Palmer... Life As We Know It!

Announcement

2011-12-25T22:44:00.003-07:00

I know it has been a while since we wrote on our blog, but I thought that this would be the perfect time to do so. IVY IS PREGNANT! For reals. She is about 10 weeks along and the tentative due date is July 21, 2012. We barely told our families this weekend (Christmas Day to be exact), and aren't quite ready to make a large facebook announcement so we are doing so on the blog. We will eventually post it on facebook, but right now we don't want people from high school that we never talked to then are rarely talk to now to post some insincere comment. This is as low key as we can get. If you are reading this then you either noticed that we updated our blog or stumbled upon it by happy coincidence (serendipity, if you would). The first ultrasound will be performed Tuesday December 27 here in Logan. Other than that I don't have much else to say. Merry Christmas everyone.

WICKED!

2011-07-31T21:50:00.000-06:00

Okay so this happened awhile ago... but IT WAS AWESOME! So I am going to reminisce. In May my fabulous mother Alison, spectacular cousin Randi, and awesome aunts Marilyn and Janice went to Boise, Id to see the musical WICKED. It was AMAZING!!

TWINNERS :)

LOVE THIS GIRL!

A Real Vacation Day

2011-03-10T20:42:00.003-07:00

Today was our real vacation day, I didn't do any work and Ivy and I got to spend the whole day together. It was a wonderful day. We started off by hopping in our car and driving an hour South to Albuquerque. We made our first stop at the temple. We didn't attend a session, but did walk around the grounds and enjoy seeing a temple that we may not get back to for a long time. After that we drove out to the Petroglyph Nation Monument. We hiked 3 small trails and saw a ton of petroglyphs on the volcanic rock around Albuquerque. From there we headed to Old Town Albuquerque. It is where the original townsite was started. We visited the Catholic Church and then took a tour around the Plaza where we learned all about the early history of the the city. It is beautiful just to walk around and see buildings that have been around for 300+ years. My favorite part of our trip to Old Town Albuquerque was our visit to the Rattlesnake Museum. I was a little worried because I don't like snakes, but I make it through better than Ivy did. We walked around and saw some fairly active snakes, but it wasn't until we spotted the 5 foot long rattlesnake that Ivy started to really feel squeamish. She actually froze for a little bit before she could convince her body that she was in no danger. We also had the opportunity to see some snakes swallowing mice. It was an amazing thing to see how it all works. We visited some of the shops around the plaza and then headed down to the Isotopes Stadium where we had our pictures taken with Homer and Marge Simpson. We then drove across town to walk through a mall. I was in seventh heaven because the mall had 6 sports stores. Ivy just laughed at me because I was like a kid in a candy store. Following our shopping trip we ate at Buffalo Wild Wings. We both decided that it would be the perfect place for my family to eat. They had 5 different sporting events blasting on their tv's. If anyone has ever tried to watch a sporting event when my brothers are around they will know how difficult it is for them to stay on one channel. That about does it for our adventures in New Mexico. We are heading home tomorrow but plan on making a few stops along the way, hopefully we will be able to get everywhere we want to.

Santa Fe Day 2

2011-03-09T21:27:00.002-07:00

Well, this seems to be turning into a diary of our trip instead of a blog, but if I don't do it now I won't remember what happened. We spent the day in Santa Fe again, but this time slept in and went to brunch at El Tecoloco. It was one of the best places that we have eaten at during our whole trip. I highly recommend it to anyone that ever is in Santa Fe. They are only open until 2 p.m. so it is important to get there early. After brunch we went to the Scottish Rite Masonic Library and Museum. It is huge building based on el Alhambra in Spain. One of the Grand Masters gave us a tour. It is a very beautiful building and we learned quite a bit. I decided that if I ever became a Mason it would be more out of curiosity than a desire to learn anything else. Too bad I don't know any Masons that I could solicit to join. Contrary to popular opinion you have to initiate the contact, the members are not allowed to invite people to join. There are only 2 requirements: 1) Belief in a Supreme Being (not specified) and 2) the recommendation of 2 Masons that you have asked to speak for you. After that I went to the New Mexico State Archives while Ivy went shopping at the outlet malls. I actually got really frustrated as I tried to do work because the archives have had to cut their hours down to nearly nothing. You are allowed into the research area at noon, but they won't pull anything out for you until 1 o'clock. Then they won't pull anything after 4, so you really only have 3 to 3 1/2 hours to get everything done. So in order to continue my research I will have to e-mail them what I want and they will copy it and send it to me. The only problem is that it will end up costing more than I hoped it would. Oh well, I guess I need to make sacrifices in order to get my degree done.

Santa Fe

2011-03-08T22:54:00.002-07:00

Well, today is only Tuesday. It feels like we have been here for more than 2 days, but we still have 2 more days to explore the Land of Enchantment. Today we spent all day in Santa Fe. Because I'm a history buff and have turned my wife into one we explored the Plaza in downtown Santa Fe. We wandered through the New Mexico History Museum and the Palace of the Governors also. We strolled around the plaza and visited the Cathedral also. Neither of us had previously been in a cathedral so it was a good experience. We tried to visit the oldest church in the USA, but the door was locked and we didn't get in, maybe tomorrow. Santa Fe is the nation's oldest capital and they take great pride in that fact, but the truth is that if the United States hadn't taken over this area following the war they would not be able to make the same claim as part of Mexico.
We had an eye opening experience when we went to dinner tonight. We wanted to try some local restaurants (most of which are Mexican or Southwestern) and we found one that was close to the Plaza. The bad thing about only using a GPS is that it doesn't tell you how much the food costs or what they serve. We took advantage of being on vacation and spent more than we should have, but it was worth it. We tried quail and duck for the first time. The quail was great, the duck was amazing. The best part of the dinner by far was the fried avocado. I know that to some of you that doesn't sound very appetizing, but it made up for the entire meal and the awkwardness that we experienced being the youngest (by far) people eating there. We were also the only people not drinking wine, but I guess it is a compliment that we look old enough to legally drink.
After dinner we wanted to take it easy so we went to see "Rango". It was kind of a strange movie, but what can you expect with Johnny Depp starring in it. It was a good movie, but probably not one I would watch again. Well, that about does it for our trip so far. We are planning on relaxing tomorrow and letting Ivy recover from her sinus troubles. She is almost done with it. The only problem is that the forecast for weather has turned out to be worse than we hoped. It actually snowed today, well it was only a skiff, but it was there. We were hoping for warm weather, I guess there is always tomorrow that could finally give us the break from winter that we were hoping for.

Albuquerque

2011-03-07T20:09:00.002-07:00

Day 2 of our trip was slightly more exciting than our first. We drove down to Albuquerque so that I could visit the Center for Southwest Research at the University of New Mexico. I found the information that I needed to collect, made copies, and decided to postpone (procrastinate) my research until a later day. While I was working in the archives Ivy went to the Sandia Pueblo reservation and rode the world's longest tram. The tram takes the passengers up the Sandia Peak and you can see both Albuquerque and Santa Fe. The reason that it is called Sandia Peak is because at sunset the peak glows red and looks like a watermelon (Sandia is Spanish for watermelon). We then went to the zoo in Albuquerque, it wasn't great, but it was still bigger than Logan's. It probably would have been better if the wind wasn't blowing so much. For dinner we stopped at Harry's Roadhouse just outside of Santa Fe. It is a great place to eat, great food and a great atmosphere.

New Mexico

2011-03-06T22:53:00.002-07:00

We haven't had much happen recently that seemed worthy enough to blog about. No pregnancy announcements, no moving notice, nothing really. Ivy continues to work to put me through school so we don't always have time to get out and do the things that we would like to do. However, we finally have something to write about. This week we drove down to New Mexico. I guess you could say that this is the first time in the state for both of us. (I went to 4 Corners once, but I don't know if that counts.)
Saturday we drove down and stayed the night in Price at my parents' house and Sunday we began the long drive to Santa Fe, where I will be doing some research for my Master's Thesis. It was only an 8 1/2 hour drive from Price to Santa Fe, but we passed through at least 6 Indian Reservations. We kinda laughed/felt bad about the horrible condition the houses that we saw were in, but were amazed at how giant and spacious the casinos were. They were by far the nicest buildings that we saw during that part of our trip. That was about the most fun that we had because the drive was so long. Tomorrow we are heading down to Albuquerque so that I can bury my nose in the archives while Ivy enjoys the nice warm weather. The only problem is that she has a wicked sinus infection. Hopefully that will clear up quickly and then we can enjoy some of the sights together.

December!

2010-12-06T21:41:00.000-07:00

Well so much for blogging every week during November... I just have one question, where did December come from? It came out of no where!

Here's what's going on in our life now...

* Greg is almost done with his first semester of grad school!
* I am almost done with another semester of undergrad (some day I'll apply to nursing school...)

For Thanksgiving we headed down to Price to hang out with the Palmer Clan. It was so fun to have just about everyone there (the Pennsylvania Palmers will be here in June sometime). We enjoyed a whole bunch of turkey and alotta laughs! Thursday night we went with Lorin and Christi to scope out the black friday deals at Wal*Mart. We ended up staying, preparing to get some good deals for them (toys that we really don't need... but they wanted for their kids!) The sale started at midnight with the sale items wrapped in plastic and people standing around ready to pounce. At about 1155pm some random customer shouted "GO" and everyone started tearing at the plastic filling their carts. It was crazy! But so much fun.

On Friday, Greg and I headed home to meet up with my mom's side of the family. My cousin Dave and his cute lil wife and baby boy were in town from Wyoming. We had dinner and played games. It was so fun to just hang out and catch up.

Let's just hope we survive the next 2 weeks :) then we'll have 2 free weeks... well free from class!

Until next time (and something else interesting happens...)

Being grateful during the holidays...

2010-11-06T22:37:00.000-06:00

I love the idea of posting or blogging everyday about things that I am grateful for. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen for us! Not that we don't have a lot to be grateful for, but I'm not going to remember to do it everyday :) So... I am going to do a weekly grateful for list!

This week I am grateful for family and a reliable car! Right now we are in Cedar City for a baby blessing. Greg's younger brother is blessing his little baby tomorrow and all but the Pennsylvania Palmers were able to make it. We made it safely :) thank goodness because I get paranoid about our car and every little sound it makes. Being poor college students that have had to fork out a lot of money towards car repairs, I'm entitled to worry.

This is my first trip that I remember to Cedar City (I guess we drove through when I was 5...but I don't remember it!). We got here last night when it was dark so I only could see the lights of the town. We when walked outside this morning I turned to Greg and exclaimed "Whoa! There's a mountain!" He just laughed and said, "Yes dear. It's always been there!"

I love our families! Even though we drive each other nuts sometimes, I'm so grateful families are forever!

Last grateful thing for the week... Pepperidge Farm's Goldfish! They are my saving grace somedays :) As long as they are not the whole grain ones (apparently I am allergic to the whole grain ones, but not any of the others... Go figure!)

Where has life gone?

2010-06-19T23:09:00.000-06:00

Holy Moly! Where has life gone? Life has flown by... this is what has happened in our lives so far this summer!

(Kenz... I UPDATED THE BLOG! aren't you proud?)

For Mother's Day, my brothers came over and we made chocolate roses and hearts to put in a bouquet for our AMAZING mother! It was fun to spend time with them and a make home-made gift :)

On May 8 my Lucy Loo got married to Mr. Spencer Thackeray in the Salt Lake Temple. It was an amazing day :) we are so proud of them and their opportunity to be married for time and all eternity.

After Lucy's wedding and before her reception, Greg and I explored SLC. We ate lunch at the Lion House, and hung out at This is the Place Park. It was fun to spend time together enjoying the little things in life :)

To help Lucy Loo and Spencer (haven't come up with his nickname yet...) with their reception, I put together their guest book. It turned out pretty darn cute if you ask me, and if you ask Greg.

At some point close to the end of Lucy and Spencer's reception, I ended up with her real bouquet of flowers. She had a separate one that she tossed to ALL THE SINGLE LADIES, all the single ladies :) she even had the song played as she tossed it :)

For Memorial weekend we headed down to Price to spend time with the Palmer Clan. Wow they have some AMAZING neighbors and ward members! Friends had helped level the front yard and put in a sprinkler system. When we got there, the sod was ready to be laid :) what an adventure! I had never laid sod before, it was kinda fun! After we got the front lawn laid, we realized that they had A TON of sod left over. The next day we thought it would be fun to lay sod in the part of the backyard. Then we realized that they no way of watering the sod SO... WE LAID a SPRINKLER system and then laid the sod. It was a weekend of first for me!

After church on Sunday we took a drive up Nile Mile Canyon. It's this 40 mile long canyon with a whole bunch of old Indian pictographs. Kara, Lorin, Christi and the 4 kids went with us.

The kids just cling to Greg. Maybe it's because he can relate to them :) but they love to listen to him and follow him around... He got them pretty excited to go to the canyon and see the Indian things.

More Good News!

2010-03-16T20:48:00.002-06:00

Well, it is once again my turn to blog. Since Ivy does it most of the time I thought that I should give her a break and tell you about my wonderful day. As many of you now know I was accepted into the History Graduate Program at USU. Ivy mentioned in our last entry that we had not yet received my letter of acceptance. However, last Friday the letter finally came and the part that most excited me was that I was also rewarded an assistantship. That means that I don't have to pay tuition and I get to work with one of the History professors in a survey class. I didn't think much more of this over the weekend because my parents drove up from Price to spend some time with us for my upcoming birthday and we did a wonderful temple session here in Logan. It was my dad's first time ever going through the Logan Temple and my mother's first time since I was only a few months old. The reason I mention this little tidbit is that for my birthday gift they gave me a book (because I love reading) and some money (because they don't know which books I have). Well today, Tuesday, I took that money and went to Borders to go shopping for books. I love to peruse the book store and wait for something to catch my interest. As I was wandering through the store I ran into my favorite professor from USU, Jamie Sanders. Jamie was one of the three people I asked to write a letter of recommendation for Graduate School, so he asked me if I had been accepted and I told him that I had and thanked him for writing me a letter of recommendation. I then informed him that I had also been awarded an assistantship. That is when Jamie informed me that I was one of the very few that he had heard of that had graduated from Utah State with a B.A. and then been granted an assistantship to Utah State. Assistantships are used to attract out of state students to campus. I was more than pleased to hear that wonderful news. It just went to show me that the Lord loves me a great deal. It looks like I won't be paying for school again this year. I have not yet paid for any schooling; more proof that the Lord truly loves me deeply.

Grad School Here We Come!

2010-03-10T19:28:00.001-07:00

After much anticipation and anxiety we found out today that Greg was accepted into the History Grad program at Utah State. Funny thing is we've yet to receive the letter...

Okay so let me explain... There is a way online to check the status of your application. Let's be honest, Greg's checked it a couple of times a week. He's also been in contact with the head of the History Grad program (which I fully believe that sucking up to your professor is a good thing!). So we sorta had an idea of when they would make their final decision and sending the letters. Last night Greg was checking online and next to "Decision" it said to contact the admissions office. Well Greg starting wondering what that meant and almost began to panic. We knew the admissions office was closed for the night (he checked at like 630ish...).

This morning he called the admissions office to ask and found out he had been accepted! The lady helping him asked if he'd like to accept at that time... hmmm pretty sure was all giddy when he said "YES!"

I'm so proud of him and what has and will accomplish :) Our future is looking a bit like this... 2 (3 years at most) in Logan then off to work on his PhD. Our ultimate goal is the University of Texas (GO LONGHORNS!) but we will go where ever the Lord directs us.

Family History... Bringing the Past to Life!

2010-01-31T20:55:00.000-07:00

Greg and I are almost finished with our first course in the new Family History Sunday School class. It's been interesting to learning as we teach. We have an amazing class! They are so eager to learn about their ancestors and do their family history and temple work.

On Saturday, Greg and I had an urge to get out of Logan for a bit. We headed to Salt Lake to visit the Family History Library. WOW! It was so amazing to see all of the information that is available. There are 5 floors of world history and the cutest little old ladies to help every step of the way. I even saw my friend Elder Shelton (although I didn't go say hi. Greg said it was okay, but I felt weird and didn't want to distract him).

Anyways... check out the website new.familysearch.org it's really interesting to look through your family history and see where you come from :)

Life... The Crazy Life We Live!

2010-01-27T20:43:00.003-07:00

I can't even believe that January is almost over! Where does the time go? In the past month I've had more emotional break downs (my poor husband...) and more joyous occasions than I deserve. Christmas was hard, just stressful and emotionally hard. I had hoped that after New Years I'd just snap back and be happy again... well it's been harder than I thought (and the stupid inversion hasn't helped).

Greg and I have stayed busy. We're both still working full time jobs (very grateful for that!) and Greg has officially submitted his application for grad school. We came to the decision that it's best if we stay at USU for him to get his master's degree. We're just waiting to hear if he's accepted or not (we're pretty sure he'll get it, but we never know what life will throw at us).

I attended my first BYU basketball game this month. It was interesting... I'm used to the intense crowd of USU basketball. BYU wasn't as intense. But it was still fun. We went with 2 of Greg's brothers and their families. We don't get to see Greg's family as much as we'd like. It's hard to find a free weekend to go to Price and well, they don't really come to Logan very often (on the other hand, Greg sees my family everyday... yet he still loves them!).

Greg and I have a new calling in our ward. We are the Family History course teachers. It's been fun learning about both of our families and playing on the church's new family history website. Apparently in my family line I am a descendant of royalty :) ain't life great!

Well after an interesting day at work, I love to relax by playing with Photoshop Elements. I've been editing pictures from the past year, including my Grandma Dodo's life and funeral. I love looking back at all of her pictures and reminiscing of all of our fun times and memories. Until I have an emotional break down start crying because I miss her so much (Greg is so amazing because he'll just cuddle up with me and let me cry) (fyi... I started tearing up just thinking about thinking about her... and Greg just turned to me and told me I didn't have to make myself cry for him to cuddle with me. Ain't he great!)

Here are some of my favorite photos that I've touched up...

My little Trevor... he's a goof!
My 3 stud muffins... Kevin, Trevor and Greg.

The Holidays...

2009-12-26T20:54:00.006-07:00

We can't believe the Holidays are pretty much over! This was Greg and I's second set of holidays together.

Thanksgiving...

During the week of Thanksgiving Greg and I flew to sunny and warm California with my family and some extended family. We spent most of Wednesday in Disneyland, enjoying all the rides. Trevor even went on Splash Mountain with us. He did fine until he got wet...

Our hotel was about 10 minutes away from the park so we would ride the shuttle back and forth. Wednesday night we all went out to eat at Buca's. It was an Family Style Italian restaurant next to the hotel. the portions were meant to fed 2-3 people. Well Kevin (my 15 year old lil bro) ordered some ravioli but didn't want to share with anybody. The waiter who was hilarious, told Kevin he wouldn't be able to finish it by himself. Well Kevin (the human garbage disposal) not only finish his plate by himself, but then finished off everybody else's. The waiter couldn't believe it.

On Thursday (Thanksgiving Day) we headed straight for California Adventures. First order of business was to get our fast passes to Tower of Terror. Then we met up with the rest of the group at Soarin' over California. The rides were amazing! Our Thanksgiving dinner that night consisted of Jack in Box.

Friday we hopped onto a bus and took a tour of LA and then onto Universal Studios. We didn't see any celebrities (atleast not any that I recognized!) but had a blast. Such a fun vacation. I really did not want to return to the "Real World".

Christmas time...

This year all of our 'normal' Christmas traditions kinda got thrown out the window. We don't have children yet so we've haven't made our own traditions yet. But didn't really fully participate in our families' traditions either.

Christmas Eve we went to my parent's house and got to talk to Elder Bodily when he called and then we opened our Eve gift... always PJs.

Christmas morning Greg and I opened up our gifts to each other and then headed back up to my parent's to open gifts with them. That afternoon we headed to Salt Lake to meet up with Greg's family at his brother's house. It was fun to see my nieces and nephews open up their presents and get excited to play with their toys.

After seeing Greg's family we headed to Temple Square to see the lights. It was FREEZING but so beautiful.

The day after Christmas we did my favorite thing... SHOPPING! They have some great deals on Boxing day :) And then I made Greg Christmas Dinner. In the hustle and bustle of Christmas we didn't get to have a Christmas dinner so we made our own, a day late and it was AMAZING!

New Years...

Greg's brother and his family that are now living in PA will be in town visiting so we're headed to Price for New Years. It'll be a blast to see our niece and nephews that we don't get to see very often.

I think that's about all for now :)

HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYBODY!

My First Christmas In Heaven

2009-12-26T18:37:00.004-07:00

I found this poem and thought of my amazing Grandma Dodo...

I see the countless
Christmas trees
around the world below
With tiny lights, like Heaven's stars,
reflecting on the snow

The sight is so spectacular,
please wipe away the tear
For I am spending Christmas with
Jesus Christ this year.

I hear the many Christmas songs
that people hold so dear
But the sounds of music can't compare
with the Christmas choir up here.

I have no words to tell you,
the joy their voices bring,
For it is beyond description,
to hear the angels sing.

I know how much you miss me,
I see the pain inside your heart.
But I am not so far away,
We really aren't apart.

So be happy for me, dear ones,
You know I hold you dear.
And be glad I'm spending Christmas
with Jesus Christ this year.

I sent you each a special gift,
from my heavenly home above.
I sent you each a memory
of my undying love.

After all, love is a gift more precious
than pure gold.
was always most important
the stories Jesus told.

Please love and keep each other,
my Father said to do.
I can't count the blessing or love
has for each of you.

So have a Merry Christmas and
Wipe away that tear
Remember, I am spending Christmas with
Jesus Christ this year

Our Weekend...

2009-11-17T09:26:00.005-07:00

This past weekend we packed up and headed to Price to visit the Palmer's. Our cute little niece Kelsie Ann was born on November 2 and we hadn't see her in person... She is so adorable!

We are now counting down to our trip to Disneyland in one week :D because we will be celebrating Thanksgiving in Cali, Greg and I decided to start decorating for one of our favorite holidays... KWANZAA! Just kidding I don't even know what happens on that holiday...

So far we have our tree decorated...

Just a side note, I hosted Bunco this month and in order for sweet Amanda to not give me too much crap, we held off on decorating for Christmas until now and attempted to decorate in a "Fall" fashion... the decor lasted a whole 2 weeks :D

And to brag just a wee bit... the fabric pumpkins on my table, I MADE! Yep, my first Relief Society Craft that I started and FINISHED in the same night. I was even so ambitious that I made 2 sets, giving one set to my wonderful mother!

Well, that's all for now... Laters!

Weekend Surprise!

2009-11-09T16:55:00.002-07:00

So to kill the suspense of everyone that has so patiently waiting to hear what the surprise was this weekend let me tell you all what it was.

IVY'S PREGNANT! Okay, not really, but since most of you were thinking that I thought that I would throw it in.

The real surprise was something that Christi, Lorin's wife, did for all of us. Christi called the Palmer parental units on Monday and told us all that she was flying Nathan in from Pennsylvania to be at Lorin's baptism. Lorin had no idea that Nathan was going to be there, but had been hoping that Nate could somehow be there. My family is not known for pulling off surprises very well, but somehow we all kept our mouths shut. Ivy and I volunteered to pick Nate up from the airport and so he called us Saturday afternoon and told us that he had another surprise for the rest of the family. Nate told us that he would be bringing his 18-month old son, Washington, to see us too. Sunday morning Ivy and I headed to the airport to pick Nate up and take him to Lorin's house. Lorin got a little suspicious when my family showed up at 10:30 in the morning to go to church with him at 1:00. If you know the Palmer family you know that we are never on time when we have to travel to places. Shortly after they arrived at Lorin's place we left the airport and drove to Lorin's house with Nate. Ivy and I walked into the house holding Washington and Nathan walked in right behind us. It took Lorin a while, but once he realized who the third person to walk in with us was he ran to Nate to give him a hug. It was such an amazing moment. It was just another wonderful example of our wonderful family can really be. Eventhough we fought a lot as kids we still love each other very much. You've got to love family.

Now onto the main event of the weekend. Lorin's baptism was amazing. He chose Todd to baptize him and my father to confirm him. Needless to say there were a great many tears shed last night. Tears of joy and relief. As a missionary I saw the Atonement change peoples' lives all the time, but seeing your brother go through the pain and struggling that sin brings is harder than anything I had ever experienced. However, the joy and ecstasy that I felt seeing him enter the waters of baptism to start a new chapter in his life was down right amazing. I know that the Atonement is real, I have felt it in my life many times, but it took on a new, more personal meaning for me last night. Once again my family is complete and will be that way for all of time and eternity. I now understand the story of the Prodigal Son more than I ever imagined would be possible. It is difficult to describe the joy that was felt in that room last night, but it proved to me that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is true and that the Atonement is real. Lorin is now clean from any of his past mistakes. We all learned a great deal from this trial; I don't think that anyone would wish to repeat it, but none of us would give up the lessons learned from it.

Anyway, sorry to disappoint anyone that was hoping that we would be having a baby, but this was still a very neat surprise for all of us. Thanks everyone for helping Lorin come back to the Gospel and be baptized again.

Exciting News!

2009-11-04T17:58:00.003-07:00

To continue with our great weekend and exciting news...

On Sunday we got word that Greg's oldest brother is getting rebaptized this coming Sunday. He went through some crazy times, but has now married an amazing girl and turned his life around. We're so excited for him and Christi! One step closer to having an eternal family.

Then on Monday November 2, 2009 Kelsie Ann Palmer was born into our family :) she is Keith and Steph's second.

Above: Kara Ann and Kelsie Ann

Isn't she beautiful?! Greg and I haven't actually seen her... but hopefully we'll make it down to Price very soon to meet our newest niece.

There is word floating in the air that a surprise is in the works for this weekend... we'll see how it turns out :)

What a week!

2009-11-04T15:59:00.003-07:00

This past week has been so crazy... yet exciting! On Friday, Greg and I took my youngest brother, Trevor, to the Halloween Carnival at my work. It was hilarious watching all the residents, staff and families dress up. Trevor was a werewolf, unfortunately his costume was an adult's size... the mask lasted a whole five minutes! My friend (basically my sister...) brought her kids to the carnival too...

Above: Austin and Trevor

Greg and Trevor

Nattie B and Seth

Greg and me

On Saturday (Halloween) Greg and I took Trevor trick-or-treating with Leslie and her kids. My parents tease us that Trevor is our practice child... I'm getting GREAT practice!

Ghost Towns...

2009-10-28T20:58:00.003-06:00

With Greg being a history buff, we end up going on crazy adventures. Lately we've been searching for ghost towns. Carbon County (where Greg grew up) is FULL of ghost towns due to the coal mining towns. I guess we dream about finding a ghost town with buried treasure... Hopefully that day will come soon! Until then, we're having fun searching.

Unfortunately, a lot of the ghost towns are now on private property and the remains have been ruined. In one such case, there is a legend about "White Lady" that haunts an old mining town. In 1972, a teenage boy was so freaked out by the thought that he had seen the ghost that he destroyed part of the building.

Whether the buildings are destroyed or partially intact, it's always a grand adventure learning the history of the towns and the people who lived there. Did you know that there was once a hot spring called Castilla up Spanish Fork Canyon (before the Thistle turn off). The numerous times we've driven that canyon, and had no idea what once stood just off the highway. The history of it is fascinating, a hobo burned the hotel down trying to stay warm years after it was shut down.

Well that's it for our adventures thus far. We're hoping to make it back down towards Price before we get too much more snow. Maybe we'll find some old coins and strike it big :) Laters!

Getting in the Halloween Spirit....

2009-10-25T18:27:00.005-06:00

In an attempt to get into the Halloween spirit (one of Greg's favorite holidays...) we walked around the Halloween USA store. What an interesting place! Here are just a few of our pictures...

We also got in the spirit of Halloween by carving pumpkins with Brennen and Ashlee...

General Conference Weekend

2009-10-04T20:52:00.003-06:00

A couple of weeks ago I attended Time Out for Women with my mom and sister Leslie. One of the speakers was Mark Mabry - the AMAZING photographer of the Reflections of Christ.

He has just finished up Reflections of Christ Another Testament. They shot the photos in Central America and he said that they dressed the natives up and just let them go with the flow.

Well his photos were on display down at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building during conference weekend. Greg knew that I just loved his work so Friday we escaped from Logan and went and saw Mark's exhibit.

Lets just say that I was so touched and felt the spirit so strongly that I of course shed some tears. One of the photos is of Christ on some large steps with the natives and children all around. Fading into the scene are beautiful Angels from heaven.

Then listening to the Prophet and the Apostles was so inspiring. I feel like I can take on any trial that comes our way!

More US World Cup Qualifying Pictures...

2009-09-09T21:03:00.003-06:00

More crazy pictures...

Kevin and Greg's crazy hair...

Keith and Greg getting pumped!

Dad and Kevin didn't know what they were getting into...

Greg getting pumped!

US World Cup Qualifying Match

2009-09-07T12:00:00.004-06:00

Well, here it goes for my first post. Ivy is letting me do this because it is my area of expertise. Saturday September 5th we were lucky enough to attend the first ever World Cup Qualifying Match in Rio Tinto Stadium. The US played El Salvador and although it should have been a home game for the Gringos the crowd was definitely pro El Salvador. I had no idea that so many people from such a small country lived in the United States. To get into the spirit of the game we all dressed up, but nothing like Todd did. Todd actually had people stop and ask to take pictures with him. Well, the US conceded the first goal to El Salvador, but before the end of the first half the US had scored twice, both on headers. The US ended up winning 2-1 and inched a little closer to qualifying for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. The good thing is that the US has proved they can play well in South Africa after taking 2nd in the Confederation's Cup after beating Spain (who was the #1 best team in the World at the time) and then falling to Brazil (the current #1 team in the World). Even though we enjoyed ourselves at the game we were more than elated (or I was) to hear that BYU had upset #3 Oklahoma. I can now say that I have completely converted my wife to soccer-ism and am getting close to converting her younger brother too. Even my father-in-law wants to attend another game, he hopes that he will be able to understand the game better this time.

First Day of Fall Semester...

2009-08-25T20:30:00.004-06:00

Today was the day. I attended my first day of classes for fall semester 2009. Okay okay, my only class for this semester. I was nervous at first, not knowing what my professor would be like but my butterflies were redirected to wig out about something else after Les almost killed us driving to class. We made it safe tho, no worries and no tickets!

Our professor, Jessica Habashi, is really nice. She seems like she'll be good and makes the material understandable. Jessica wants to learn everybody's name (all 60+ just in the Brigham City class) so she took a picture of us holding a little white board with our names. Cleaver, huh? She learned my name right off. I guess that's what happens when you have an unusual name unlike the 3 Melissa's in our lab.

Greg is taking this year off from school to work and prepare for the master's program. He'll apply for USU's master's program at the end of the year (or begining of next year... I can never remember). He is enjoying working at Bridger Elem again. The teachers all seem to like having him around, especially his mother-in-law ;) and brother-in-law who is in second grade this year.

We're off to continue with our busy schedules until, well Christmas in 4 months!

Moving a Piano...

2009-08-22T17:21:00.007-06:00

Since Gma Dodo passed away, Greg and I have taken an inventory of our apartment and have decided to 'downsize'. We want it to be our apartment, not a storage place facility... The first thing to go was my grandma's baby grand piano.

I loved playing the piano for her (that was the only time I would sit down and play it) but I haven't played for 2 and half years. Sad to say but I felt I could only play for her. I asked (okay... told) my parents if they would take it. In a few years when Greg and I move, they'd have to take it anyways.

Well, in order to safely move the piano and other various heavy objects out of our apartment and up to my parents house, my father hired professional movers. They came and got started. First, they removed the foot pedals and the left front leg and tilted the piano onto it's side. Then removed the other legs and strapped the piano to what looked like a body board. They then shimmied the piano through the front door onto the porch. The next obstacle came when trying to turn onto the stairs...

What an ordeal! But our apartment is so much bigger now with more space to scrapbook :)

Trevor's Teeth...

2009-08-15T20:54:00.006-06:00

So a couple of months ago Trey and I were goofing around at my parental's house. He had a loose tooth and his mouth ran into my hand... honest, that's what happened! Well, long story short, I knocked his tooth out. He wouldn't let me forget it either.

With his next loose tooth, he wouldn't let me near his mouth. I even offered to knock it out so he could get money from the tooth fairy.

Fast forward to lastnight... Greg and I stopped into my mom's classroom to chit chat (my mom, dad and trey were there). Trey started goofing around and before we knew it, I had knocked another one of Trey's loose teeth out! I don't know how it happened this time. I had picked him up and gently placed him in the large garbage bin. Upon trying to get him out of the bin, Greg came over to help. Then all of a sudden, his tooth had come out.

I'm never going to live it down... I hope the toothfairy brought him lots of moola :D

The First Year...

2009-08-10T20:34:00.000-06:00

WOW! It has been one whole year since Greg and I were married August 9, 2008 in the Logan LDS Temple. What an amazing year it has been. Elder Justin Bodily left for his mission in Sept of 08. In the spring of 09 Greg graduated from USU with his BA in history. I continue to study nursing - someday :D I'll be able to apply to the programs. Greg works at Bridger Elementary (where we met). I am working at Legacy House Assisted Living.

Well, that is about it for our first post :D more to come later...