Catching Up

So - I owe you a few updates - I thought I had to start with my birthday, but it appears that I've already written about that.

First on the list is Easter. As previously mentioned, the Easter Bunny was able to find me in our little apartment in Rexburg. We decorated (monster) eggs on Saturday night (I think) and then there was an Easter Egg hunt ready for me on Sunday morning.
Note from The Bunny.

Money Egg!!

Pretty good hiding place, eh?

The Eggs:



Hanging out in the fridge. It made me laugh every time I forgot they were in there and opened the fridge.

And I made Easter dinner:



2) So next on that list is graduation! I am a college graduate!!!! Apparently the only pictures I have are from Mollie's graduation. (?) Anyways - we went down to Provo for Mollie's graduation and took some pictures together.
Mollie.
The Y and the Y of I.
I thought there were a billion of these - how come I only have 2?
See ya later alligator. We're officially smart now. Goodbye BYU.

After graduation, we went to Winger's to celebrate. After Mollie's graduation, we went to KFC to get something quick because Chad and I had to get back to Rexburg. But the night before we went to a big Chinese Buffet and it was yummy.

Also - Chad gave me my living, breathing graduation gift of a GUINEA PIG!!! He is so cute, and I love him. After days of calling him Pig-Pig, we have decided that that will just have to be his name. He has thick fuzzy hair (teddy breed, we think) which made us think perhaps he's an African-American guinea pig and we considered names like Jamal, or Tupac. Then we noticed that one of his feet is white skinned and white furred, and the other is black skinned and black furred, which made us consider MJ. But in the end, we settled on Pig-Pig. And a pig-pig he is!



3) The first weekend in May, I had to go to Coeur d'Alene to accompany a couple of students who were auditioning for all-state. It's usually held in Boise, (about 5 hours away) and Mrs. Blackburn usually plays, but since they moved it to Coeur d'Alene, she wasn't able to go. The district paid more than enough for our gas and hotel, so I don't think it cost us anything. It was a really fun trip. We got into Coeur d'Alene with enough time to spend the afternoon/evening in Spokane (about 20 minutes away). We found Riverfront Park, and had a lot of fun. We took pictures with the carousel (we are too cheap to ride), went mini-golfing, watched an IMAX movie about the Hubble, rode the gondola across the falls, and ate dinner at Panda Express in the mall across the street.
View from our room in Coeur d'Alene.
Look! It kind of looks like I'm riding it.
Both of us.
Now THAT'S a wagon!
Mini golfing.
Eating nachos before the IMAX. Yum!
View over the falls from our gondola.

On Saturday, we went explored Coeur d'Alene a little bit, and then went over to the high school for the auditions. The girls I accompanied did well, but not as well as they would have liked. We headed out after the auditions, and spent a night in Missoula where we found a Mexican restaurant that served mole. (which is supposed to have a little "accent aigu" over the e) Chad used to have it on his mission, and hasn't had it since. Mole refers to the chocolate peanut butter sauce they put over/cook meat in. EEEW. But he was happy.

View of the drive between Coeur d'Alene and Missoula.
Gift shop we stopped at.
Missoula.

4) Later in the month of May, we went to Florida with the family. (Of which trip Mollie and Erin already have posts)

Tuesday, May 11, 2010:
Our trip began by getting up at 4:00am to walk to the 5:00 shuttle that leaves from campus, riding it to the airport, and arriving around 10:00, meeting up with Mollie, boarding our flight around noon, switching planes in Kansas City, and then arriving in Orlando around 10:30 pm, after which we wait for Erin, Mollie, Bryce and the boys (who were on a later flight) to arrive before mom and dad pick us all up. It was a LOOOONG day.

The main purpose of the trip was to see one of the last manned missions launch from Kennedy Space Center.
We also included a trip to Disney World and Gatorland.
For the rest of the itinerary, see Erin's blog.

Here are some of the pictures we took:

Thursday, May 13, 2010 - Disney World - Chad's Birthday!

Downtown Disney - different day
That stage over there is where we played in high school.
Apparently those are all of the pictures I have from Disney World. What?


Friday, May 14, 2010 - Day at Kennedy Space Center - Shuttle Launch
Getting ready for the launch countdown.
Chad meets an astronaut! (or more likely, a 14 year old working for minimum wage)
After the launch, we tried to cool off with some Italian Ice. Guess what color Chad and Mollie had...
The van that takes the astronauts to the shuttle - they call it the Astrovan!!
Bus tour - Sunday
Vehicle Assembly Building - Where they prepare the shuttle for its mission
Newspaper from the moon landing.

Pictures from Gatorland and other excursions must be on Chad's camera - or a different memory card.

Highlights of the trip:
1) seeing the launch
2) Disney World
3) Gatorland
4) awesome house we stayed in
5) Happening upon a Friendly's and eating dinner there

Other pictures:
Florida Beach
Tram at the airport
Will at the airport waiting to board the plane.

5) When we got home from Florida, we were EXHAUSTED. We were supposed to drive straight back to Rexburg and be at work the next morning, but due to tornado warnings in the Denver airport, and lengthy delays, we didn't get back into Salt Lake until... 10:00-ish? We stayed at a hotel in Logan and drove the rest the next morning before making it to work for a half day. That afternoon we did a walk through on our home and the next day we closed! We are homeowners!!!



Sandbox, garden, and clothesline.
Remodeled kitchen
New mailbox! No more going to the post office to check the mail! WAHOO!
Lilac bush. One of two. It is now completely brown, but it looked pretty when this picture was taken.
Chad with the monster weed. I'm not sure it's a weed, but he was proud of himself for cutting it down. So weed it is.

Anyways! Now you are ALLLLLL updated. There will be a few more inside/outside before/after pictures coming up. But for now, take a break from reading my boring blog.

(There mom - can I please no longer be lame??)