My mission president's wife sent these YouTube links of a couple videos some missionaries put together of my mission that I wanted to save. So I decided what better place to save them then on my blog. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdFcyScV0ZU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCoIMivKLjA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zr-hzdNZuyg
Well I think I've earned the right to say that I have one of the coolest, most determined Dad's in the world! This last Saturday he successfully ran the St. George Marathon! Mom and I went up to cheer for him as he came across the finish line. It was an overcast, windy, rainy day, but that didn't stop him. He started the race at 6:45am in the dark (because it was so overcast). It sprinkled on and off during the entire race and they had a 15mph head wind as well. But he still did a fabulous job! He ran the race in 5hrs 21min and looked great as he came across the finish line. He wasn't exhausted, he didn't collapse like other people we saw, he didn't look like he was in pain, nor did he have a limp or anything. We were very proud of him and treated him to a big Denny's breakfast at 1pm in the afternoon. :) Great Job Dad!!
We finally made it back up to Provo to visit friends and family. Two of my sisters and their husbands, my brother and many of our college and mission friends live in the area. The last time we were there was in February, so this was a long awaited visit for sure. Travis had his first Jewish Holiday break at school so we decided to head up to Provo (Touro is a private Jewish Medical School so he gets Jewish Holidays as well as the regular holidays off).
We got in Friday night just in time to pick up Sarah and run up to Cabelas for 45 minutes of shopping before the store closed. Then since we were up there, we called Travis's friend Wyatt and his wife Mindy came and met up with us at Chipotle, the dinner of choice by my pregnant sister Sarah. :) Then we headed back to Provo, said hi to the fam over at Jess's and then headed over to Sarah and David's to get settled in for the night. They live in a cute 2 bedroom house. It must be so nice having a yard and a place to park!
Anyways, Saturday morning Travis got up super early to meet up with his friend's dad and people to go blue grouse hunting somewhere outside of Bountiful. We had decided to cancel hiking and biking since I had a horrible cold. So instead of doing our usual adventurous activities I decided it'd be nice to go shopping. So Jessica, Sarah, Lisa and I went home decor shopping. It was a blast and we all came away with great Halloween and Fall decorations at a great deal too, of course. Then we ate Noodles for lunch-my favorite! Then the plan for the evening was for Jess, Sarah and I to go to Relief Society General Conference at the Conference Center in Salt Lake. Sarah had never been to a live session of Conference before so it was a fun thing for the 3 of us to do together. The talks were amazing, of course, and I was reminded how much I actually enjoy watching conference in the conference center.
After that we headed over to meet the boys at Tucanos in Salt Lake. It's gorgeous! It's bigger then the Provo one and had great lighting (my favorite). The food was just as good and we had a great time. It's Travis's favorite restaurant so he definitely enjoyed himself especially after a long day of hunting.
On Sunday, we slept in. I had just been so exhausted from my head cold that sleeping was exactly what I needed. So Sarah and David got back from church around 11:30am, just in time for us to wake up and do breakfast. :) We got ready and ate and then headed off to church with Jessica and Thomas. After Church we met back up with Sarah, David and Joe (who was making cookies-his assignment for the pot luck later that night) and decided to head up Provo Canyon to check out the changing leaves and to see if the fishing was good. It was so beautiful up there! Fall is definitely my favorite time of year and I miss all of the colors and the plants and everything. It was a nice escape.
That night Jessica & Thomas hosted a pot luck with our friends. Lisa & Mike came, Jocie & Scott, Wyatt & Mindy, and the fam of course. We had blue grouse buffalo wings for appetizers, compliments of Travis's hunt and they were a hit! So yummy! Jessica's cute little apartment held us all well and we enjoyed a yummy pork roast with corn, mashed potatoes and salad. It was so nice catching up with Lisa and Jocie! I miss them tons and miss even more just laughing with them. It's so easy to laugh when you are with old friends. We played games as well and I lost it laughing so hard playing my favorite game-catch phrase. :) We said our good-bye's to everyone that night since they all had work and school the next day.
Monday Travis and I went fly fishing in the Provo River. It was a great adventure. I'd never fly fished in a river before and I made good use out of my waders. It was pretty difficult standing in a rushing river and trying to walk in my father-in-law's boots (since I don't have any of my own yet), but I did ok and didn't fall in, although I was worried. Travis was teaching me how to cast and place the fly and where to place it and everything. At the end of his little lesson he casts the fly and totally catches a fish! It was amazing! I told him he should be on a fishing show or something with skills like that. :) I tried a bunch of times and almost caught a fish twice, but it's super hard. We did get some good pictures though.
Next we went to Cabelas again because of course 45 minutes on Friday night was not long enough. So we took our time going to each dept and unfortunately were not every successful. They were out of a lot of things we wanted. Bummer... We did find a medium sized tent we liked and are asking for it for Christmas this year, so that was good.
Anyway, that was our much needed, long awaited trip to Provo. It was so good to see everyone and I hope that someday we'll be able to live in the same town as my family and our old friends again.
Our adventure this weekend was a trip to the hot springs near Hoover Dam. Travis mentioned the idea to people at PA school and they were all excited to go. Sarah & Cory Smith also came with us making our group a total of 16 people! It's still pretty warm out, so it wasn't the best temperature, even for a night hike, to go sit in the hot springs, but it was still lots of fun. The springs are always changing. We've been down there a hand full of times or so now and the pools are either bigger or smaller, or some are non-existent any anymore. The big pool was a good depth, probably 4ft deep, but pretty cool water, and most of the smaller pools were still there and really hot. Going down there often brings back great memories of mine and Travis' first "unofficial" group date! Travis likes to say it was the first time I also saw him naked since he went skinny dipping, but of course I didn't look! Although, the idea of him skinny dipping just being home from his mission was a pretty appealing gesture. :) Anyway, we had a blast and it was great spending time with Sarah & Cory, as always!
We got one! And she's a pretty big one too! I seriously think she was the size of a small horse! And yes, that is me all decked out in camo, can you believe it? I never thought I'd give in to wearing that stuff, but there I am all stealth-like in my camo. Anyways, so here's the story. We woke up before 1st light, as usual. We had our plan all ready to go. They, Travis and his Dad, decided that we would do the same thing we did the last weekend we were up and see if we couldn't find the cows in the western fields this time. So I dropped Travis and off and David drove around on the east side of the fields glassing across to see if he could spot anything. After awhile I hiked east on the southern edge of the fields and then decided to drive north. I figured it wouldn't be a problem since there were some other guys around making tons of noise on their ATV's driving in the same direction. So I ended picking Travis up and we decided to head back to camp to pick up David and then head back out.
Well on our way to camp, Travis looks to his north, off the main road and sees a few brown spots in the distance. So he stops, glasses, and sees a whole bunch of elk! I couldn't believe it-off the main road again! We got the antelope and deer off the main road as well, without much hiking involved. This time he would just have to hike out toward them to get close enough to pull off a shot. We couldn't believe where we had found them though-in the middle of the sage, on their way back to tree line, which was a long ways away, from eating the alfalfa fields earlier that morning. Anyway, I got to watch the kill from my binoculars far away while Travis sneaked up on them. It took 4 shots to get her down. After the 1st shot, most of the elk too off, including a huge Bull. But another bull and calf hung around. It was kind of sad to see this little family lurking behind, but eventually they took off as well.
Next was the chore of getting it back and dressing it etc. Normally you have to cut an elk up into quarters to get it out from where you shoot it down. But since we were in the flats and in the sage, David dragged the thing to the road behind his ATV! Talk about saving time and strength! Then they gutted her, the worst part of the whole process, while I sat in the truck and continued reading my last Harry Potter book. I really got into those books and literally could not put them down. I finished that day and was so glad to be free of my addiction, but they were really really good! Anyway, the next chore was getting the elk into the truck to take back to camp. (see picture below) Those come-alongs are pretty handy. So we got the elk back to camp and then Travis had the disgusting chore of cutting up the elk in order to get it into the coolers. It's still pretty hot around Pioche in September, so we couldn't just take it back whole. So overall it was a pretty easy hunt, and we couldn't have asked for a better weekend to go!
David on the ATV on his way out to meet up with Travis and his kill.
What did I tell you? It's the size of a small horse!!
And then this last picture of this bull elk was taken the day after we got the cow. The herd was back in the exact same spot they were the day before! This guy was really close to the road.
Monday, September 1st was opening day of Travis's Cow Elk Hunt. I personally was pretty excited for this hunt, mostly because I'm so curious to try elk and see what it tastes like. Everyone says it's a lot better then most other game. Anyways, we set out Saturday night to go scout out our measly area-the Atlanta Farms Fields. The owners want hunters to come in and thin out the herds because they chow down on their crop. So we only have a 5 mile radius to hunt on all the way around the farm. The farm is pretty big, but the area where the elk would be is pretty small. Saturday night we went spot-lighting and saw a few deer and we think 1 herd of elk. Sunday we went scouting around all day, saw a few cow elk, but in an area that would be impossible to find them again in on Monday. We did see some elk right next to the fields 1st thing in the morning though, so from there we, well Travis, devised our plan of attack. Monday morning, 5am, we drove in on the south end of the fields. I dropped Travis off and hiked north along the edge of the fields. I sat in the truck snoozing until I was given the ok to drive ahead and glass. (I couldn't see anything because it was dark and because I was in the trees so I felt justified in snoozing). I was abruptly woken up by a radio call from Trav saying he had found some elk. Hooray! We were so excited. Our plan worked! But, a few minutes later, Travis informed me that they were all BULL ELK! I couldn't believe it. Bull are hard enough to find, let alone on the day we were suppose to be finding cow. So I had to see for myself. And sure enough, there were 7 Bull Elk making their way out of the fields heading due south towards me. Check out the up close and personal video. Unfortunately, we were not successful this trip since our cows turned out to be bulls, but we'll be back before the tag expires.
