Take that St. George!

So Bill and I signed up for the St. George marathon, hoping to make it into the lottery, but we didn't. So instead we're going to run this race on the 5th of September. That's right. We're heading of our own volition to Pocatello, ID to run a marathon. We figured, if we couldn't get into St. George, we might as well get something out of the race for our trouble. :) This race was selected "Best $chwag" by Runner's World a few years back. Which if you're like me and don't know what that means, it's known as the race that gives out the most goodies to its participants. We'll walk away with a technical shirt, a duffle bag, a finisher's medal and certificate, various goodies in our duffle bag, and to cap it off, a bag of potatoes. I find that utterly hilarious. It should be a good time. I'd like to run marathons, or at least races, in as many states as I can, so this spreads my repertoire to include Utah, Massachusetts, and now Idaho. I have a few more to go. :)

Y Mountain

I haven't blogged for awhile, since we haven't done anything particularly interesting of late, but we finally got out yesterday and went hiking. We've been wanting to hike Y Mountain for a couple months, but it snowed so many weekends during the last month of school that there was too much snow up there. We didn't want to mountaineer it with ice axes and boots and all that stuff, so we just waited for the snow to melt.

It was an awesome hike! In fact, all of yesterday was pretty much perfect. We slept in until 11am. That's right, 11am. I can't remember the last time that's happened. We're in the midst of marathon training, though this was a rest week, so we did our 5-mile run right after breakfast/lunch or whatever you call a bowl of cereal at 11:30am. After that we managed to kill a few hours not doing much, just relaxing, and didn't get out to hike Y Mountain until 4pm.

The hike was gorgeous. The mountains are so green and pretty right now and it's amazing! It took us about 3 hours to get up to the top and an hour and a half down. We brought headlamps in case it got dark, but we got off the mountain just in time. Here's a few pictures. I forgot my camera, so they're just from Bill's phone, and we forgot to take any on the top, but oh well. It was a good night. Needless to say, both of us are tired and sore today after lots of exercise yesterday.


This was a view back down the path we had just climbed up. We were in the canyon on the south side of Y Mountain

We stopped to sit on a huge boulder and take a couple pictures.

Coming back down the mountain. You can see the Y in the middle of the shot. Pretty cool angle.

We caught a beautiful sunset. It was so pretty!

The money always works out

It's not easy trying to figure out how to pay for grad school, undergraduate tuition for Bill and our living expenses. It can cause a lot of stress, but today I feel really blessed because it just seems like the money always works out. I have a budget and adhere to it, but sometimes unbudgeted things come along and can throw things off. This could have been one of those months, but it looks like, despite that, things are going to work out just fine and we'll be able to pay for important things like car registration. I feel like Bill and I are getting blessed for those things we're trying to do right and I'm grateful for that.

Seriously amazing friends

Last week didn't start out so well, what with not going to Cancun and trying to figure out what to do with ourselves and what to do for a honeymoon instead of the one we had cancelled. 3 of my roommates from right before we got married were the ones that brought Bill and I home from the airport Sunday night. Bill got a text from one of them, Saundra, sometime during the week to set aside our Friday night for something she had planned. I promptly forgot about it, and only remembered Friday when Bill said we needed to be at my old apartment right away.

So we drove over and walked in the door to find the front room completely transformed into a "restaurant" for two, complete with candles, sparkling cider, and our friend Dan serenading us on his guitar. Saundra and Sarah acted as our servers as well as another friend from the ward Trevor. It turns out they had made this wonderful dinner for us and served it to us. It was all so incredible, that I couldn't believe when they brought us the "check" (a red paper folded in half with a note in it), what it said. They had gotten together and bought us a night's stay at this adorable bed and breakfast in Provo and sent us on our way over there as soon as we were done with dinner. These are some pictures of the room we stayed in. It was called the Whispering Willows room, and was beautiful!

What an amazing night! Bill and I don't have a clue how to thank them enough. I really think it's the nicest thing that's ever been done for me and Bill agrees it's the same for him. We did the best we could by making some delectable mango rice to share with them tonight and writing a thank you note, but how do you really thank people that are that caring and go to so much effort to give you a lift and a good memory? They went so beyond the call of duty that I almost started crying on the spot when I saw their note to us out of pure gratitude. I really do wish there were something more I could do to express my appreciation.

Haircut!

I've been wanting to get my hair cut for ages and finally got around to doing it today. It's been long for the last few years and I decided to go shorter for the summer. Not short like when I was younger, but just not halfway down my back. Here's what it looks like straightened from the appointment today. I'll post a curly picture another day.

A Plague on Delta and Travel Agencies

Bill and I had plans to fly out to Cancun last night for our honeymoon that we didn't really have when we got married in January. We've been planning it for months and were so excited to go. When we got to the airport, we found out my ticket was made in my maiden name and when I changed my name with Delta's records, they failed to change the ticket. They wanted to charge us $200 to make the change, which is absolutely absurd. They gave us no service and wouldn't help us at all. We ended up getting our tickets refunded and headed home rather dejected late last night. The hotel we were staying at in Cancun was a free deal that we got by going to a presentation while we were engaged, so we thought we'd lost it by not being able to get there on the flight. Needless to say, last night we didn't feel so happy or great.

However, when we woke up this morning, we found out that all non-essential flights to Mexico have been cancelled because of the swine flu that is going around down there. It's really bad and over 100 people have died from it in Mexico. If we had gone last night it probably would have been a very bad idea. There's a good chance we wouldn't have made it out of Atlanta where we had a stopover scheduled or something else bad might have happened.

That being the case, we called the travel agency that had booked the hotel this morning, hoping to get the trip transferred or at least our $100 deposit back. Their response? We could change it to a specific date if we wanted, but only make those changes today, and it doesn't matter that we don't know if the swine flu will be over by whatever date we pick. Oh, and if we want to change it, we have to pay $350 to do it. And no way can we get our deposit back. That's final regardless of if the state department has basically told everyone not to fly to Mexico. Does that travel agency care? Nope!

This hasn't been the best start to this week. Definitely not.

Camping and Canyoneering

Bill and I headed down to the Goblin Valley area with some friends to go camping and canyoneering this weekend to celebrate the end of the semester. We left Thursday and came back Saturday afternoon. It was such a fun weekend! It's always great to get out of Provo for a few days, and we had tons of fun doing this canyon, Baptist Draw. We would have done another one, but we got rained out. Oh well. Good times all around!

This was how most of the canyon was. It was so narrow and so many pretty spots.

I love Bill's face in this one. It screams, "Who are these people and how the heck did I get into this canyon?!"

This was the first place we had to span to get across. It was a little too wide for me and to be honest, I was scared of falling, so my friend Adam came and gave me a hand. That's Adam Read from Colorado Springs, Tori, if you're reading this. Small world.

After getting out of the canyon we headed down to Goblin Valley to play on the goblins. This shot looks cool, but really it's me being too scared to stand up on the goblin because it was so windy. :) See the clouds? That's why we didn't do another canyon the next day.

Isn't Goblin Valley cool? I highly recommend making a trip down there for anyone in Utah. What a fun place to explore!

This picture is all for Hillary. Manpris and chacos, all of her favorite things.

It looked like a saddle. What can I say? It was a great weekend.

Oh, and one more thing. For all of your viewing pleasure, this is Bill showing he's 5 popped collar cool.

Swanki Hats GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Swanki Hats GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

These are the cutest hats! You should totally go look at them.

Finished Decorating House Pics

Save for a few pillows and a set of curtains in our bedroom, the apartment is as decorated as it's going to get. I think it turned out quite cute. Here's a few shots of the living room:

From the "dining room". Good shot of our new rug.
View from the front door. And yes, that's Bill's legs, standing on our kitchen counter. You can do that in your own apartment you know.Our more artsy wedding photographyA few fun photos at the temple after our wedding right next to our front doorWe got a bunch of pillows from IKEA that we really like. Oh, and Bill really likes to jump on the bed, since there's 3 inches of foam under that amazing down comforter. Here's him levitating.

What an awesome weekend it's been!

This weekend has been fantastic. Yesterday was super busy and tons of fun. Bill started the day early with a 7AM dance final. That part wasn't so great, but I was asleep, so no worries, right? :) I got up shortly after he got back and we made pancakes for breakfast and then headed out to Kohl's and then to a piano store to play some different digital pianos. How awesome would it be if we could afford a $2300 Clavinova? I'll settle for something for about half that price that will fit into our living room. That is, in about 6 months when we've earned enough to buy it!

Next we went to see Monsters and Aliens with a gift card from our wedding. It was at that new theater in Orem, which is so nice! It took us about 5 seconds to get our tickets at a kiosk before we went in and then we walked right into the theater. How cool is that? No lines! By the way, it's a really cute movie. It had some great one liners and lots of laughs.

After that we headed to Paradise Bakery in American Fork for lunch and then on to meet a couple friends to go shooting on the other side of Utah Lake. We had tons of fun, though Bill and I completely forgot ear protection. Stupid, I know. He stuck some 38 specials in his ears and they worked just great, but my ears are a little small for those. :) I stuffed some tissue in my ears and hoped for the best. That didn't work out so well as my right ear started ringing after the first shot and it's still ringing today. Oops! It's a lot better now, but it's still going to take some time for my hearing to come back all the way. Not my most intelligent moment.

After shooting it was off to Guitar Center in Salt Lake to play a few more reasonably-priced digital pianos and then a quick stop off at IKEA to pick up square pillows to go inside the cute pillow covers we bought last week for our bed. I'll have to take a picture and post it.

We stopped by Chili's on the way home for dinner. It was one of our last wedding gift cards. Sad day! We've done lots of fun things these last 3 months on other peoples dime. Thanks everyone!

We've been training for over a month now for the St. George Marathon. It was a little hard to get out on long runs these last few weeks when I was so sick, so yesterday we promised ourselves that we'd go on our planned 8-mile long run. That turned into leaving at 10:40pm to run and running somewhere between 6 and 7 miles. Close enough, right?

And that was the day! Crazy busy and never a moment to stop and breathe, but so much fun!

Wish I could get to Texas

So my brother and his girlfriend eloped recently and are having a wedding reception the first weekend in May. My mom and 2 sisters all got tickets to head down for a quick 1-day trip to be there for it. I want to go too! The $325 plane ticket just isn't fitting into the new student budget Bill and I are on these days. Sad! Anyone want to buy a plane ticket for me? :)

I got a scholarship!

A couple weeks ago I found out the bad news that the government thinks Bill and I are made of money, so we don't qualify for pell grants. This week I got much better news. I found out Monday that I got a scholarship from my program! $2000 for both Fall and Winter semesters. It doesn't pay for the whole $5000 price tag of one semester of grad school, but it does take off the edge. I'm quite pleased.

Feelin' Domestic

So I love headbands but they always give me such a headache, so when some of my coworkers found this place that sells headbands that tie underneath, I was so excited! One problem. They're $15 or so bucks, each. Yeah, seriously. Who can afford that? Well, I probably could before I got married and got into grad school, but not these days! Well then at Christmas time my coworker gave me an adorable green one of these headbands and I found out that she made them herself. Second round of excitement for me! I have a sewing machine thanks to my wonderful mother-in-law, and they really don't look hard to make. So I've been planning on trying my hand at this project since January and finally got to it this weekend. My sister and her roommate helped me pick out a couple cute squares of fabric at WalMart last night and I started working on them today during the afternoon session of conference, which was amazing, by the way. :)

Below are a few pictures of the result. I'm so pleased with how they turned out! They have a couple really great features. One, like I said earlier, they tie instead of having an elastic band. You can make them as loose or tight as you want. It's awesome. Two, if you look close at third picture you'll see that there's little velcro tabs on them. It helps them stay in place in your hair, so if you want to wear them with your hair in a ponytail, you don't have to pin it in. What a great little feature!

Anyway, here's the breakdown on cost. Piece of material, $1.50. It made 4 headbands. Ribbon for tie, $2.00. I still have some of both left and could make several more with it. Velcro tabs, $2.50 for a pack of 20. I used all those up. So the final price, including tax? $1.27 each. I made 8 of them in a few hours. It would take me less time now that I know how to do it. I made up the pattern from the finished one, so it took a little while at first to get going, but was super fast once I got into a rhythm. Anyone want the pattern?

Festival of Colors

Bill and I took one of my old roommates Saundra with us to the Hare Krishna Festival of Colors yesterday. It was so much fun! Here's some pictures of the festivities. There's the three of us in the midst of throwing the colors, what it looked like when I finally dared pull my camera back out after it had died down some, and then what we looked like afterward. What a fun afternoon! We'll definitely be doing this next year. :)

Sick and not getting better

I've had a sore throat for over a month. Yup, over a month. I finally went to the doctor the other day and she told me to get a humidifier. Now that very well may work and I plan to as soon as April comes and I actually have money again, but I'm just wondering what the deal is?! I've lived in a dry climate my entire life. We don't run our heater high, or at all if we can help it since we live on the third floor and we're plenty warm. I drink plenty of water, but yet I feel perma-dehydrated. I'm so tired of this!

Oh, and to make matters worse, the allergic tendencies I've had since high school seem to be ratcheting up these days. I've taken more allergy medication in the last 6 months than I care to think about.

I really just hate taking medicine and in the last few months I've taken more than I've needed to in years and I still don't feel very good! Sorry for the complaining post if you're reading this, but it's been an exceptionally frustrating morning and I have nothing else interesting to talk about at the moment. I could really use a very long vacation, that's all I can say.

Vice President of Events

I just applied for the Vice President of Events for the BYU Graduate Student Society. I'm so excited about the position! I hope I get a chance to interview for it. It would be right up my alley. Fun times!

Running Woes

Bill and I usually run together in the evenings, but tonight I have a commitment in Salt Lake, so I decided to go running this morning. The weather has been gorgeous these last few days, so I was only wearing shorts and a running tank top. I was maybe half a mile into my 3-mile run when I looked down and saw a wire ring on the ground kind of like a hanger. I stepped on it with one foot and apparently hooked my other foot in the ring because before I knew it I was scraping along the cement on my hands, knees, and thighs. No fun at all! The small amount of clothing I had on did nothing to shield me from the concrete! I kind of just laid there for a minute, shocked that I had fallen so fast, and then slowly got up to discover that I had torn a chunk out of my right hand and my left knee was pretty scraped up. I wasn't bleeding too much, so I decided to keep going on my run, but needless to say, my pace slowed down quite a bit.

When I got home, I started cleaning myself up and discovered that I also scraped up my right thigh and knee pretty good and my left hand is roughed up too, though nothing like my right. When I fell, I slid along on my chest and stomach a little bit, and when I looked in the mirror I realized the whole front of my tank top was covered with dust. I can't imagine what I looked like out running! Bloody knee, dirty shirt, roughed up legs and hands...I'm all patched up now, but moving kind of slow. I wouldn't call it the best start to my Friday, that's for sure. It made me want to curl up on the couch and not do anything. Wouldn't it be nice to have that luxury!

Working on Grad School Stuff

I've been working on some of my admissions stuff for grad school these last couple days. I got my official acceptance letter yesterday with a packet of information and I've been going through it and doing things like updating my personal information, changing to my married name, doing scholarship applications, looking at schedules and what my program is actually going to be like, and details like that. It makes me so excited! I just can't wait to get going in this new program and a new direction in my professional life. I feel like I've been floating along in limbo for quite awhile at the place I currently work, without a good career path, and this new direction just makes me want to do a happy dance. Actually, I've done one several times already. :) I can't wait to get back into school!

I Got In!

It's official. Nearly 3 years after I graduated with my bachelor's degree from BYU, I've received another acceptance letter from them for their Masters of Public Administration program. I'm going to grad school! I can't even tell you how excited I am. I've wanted to go back practically from the day I graduated the first time, but it's taken a few years for everything to fall into place and me to get to this point. I'm just so excited I can't even contain it!

A Book Giveaway!!! (with a twist)

I'm giving away this book:
























But wait! There's a twist to this giveaway, so read on to find out the stipulations.

A childhood friend of mine gave me this book in a similar blog giveaway and I absolutely loved it! This book has a powerful message, and this friend of mine is trying to do something to help it, via her website Thrilled by the Thought. I've decided to help her cause as well. So, if you enter this giveaway, you're signing up to 1. read it (soon), 2. give it away (on a blog, to a neighbor, whoever), 3. go back to my friend's blog, thrilledbythethought.com and tell her who you gave it away to so she can track it. I'm linked to her blog, so I'll find out as it gets passed on, as she'll blog about it. Once you read it and pass it on, please let give it to someone that will agree to the same terms.

Now, let me tell you why this book must be passed around. It is a fascinating story of how one person can change many lives. Greg Mortenson was hiking the famous K2 mountain of Pakistan in 1993 when he

got lost, nearly died, and stumbled upon a tiny village. As he was being nursed back to health by the villagers, he asked to see the village’s school. What he was shown was shocking. Boys (and a few girls) were outside in the elements (without a teacher), scratching their lessons into the frozen ground. It turns out that a teacher cost $1 a day. The village was too poor to afford that salary, so they teamed up with another village to hire a teacher. Even between the two villages, they could not afford to pay a teacher to teach every day. So on the off days, the students gathered to practice their lessons.

How many American children do you know that would dedicate that much effort to school?

Mortenson returned to America and tried to raise enough money to build a school and hire a teacher for this village. It took him a long time, but he finally found a donor who was willing to give it a shot. Mortenson returned and built the school, under extremely difficult adversities. Later, with the help of the same donor, Mortenson was able to set up a fund, called the Central Asia Institute (CAI). He has since established 78 schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan, with a special emphasis in helping girls receive their education. (You can read more about this book and see pictures of the schools at www.threecupsoftea.com).

Mortenson believes that the only way to end the terrible conflicts in these areas is through education.

So back to my friend's blog and what she wants to do to help Mortensen's cause. In her words:

"I believe he [Mortensen] is right. That is why I am giving away this book. Each time this book is given away, I will donate $1.00 to the Central Asia Institute, and I will invite any willing readers to do the same. It only costs $1.00 a month for one child’s education in Afghanistan or Pakistan.

So that is why it is important that if you enter to win this book, you must accept the terms to

1. read it soon and give it away
2. come back to www.thrilledbythethought.com to tell me about it
3. make sure the person you give it to agrees to give it away and follow the same terms you have agreed to"

So as to how this giveaway works. Leave a comment on my blog by March 13th to be entered into the giveaway. Send a friend over to my blog and you'll get two additional entries. If you blog about giveaway on your blog, you'll get five additional entries. You can do one or all three! Giveaway ends Friday, March 13th. I plan to donate each timet his book is passed along as well, so please help me and my friend keep this going!