Sleep

As a continuation from the last post.....

After Sadie and I picked my mom up from the airport on Monday night we decided we wanted to go out to eat and then hang out back at the house for a bit to catch up and talk about all the big changes coming.  My moms plane got in late so we knew we were going to have a really late start getting back to school.

Sadie, her friends Lauren and Abbey, and I all were at the airport to pick up my mom.  She had absolutely no idea we were going to be in town and her reaction was the best.   She had hardly made it though the security doors when we jumped out.  She froze in her steps and let out a high pitched scream for about a minute straight. It was actually quite impressive. She was so happy and we were so glad we could be there to welcome her home!

So after dinner and getting back to the house, we finally got up the motivation to get on the road (it was so hard to leave our mom).   It was after 10 pm.  and we had a long night ahead of us.   

I dropped off Sadie and Lauren in Burley and bought my first ever energy drink.  It was disgusting, but I drank it anyway just to be safe for the part of the trip I was going to be alone.  The trip got even longer as I neared went through the Sweetzeer pass with snowy roads. yuck.  Harry ended up not getting the Land Cruiser and was waiting for me to pick him up in Ogden.  Just before 4 am I got there and he loaded up his stuff and we continued on down to Provo.  He had an assignment due the next day at 8 and so when we got to Provo we unloaded all of our crap and he printed some stuff off at my house and headed back to his house at about 6:30 am.  

The next day was a tough one.   As was the rest of the week trying to catch up.  I even got sick one night and was up half the night again.  I need more sleep!

This weekend was good though, we got our engagement picture taken from Casey Hyer and they turned out really good!  It was really fun and Casey is great.  He even bought us lunch from Moochies and we picked the ones we want to print and he edited them all in that one afternoon.  I will put pictures up soon!

We only had one little crisis the night before when my outfits for the pictures were not quite done and the mall was closing.  PANIC.  I was locked inside one store as I was buying the one thing I needed.  We even had to rush to Target after that to get one more skirt, which I ended up making out of a men's button up collared shirt.  Ridiculous, yes, I know.

Falcons, Freeways, and French Fries

Falcons.

So my professor (the one who has us writing these weekly blog entries) is an avid falconer.   Until I took this class, I didn't even know this was a legitimate hobby.  Well, apparently it is, and there is a whole society of falconers, and they even have tournaments.   This last weekend one of those tournaments was held in the boonies out past Eagle Mountain City and my professor gave us the opportunity to volunteer at the tournament.   He asked if any of us knew how to drive a truck, so with out really thinking about it I volunteered because I have a truck and CDL.   Friday morning came around and it was time to head out to the tournament.   As I was making that hour long drive out to the tournament it finally dawned on me that I actually wasn't sure why I was doing this, because I actually don't like birds.  They kinda freak me out a little.  In fact, on multiple occasions I have had birds swoop down and hit me.   

Anyway,  despite my discomfort with birds, I ended up having a great time and learned a lot.   I got to wear a bright orange tent-jacket and help with parking.   Not only is there a large society of falconers, they draw spectators as well.   It was really interesting being out there and learning about how the tournament works and  talking to all the different falcon trainers that had come in to fly their bird.  

Unfortunately I didn't get to stay very long because Sadie and I had made plans to meet up in Burley just before 2:00.

So off I went and got on the freeway for the drive back to Boise.   I got a little bit of a late start from being at the tournament that morning so I really had to book it down the freeway.    I had hardly slept all week and had woke up at 5:00 am again and so I was a little worried about being sleepy.   I drank a five hour energy and had some red vines and peanut m&m's.   

I met up with Sadie at 1:58  ( I was under orders that the latest I could get there was 2:00).  And then Sadie and her friend Lauren hopped in my truck and we were off.   About Mountain Home I was starting to feel a little shaky and realized the only thing I had eaten that day was that candy and energy thing that morning.  BAD.  So we made an emergency Wendy's stop and Sadie drove the rest of the way.   

On our way into town I call my mom and tell her that I am riding with Kristen and we are headed into town and I could get dropped off and take her to the airport instead of parking her car there the whole weekend.  My mom and Brooke are in San Francisco for the weekend (and he proposed on Saturday!) and Sadie and I had devised a scheme to be able to surprise her at the airport when she gets back tomorrow (good thing she doesn't read these blogs).  In order for Sadie to have a car for the weekend, I took mom to the airport and Sadie took my car home.   That way my mom thinks I will have to go back early Monday and wont be here when she gets home, and she has no idea Sadie is here!  Genius. I know.

About the whole proposal: I AM SO EXCITED.  Brooke is such a great guy and we are so excited to have him as a part of the family.  He makes my mom happy and he really cares about us all.  It is going to be a fun year.  My cousin Jamie, my mom, my 2nd cousin Natalie and I are all getting married (plus a bunch of other friends) and two of my cousins (Nikki & Josh , and Nate & Jen) are going to be having a baby!  

I had my last dress fitting that evening and it's perfect!  All the alterations are done, and I just love it!

The rest of the weekend has been spent getting more wedding stuff, and spending more money I don't have.  I love being poor.

French Fries.

So another assignment from the professor this week was to "buy a stranger a coke."  All this entailed was to buy someone you didn't know, something.   I was really excited about this assignment.  So I was being 'compelled' to  serve,  but I wasn't quite sure how I wanted to do it.  I decided I was going to pay for someone's food who was behind my in a fast food, drive-through line.   I wasn't really hungry at the time so I brought along my dog, Gunner. so I could buy him a hamburger from Wendy's (double service).  The whole time I was driving there I was just hoping someone would pull up behind me in line so that I could pay for their exact order.   As I pulled into the line, I saw a younger guy pull up behind me and I was pretty excited, but I was really excited when I saw that he had a little boy in the backseat too!

I got to the window to pay and just mentioned that I would like to pay for the person behind me as well.  The guy at the window said "oh, ok, but you realize that their order is substantially more than yours."  I told him that was fine and he got a big smile on his face and said "ok, if you are sure!"  And then he happily sent me on my way.  I made sure to drive off quickly so I was gone before the guy behind me came around the corner to the window.

It made me feel really good to do that,  and I think I am going to do that a lot more.  Just a fun way to do a little service!

And Gunner enjoyed his hamburger as well.

I wish Harry could be here this weekend!  It is one of the only breaks we get the whole semester and we didn't get to spend it together.   He is with the Anderson's in Ogden and is working on the sickest Land Cruiser (that may potentially become ours) ever.  I just wish we had more time so we could do all these things together.   It has been fun to see his family though.  They are such great people and I am so happy I will officially be a part of the Douglass clan soon!

the dress-capade

There are currently six brand new dresses and one new skirt hanging on my bedroom walls.  All of which were purchased in this last week.  At least they are not ALL for me.

So after skiing at the Canyons last Saturday, Harry and I decided to go shopping at the Park City outlet malls to look for a suit for him and outfits for our engagement picture that we are taking in a few weeks.   We started at Banana Republic looking for suits and we found  a really good one and some brown pants for him, but wanted to make sure so we kept looking around at other stores.....EVERY SINGLE STORE in the outlet mall.   If you know Harry and I at all, you would know (1.) we don't like shopping and (2.) we take forever when we shop to make a decision -which is probably why we don't like to shop.   So yes, the only stores that we skipped were the children's clothing stores and the out door and sporting good store, because we knew we would spend even longer in those and probably buy something we didn't actually need. 

About 5 hours later we are getting around to the last shops.  We haven't bought a thing and I am getting grumpy and hungry (strangely the roles had changed).  And we come to the dress barn and I tell Harry that we are not going in there because that is an old lady store and I wont like any thing.  He insists that we go look at least.  Well apparently I like old lady dresses because about 30 seconds after we walk in I have gasped twice because I like a dress so much.  Well after a long process of trying on dresses and thinking they didn't have my size and magically fitting into a smaller size, I bought two dresses to wear to wear for the luncheon and then a get-a-way dress!   The ladies in the store were so excited that the one dress fit, that they started cheering and giving me high fives.  Sadly, it was more exciting than when I got my wedding dress from the dead-head david's bridal consultant.  (ok I was still WAY more excited to get my wedding dress.)

Any way so I got those two dresses and then we continued on our way.  At about the 6 hour mark of us shopping we have gone to every store and Harry has convinced himself that he does not want to buy that suit now.  I convince him that it was a good suit and he looked great (and it was less than $200!)  So we go BACK to try on that suit.....and he ended up getting it.  And then with opening a card there we look at some of the discounts we could get that day and we go BACK into the store we just came out of and got the brown pants -because they actually did have his size- that we spent the whole day looking for.

So that is part 1.

The next part is about bridesmaid dresses.   I have been looking online EVERYWHERE for some gray bridesmaid dresses and I had found some on-line that I loved....but they only had size xl, which would work out and I was getting discouraged.  They were perfect!  I was telling my Kristen about the dresses and she tells me those dresses just happen to be in the BYU bookstore of all places.  

Well the next day I just headed there in between classes and sure enough, there were there in all the sizes I needed!  strange, but YAY!

While I was getting those, I also saw a skirt I thought was good for the engagement pictures...  I bought it too.

I also saw this really pretty black lace dress, but had no reason for actually getting it so I just left.  Then as I was talking to my sister later that day I was mentioning how I still need to buy a  black dress for me being a bridesmaid in my cousin Jamie's wedding......der-duh-der.  I have also been looking everywhere for a black dress for her wedding, so I went back up to campus and bought that dress too.  All along I have been looking for dresses everywhere and I guess I just had to go to school more.  stupid.

Six dresses later, this weekend we spent about another hour looking again for another one for the pictures. 

And I also got my hair done which took 6 hours of my life I will never get back.  It looks good, but that was a little ridiculous.

Yay for dresses!  At least I got a little done for the wedding!

BEEF STEW!...saved my life

So this week I decided to make some beef stew with the beef from my grandpa's cows (it is the best beef).  My mom so kindly loaded me up last time I was home, and this time I got a package labeled "stew meat."  I  like it when the meat tells me what  I should do with it.

Anyway the stew turned out pretty good, but as I was making it I was reminded of a time when beef stew really did save the day....

My senior year of high school I went to Tajikistan for the fall semester to live with my best friend Kelsi and her family while her father was on an assignment with the U.S. government.  While we were there we did online classes, joined a youth group, went to some embassy activities, attended a Marine corps ball,  hung out with a few really neat families, and went long-boarding and bowling a lot.  We did get to make some really neat trips with her family too.  There were a lot of historic sights around that we would go see and markets on the weekends.  Also, the closest ACT available was in Abu Dhabi so we HAD to make a little excursion over there too....dang.   But this story is about our trip through the Pamir Mountain Range along the Tajik-Afghanistan border.  We were travelling to this little town that took us two days of driving along a really sketchy dirt road..... where this was a common warning sign, there were bridges made of scrap wood or metal that I was sure would not hold a car as we drove over,and young armed boys patrolling the border asking for a cigarette.

Because the trip was so long we stayed in a hostel? at the halfway point where we had dinner, explored a little, and then played skip-bo by candle light (although I some how remember that not being necessary).    So  we continued on our trip and really had a great time.   The scenery there was absolutely beautiful with huge gray rock mountains coming right down to  meet the glacier water river that has a misty teal color.   We got to see a lot of neat things on that trip and some of my favorite memories from the whole stay.   However, on our way back we had a slightly unpleasant experience, where the beef stew actually comes into play (finally!).  We stayed in the same hostel thing and were fed dinner again.  This time as we ate dinner, one of us found a hair in our food,  and then another one of us did, and then kelsi cut  open a piece of her food and found a little meal worm.. or something.  The hairs were bad, but the worm was too much to handle, but we were hungry. Kelsi and I, trying not to be rude, played around with our food for a while and then left the dining area (which was also great because they were kind enough to turn on some tajik soap opera or something and it was getting weird) and headed outside to go "explore some more."  

 Really, we were just heading outside to eat some of Kelsi's father's, Kim, MRE's and one of them happened to be beef stew.   Maybe we just hadn't eaten very good food in the last few days, but those MRE's tasted like heaven in pre-packaged bag.   The beef stew was amazing and there were definitely enough calories in it to last me a while.... just like they are designed to do.   Beef stew actually became a little slogan of ours--didn't make any sense but to this day I sometimes randomly yell "BEEF STEW!"  I think we even made a movie about it.  Maybe it is on youtube, maybe it is not.

Do you ever start a story and it ends up being really long and turns out to not be a very good story.... ya, that just happened.  Sorry.

peace and blessings from Dubai