Geology Homework Isn't So Bad

My geology professor has a very strange grading system. Basically, if you take a test, you automatically get a C on it. If you score above 75% you get a B. The only way to actually get an A in the class is to get B's on your tests then go out and do "extra credit" field trips. You have to have a total of 3 to get an A (1 gets you a B+, 2 gets you and A-, 3 gets you an A) One option he gave us was to hike to Timpanogos Caves and write a report about what we learned.
I know I have been up there plenty of times in the past, but never really went up there to specifically learn about cave formations. This time I was on a mission. Besides, Jay really needed some one on one time with me so we made a date out of it.

It was a nice, cool, overcast afternoon. Perfect for hiking. Jay was so excited to start our hike.

You can't really tell from this photo, but right behind that bush Jay is sitting in front of is a huge cliff. The second I snapped this photo, I made him get back on the trail and next to me.

The fall colors were amazing this day. The pictures do not do it justice, but here is one I took that warmed my soul. I LOVE the fall. My favorite time of year!


Here we are taking one of our few rest breaks. The rangers can make the hike in 45 min since they do it everyday. They said it usually takes twice as long for the visitors. Jay and I made it in 1 hour and 5 minutes.

Once we got inside the caves, the Park Ranger found out that Jay was about to have a birthday. He made Jay his official Assistant Park Ranger on the tour. Here is Jay pointing the flashlight up to where the original cave opening was and showed us the 100 year old ladders still up in the narrow cave. The hike wasn't a piece of cake by any means, but I am glad we didn't have to repel into the caves once we got up there.

We saw some pretty awesome stuff while we were there. You have to be VERY careful to not touch the walls and duck down really low so you don't actually touch any of the formations. The oils from your hands damage the forming rocks. This is one of the stalactites we had to maneuver past on our narrow trail.

The most famous stalactite on the whole tour (and in all of Utah) is the Heart of Timpanogos. It is HUGE.

Further on into the caves, there are a ton of different formations that people pretend to look like something vague (such as the dead mouse hanging from it's tail) But THIS formation honestly does look like the profile of a St. Bernard.

When we finished the tour, we were exhausted but still were having a great time. We were glad that when we finished the tour, the rest of our hiking was downhill. Hence, the relieved smiles we have here.

On the hike down, Jay found an little outcropping in the rocks and decided it was the perfect place to take an apple break.

All I have to do now is write the report of what I learned on cave formations and turn it in. It would be so much easier to just give my professor my blog address. ;)

We Will NEVER Forget

On September 11th, 2001 the world changed. People looked within themselves and figured out what was really important. We were a unified and selfless country for that brief moment. Out of the horror and anguish came brotherhood, compassion and a renewed sense of patriotism. Life went on, we healed (are healing) and went to war. I stand behind our soldiers and support the men and women defending our freedom. I will be forever grateful and forever proud to be an American.
That dreadful morning started as a typical Tuesday for me. Woke up with my husband of 5 months and got ready for work. He was stilled a little bummed that his business trip to NYC was canceled because the trainer of his week-long management class was sick. I drove him into work that morning so we didn't have to pay for downtown parking. I worked as the accounts payable clerk for a plastic surgeon and he as a mortgage loan processor for JP Morgan Chase. As I was preparing the morning bank deposits I remember writing the date on the deposit slip and thinking to myself "hmm...911...hope that's not an omen". Right then I got a call from Jeremy. He said a plane just struck the World Trade Center. I just thought some inexperienced pilot in a prop plane was having a very bad day. He said, "NO! Go turn on the news!" We turned on the radio and after hearing what had happened, the entire office raced to the basement where the only TV in the building was. Luckily a phone was down there and I think every single patient that had an appointment that day called to cancel. We watched in horror as the second plane hit. The OR director just sank to the floor. Her son was getting married in 2 weeks. His best man worked on the 102 floor of building 2. He didn't make it. We stared in silence with tears streaming down our cheeks unable to move from shock. As we watched the towers fall everyone seemed to dissipate. We'd had enough for the time being.
When I went back to my desk, Jeremy called again. Even though we lived in Rochester, some 8 hours away from NYC, his office was being evacuated. All of downtown was being evacuated. There was an order to evacuate every high-rise building in NY state.
I have no idea how I was able to drive downtown, against traffic, to pick Jeremy up. I was shaking so violently I was sure I was going to cause an accident. When I reached his office, he drove us home where we sat on the couch the rest of the afternoon in each others arms, knowing that he was supposed to be there, in the middle of it all. As other buildings started to fall I got nauseated when they announce building 5 had collapsed. My newlywed husband was scheduled to fly to NYC and be in that very building at this very moment. I have never been so grateful that a total stranger came down with pneumonia the day before and called everyone in her training class to reschedule.
The rest of the week was basically spent going through the motions of everyday life in a zombie like state. Nothing seemed real. We donated blood and friends were driving to NY to provide any help they could. No one was flying. I honestly do not remember much from that week other than going home everyday and holding Jeremy all night long.
The following Sunday, our tiny branch of about 30 members or so gathered in our little chapel beneath the dance studio on Atlantic Avenue. We didn't have Sunday School or Relief Society that day. Our little ward family stayed in the chapel and cried and prayed together.
Today as I await Jeremy to come home from work and hold my children, those same prayers are being repeated in my heart. That we can protect our nation from tyranny, that our loved ones will be safe from harm, that we will remember the truly important things in life, that we can move forward and forgive, but NEVER forget.

I'm NOT Dead

Ok, so a 9 month break from blogging was really just me being lazy. I will have to get caught up with the individual activities/expeiernces we have done/had (Lagoon, camping/canoeing, hiking, moving, car accident, Dinosaur Museum, etc) but I just wanted to put a quick up date on here.
The biggest change to our family came in January. We now have our niece, Briget, living with us. She is my oldest brothers daughter. After a few months of the "honeymoon phase" she has been adjusting pretty well and is doing much better in school. We aren't sure how long she will be with us. Could be a few more months, could be a few more years. Who knows? In the mean time she gets to see what is like having annoying younger kids living with her.
Jay is soon turning 8 and will be baptized in the beginning of November. He started 2nd grade a few weeks ago and is loving being back in school, just not the homework that comes along with it. He played baseball again last summer and Jeremy and I were his coaches. (NEVER gonna do that again. Don't mind being the team-mom, just not up to coaching) He still adores Iron Man and most other superheros.
After months and months of testing Jay was diagnosed with ADHD this summer. I insisted on all of the testing since it is so over-diagnosed these days. Needed to make sure that the Dr. wasn't just throwing meds at him for being an active, normal kid. So in addition to baseball, he spend his summer going to about 3-4 different specialists and all tests came back showing that he really does have ADHD. The thing with Jay is that he isn't really off-the-wall hyper all the time. He just can't seem to focus on the teacher because he is so distracted by anything and everything else around him. He is still excelling in Math and his reading is improving but we want to get him help so he can catch up in the rest of his subjects.
Alyssa turned 3 shortly after my last post, meaning she will be 4 very soon. (January) She is going to preschool 2 days/week and LOVING it. I just love that little girl. She is SO independent and insists on doing everything for herself, however, she will still come and snuggle up on my lap or give me unexpected hugs. This girl loves to sing, and love all the funny things she makes up. Her favorite primary song is "I love to see the temple" and she sings the WHOLE thing. I was impressed that she knows all the words. I know that I shouldn't encourage her when she mispronounces a word since it will just hold her speech back, but I can't help but laugh when she sings about Eeyord, Pliget and Winnie-A-Poo. Her sense of humor is going non-stop. She is starting to understand knock-knock jokes and loves to make some up of her own. Most don't make any sense but a few are cute. An example would be:
Knock-knock
Who's there?
Duck
Duck who?
Quack Quack.
Like I said, more cute than funny. But I think she has big aspirations of being a comedian since she loves being the center of attention and making people laugh.
Jeremy is still at the same job doing tech support for Macintosh. It's ok, but he really is over-qualified. Hopefully he will find something more worth-while soon. In the mean time he is starting to get his Macintosh certifications. Hopefully he will be going back to finish his bachelors next semester. Now that we have residency here in Utah we can actually afford it. (Well, at least the grants would cover it)
As for me, since Jeremy isn't going to school this semester, I took the opportunity to go. I quit my job at Harmon's last month and am going to UVU full time. I am majoring in secondary education in deaf studies. When I am done (hopefully in Spring of 2014) want to teach ASL in high school. I am contemplating getting a minor in Geology so I can teach science if there isn't a need for ASL teachers when I graduate.
Looks like my quick update wasn't so quick. I will try to better about posting but no promises. Until next time...

Photos as Promised

June:Jay's last baseball game of the season. Coach Brian in the pink dress was a great motivator for the kids.
End of season baseball party and award ceremony

July:
Alyssa got into my mascara. It was pretty funny at first then I realized that she used the wand as a Q-Tip to "clean" out here ears. Took 3 days to clean it all out.

August:
August was all about hair cuts. Alyssa got her first hair cut and I had my nieces over to our new house to cut and color their hair for back to school.

September:
Jay is discovering a new interest in photography. We let him loose with daddy's camera to see what he came up with.

October:

Jay and Gracey's first grade classes went on a field trip to the Big Red Barn in Payson. They got to tour the apple orchard and go on a hay ride. It was a lot of fun and the rain made it even better. We were soaking wet and having a ball.
Jay and Gracey turned 7 on Oct 16th and 17th. We had a small family party at Dan and Liza's club house and painted pumpkins.Unfortunately I forgot my camera on Halloween. Jay dressed up as Optimus Prime and Alyssa was a puppy. We went over to Uncle Buds and Aunt Michele's house for a fun party and trick-or-treating. Aunt Michele made us this adorable Halloween Train.

November:
Thanksgiving and Dan and Liza's new house. This was the very first time we had all of the cousins together at the same place and same time.Jeremy's parents came to visit us at the end of November. They stayed with us for a week then drove to Prescott to spend a week with Edie and her family. It was good to have them visit even though they were both sick while they were here.

December:

While Jeremy drove his parents to Arizona with Alyssa, Jay and I went on a mommy-son date. I took him to Heber to take a ride on the Polar Express. On the train we met Santa's elves, sang Christmas Carols, read the Polar Express story and met Santa. Santa even gave each of the kids a bell off of his sleigh to remind them to always believe.The kids are getting used to living in snow country. I took a picture of the mountains outside of our front door to show off our gorgeous view. Jay had a great time with his cousins making his first snowman.Christmas morning with the kids. Jay loved his new skateboard and scooter and Alyssa couldn't get enough of her princess wand and crown.

2009 Wrap-Up

For anyone that follows my blog but doesn't keep up with me personally (which I am sure there isn't anyone out there that meets that description) a LOT has changed with our family since my last post.
Most importantly, we moved from our home in Las Vegas and made the trek back to Utah. We are now renting a townhouse in Spanish Fork and getting adjusted back to Utah winters. Nowhere near as bad as New York winters, but still the kids are not used to all of this white stuff.
Jeremy finished is Associates of Applied Science in Electrical Engineering in July and is currently working at a call center doing help-desk support for Macintosh/Apple. He is taking a year off of school before going back for his Bachelors degree. We need to re-establish residency here in Utah so we can qualify for the in-state tuition at UVU.
I went back to work after moving to Utah. For a while I was working two jobs (over 70 hours every week) and wore myself out. I was working for an anesthesiologist doing all of his insurance verifications and authorizations during regular business hours then in the evenings I would go work in a deli at a grocery store. It was exhausting. I finally had to give up one of the jobs and though the logical answer would have been to quit the deli and stay with the doctors office, I decided to keep working at the deli. With night time hours it is a lot easier for me to run errands during the day, Alyssa would be at the babysitter (grandma's house) for only a few hours rather than all day long, and there is a LOT to be said for being able to come home from work and not stress about it all night. I have also been staying busy every day with taking my mom to her radiation treatments. She was diagnosed last October with squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue and though they were able to remove the visible tumors, they still wanted her to go through radiation to kill any unseen growths.
Jay is now in the first grade and making lots of new friends at his new school. He is excited for this snow to melt and baseball season to start again. He had a rocky start this school year with his reading so they put him into a reading recovery program where he gets one-on-one time with a reading teacher every day. We just had his parent-teacher conference this week and he has improved enough to "graduate" from the program in the next week or two. Math on the other hand it a totally different story. This kid is a wiz, always bringing home 100% on his math worksheets. We are very proud of the progress he has made and cheer him on as he conquers new abilities.
Alyssa can't seem to stop growing. She keeps us all amused with the new things she comes up with everyday. She loves to sing and play dress up. She actually shocked Jay's teacher when we took her to his class the other day. She was telling me what each letter was of the alphabet on the wall, all the colors and shapes on the reading rug and counted to 11. She is one smart little cookie! We are getting geared up for her 3rd birthday next Saturday. (Can't believe she is almost 3! Where did the years go???) I will be attempting to out-do last years Elmo cake with her new favorite obsession, Dinosaur Train. Wish me lots of luck!
As for pictures of the last 6 months, I will have to get those posted as soon as I find my card reader. Maybe that will inspire me to update this blog more often!

Life Imitating Literature

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