OuR tRiP tO uTaH...

For Christmas, Zach and I went to Utah and Idaho to visit family. We love it up there. The mountains are so beautiful. We had alot of fun spending time with friends and family. Below is a pic of the gingerbread house Sarah and Carolyn made. It took them 3 days to make. This has to be the best gingerbread house I've ever seen.

On our way to Idaho!

After we went sledding with the kids in the mountain, there was a frozen steam.

Beautiful Idaho sunset! We had just gotten done sledding in the mountains and this was the view when we were leaving. SO NEAT!

Carolyn with the tube and Lu Lu at the top about to go down the hill.

That's me posing in the snow after sledding in Idaho. The flat tub under me was the kids until Zach popped it with his boot. :)

That's all the pics for Idaho. One thing that Zach got to do but didnt get any pics of was FLY FISHING. Ed and Zach went fly fishing and zach fell in love with the sport. They didnt catch anything but he had fun anyways. Oh yeah and Ed fell in the freezing cold water. HAHA!

So, back to UTAH! On Christmas day, Zach and I went with Uncle Brady, Aunt Shawna and the kids to a place in Ogden where they have these little houses and in each house in a different theme. For example, the fire station did a house with a dalmation. The train station did the Union Station. It was really neat and there were alot of little display houses. It was also really cold that day so we walked pretty fast through the park.

Nutcracker theme! Mom collects nutcrackers so I thought she would like this one.

Snowboarding theme!

Ski Shop theme!

Train station theme

Morgan, Me, Zach, Katee, Clint and Tanner

Fire station theme!

Penguin theme!

Golf theme!

Mexican theme! Those lights on the tree are chili peppers.

Hansel and Grettle theme! See him in the cage! The witch lady is to the left and the outside of the house has candy on it.

Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy.

Katee and I were trying to make a snowman, but it just wasnt working. The snow was not sticking together. Bummer!!!


Icicles from roof to ground. This just blow my mind. They have to be over 12 ft. icicles. :0

I thought this was so neat. I have never seen icicles(spelling?) from the bottom of a car. It just doesnt get that cold in Texas.
Zach and Morgan at the ski resort. They became skiing partners.

Zach and I on Wolf Mountain, a ski resort. On this day I was not able to go skiing or snowboarding because we thought the rental place rented out snow clothes. Well, we get there and they tell us we have to go back down the mountain to rent them. So, I said that is ok I will just take pictures and stay in the lodge. However, we did go back on New Years day and I was able to ski and Zach got to go snowboarding again. He had a BLAST! I liked it as well until I couldnt feel my toes. I went down the mountain twice. The first time I did not fall and the second time we went down a steeper slope and I fell twice. That did it for me. I went back to the kiddie hill as seen behind us. You can see that it is not very steep at all. We both had alot of fun though.

Zach and I in front of a tree along the road of displays in Ogden.

We went to Ogden to see a bunch of Christmas displays and the whole park was lit but christmas lights. Also, I was born in Ogden so that was neat to go there. After the park we went to the movies and when we came out, there was a small blizzard. It was cool and scary because I have never been in a blizzard.

This view is from the back porch of our aunt and uncle's house in Utah! BEAUTIFUL!

SALT LAKE TEMPLE!!! Zach and I went through a session and it was sooo beautiful in there. The architecture(spelling?) was amazing and it was a live session. Im gald we got to go through. It was a good ending to our trip.

SNOW...

The church and all the houses had snow on the roof tops

The front of the church! I had YW that night.

On December 10, 2008 south Tx recieved snow. We have not had snow in about 4 yrs. It was really neat. It had been drizzling all day and around 6:00p it started snowing. Mom and dad have a huge oak tree in their front yard so there was not enough snow in the yard to make a snowman. Many of our friends were able to make little snowmen. Zach and I will be going to northwestern states in less than a week to visit family and there is pleny of snow there so I wasnt too bummed that I couldnt make a snowman. I LOVE SNOW!

Softball nights.....

Every Thrusday Zach goes to play softball with members of our church. Well, this past Thursday it was really cold and the wind was blowing right in our face. His team played late and as it got late the tempurate was dropping. I had Dillinger with me and even though he has fur, I knew he was cold. When Zach's team was in the outfield Dillinger and I would go for a run on the outside of the field so we could get our heart rate up and try to keep warm. I know it worked for me but I dont know how much that did for Dillinger because I was sprinting and Dillinger was just trotting. It was funny. Anyways, after about the 4th or 5th run, I was tried of doing that so I just put Zach's jacket on him and I thought it was so cute. He looks like a midget or something.

House of Blues Concert....

On November 10th me, Zach, Natalie, Ryan, JJ, Meredith, Jared, and his date Corine went to the House of Blues to see Matisyahu. His must is more along the lines of reggae. He is jewish. He wears his yamaka(check the spelling). His music is really laid back and cool. We had a great time considering the fact that Zach and I left early because I had to get up for school at 6am and we didnt get in bed until 12:30.

This all started when my sweet husband offered to hold my purse for the concert because it was too heavy for my shoulder. They thought it was funny, but very manly of him to do that so Jared, his brother took his date's purse, and Ryan, his friend, took his wife's purse and they all struck a pose!!! :) HILARIOUS!

Before the concert, we ate at the House of BLues resturant. The desert we had was really good. The cool part about the resturant was that they had a wall of famous peoples' faces sculpted out with a blue light hightlight the face. It was really neat, but my camera flash was too bright. Some people that were on the wall were B.B. King, Buddy Guy, the Blues Brothers and more.

My first deer!!!

So, November 1st was the first day for hunting season. On November 2nd I shot my first deer. It was a doe(female deer). I wanted to shoot a doe first because doe season ends after Thanksgiving. That way the rest of hunting season I can focus on getting a buck or a hog. The rifle I use is a 270. I like it because it does not have alot of kick. Anyways, one of my friends that Zach and I hunt with put the deer's blood on my face. It is their tradition to put the blood on your face when you kill your first deer. We got alot of meat out of that deer. We got hamburger meat, steaks, and backstrap. She was almost 3 years old and she weighed about 100 lbs. Zach also shot a deer the following week. Out of that deer we are getting 2 different kinds of sausage and steaks (I think!). Anyways, I love hunting because that is one hobby that Zach and I do together. We love it. Last year we hunted together, but this year we have our own memberships. Sometimes we will hunt together, but most of the time we hunt seperately. I think the most amazing thing about hunting is getting into your deer blind really early and watching the sun come up and see the forest come to life. It is so beautiful to be out there with nature.

2 yr. anniversary

So, on September the 23rd Zach and I celebrated our 2nd year anniversary. WOW! I cannot beleive it has been 2 years already. I guess when you are having fun the time flies by. I am so lucky to be married to a wonderful, supportive, and lets not forget sexy husband. He spoils me and I love it. :) He had a dozen long stem red roses delivered to the house. They were soooo beautiful. I took alot of pics of them. Zach said, "Why are you taking so many pics of the flowers." I said, "Because I hardly ever get flowers. This is like once a year occasion to me."

Anyways, for our anniversay we went to a dinner and a movie. We played it low key since we went on a 10 day vacation in August. So the restaurant we went to is a new place called Vegas Grill. I would not recommend that place to anyone. The atmosphere was not good and the food was WAY over priced for the quality of the food and the food was horrible. Then, we went and saw Lakeview Terrace. It was a good movie. The acting was really good but as far as the story line goes, it was alright. The ending was one of the best parts of the movie though.

Hurricane Ike

As many of you know, Zach is a surfer. So, where do you think we went for our evacuation?.... That's right, the beach. We went to South Padre. It is about 7 hours south of us right by the Mexico boarder. We left Thursday, Sept. 11th, and came back that following Monday. Zach and I drove down there with his family. While we were down there, the only effects we felt from the hurricane was wind. We did not get any rain from the hurricane. It was bright and sunny. Also, there was no traffic going to S. Padre and there was not traffic coming home from S. Padre. It was nice. We went away from the crowd.
As far as damage goes, we did not have hardly any damage compared to others. There were a few shingles that blew off the roof and our back wooden fence had fallen over. However, I am so glad to be married to a handy man.... Zach and his dad replaced the missing shingles and the fence within a week after the storm.
My parents had a few shingles that blew off their roof and a tree in the backyard fell on the powerline and ripped the meter of the side of the house. They also had some tree branches that fell. They did not have power for a 8 days. Zach's parents had some shingles that blew off their roof as well and their banana tree leaves had been ripped off. They did not have power for almost 2 weeks. Other than that, no flooding and not too much damage.
We are so blessed to have minimal damage and to have a home to come back to. My thoughts and prayers go to those who have suffered from hurricane IKE!