the wind was blowing like crazy. Its a good thing I wasn't the one driving or I would have had a nervous breakdown! Thank goodness Tim can keep his head straight when I clearly could not have :). We ended up making it through the storm fine and made it safely to Virginia and to his family. We arrived there at about 2:30 in the morning and promptly went to sleep.

On Saturday we woke up and got to go see the Air and Space Museum, it was pretty cool. Tim's dad knows just about everything about that stuff and it was great going there with him to hear the things that he had to say. I love learning new things especially from someone that I know is very knowlagable about it.

So as we are walking through the museum somehow Tim and I started talking about if I was able to kick high enough to actually kick him in the face. Of course we both know that I can and he is just teasing me telling me that I can't so I decided to prove it to him. I stop him in the stairwell on our way down to the ground floor and kick my foot up high enough that he can see it is indeed possible and he proceeds to tell me that I wasn't even close. As we get to the ground level, I stop him again and showed him to which he gave me the same response so I stopped Kallie so she can be a witness. Well folks, the third time is a charm because on that third kick I actually kicked him straight in the mouth. I was so shocked that I couldn't stop laughing. I almost fell on the floor (yes that is my reaction when I am in shock, I know its weird). Kallie was laughing almost as hard as I was, I can only imagine what was going through the minds of any onlookers. Don't worry though, he still has all of his teeth and he only had a little fat lip for a minute. I however, could not keep my composure any time I looked at him for the next 20 minutes or so. As we walked out of the museum Ray turned to me and asked "Do you want to high kick anything else before we leave?" and the jokes kept going from there.

After we got back from the museum we had a nice dinner and a program for Tim's grandparents, it was really sweet they had a video and everything. We came back the next afternoon and had a pretty nice drive though we went through another storm in Pennsylvania I think it storms there all the time. . . It was nice to finally get home though and relax for awhile.

Catching up and stuff. . .

Hey dear followers, sorry for the lapse in writing! They've been keeping me busy at school and Tara has a full-time job now, so our blogging time has been greatly decreased. There's definitely a lot to tell you about now. The biggest thing that we did was take the hour-long drive up to Palmyra, N.Y. and check out the Hill Cumorah pageant and all the church sites up there. We started off at the Smith farm where we went on the tour. Tara had already been there before, but it was a first time experience for me to see these places that I had only read about.

Being the weekend of the pageant, it was really busy there. The sister missionaries that were leading the tour said during the week of the pageant roughly 50,000 people visit the sites. We started off getting a history lesson, and then toured the Smith homestead cabin. The cabin itself is a replica, but it is built on the original foundation of the 1820s Smith cabin, and it was built without using any modern technology.

Following that we went down to road to the Smith frame house that was built later on. It is the original structure, and they showed us the different places in the home where the gold plates were hidden. From there we went through a threshing barn that was built by Brigham Young's brother and later moved to the site. Then we went to to the shop where they made and repaired barrels (the name escapes me). After that, the formal tour ended and they turned us loose to go wander through the sacred grove. It was really amazing to be there, knowing what happened there. While wandering around, we found some remnants of the original rock wall the Smith's built, and even tried a couple wild raspberries.

After the Smith farm we headed into Palmyra and drove to the E.B. Grandin Print Shop where the Book of Mormon was published. Being a journalist, it was awesome to see how the old printing presses worked and see what people of that time went through to publish a book.

When we were done at the print shop, we just drove around a little bit following some of the streets and seeing the city. I'm an avid fan of the "Work and the Glory" books, and it was crazy to drive down these streets that I've read about – even if they are completely different than they were back then.

Finally, we headed down the road to the Hill Cumorah to catch the last night of the pageant. This was an experience in itself, but maybe not for the expected reason. As we were pulling up to the parking area, there were a few anti-mormon groups out hollering, protesting and generally making an uneducated nuisance of themselves. A couple had megaphones, and were spewing out words of hatred at the oncoming crowd. It is amazing to me that no matter where the church gathers in large groups, these people show up. Maybe I just notice it because it's my religion, but I'v never seen so much animosity built up towards other religions.

Then we entered the actual pageant area, and the scene completely changed. There was clearly just as many (if not more) non-members as there was members, but as we walked through the gates, MoTab blocked out the megaphone guys and the spirit completely changed. I'm not usually one throw on some church music and just kick back, but it was such a change from the scene driving in, that it was impossible not to notice.

The pageant itself was really cool. They had a lot of special effects and it was definitely a high quality production. I knew it was a big deal, but I had no idea that is was 9,000 people's worth of a big deal. It was great to see such a big gathering of people to see church stuff so far away from Utah! Also, during the production, something stood out to me. I won't go into too much detail and get all religious, but sometimes those resounding moments happen that confirm this religion is no joke.

During the production, they act out scenes from the Bible and the Book of Mormon. In one of the particular scenes, they're acting out Lehi's dream. They didn't go into all the details from the dream, including the part about the people that are in the building yelling and mocking, but it hit me right then and there – that's exactly who the people out front with the megaphones were. They were the people in the great and spacious building, mocking and yelling at those who sought after the gospel. It's awesome when scriptural things happen right in front of you!

Anyways, needless to say it was a fun and eye-opening weekend.

Other than that, Tara and I have just been busy working! Between the two of us, though, hopefully we can get back on track and write a little bit more often. Stop back soon!

New Job!

So after a week and a half of sitting around here trying to fill up my time I found out today that I got a job! I will be working at Value City furnature starting tomorrow morning. I'm pretty happy about it because it was the first place I applied, talk about lucky :).
Tim also seems to be doing really well in his classes, he is keeping busy and such. From what I have seen it hasn't been extremely bad homework wise because he is in class long enough that he gets most of his work done before he leaves school which is nice. Right now he is doing a project that he has to go around town and take pictures of every letter of the alphabet from signs and stuff like that. It has been pretty fun to see some new things while we find all the letters.
Tim also found out that the university has a golf course that they own we went there today and hit some balls at the range, it was nice, super hot though! Because he is a grad student he gets a year membership for $25 and I get in for $10 when I want to go with him, pretty good deal if you ask me.
So when Tim and I moved out here we both made a goal to be more active in our ward and I'm happy to say we have been! Last week I went with the sister missionaries twice to talk with some investigators it was a really great experience. It was mostly really great to be able to look at some of our beliefs in a different perspective it has been a really great growing experience for me.

Stuff

So far living in the far east has treated me pretty well, at this point my life is pretty uneventful but good over all. I have made dinner for Tim four nights in a row now which sad as it may seem is actually a record for me. What can I say, he is a good cook and I don't want to discourage him :)!

Tonight we invited some friends over for dinner and buzz quiz, it was a lot of fun. I love that I have been able to make friends so quickly. Rosie, Biff, and their little girl Hazel are in our ward, they got here a day or two before we did. I made chicken and rice casserole, it was the first time I have ever made it and I am happy to say it turned out a smashing success! For all of you who know how to make it just shhh don't tell anyone how easy it is okay!

I am loving our apartment. It is so nice, I'm sure Tim has mentioned things about it in prior blogs so forgive me for repetition but it is set up so well. The square footage is less than our last place but it seems like we have so much more room the layout is so great. One thing I think is so weird though is that there are not light fixtures in the main living areas.. weird right?! The outlets closest to the door will turn on a lamp with the light switch but that is it, very interesting.

So I found out today that I am exactly three hours away from Wes in his current area! Crazy that I'm so close to him maybe we will have to plan a little road trip...

So for any of you that follow our blog that have any questions please comment and ask them, Tim wants me to write more on it and as of right now, with no job and everything, my life is pretty boring please people give me some ideas!

Fast & Furious

Yesterday was my first real day of classes, and true to all the warnings about "boot camp" it was intense. We started at 9 a.m. with a large group lecture that lasted until noon when we took lunch. For lunch, I walked down the street to a place called Varsity where I had some pizza. New York Time's beat writer for the Jets, Greg Bishop, told me about it when I was emailing him about Syracuse (which is where he did his undergrad).

We started again at 1 p.m., and this time we split into smaller groups to write leads and work on some stories. That lasted clear until 5 p.m. when class ended. The work did not end, however. Our instructor (who happens to be the Sports Editor for the Syracuse Post Standard), assigned us a story that was due by 9 a.m. today. We had to interview a classmate and two other sources and write a profile about them.

Normally that wouldn't be an assignment that I would expect to take a long time, but it took awhile to get ahold of all the sources and when I did, they were very long winded. By the time I finished the interview, organized all the quotes and the story and wrote the story, it was 1:30 a.m.

Turns out, I got more sleep than a lot of my classmates, including the girl who was doing a profile on me. I woke up this morning to find a text from her sent around 3 a.m. when she finished.

Today was just as long, but with a lot less homework, so that is nice. The classes are fun though, and my experience both in writing and designing layouts for the paper will be very, very beneficial!

Tara and I are finally relaxing a little bit tonight. . . finally!

Orientation

So today was the first day of school, but not actually the first day of classes. They took my picture, game me my iPod touch and fed me lunch. In between all that, I listened to a few speeches and walked around the campus. All-in-all, it was an easy ice-breaker for what's coming during the next six weeks.

At six, Tara and I went over to help some other recent grad school ward members move in. Their names are Biff and Rosie. He is from Idaho and she is from Oregon and they just moved from Texas where Biff was doing his undergrad. It was good that we showed up, because apparently everyone else in the ward was busy. We were able to help them get moved in, and they were very appreciative!

It's time for bed now though, Tara and I have both been feeling a little under the weather. See y'all tomorrow.

Last day of freedom. . .

School officially starts tomorrow, so that made today my last day of freedom. The first goal of the day was to find a decent printer that we could afford. So, we woke up and went to Sam's Club. Sure enough, they had a Lexmark printer/scanner/copier/fax machine for $50, so we grabbed that and a few other items and then headed over to Wegman's (the Lee's on steroids) to grab a few other things we didn't need in bulk.

Wegman's is right next to the furniture store Tara applied to on Friday, so she decided to pop in and see if there was any news. Thirty minutes later she came out and said she'd had and interview and went well. They told her she needed to pass a background test and a drug test and then she should be good to go. I guess they didn't say for sure that she has a job, but by the looks of it she does and we're pretty stoked about that. . . wouldn't you know, she would get a job at the first place she applied after arriving in Syracuse. Plus, we'll get a pretty good deal on new furniture!

After that, we headed home to unload the groceries. . . that turned out to be an adventure. Tara got chatting on the phone with her sister Jen, so I tried to carry up more groceries than I should have. Plus, we have to unlock the door to get into our building, walk up to the third floor, and then unlock the door to our apartment. By the time I got to our apartment door, things had shifted position and I had to put down the 2-pack bottle of syrup I was carrying so that I could get to my keys. I put the syrup on the banister, and it looked solid. And then it was gone. I looked up just in time to see the bottles hit the landing on the second floor. One of the bottles exploded and sent syrup flying everywhere. It was on the walls, the railings, dripping down the banister to the floor below. . . needless to say, we spent the next half hour or so cleaning it up as best we could!

Following the syrup explosion, things quieted down for awhile. I read a bunch of stuff that I'd been procrastinating reading and Tara read some more of her most recent vampire book. Around 7 p.m. we headed up to the restaurant at the Sheraton Hotel right by the university. The MNO group (Magazine Newspaper and Online journalism grad students) decided to have a little meet and greet before classes start tomorrow. We spent the rest of the evening there, and they seem like a pretty good group.

Now the fun starts tomorrow for both Tara and I. Hopefully she'll find out soon if she for sure got the job and journalism "Boot Camp" starts for me.

New day, new couch

Tara and I seem to finally be – at least slightly – adjusting to the change in time. We didn't stay up ridiculously late last night, and woke up at a decent time this morning! Now, it's 11:07 p.m. and I'm definitely ready for bed tonight. . . good sign.

Today was a fun day, and plenty full! We went to Jamesville Beach where we met the rest of the ward for a BBQ and some beach time. There are four or five other couples just like us that moved in over the past couple of weeks for graduate school. The main difference between us and them though, is we seem to be the only ones without kids. . . pretty soon I'm going to be one of those weird people that writes their pets names on cards and things before they have kids! (Don't tell Katie I said that!) :-)

The beach itself was interesting. The lake reminded me of Hyrum dam, except their were houses all around it. Pretty much each house had a power boat docked behind it, but we were there for a good four hours and never saw a single power boat out on the lake. I though that was a little weird considering it was Saturday on the 4th of July weekend, and the lake obviously allowed powerboats. The public beach was a rather small affair and was sectioned off, maybe a couple hundred yards long. The actual swimming area out in the lake was also sectioned off and rather small too. Lifeguards were on duty to make sure no one went outside the established boundaries. Overall, it was a fun day though. I helped grill and Tara helped some people with their kids and everybody loved her Frito Salad (thanks Idona!).

After the party we went and looked at a sage microfiber couch that we saw on craigslist this morning. They were only asking $100 for it, and it seemed like a solid couch. On the way out, we bought some ratchet straps so that we could transport it in the X-terra if it would fit. We loved the couch and offered them $80 and they took it. . . SCORE! We laid the seats down flat in the back of the X-terra and we were just able to fit the couch in the back with about an inch to spare. It was obviously longer and hung out the back a couple of feet, but we strapped it down and it worked like a charm. It was even pretty light, so Tara was able to help me lift it up the stairs. She didn't even complain too much. . . even though she has been a little bi-polar the last couple of days! ;-)

Now all we have left to find is a desk, and we should be set! Here are a couple of pictures of the new apartment, a better picture of the balcony view and even one of the new couch!

Settling in. . .

It's been two days since we arrived in Syracuse, and we're starting to get settled in. We LOVE our new apartment! Though it is a little bit smaller and has one less bathroom than our last apartment, it is laid out much better and has a lot more open space and a deceptive amount of closet space. Ultimately, we had a lot easier time putting all of our stuff away than at our North Logan apartment. Also, we're up on the third floor and have a massive balcony that looks West, so we can see out over the area a little bit and get some good sunsets.

Along with getting acquainted to our new apartment, we're getting acquainted with our new city and new ward members. Yesterday we went to the "Lee's" of upstate New York, a store called Wegman's the one closest to us is pretty cool and is like a Lee's on steroids! It is probably bigger than the Logan Wal-Mart and has a ridiculous amount of grocery products. One interesting thing we noticed is the amount of organic produce available. There was basically two aisles for everything. . . one for the regular stuff and one for the organic. We're not weird like that, so we didn't pay three times as much money for the organic stuff.

Today we added a few more pieces to our apartment. We found a pair of black bookshelves that are identical to the ones we left behind in Logan. We bought both of them for $20 and then added a really nice leather desk chair for $25. . . now we just have to find the desk. Most recently, we just got back from having dinner with the Cundick's (Paul and Taniel), their neighbors, and some other ward members. We're trying to get to know people in this ward faster than we did our student ward back home, so that maybe we can actually enjoy their company longer. Plus. . . once we got to know people back home, Tara decided that she was actually quite the party hostess.

We're still trying to get adjusted to the Eastern Time Zone, so I'm going to sign off for the night. There's a big ward party at one of the many local lakes tomorrow, so we don't want to sleep in too late like we have been!