LIFE AS NELSONS

Going-ons

2011-04-10T19:11:00.000-07:00

So I feel like a bad wife - Some of the most exciting news that could happen right now, happened and even though any one who's going to be reading this probably already knows, I still have to post it...

***SKYLER GOT INTO PHYSICAL THERAPY SCHOOL AT THE UofU!!!!***

I know this is a several-months-belated post topic but I am so proud of him and excited for him and what this means for us as a family. He amazes me every day and I know that he is going to be amazing as a PT. I don't think I know of anyone more personable and intelligent than he is and I am constantly being told from everyone who meets him what an inspiration and example he to them.

He starts the first semester of PT school in May, just as I start my last semester of nursing school. It's going to be a wild summer!

As far as what else is going on, Skyler is still with the Boy Scouts, but we'll see how much longer that is going to be. I'll have a new calling to post about in another week or so, and then I'll need all the help I can get because I'm going to have no idea what I'm doing :)

I have my jaw surgery scheduled May 9th. I'm terrified/excited. It's going to be weird to be able to close my mouth comfortably around my teeth and to be able to bite into something and actually bite it off, rather than having to tear it apart and then to be able to chew food with my teeth touching where they're supposed to, rather than just a few places in the back...I can hardly imagine...

I just got my school schedule for the summer and prayers have been answered - we are going to be able to go on our stake Pioneer Trek. We still aren't sure if we are actually a Ma and Pa or if we are going as alternates a.k.a. big brother and sister. It seems like they're needing us as an actual Ma and Pa since one of the other couples is officially unable to go - I don't know. We need to figure that out.

The other day we went out for 1/2 off Sushi rolls at Ginza with some friends from nursing school and their hubby's (Except for Sharon, who's date was her adorable little boy).

I can't stand seafood of any kind what-so-ever, but I went for the social value :) Skyler, on the other hand got a smoked salmon roll and was in heaven. Jonelle got these pretty looking dishes below. I love how sushi looks, so even though I wont eat it, I find it fascinating to watch others eat it. Weird, I know.

Skyler and I have been doing P90X. We started December 27th and with only a few weeks here and there putting us off schedule, we are almost done now at week 13 of 14. I'm really proud of us for sticking to this. It's gotten harder near the end where we know all of the videos and exercise moves. The yoga video is the hardest, mostly because of how long it is. On a few of the nice days we've had we've replaced the yoga for running - not exactly equivalent, but a much enjoyed break. And for the dessert/sugar junkie I have always been I am proud to say that I can now turn down a dessert with no remorse (well, almost none). I do love the feeling that exercising gives me and I've liked trying new exercises - Kenpo is probably my favorite video and Plyometrics is Skyler's.

Last Wednesday I got to try another new exercise (again, with my nursing schools buds). Katie, Jonelle and I took an antigravity yoga class. Jonelle was the one who introduced us to it, and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

Here we are doing Monkey Pose - It was kind of a head rush, as you can imagine.

Maybe when we're "done" with this P90X routine, I can get Skyler to let me post some before's and after's...we'll see.

Mmmmmm

2011-03-13T14:08:00.000-07:00

As usual I should be doing homework - but this wont take long!

I just discovered my new favorite "dessert." It's kinda healthy, but still hits the sweet spot. It's SUPER easy and quick, plus it's really simple to double/triple/quadruple the recipe, so I had to share:

Warm Apples with Cinnamon

1. Slice 1 Golden Delicious apple (or any apple, really - I used Gala)
2. Combine in saucepan with
~ 2 Tbsp apple cider (I used apple cider vinegar which gives it a little tang)
~ 1 tsp brown sugar
~ A pinch (or to taste) of cinnamon
3. Cook over medium heat, stirring until the apples are tender
4. Serve with a dollop of vanilla yogurt (Greek yogurt would be amazing with this!)

So, I may be the only one extremely excited about this discovery - if you know me you know I'm a 1-2 apple a day kinda girl - but go ahead and try this out and tell me if you love it as much as I do!

Life as a scout master

2011-02-27T18:17:00.000-08:00

This is doughnut falls, a favorite to hike. Nice safe and close, except the time one of the scouts tried to throw a rock at a bull moose. He was stopped in time.

These are the diamond fork hot springs. Another favorite hike. Each pool is a different temperature and can be drained or add cold water to it. We go during the day because at night they are full of naked BYU students. Its a good 3 miles in and 3 miles out but worth it.

This is scout camp in Idaho. Since I have been scout master I have had one aspergers, 3 autistic, one bi-polar and one down syndrome scout. So I get to do most of the activities with the boys to make sure they don't drown. We just earned the canoeing merit badge in this picture. I went out and flip, drained and got back in the canoe 4 times. I also signed up for the mile swim but you had to swim a half mile to qualify. I swam the half mile and felt accomplished enough and didn't swim the full mile.

Oh the adventures of the wilderness survival merit badge. I went out and stayed with the boys to keep an on a few of them who have handy caps. The boys made the shelters out of wood but I just tied a rope between trees and hung my poncho over it. But when I went to crawl into my bag the biggest wolf spider I have ever seen was there to greet me. I had some fun dreams that night.

Candy and Twelve year old boys. Ya

This young man didn't want to bring his scout shirt to camp. So he got the loner and had to wear it to all the meetings. He now brings his scout shirt.

He walked head first into the rock. So I told him to move it. I didn't think he would take me seriously.

I don't know how to move the picture the right direction. But this is little wild horse canyon. It was a great slot canyon hike. It flash flooded a few days before so we had some water and debris to deal with. Great hike, 11 miles but I recommend it. There were a few parts we had to shimmy up the canyon to be able to keep going.

Little wild horse canyon.

Just before the hike. You can't see them but the bugs were horrible.

This is goblin valley. Each of the mushrooms is about 6 to 14 feet tall. We played capture the flag here for hours. I deam it the worlds best capture the flag arena anywhere. We used about 200 feet of rope as our boundary line and you could run on top of the mushrooms or between them. It made me want to go home and watch labyrinth.

We eat good, breakfast burritos. oh-ya. I just happen to be cooking, it is usually the boys. But if I am going to eat it. I help.

For the Metal Working Merit Badge we made knifes. We went to Lyndsey's step dads work where he is a sells rep for ESAB welding. The boys had to Mig, Tig, Plasma cut and Torch Cut. We the made the knives out of 18-8 stainless flat stock, a ax handle and epoxy. It was a blast.

We also made home made snow shoes. We used emt conduit, construction fencing, zip ties, string and rope. We then snow shoed into a cabin. One of the boys complained because he was sinking about 3 inches in the snow. So he took them off and then sank to his waist in the snow. So we found out these actually worked. I was surprised because I just made them up from extra junk I had laying around at work.

BraceFace

2010-10-21T20:18:00.000-07:00

IT'S OFFICIAL! I'M 12 AGAIN! Thanks to my Momma Mia, who insisted she come to my appointment with me, I have a plethora of pictures for remembrance.

BEFORE

DURING (and my favorite for obvious reasons)

AFTER -
I had to get a pic next to the board with my name on it! My mom actually got a pic of me AND Duncan (my fellow BraceFace). He was arriving as I was leaving. I made sure to wish him luck :)

I'm quickly remembering what braces were like. Wax is my new best friend as well as anything of an edible nature that is smooth, soft, and creamy. Really, the only downside of all this is having everyone I know see me and say "Why did you get braces? Your teeth are straight!"... I don't have a short/easy answer so instead I think I'll start saying "It's part of my Halloween costume."

Redefining Beautiful

2010-10-19T08:04:00.001-07:00

I heard about these girls on the news this morning (not this exact video, but very similar)

"Too often in our celebrity-driven culture, beauty is defined by the products a woman puts on her face. But a group of teenage girls in Texas has set out to change that idea, one makeup-free face at a time. "

I LOVE this! Way to go girls!

A Series of Unexpected (but not unfortunate) Events

2010-10-13T17:24:00.000-07:00

1.
My retainer no longer fits correctly despite religious wear-age from the day my braces came off
2.
I found out that my insurance covers (and has covered) orthodontia
3.
I found out that my insurance cuts off coverage at the age of 24 (Happy 24th Birthday to me on December 1st)
4.
I was squeezed in today for what I thought was a consultation to discuss my options to fix the problems I have with my teeth/jaw
5.
The secretary apparently scheduled me for a retainer fitting...
6.
Consequently, over the course of 3 hours the Dr. who, granted, was very nice, knowledgeable, and did not make me feel rushed, flitted from other patients, to me, to other patients to me (luckily I had an open schedule today)
7.
I'm getting braces...again...oh, and that is just prep for the jaw surgery I need...

I can't believe it! First of all I walked into that appointment thinking "Ladi-da, I'll just get Invisaline and that will fix everything, ho-hum" Apparently I was a little naive. It shouldn't surprise me that I have this structural defect - my mom had the exact same problem and surgery I'm needing and my original braces were in effort to avoid this step. I guess it was so long ago that I had braces or talked to anyone about this that I thought the problem was gone *magic*

Second, I feel like I'm reverting back to age 12. You would think that being older and more "mature" ;) would keep a person from feeling insecure about getting the dreaded braces, but I can't help myself - the feelings are all coming back to me.

So not only is this happening, but it's happening quick. I got a workup done then and there at the office today. Then I got spacers placed to get ready for the braces that I will be getting *drum-roll* next Wednesday! Ahhhhh! I thought for sure I was going to have a breakdown when I got in the car, but I didn't (still don't know how I avoided that).

Of course the biggest stress-er is the money issue ~ I don't need to go into it too much, but anyone who has had/paid for braces knows they are expensive and even with insurance the cost definitely won't go unnoticed. Luckily since my problem is a functional problem (the doctor says I'm probably only using maybe 1/2 my teeth right now) insurance SHOULD cover the surgery portion when the time comes. The definitive "will cover" won't be ultimately approved until I get closer to the actual surgical event.

So these have been the events of my day. I'm still stunned, questioning myself about the triviality of it all. Luckily have a wonderful husband who is supporting this decision ~ thanks Sweetie <3

PHOTOGRAPHY

2010-10-04T19:26:00.000-07:00

So my brother in-law (Skyler's brother) and sister-in-law who live in Baltimore just got there family photos. I can't help but rave about this woman's talent! I saw these pictures and decided I want to have a child and move to Baltimore right now, just so Katie Ash can be our photographer.

Look at this adorable family! We sure miss you guys :)

I can't get enough of cute Brooklynn's Smile

Unfortunately Baltimore is the key here, but check out these other photos, if for no other reason but for the "awwww" factor

http://katiesphotogblog.blogspot.com/

Las Vegas

2010-10-03T15:16:00.000-07:00

Skyler and I were able to take an awesome and much needed vacation between summer and fall semesters. We went with 2 other couples in our ward, Marta/Andrew and Rick/Brittni.

In our rented Suburban we began our trip which first led us to Las Vegas.

The ceiling at the Venetian

INSIDE THE VENETIAN: I've never seen the real thing, but this place was pretty amazing. I actually got this pic from online, but it looked exactly like this. We walked through at about midnight and it looked like midday.

If you've ever been to Las Vegas you can imagine what it looked like on a Saturday night. Although it was fun to see MOST of the sights, I told Skyler that I think we experienced enough Las Vegas for ourselves as well as our future children's lifetime.

The ceiling at the Bellagio is made up of 2,000 hand blown glass flowers. It was gorgeous.

We managed to keep our eyes open (mostly) for one last pic that night before we went to bed.

3 pictures I can't get enough of

2010-09-20T15:42:00.001-07:00

#1
Dr. Alissa

#2
Dr. Abby

It just so happens that I'm going through my Pediatrics class right now and pics #1 and #2 are PERFECT theme pictures to decorate my school folders. I love showing off my nieces to all my fellow classmates.

Handsome Haven and Lovely Lauren

This gorgeous pic of these two gorgeous babies (siblings of above nieces, so a.k.a nephew and niece) make me smile every time I open my computer (it is currently serving as my desktop at home). I look at this picture which to me emanates complete contentedness and love.

**These are my sisters kids - she is amazing at photography and picture editing and I can't get enough of all the perfect moments she captures ~ of course this means I'm constantly yoinking (is this a word?) her photos :) Thanks sis!**

New Camera

2010-09-15T18:51:00.000-07:00

Part of the treat to ourselves before we went on our post-summer/pre-fall semester vacation was to purchase a new camera - my 2005 Kodak camera was just not cutting it anymore. We purchased a Panasonic Lumix from Costco. Now, we are not anything near camera/photography experts, but we L.O.V.E. this thing. It's perfect for what we needed ~ small enough to carry around for all-purpose use and the pics turn out pretty good, plus it has some fun features.

I was trying to hurry up and learn this new technology before we left on vacation so I was taking pictures of EVERYTHING lol Here are some of those oh-so-pointless pics :)

This is probably my favorite pic of my Chet-ster. I love how he's peeking out from under his bangs...yes, our dog has bangs

This is my self proclaimed mascot at work. Really I just like to look at it after having to deal with a difficult/mean/angry patient and then daydreaming about becoming green and powerful

My workin' legs

Self Portrait: I call it "Chompers"

This is our pepper plant from our garden ~ de-lish!
Garden Lantern
Scratching
I really liked the "film grain" feature, hence all of the black and white - it just seemed to make everything look better.

Fall is in the air

2010-08-25T08:41:00.000-07:00

Well, I can't believe it but August is almost over...where does the time go anymore?! Skyler and I are just getting back into the swing of things with school after enjoying a glorious break from it. We even got to go on a vacation during the break to the happiest place on earth ~post on that to come~ Although I am a warm weather lover all around, I'm finding it hard to fight the realization that, yes, I am kind of excited for Fall (and don't tell anyone, but even the thought of the first snow around the holidays makes me feel all cozy). I'm sure I will be writing another post come January about how I can't stand the brown winters, but as for now I guess I will welcome the beauty and blessings that seasons bring.

Summer Time

2010-07-22T16:04:00.001-07:00

So, as I'm sure it has for everyone - this summer has been CRAZY! Skyler and I have been running around doing all sorts of fun stuff: school, work, scouts, primary, family, some fun - a lotta-bit of everything :) Hence why I haven't been able to blog. That and the fact that there really aren't any interesting pictures - but oh well, I'll post what we've got.

Father's Day

Here is my dad on Father's Day Sunday. We went over to his and my step-mom, Joan's house to eat dinner and celebrate dads. I think I must get my not-sure-what-to-do-in-pictures attitude from my dad. That explains his goofy smiles LOL

I told my dad I wanted to get a picture with him so that I could see how much we look alike - he wouldn't smile, but I'm still amazed at mine and his resemblance. Yep, I'm his daughter.

Who would have thought aviators could look so good?? ;)

Bells Canyon

We went on a hike up Bells Canyon here in Utah. It was such a hard but beautiful hike. We were able to get my friend Aleta, and her friend Amber and Amber's boyfriend Sam to come with us. It was a gorgeous view from the top. We actually ended up missing the turnoff to the waterfall on the first go around, but it was okay because the canyon was beautiful and we found a nice place to snack and rest.

On our way back down we found the correct turnoff. As we made our way down to the falls we could hear a helicopter and we were kind of joking around about how maybe another person fell off the falls (a man had fallen off the falls the week prior and the Search and Rescue team had to retrieve him and life flight him out) Then we saw a group gathered around somebody lying on the rocks - Turns out a young man and woman were trying to cross at the top of the falls. She started slipping and he went to try to save her and they both went over. They had just pulled the guy out when we got there so Skyler rushed down to see if he could help with any first aid. Luckily he was prepared with all sorts of stuff - especially the space blankets. The guy was right in the spray off from the waterfall and even with the blankets he ended up going into early stages of hypothermia. The kid was in shock, and had 3 head lacerations and a laceration under his eye. As we waited for Search and Rescue they just tried to keep him talking to assess his level of consciousness. They couldn't find the girl. After she fell they didn't see her again. It was really sad to think how quickly things happened. Even with search and rescue they weren't able to find her body for a few more weeks because of the incredible force from the large amount of snow melt runoff coming down the falls.

This pic was taken from the KSL news report helicopter. Skyler was assessing the wounds on the guys head. He and another man that was there were able to give him a Priesthood blessing. Despite the situation it was really amazing to be able to see the priesthood used like that. I've never witnessed it like that and it strengthened my testimony - probably sounds strange in this context...

Luckily they were able to get the guy loaded up on the LifeFlight helicopter and could get him to a hospital. The 3 head lacerations and eye wound ended up being his only injury.

Manti Pageant

I had my first experience at the Manti Pageant this year. My mom and step-dad Vince invited Skyler and I to attend with them. I may have enjoyed it even more had I not been so tired, but it was fun. My favorite part though was seeing the Manti temple. I had never seen it before and it was so gorgeous.

Nursing School
For me this summer has been full of new experiences in clinical. My clinical group started out on the Med Surg. floors. I was able to go to the Surgical/Telemetry, Surgical/Oncology, Surgical/Transplant, and Surgical/Trauma floors. I got to help take care of patient's with Steven Johnson's Syndrome, Bacteremia, Autoimmune Hepatitis (recovering from a Whipple surgery), and a patient who was lucky he wasn't worse off (and lucky to be alive for that matter) after crashing on an ATV which then landed on top of him and crushed one entire side. I really learned a lot and saw and participated in some new things I haven't been able to do/see (on a real person) before.

Now it is nearing the end of the summer and I have only one of 3 maternity clinicals left. The first clinical day my instructor put me in Labor and Delivery. Knowing that I wanted to see a Cesarean Section she placed me with a patient who was going to have one (and with twins, too). I had hit the jackpot...I thought. I met my nurse who was already getting the mom ready to go into the OR. As I followed her into the room I was surprised to realize that ironically I knew the soon-to-be-mom. Unfortunately it turned out that she didn't feel comfortable with me in there as she delivered - totally understandable :( I mean I wouldn't want some random person I happened to know seeing me and my who-ha just hangin' out there to the world (I'm sure that was the issue). Luckily for one of my classmates it wasn't a Student issue, just an I-know-you-in-a-very-different-context issue, so she got to go watch that delivery and I went to Postpartum. Ironically (again) that mom that I knew ended up coming to my floor, and became one of my nurses patients - I couldn't get away from her!! I didn't want to make it awkward for her by pushing the issue of me taking care of her so I just stayed out of the room. BUT, since she was the only new admit to the floor that my nurse had I had nothing to do for the last 2 hours. Luckily my friend Katie was in the nursery on that floor so I went in there with her and held the cutest little baby boy ever, who I named Hurley (I think that was actually the doctors name LOL) I may have not learned a thing for that last hour except how to swaddle a newborn, but I can't say that I wasn't perfectly content :)

My second Maternity clinical experience was a little more exciting. This time I did get to see a C-Section. I helped get the mom all ready to go in; made the mistake of putting the wrong time on the lab samples (0657/0757 same difference, right?) so they had to come poke the mom 2 more times to get the draws :( Won't do that again! Poor mom. They got her into the OR and first attempted a Version where they try to turn the baby. After attempting this though, they couldn't find the fetal heart tones so it then became an Emergency C-Section. I've never seen anything like it; they moved so quick. Then there I am trying to stand out of the way while still trying to see everything. At one point my nurse is yelling at me to get that blah, blah, blah on the counter --- I had NO idea what she was talking about so after a couple of "This?" "This?" she yells "Just grab whatever and give it to me!!" So I grab this huge armful of crap and run over to her with it. My knees have never shaken so hard in my life! Talk about feeling like an idiot.
P.S. I still don't know what it was she was asking for
They probably had that baby out within 1-2 minutes from start - what a neat experience! I was worried that I might pass out or something, but the thought/feeling never crossed me in the moment. I did however have to look away as the new daddy went over to his little girl and started talking to her minutes after she was born- I almost started crying. It was different than I thought it would be though. Even though I saw it, it was sort of unreal how this baby was just pulled out of some girls stomach. One moment she was pregnant, the next they're sewing up her uterus as it sits on her stomach. Weird. I can't hardly wait until next week where I have requested to see a vaginal birth and then follow the baby up to the nursery. I imagine that will be an even more emotional experience.

Here are some more pics of my clinical group. Unfortunately we can't really take pics as we are taking care of the patients so all of our pictures sort of look the same. Hey, but here I am "delivering" a baby...a mannequin baby :) The poor mannequin mom's va-jay-jay kept falling off as the baby was trying to be born so the lab tech is trying to hold it on as our instructor tries to pull the baby out LOL Good times!

Dad Muhlestein's 50th Bday
My dad turned 50 this year on July 2nd so Skyler,my step-mom Joan, and I threw him a party. Skyler themed it "pushing him over the hill" and we catered it with all the sweets you could eat - perfect for my dad. Skyler made 3 kinds of Dutch oven peach cobbler (cinnamon, pineapple, and plain). Then he made Dutch oven smore's - AMAZING! We had birthday cake, pie, cupcakes, RedVines, DoubleBubble, a Chocolate Fountain, a cotton candy machine, and to top it off, Little Debbie Snack Cakes. Other than having to wear the giant birthday hat and pin that said "over the hill" :) I think he had a pretty good time.

4th of July Fireworks
After my dad's party we went to see the 4th of July fireworks at Murray park. Of course my dad had us hop in the old Flatbed Chevy truck, so we could enjoy the show from the back but they switched the place they set the fireworks off at, so we had to jump out and set up chairs in the lawn - that worked too :)

Adams Canyon
We were able to go on another waterfall hike that, luckily, was a little less eventful than our first. The hike wasn't quite as tough as Bells Canyon which made it a little nicer. The view was gorgeous and it was fun because the trees and plants were different than we are used to seeing in Big and Little Cottonwood Canyons.

Joan's Birthday Celebration
Joan just had her birthday last week and although it's a little backwards, she and my dad took me, Skyler, my bro Clay, my stepsister Ashton, my stepsister Maddie and her boyfriend to Buca di Beppo's for dinner. I've never seen meatballs so big! It was really good and I'm sure Joan's favorite part was when the staff all came to sing her their birthday song LOL

So, I'm not the best story teller, but believe it or not those were the short versions of those stories. That is pretty much what we've been up to so far.

Week 18 Through Arrival!

2010-07-21T08:15:00.000-07:00

My sister Heidi and husband Nick just had their 3rd...and 4th children :) They were born 7/7/10, Lauren at 5lbs 15oz and Haven at 6lbs 9oz - good sizes for twins. Lauren is home with the family and Haven is recovering well in the NICU from his surgery to fix a diaphragmatic hernia. Hopefully he'll get to come home soon!

CONGRATULATIONS HEIDI, NICK, ALISSA, and ABBY :)

WELCOME TO THE WORLD LAUREN AND HAVEN!

Alissa the Dancer

2010-06-13T14:05:00.000-07:00

Skyler and I got to go watch our niece Alissa at her first dance performance yesterday. She was so cute. My sister Heidi said Alissa was terrified, but for being terrified she did a great job. She looked so cute in her costume.

Here she is with some of her neighbor friends who are in the same dance class.
I told Alissa to strike a pose for this picture and this is what she did - silly goof :)

Then I had way too much fun cropping this pic in different ways.

She has these stunning eyes and they really stood out in this pic.

I'm not the expert cropper/photoshopper that her mom is, but I liked how these all turned out.

Then there's this cute mommy/daughter pic

Here's Skyler and I, just being in love

And here's Heidi and I. She looked so cute and SO pregnant. She grew 8cm this last week - I don't know for sure, but that sounds like a lot to me. She's hoping to make it a couple more weeks before they pop out, so I'm excited to see how much more she will grow (she's probably going to read this and say "ya, real exciting!" What are sisters for? :)

Race For the Cure

2010-06-13T13:31:00.000-07:00

Skyler and I ran the Susan G. Koman Race for the Cure this year. This race earns money towards the fight for breast cancer. My friend Amanda and her mom had done it last year and said it was an awesome experience and that we had to do it. They were right about what a great experience it is.

This is a picture of the race map. At the point on the map where the yellow line first starts to bend is where I turned around to look behind me. It was an amazing sight! There was a solid mass of people behind me - You could see masses who were still crossing the finish line. And then on top of that, there were masses in front of me too! It was enough to make you teary eyed if not balling! There was such a spirit of togetherness. What was really neat was to see the survivors wearing their solid pink survivor shirts (different from the shirts like the ones we're wearing). Some of them had been survivors for years and were running the 5k, and others were still working on surviving. There were ladies who were practically being carried by their family members through the mile walk. It made me think of how amazing our bodies are - what they can go through and survive. It also made me grateful for my body and it's strength...I don't know. I'm probably rambling, but if you ever have the chance to run a race where you get to support amazing people and/or an amazing cause, I would definitely recommend it. The whole time I was running I was thinking about how blessed I am. Usually I'm just praying that I don't trip and fall or pass-out from exhaustion :)

Here we are, posing before the race - Right to Left: Amanda (a BFF), Skyler, me, and Lisa (Amanda's mom)

Where did my brain go?

2010-05-15T07:44:00.000-07:00

I'm writing this post in hopes that others out there can relate - please tell me I'm not the only one that does these things:
So Skyler and I had a whole week of no school - yay. We were so excited that we were trying to plan some sort of a mini vacation/getaway. We talked about camping in Moab - that kind of fell through due to several reasons. Then we talked about staying at an anniversary inn for a night. We could get a discount through my work, but I waited too long to say 'yay' or 'nay' and I suffer from severe buyers remorse. It's so bad that I feel remorse before I ever even buy anything - just the thought gets me going (yes, this means that probably 3/4 of my wardrobe consists of clothing from high school days....luckily I'm also a little OCD so the cloths are in really good condition LOL). Needless to say it is now Saturday morning; Skyler is at a priesthood service project with our stake until 10, then we are off to my G'ma and G'pa Muhlestein's to help them clean and plant in their yard, then we will come home to help my mom and step-dad finish in the yard here if they're not done - not exactly the weekend getaway we had in mind...

Anyway, I worked Mon, Tues, Wed this week and was SOOOO excited to at least have Thrs and Fri off whether we were going anywhere or not. I was so excited that I text my sis. and told her that I wanted to come clean her house and paint her toenails Thrs - she's prego w/twins with only a couple months left (if that) and she can't/isn't supposed to move around too much. So Thrs morning came around and I spent all day helping her get things done. It was a lot of fun. I don't know why cleaning someone else's' house is so much more fun than cleaning your own! At around 3 I saw a message from my boss and I thought she was probably calling to ask if I could come in to work for someone. Then I listened to her message. It said something like "Hi Lyndsey, this is Kay. I was just calling to see if you're okay - you didn't show up for your shift today and I didn't see anything on the calendar. I hope that everything is okay. Give me a call"....yep; I TOTALLY skipped out on my shift at work. I just plain didn't show up. Had nobody said anything to me I would have never realized either - this info was nowhere in my brain until I heard that message. The thing was that on Thursdays I was coming in from just 12:30-3:30 because the other girl I split my shift with had a class at 12:30 on Thrs so she couldn't work the complete shift. Well, school was out so why would she need me to come in for these hours, right?? I guess maybe I should have discussed that with her...I called my boss back and all I could do was apologize. Luckily this is the first time in 2 years that I've done anything like this - I've never even taken a sick day and have only taken time off a handful of times!

Needless to say I felt pretty darn: embarrassed, stupid, sorry, etc. I ended up making all my co-workers brownies that night that I was going to take in Fri. It was funny though. Fri came around and I ended up working 12-3:30 for this same girl - just on a different day :) I took the brownies in then. When I walked in one of my co-workers goes "Should we shoot you now or later?" I told her to just shoot me now and get it over with and then we laughed. Turns out nobody is mad at me, thank heaven!! That same lady said "If I had known it was you that was supposed to come in I wouldn't have made such a big deal about it to Kay - lucky me that they love me there.

So I am asking myself "Where did my brain go?" I just hope I never do anything like this again. I think I'll be checking my calendar daily instead of assuming I've got my schedule down LOL

Like A Little Child

2010-04-29T15:44:00.000-07:00

Skyler went onto KSL the other day and called me up all excited to tell me he found 2 posts for trucks and wheels for his longboard for only $30 - this is good apparently :) What he was really calling for was to get the "ok" to go ahead and buy a set. Since the weather has gotten nicer we've been doing a lot more outside and one of those things has been longboarding...well, I've been longboarding and he has been jogging along LOL Needless to say I agreed that it would be a lot nicer (and more fun for him) if he could also ride a longboard instead of trying to keep up with me. He went ahead and bought a set of trucks and wheels for $30, and they ended up being Sector 9's - also good apparently. He came home that day and had all of the needed supplies to finish his board - he was so cute. It was like watching a kid who is all giddy at Christmas from all the excitement. He got his board in riding condition that night and was so excited he wanted pictures. We randomly knocked on our neighbor's door and asked one of the girls to take some pictures of us. So here are the semi-finished longboards:

Here's the fronts of our boards (p.s. I just finished running so don' t mind how amazing I look)

And here are the backs of our boards. Skyler decorated mine all by himself for my Christmas gift. He's so cute!

And here we are being cool on our boards

After our photo-shoot we went down the road and rode around the church parking lot. I'm ashamed to admit that I totally biffed it!

Luckily this ankle wound was the worst thing that happened to me besides the hurt of my pride as our neighbors across the street watched me fall :( ....shame.....

Bye Bye Fundamentals - Here we come Maternity Newborn/Med Surg!!

2010-04-23T15:48:00.000-07:00

Today was my clinical groups last day in clinical - Yay! Don't get me wrong, I've loved every minute of it and I've learned so much, but any break from school is a welcome break. This semester we got to experience what it is like to work in a care/rehab center.

It has been interesting (especially for me who has never had experience with direct patient care) to assist the wonderful people I've met with their daily living tasks. One thing I have decided is that I'm not going to get old - but other than that LOL There are things that may or may not happen to you as you age. Sometimes we play a role in our health and other times we are along for the ride. I saw a lot of people who were along for the ride. Life is a chain of events and all I can hope to do is take care of my body (which I am so blessed to have) and pray for help with the rest of it :)

Like I said I learned a lot. I was able to assist/do many things from showers and helping people eat to administering meds and injections and changing a wound bandage on a stage 3 (almost 4 pressure ulcer). I was going to post a pic of what the wound I saw looked like, but then I was thinking not everyone may appreciate or be facinated by those types of things like I am. All you have to do is google "stage 4 pressure ulcer" and you can see what I'm talking about if you're interested. As for the showers and bathroom visits - before I had done it I was really worried about it being awkward and uncomfortable, but from the very first clinical day it was easy to see that when you are helpless to do things on your own those feelings go out the window. I was so glad I could help these people do these things they couldn't do. The best was when they would look at you and say "Thank you so much for helping me."

Today was really fun. One of the ladies there loves to sing. If she's in a grumpy mood all you have to do is get her started on a song like one of her favorites (I'll be loving you) ALWAYS by Patsy Cline. Today she got started on that one. She and this other lady (suffering from dementia) started singing together at the top of their lungs. Usually we (me and fellow nursing students) will chime in when we know it, but today they were singing to each other and we just watched and listened. It was probably the cutest thing I've ever seen. They would change the words or add words in where they saw fit - One lady sang "I'll be loving you Always - Curly" because she kept calling the other woman Curly since she can't remember people/names. She was being so funny.

It is hard work! I am exhausted and my back is sore, but I can tell I am definitely going into the right career. For every bad experience (like the day I got spit on as I was trying to get blood sugars, or the woman who screamed bloody murder as I was trying to give my first injection on a human, just to scare me) there are a million good ones. I just need to go write them all down! Anyway, this summer is our Maternity/Newborn class/clinicals and our Med Surg class/clinicals. I am very excited and can't wait to have more stories.

Here is my clinical group - Left to right/Back Row: Josh, Debbie (clinical instructor), Linda, Sharon, Cammie, Vanessa, Katherine, Diana, Katie. Front Row: Me and Jonelle

Same order But just being goofy. We have a lot of fun together (unimportant side note/observation - I have the same funny face I pull in every funny face pic...weird, I'll have to change that!)

Our little Aleta, all grown up

2010-04-18T17:43:00.001-07:00

Aleta, Amanda, BreAnn and I go a long way back :) We first met our senior year of high school when we all took a Veterinary Assisting class at Jordan Applied Technology Center. It was probably the most fun I have ever had at school (although I'm pretty sure our instructor hated us, now that I look back on how we acted LOL). We (minus Aleta) even ventured all the way to Nashville, Tennessee that year to compete with HOSA (Health Occupation Students of America) where we won 5th place nationally for medical reading - good times :) We've been friends ever since. Although I was the friend saying I wouldn't get married until I was 30, I turned out to be the first one hitched. They all came to see me in AZ for my bridal shower and then to Skyler's and my reception in SLC. Whether we've gotten together once a year or every few months we've stayed pretty close. If I'm ever needing a girls night out where my stomach hurts from laughing so hard, these are the girls I call up.

Well, it was Aleta's turn to marry the love of her life. She and Paul got married last Saturday, April 10th. Skyler and I were able to attend the sealing ceremony at the Draper temple here in SLC. It was really neat to be able to be there for that ~ she's the first one of my friends to get married. Amanda and BreAnn were outside the temple and it was so fun for us to stand back and watch how happy Aleta was. She and Paul are perfect for each other! Congratulations Aleta!

Left to Right: Amanda, Aleta, me, BreAnn

At the reception place we thought it was a good opportunity for some couples photos. I was the only one with a camera and unfortunately it stinks! But some of the pics weren't too bad. Here are a few of Amanda with her boyfriend Tim and his son Taylor.

Amanda and Tim

Tim and Taylor

Skyler and I

Our BreAnn didn't have a boy to pose with so she strutted her cute stuff solo.

And then we posed with her too - aren't we a cute couple!?

Amanda, BreAnn, and me

This interesting pic is not supposed to be what it looks like. I was simply trying to be silly and act like I was going to lick the ice sculpture. Really I was on the side of the swan, but when I saw this later I realized it looked a little risk-ay - like I'm gonna goose the goose. Ooops!

We later entertained ourselves in the courtyard. Skyler and I were across from them in this pic on another swing. We were touching feet as we swung. As you can see on the faces of these two, it was surprisingly fun.

The reception was really pretty and they had ColdStone cater it ~ coolest thing EVER! Aleta looked gorgeous and so happy next to Paul. I'm really glad that she found such a great guy to marry. Skyler and I got them a tent for their gift so they can come camping with us ;) We love you Aleta!!....oh, and Paul!!! :D

Easter

2010-04-18T12:50:00.001-07:00

We kind of had a laid back and quiet Easter this year - partly because I think it snuck up on us! Last year we did Easter baskets and everything, but this year we just had a nice Sunday dinner over at my dad's and Joan's house with my brother, grandpa, and grandma Muhlestein. Skyler and I watched Conference together as I baked this Easter cake. It was a coconut vanilla cake with multi-colored layers. It turned out okay, but if nothing else it was definitely Easter-y.

Of course we had to dye Easter Eggs, but we only did six because neither Skyler or I like to eat hard boiled eggs very often. It's just one of those tradition things :)

For Christmas this last year Joan bought Skyler and I a scrap-book calendar so each month I've been trying to get a pic from one of the highlighting events. This one's just goofy, but I think I'll put it on for April.

Bachelorette Party

2010-03-28T18:07:00.000-07:00

One of my best buds, Aleta-the-pita-eata :) is getting married in 14 days from yesterday. Naturally we had to throw a bachelorette party for her. We rented a hotel in Park City and stayed the night. I love that when I'm with these ladies I laugh until I cry, over and over. I'm so excited that she's met a great guy and that we could celebrate with her and see how excited she is.

We couldn't let her go through the night without trying to embarrass her a little. I don't know if it worked. We bought her a brides outfit from Wal Mart - it was for a 3+ yr old, but it kinda fit her, the lucky duck :D We ate dinner at Fuego's. The service wasn't too good - they didn't even comment on Aleta's obviously absurd outfit! But the food was good and the company was awesome!

Amber & Aleta

BreAnn & Amber
Amanda & me
She wore the brides outfit over cloths at the restaurant, but stripped down back at the hotel LOL
We went for a late night dip in the hot tub
The next day we did a little window shopping around old town Park City

Here's BreAnn workin' the giant hat

We also enjoyed the art shops

Happy St. Patricks Day!

2010-03-21T12:53:00.000-07:00

The annual St. Patty's Day parade was fun as usual.
Back Row/Left to Right: uncle Kurt, me, Skyler, aunt Sari, Grandpa
Front Row/Left to Right: Grandma holding cousin William, cousin Milo, and cousin Dylan

Here's Grandpa and Grandma Muhlestein. Grandpa had everyone cracking up at his costume.

Babysitting the Girls

2010-03-21T11:42:00.000-07:00

Skyler and I got to babysit our nieces the other weekend. They are so much fun and so cute - we had a great time.
Here are some shots of Abby. I love some of the pics from the park. The second I pulled out the camera she was pulling all sorts of poses - you'd think her mom took a lot of pictures or something :)

And here's her big sis Alissa

Alissa wrote Skyler and I a play to act out. I suggested that we record it like a real video and she could be the director. Her eyes were huge and she had this enormous grin the whole time.

IT'S A GIRL!!!!.....AND A BOY!!!!

2010-03-08T15:02:00.000-08:00

I'm so excited! My sister and her hubby Nick are having twins and just found out today that it's a girl and a boy. They have two adorable girls already and they probably didn't care about the boy/girl thing, but I was SO rootin' for a boy - and my wish came true! (I have to live vicariously through others until we can start having kids).

Here she is - Only 19 wks along Look at that beautiful belly!

Summing Up Random Happenings

2010-03-06T11:06:00.000-08:00

This is our dog Chet. He came inside the other day and had this Alfalfa Hair going on so I had to take a pic. I thought it was hilarious.
Skyler and I don't usually eat a lot of popcorn, but I've been trying to find healthier snacks so it has made its way into our diet. I popped some the other day and got SO excited when I remembered that we had these bowls especially for popcorn. Someone gave them to us when we got married and we have never had an opportunity to use them until now - Thanks popcorn bowl givers!
Here we are on Valentines day. Skyler and I took a love letter writing class the week before so that is what we gave each other for Valentines Day - Love Letters we wrote to each other. He's so cute to do stuff like that with me.
I had to make a poster for school with the 6 Rights of Medication Administration on it. One of them is right route and our medication was "oral" so I took a pic of my open mouth. I just thought this pic was funny because it is a picture of my very own mouth, but something just doesn't look quite right...

Since we first moved to Utah I have talked several times to Skyler about this great park and how we have to go there and it's so fun - Copperton Park. I would tell him how I used to go to it when I was little and it had this HUGE pyramid at it and these giant tires you could crawl inside and on and these tunnels you could go through. I remember it being so amazing...Have you ever gone back to something years and years after you had been there and it's hard to believe that you're looking at the same place because it doesn't look anything like you remember it?

Here I am sitting on one of the tunnels. Notice the beautiful art work addition?

And here I am on one of the giant tires. They are pretty big, but considering I used to be able to crawl up inside of them and now I can probably fit my big toe inside - it's just wasn't the same. Behind me is the "HUGE" pyramid. It was slightly taller than my head...I guess for a kid I could still see it being pretty amazing, but I kind of like my memory of it better than the reality at this point. LOL Oh well!

Duchesne Adventures

2010-03-06T10:34:00.000-08:00

Let me start out by stating that I think my dad has gone crazy. Okay, maybe crazy isn't the right word, but what do you call someone who is willing to go on a two hour drive to the middle of nowhere, in the winter, in a Ford Focus, and then walk over a mile in snow which reaches at LEAST up to your knees and sometimes up to your thighs while carrying probably 50 lbs worth of tools and supplies to work on a cabin that takes at least 2 hours to heat up with the fireplace? Okay, ya, crazy is the only word I can come up with! lol This was the adventure Skyler and I got to be a part of the other week. My dad has been working on his cabin in Duchesne, UT for a few years now and he is itching to get it done this year - hence the winter crazies. I guess it doesn't help that I despise the cold. Partly because Skyler and I don't own any proper snow equipment. Despite the conditions, we were able to smile and laugh about it...well, it took me until I was un-thawing by the fireplace (okay, I'm a wimp). We did get quite a bit of work done. But Skyler and I haven't gone back since. I promise it's only because we've been so busy :)

Here is Skyler making the final stretch up the 'driveway' to the cabin

And here's my "crazy" dad - Love you dad!

I didn't realize we would be hiking in snow up to my thighs so I wasn't quite prepared wearing jeans and sneakers. I was soaking wet when we got to the cabin (not a good way to start the day). Luckily there were some garbage bags with sheets and towels and I found an extra pair of my dad's socks lying around. I stripped down and strutted my stuff in a bed sheet and grocery bags tied on my feet with towels and washcloths stuffed in them to stay warm while all my things dried.

I'm sure Skyler would do it again, but as for me I think I'll wait until the snow thaws before I head there again - no offense dad!

Happy Birthday Amanda B!

2010-03-06T10:19:00.000-08:00

I guess the downside of not being very good at up-keeping my blog is having (or more-so wanting) to back track on events. So even though this and my last few posts have happened over the last couple of months, the events were too fun to pass up.

My BFF :) Amanda B. had a Birthday - Yay for Birthdays! Our little group of 4 got together at Amanda's to celebrate with ice skating and cake and ice cream. I don't think any of us had really ice skated since high school. This meant that 2 out of 4 got to experience falling on the ice - the other 2 got to experience laughing at their friends when they fell ;) One thing I have really been blessed with in my life is a handful of really good friends and when we get together whether it's every few months or once or twice a year, we always have a lot of laughs and carefree fun.

Left to Right: Aleta, Amanda, Me, BreAnn

Aleta and I took on the task of decorating the cake. It said "I 'heart' B-Days & U" and Aleta's addition was the stitches which were holding the cake and frosting together. Every time we tried to spread the frosting it would just pull up giant chunks of the cake. It actually turned out looking pretty darn good compared to it's initial state.

Stromboli Ladder Loaf

2010-03-06T09:49:00.000-08:00

The thing about dinners is that I don't like to make the same things over and over. This is only a problem because every time I cook it is more of a production then just making dinner. I'm still learning :) I'm sure once we have kids and I can't convince them (nor will I want them) to eat cereal for every meal when I don't want to cook, this will have to change. The upside to this is that when I do cook I try a lot of new recipes courtesy of the lobby magazines where I work.

This is one of my most recent favorites - the Stromboli Ladder Loaf. It's like a giant homemade Hotpocket -mmmm What's nice about this is that you can fill it with anything you want. I've done the traditional pizza sauce, cheese and pepperoni but I've also tried Alfredo sauce with broccoli, spinach and chicken - and the list of options goes on.
It's a pretty quick meal because you don't have to wait long for the dough to *rise and like I said, the list of options for fillings is as long as you are creative.

Prep: 25 min + rising Bake: 20 min

Dough Ingredients

1 1/2 c water (70-80 degrees)
2 Tbs canola oil
1 tsp lemon juice
2 Tbs nonfat dry milk powder
2 Tbs sugar
1 tsp salt
4 c bread flour
3 tsp active dry yeast

Filling (as they suggest - I didn't follow any of the measurements because it's more of an add-your-preference type dish. I would suggest adding a lot of sauce if you don't want it dry because the dough soaks up moisture easily)

3/4 c pizza sauce
1 pkg sliced pepperoni
2 c shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 c grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg white
1 Tbs water

In bread machine (we don't have one so I just mixed by hand) place first 8 ingredients. Select dough setting (check dough after 5 min of mixing; add 1-2 Tbs of water/flour if needed). When cycle is complete, turn dough onto a lightly floured surface. Roll into a 15-in x 12-in rectangle. Place on a greased baking sheet.

Spread pizza sauce in a 3-in strip lengthwise down the center of dough to w/in 2-in of short ends. Arrange pepperoni over sauce; sprinkle w/cheeses.

On each long side, cut 1-in-wide strips about 2 1/2 in. into center. Starting at one end, fold alternating strips at an angle across filling. Pinch ends to seal.

Beat the egg white and water; brush over the dough. Bake at 425 for 20-25 min or until golden brown. Let stand 10 min before cutting.

*I don't make a lot of breads, but to me this recipe doesn't really say how long to let it rise. Honestly I didn't let my dough rise at all, but it turned out fine. It wasn't too thick and it rose a lot when I cooked it so I haven't worried about it. Maybe someone could give me a pointer on this :)

Dinner at Ghidotti's

2010-03-06T09:10:00.000-08:00

Skyler and I went to a fancy restaurant up in Park City with my friends Sadie and Jessica (and Jessica's boyfriend Brian). When we first moved to UT I thought an upside for me is that I would be able to see all my friends more often - turns out life is crazy busy for EVERYONE and it doesn't matter if you live one state or 5 miles away from each other; finding/making time to hang out gets hard. Plus Sadie now lives in...Montana I think (those "M" states always jumble up in my mind). My genius buddy is going to pharmacy school :) Anyway, we had a blast. Skyler and I never go to anything more expensive than Texas Road House so it was fun.

Left to Right: Me, Sadie, Jessica

I had to take a picture with the menu. It was so huge I could have changed outfits behind it. I'm glad we got the pic though because it is the only reason I know the name of the place.

I kept wanting to name the restaurant after the chocolate company:

The thing about expensive restaurants is that the more your food costs, the less of it you're going to get. This was Sadie's salad...it was the size of a tunafish can...and it was disgusting...and it was almost $10...

This pic is my favorite. The waiter came around to each of us offering freshly grated Parmesan in our oil and vinegar (for the focaccia bread). When he grated the cheese for Skyler a giant chunk of cheese broke off onto his plate. The waiter just kind of looked at it for a sec, finished grating, and then left. We were all laughing at this giant chunk of cheese on his plate and then realized that the waiter wasn't allowed to take it because he would have been touching Skyler's plate of food and then he couldn't use the cheese now anyway. So when I realized that they were going to just be throwing this chunk of cheese away, I couldn't let that happen. Parmesan cheese is expensive! and so good - so I took that chunk of cheese and stuck it in my purse. That's what this pic is. There was even a perfect little cheese pocket in my purse (I think it was for a cell phone or something). Skyler and I ate 2 spaghetti meals each the next couple of days with freshly grated Parmesan. It was glorious - I have no shame!

Waterfall Canyon

2010-03-06T08:32:00.000-08:00

So Kai, Clarissa, and Brinley :) got us this GREAT book for Christmas. I've actually been reading it like it was a novel, marking all of the hikes I want to go to first (there's about 30 hikes I want to go to "first" LOL) Then I got the great idea to do all of them! Not within any certain time frame, but just to do them all and take a picture at the highlight of each one. Then I started thinking "with all these pictures, we might not be able to remember which hike was which. So then I got the idea that in these pictures we would hold up a sign that said the hike name and the date to mark when and where it all took place - cool idea, huh!?

The book is awesome because it breaks down the hikes in several different ways such as: location of the hike (North - Weber County; North - Davis County, etc) , author's picks, hikes of 1-3 mi, hikes of 3-6 mi (etc up to > 9 mi), steep hikes, hikes near streams and rivers, best hikes for children - Anyway, the list goes on. So one of the categories is "best winter hikes." I loved this because Skyler and I haven't really branched out on the winter hiking because we assumed it would involve a lot of snow gear here in UT (a lot of expensive snow gear). But the whole book is about hikes that you don't necessarily need gear for and they are all hikes you could do in a day - especially because they are all within 60 miles of SLC. So the first hike we decided to go on was Waterfall Canyon. It was BEAUTIFUL! and hard...But BEAUTIFUL! lol It was only hard because we didn't really have the proper footwear which is probably the only thing you might want to spend a little money on for hiking in the snow/uphill ice. But we made it and it was all worth it. The waterfall was frozen which I was a little disappointed about at first, but then we got closer and...it was BEAUTIFUL :) So here we are with our sign at the "highlight" of the hike.

Here are a couple of videos that Skyler took. In the first one I take a nose dive and in the second one Skyler almost slides right off the side of the mountain. It doesn't look like we are going very fast, but we were. Once you got going you had to dig your heels in to stop. So much fun. Thanks Kai, Clarissa, and Brinley!

P.S. This book exists for almost every major city so I would definitely recommend it if you're looking for a great hiking book.

Christmas Vacation - A Brown Christmas

2010-01-17T14:00:00.000-08:00

We were able to spend Christmas in Arizona this year - a whole 10 days! Mom and Dad Nelson were so good to us to let us stay at their house and eat their food and enjoy their company. Hanging out with the family was just what we needed. It was a great break.

The Saturday morning after we got to AZ was the Nelson breakfast. The weather was beautiful and the food was great. Afterward we went on a little family hike. It was a lot of fun.

Here's Brinley and Clarissa
I got to go over to Aubrie and Jacob's apartment to help watch little Linden while Aubrie cut hair.

Here is cute little Linden.

Hiking Bolder Creek near Canyon Lake

Picture Shoot :)

2010-01-17T13:37:00.000-08:00

While in AZ everyone was showing us these cute pictures they had taken at the Mesa Arts Center. Well, Skyler and I decided to ask his brother Kai if he'd take some of us. Usually the only pictures Skyler and I get taken together are when one of us takes them.

Out of all of the pics Kai took these turned out to be some of my favorites.

These are most of the pictures that were taken. In some of them we are just playing around, but there are a lot of good ones that I'll probably print and stick in a book.

Tap Dancing

2010-01-02T10:03:00.000-08:00

Here are a couple videos of my cute brother. He took a tap dancing class at SLCC this semester for an Arts credit. I don't know how I convinced him to do this on video, but I watch them all of the time. He always makes me laugh.

I don't know how to rotate the videos unfortunately - if anyone knows how let me know! - Here he is teaching me the steps:

And here he is dancing to Prince's "Kiss" I don't know how he kept a straight face. I was laughing so hard I had tears running down my face. Maybe it's just because he's my brother??

And finally I took a video up closer because I was trying to capture his serious face.

What a good sport! He actually isn't too bad at it LOL

Halloween

2009-12-05T15:22:00.001-08:00

The month of October was so full of fun that I haven't had a chance to post anything until now! (good excuse, huh?)

Now that Skyler's the Scout Master he gets to do all sorts of fun things, and I often get to come along. One of the traditional October activity in this ward is going to the corn maze. This year we went to Thanksgiving Point's Cornbelly's Corn Maze.

These are a few of Skyler's scouts - good kids.

They had a giant half bouncy ball thing that you could jump on. It was SO windy and freezing cold that it actually helped to warm us up to jump on it even though we had to take our shoes off. These are a couple of pictures I got of Skyler jumping.
And these are the pictures that Skyler took of me. He did NOT plan this, but it's kind of creepy how well these pictures fit together.

This is Zack in the corn pile - it was like a sand pit only filled with corn and he LOVED it

And here we are with the Cinderella carriage. I'm blowing Skyler a kiss, and he's pretending to whip me... :)

These were my cute little Sunbeams. Towards the end of the year it gets really fun to teach them because they are older and more interactive. I had a really good group this year - couldn't have asked for a better one!

This is the Primary Halloween Party group photo

Skyler came with me and we both had to throw together a costume. He wore my dad's high school football jersey. We painted on some black streaks under the eyes and transformed him into a football player. I threw on some scrubs, a lab jacket, and a stethoscope. Then I wore my hospital I.D. and even though it says "Registrar" on it all of the kids kept asking me if I was a real doctor. If only that was all it took! LOL

For a girls night one weekend I got to go to Odyssey Dance Theater's Thriller. If you ever have the chance to see this I would definitely recommend it. It was so much fun!

Before the show actually begins they have 'zombies' roaming around the seating scaring people or just making them laugh. We got a few pictures with some of them.

This is my best friend Amanda and I with one of the zombies

And here is the whole group that went

We even got around to carving a pumpkin this year. I think it turned out pretty well.
Before Skyler and I were officially part of the activities committee we were just volunteers and we got to help with the Halloween party. We were in charge of what became the coolest ward party haunted house EVER. This left us only minutes to run home and change into our costumes. We were supposed to be Morticia and Gomez Adams, but all the kids thought I was a vampire and they weren't sure what Skyler was supposed to be :)

I tried my hand at making a Monster Cake. It sort of ended up looking like a frog, but if you look close you can see the teeth - that helps out a little
I made some monster eyeball cupcakes to go along with it.

HALLOWEEN DINNER:

These are my "Feet of Meat" which was just meatloaf in the shape of feet and Brazilian nuts for toenails. Then at the ankle where the feet were 'cut' off was chili sauce. It made for a fun Halloween dinner.

My sister and her family came by Halloween night before they went out trick-or-treating.

Abby was a pumpkin and Alyssa was a witch.

Here's Abby trying on my wig. She that that was awesome. - And that was our Halloween fun!

Random Happenings

2009-12-04T19:01:00.000-08:00

So once upon a time when I was younger my brother said something like "hold still, you have a hair on your face" and then when he tried to pluck it off we realized it was attached! It had to be 3 inches long growing right out of the side of my face! (I don't know if any of you have ever had such a devastating experience before LOL) Needless to say he has never let me live it down. Well, not long ago we were all sitting around talking and he found THIS on his leg! It wasn't quite the same as being a girl and finding such a hair on your face, but it was still quite impressive and we all got a good laugh out of it...

How would you like to have a job where you could do this? I know I have many days where I think to myself "Man! If I could just hop on a mini dirt bike for a quick ride around the hospital, I know I would be completely rejuvenated" Some people have all the luck :D

I was finally able to re-finish our living room coffee table this fall (thanks Aunt Barb aka Dumpster Diving Diva). It was a lot of fun to see it transform. There's something so satisfying about "making" the things that decorate your home.

Here we are at the State Fair 2009. This year my buddy Amanda H. and her buddy Ryan C. came with us. It was a lot of fun to be able to go with some other people this year. P.S. I just realized that some random lady is giving me bunny ears in this picture...Thanks Lady!

The first attraction we saw was the Alligator-tamers. It was very exciting to watch. The two guys that did it are brothers and have been traveling with this show for years. They had one cheesy, but hilarious joke after another. We were cracking up. They performed the hand-in-the-alligator- mouth trick and both Amanda and I holding our breaths in anticipation. That was kind of scary to watch and I'm pretty sure I screamed when the alligator chomped down (not on the guys hand luckily) After that came the rides...
I got the brilliant idea to try to take pictures as Skyler and I rode the infamous fair ride: The Zipper - hence the lovely shot of my chompers and Skyler's chest

Believe it or not these two are action shots I snapped as we were rocking and spinning around - I love Skyler's laugh during things like this. It's so unguarded. It sounds like a cute little giggle and neither of us could stop laughing the whole time.
Poor Ryan is something like 6'7'' so needless to say he wasn't the most comfortable during the ride.

These are some pics on the only other ride we went on. You got to lay on your stomach for this one and "hang glide" It was more of a relaxing ride, but still fun. Due to the expense of tickets for the attractions (I think we spent $20 buck for 2 rides totaling about 8 minutes of fun) we didn't get to see the smallest person in the world or the half snake half women, but maybe next time...

Maybe the grossest thing ever...?

2009-10-09T09:36:00.001-07:00

So my friend got married yesterday - everything was gorgeous - I'll have to get pics from the family (since I didn't take my camera) but I witnessed the most...creative *?* "Just Married" car decorating I've ever seen. Both the bride and groom are outdoorsy type people and the groom has some friends big into hunting. Well, when they walked out to their car that night, not only was it decorated with the more traditional shaving cream, silly string, Oreos, and ceran wrap, but greeting them on the front of their car hood was a freshly dead raccoon...YES, A RACCOON! They even managed to get the tail to stick straight up with some wire manipulation. One of the grooms buddies had trapped and killed a raccoon just for this occasion. I thought it was hilarious, but after a little thinking they decided they'd better take it off. Could you imagine the law suit from some PITA member who saw that!!?

Got this in an e-mail

2009-09-25T10:32:00.000-07:00

I thought these were hilarious - I bolded some of my favorites either because I just thought they were great or else I have thought/done them...

- I wish Google Maps had an "Avoid Ghetto" routing option.

-More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can
think about is that I can't wait for them to finish so that I can tell
my own story that's not only better, but also more directly involves
me.

-Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you
realize you're wrong.

-I don't understand the purpose of the line, "I don't need to drink to
have fun." Great, no one does. But why start a fire with flint and
sticks when they've invented the lighter?

-Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you're
going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to
be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the
direction from which you came, you have to first do something like
check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to
yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're
crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk. - This is funny because I've done this!

-I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

-Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the "people you may know"
feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose
not to be friends with?

-Do you remember when you were a kid, playing Nintendo and it wouldn't
work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically
fix the problem. Every kid in America did that, but how did we all
know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards
or FAQ's. We just figured it out. Today's kids are soft.

-There is a great need for sarcasm font.

-Sometimes, I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and
suddenly realize I had no idea what the heck was going on when I first
saw it.

-I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually
becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting
90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's
laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little
bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I'm still the
only one who really, really gets it.

-How the heck are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

-I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than
take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

- I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear
your computer history if you die.

-The only time I look forward to a red light is when I’m trying to
finish a text.

- A recent study has shown that playing beer pong contributes to the
spread of mono and the flu. Yeah, if you suck at it.

- LOL has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say".

- I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

- Answering the same letter three times or more in a row on a Scantron
test is absolutely petrifying.

- Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart",
all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

- How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod
and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

- I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up
to prevent a jerk from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

- Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in'
examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete
idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and
said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies"

-What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

- While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and
i nstinctively swerved to avoid it...thanks Mario Kart.

- MapQuest really needs to start their directions on #5. Pretty sure I

know how to get out of my neighborhood.

- Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the
person died.

- I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the
shower first and THEN turn on the water.

-Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty,
and you can wear them forever.

-I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

- Bad decisions make good stories

-Whenever I'm Facebook stalking someone and I find out that their
profile is public I feel like a kid on Christmas morning who just got
the Red Ryder BB gun that I always wanted. 546 pictures? Don't mind if
I do!- Ha ha, okay that's creepy

- Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

-If Carmen San Diego and Waldo ever got together, their offspring
would probably just be completely invisible.

-Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go
around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly
nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be
a problem....

-You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work
when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything
productive for the rest of the day.

-Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don't
want to have to restart my collection.

-There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are
going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

-I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me
if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I
swear I did not make any changes to.

- "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means I will never wash this ever.

-I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people
watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will
they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't
watching this. It's only a matter of time before they all get up and
leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

-I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello?
Darn-it!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and
goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone
and run away?

- I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not
seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

-When I meet a new girl, I'm terrified of mentioning something she
hasn't already told me but that I have learned from some light
internet stalking.

-I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it's on shuffle,
then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

-Why is a school zone 20 mph? That seems like the optimal cruising
speed for pedophiles...

- As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers,
but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

-Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still
not know what time it is.

-It should probably be called Unplanned Parenthood.

-I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to
answer when they call.

-Even if I knew your social security number, I wouldn't know what do to with it.

-Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car
keys in a pocket, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the
Donkey - but I’d bet everyone can find and push the Snooze
button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time
every time...

-My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day "Dad what would
happen if you ran over a ninja?" How the heck do I respond to that?

-It really ticks me off when I want to read a story on CNN.com and
the link takes me to a video instead of text.

-I wonder if cops ever get ticked off at the fact that everyone they
drive behind obeys the speed limit.

-I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

-I disagree with Kay Jewelers. I would bet on any given Friday or
Saturday night more kisses begin with Miller Lites than Kay.

Last Hoo-rah!

2009-09-08T16:18:00.000-07:00

This Labor Day weekend was busy as ever, but we managed to squeeze in some fun. Saturday Skyler helped out the neighbors as they unexpectedly had to replace a REALLY old water heater (gotta love those kinds of surprises). In the meantime I got a phone call from an aunt who was needing a little cheering up so I went over to her place and we canned tomatoes and peppers. This was my first experience canning and I think I could really get into it. We made a giant pot of a salsa type deal, and then she gave me a jar of just tomatoes and a jar of tomatoes and peppers (w/out the onions and garlic) to take home, plus some of what we had made together. I still haven't tasted what we made, so I don't know if I was any good at it or not, but I'll just pretend I was :) It smelled good, that's for sure!
When I got home Skyler and I decided to take a drive up a canyon we hadn't been to yet - I think it was called Neff Canyon?? We didn't get very far on the trail, but we got far enough to realize it's one we'll want to do sometime. Oh, and on the way down we saw the most random thing; this man had a bunch of packing goats that he was training for hikes and he was taking them on a walk up this trail. They got a little distracted by us when we passed by, but when he whistled and called them they followed him. It was so fun to see.
Labor Day we woke up and got ready to go hike this Neff Canyon trail, but moments before we were about to leave I got a call from my sister Heidi. She invited us to come up to her parents get-away home in Huntsville to go boating. Our plans quickly changed :D The weather was wonderful and we had such a good time with Heidi, Nick and the girls, and Heidi's friend Madie (sp?) and her husband Colby. I'll post some pics below - there are some good facial expressions in some of these so look close LOL

Here I am just chillin' on the boat

And here's Skyler manning the tube

This is about as close as a pic together that we got that day

Skyler just can't stop making me laugh (and I hope he doesn't)

Girls got to go first: Here's Madie, Heidi and my niece Alyssa, and me getting ready for the coldest shower (or more like face spraying) of our life!
Heidi's face in this one cracks me up - we were all screaming pretty loud. I really love the second one though because you can totally tell Heidi is mad and yelling at Nick to slow down LOL

The guys got to go next and we made sure their ride was JUST as exciting as ours >:)
Here is Nick, Colby, and Skyler
This was the final jump before the guys then got a little upset and had us slow down LOL This pic was taken right before the tube came crashing down and Skyler flipped off, rolling under the tube. We all couldn't stop laughing. Nick's face is the best in this one.

If there had been a trophy awarded for the person who fell off the most, Skyler would have won. He didn't mind though - it just meant a little more excitement for him. What a trooper!

Our Summer :D

2009-09-05T18:11:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it, but summer is ending quickly. I keep thinking to myself that I don't know where it went but then I look back on all of the pictures we've taken this season and I guess we've been staying pretty busy - no wonder time flies! I decided that it would be easiest to recap the summer with a bunch of slide shows and a little "blurb" about each thing so here ya go:

Top of Utah 1/2 Marathon
So this was a beautiful trail. It was gradually downhill for the 1st 6/7 miles through Logan, UT canyon and the last little bit was mostly level through some neighborhoods and ending at a park. Mishelle, Page, and Amanda all did great. Skyler was there at the finish line to take pictures. He even got one of Brother Steadman who is also in our ward. I did not have the best experience with this one, which was VERY, VERY disappointing. I made it to mile 9 and had to get a ride to the finish line - I was SO sick. When I found Skyler at the finish line he had the camera ready and the cutest look on his face and I could tell he was searching for me to be coming down the finish line soon...I burst into tears :( He knew just what I needed and took me in his arms. I was so glad he was there. The only thing that is helping me to get over what I am still struggling to not call a failure is that there was absolutely NOTHING I could do or could have done differently. Hopefully I can figure out what went on and I will beat my one and only 1/2 marathon time from Hobble Creek of 2hr11min.

Happy 80th Grandpa!
My Grandpa Muhlestein turned 80 this year - wow! He keeps joking that he doesn't feel a day over 65 LOL We threw a party for him with all of my aunts, uncles, cousins, and some of Grandpa's siblings. As decoration there were pictures of Grandpa from his lifetime all over the picnic tables. They also had a table set up with some of his memorabilia. The birthday cake was awesome (thanks aunt Amy). It had a screen print pic of Grandpa and then there were things like tools and a hairpiece - things that remind us all of grandpa - because he's a carpenter and used to be a hair piece salesman. My job was to make the "Family Tree". Then we all traced and cut out our hands on green paper and wrote a birthday message to Grandpa. It was a nice visual of all of the people that have been brought into this world in part because of Grandpa - and it made a cute backdrop. To top off the night some of Grandpa's siblings and those that grew up with him, as well my dad, told stories they remember about Grandpa. I liked the story his sister Lily told about the time Grandpa took her around in a little red wagon and tried to sell her for 5 cents. I also like the story she told about Grandpa and his batman costume. Those are wonderful memories to have. Look forward to another 80 years Grandpa! ;)

Well at the party I took a pic of my cousins Chloe, Lauren, and Malorie. As I was taking the pic I said "Hey, something looks familiar." When I got home I found a pic from many years ago of these same cute girls! - same order and everything! I thought that was pretty fun.

Camping and Fishing
Skyler, being the great event organizer that he is, planned a fun camping and fishing trip up Provo Canyon with his friend Jake and his wife Alyssa. A couple of PT's Skyler worked with at the VA hospital came too (Liz and Micah- but we didn't get pics with them) and they were fun to get to know also. We slept in the most random camping spot in grass that reached up to my hip before we smashed it down with our tents. It rained on us a bit, but we didn't let that stop us from having smores and peach cobbler (Skyler's trademark camping desert). We only got in trouble once with the cops who thought we might be some youngsters getting plastered in the mountains. We were all just about to go to bed when the cops came and we were just glad that they didn't tell us to pack up camp! We didn't catch a single fish even though we could see them jumping in the river. I did however see a Black Footed Ferret - that was random and SO cute. Overall it was one of those simple and nice get-aways that we don't get enough of :)

Delta UT -July 18th
Skyler's cousin Jacob Porter got married to a girl from Delta, UT. I had never heard of Delta before, but apparently it is only a couple hours from us here in SLC. What this meant was that we got to go to their reception. This was a lot of fun for us. We got to see some of Skyler's side of the family including G'ma and G'pa Porter and Rodney and Lisa. It was fun to see some of that side of the family without having to travel for 11 hours - only 2! LOL Unfortunately we were so busy talking that we didn't get any pics until Skyler and I stopped on the way home at the only open restaurant at 9p on a Saturday in Delta. We were just being silly, but that's us!

Zions Trip
For the 4th of July Skyler, me, and my BFF (besides Skyler) Amanda all went to Zions National Park and enjoyed some heat (which we did NOT get the entire month of June). Amanda was such a sport ;) to come with us married folk for some cheap-ish fun. The weather was great! We hiked The Narrows (those pics aren't scanned to the comp yet) and Angels Landing. It was dusty and hot, but beautiful. Luckily the Narrows didn't flash flood until the day after we hiked it. That kind of put a damper on our tubing the Virgin River idea - the water looked just like the chocolate river in "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" LOL So instead we just snuck into a swimming pool at a local camper "resort." Good Times!

Happy Birthday Dad!
My dad turned 49 this year - only one more until the BIG 5-0! We made sure to get him some manly gifts like tools and earplugs - he can always use those!

Making a picture frame
I was just proud of this idea. I got a bunch of different scrapbook papers and tore them randomly and glued them to the part surrounding the pics in this frame. It turned out really cute, I think. And it is so fun to look at all of the things Skyler and I have been able to experience together.

Ward Campout
The ward campout was fun. Skyler and I got to teach everyone a new and hilarious game. We will still never think of certain people the same i.e. Jerry Hatch "The Sex Kitten"...yes, I did say WARD camp-out...you don't want to know LOL

This video is hilarious. Lets just say we now always check EVERY pocket in the tent before we pack up.

Here is Skyler and I going down the zip line.

BABYSITTING THE GIRLS
I started the summer out right when I got to be the nanny for my nieces Abby and Alyssa. It was so much fun to be there with them that much. They are both so cute and fun!

2009-08-08T16:39:00.000-07:00

My Dad is so much fun! He has been entering in parades this past little while; 4th of July, 24th, and here we are at Midvale's Harvest Day Parade. He has a 1945 2 ton Chevy flatbed that he puts in while who-ever sits in the back. Skyler was camping with the scouts so he couldn't come, but Clay had just gotten home from basic training the night before and he got to be there to drive the old truck, while my dad's bluegrass "band" played in the back. I was in charges of throwing candy (very important).

My dad is the one on the guitar (he also played the banjo), and the other two are from my dad's ward.
Page is the girl and the only one you can hear in the video clip, but you get the idea. It was a really fun parade for them to do this in because it went through the neighborhoods in Midvale and they played a couple old-timin' songs that everyone really loved.

Laugh out loud

2009-08-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

So our computer that has all our pics on it and the only one that we can transfer our camera's memory card to has crashed! This means that we haven't been able to download any new pics for a while. This led me to looking at what pics were on our other computer and I found some that were taken on my cousin Leslie's computer while we were all in Pennsylvania for my Grandpa Pinky's funeral. I laugh out loud every time I look through these. I don't know if this is because I was there and part of it or what. These are just a few (and I mean a few because we went until 5am doing this and ended up with almost 600 pics LOL) of my favorites. Hope you enjoy them at least a little:

This is one of my sis. Heidi I played around with and changed a little because I thought it was such a cool shot.

Here is one of me with a twisted look...

And then here is Heidi

Leslie started looking like Penelope with her hair like this and her nose taped up LOL

And then a few moments later she pulled off this Jay Leno look

This is one of those I laugh out loud at. Sometimes I look at these and am amazed at how distorted things were

Here are our crazy eye pics: Heidi

Me

Here are all 4 of us (my cousin Josh, Heidi, Leslie, and me)

Big lips run in the family :D

This is about the most normal shot we took. There is no distortion - just a weird color to the pic...oh ya, and our makeovers!

Here is one my aunt Cyndi did. She and my aunt Aly were watching us and cracking up the whole time

This one kind of scares me

And this is one of my favorites of me

Living the Bachelor-ette Life...

2009-07-06T20:20:00.000-07:00

Skyler left for Scout camp this morning and wont be home until Wednesday night so I am living the bachelor-ette life again. This has me asking myself "How did I ever spend all this boring time?!" I didn't have a house to clean or a full time job like I do now - what did I do? Anyway, luckily my boss helped me out by asking me to work 3 1/2 hours past my regular shift to cover someone who just this day let her know she was not coming back to work, so I pulled a 7a-7p (a blessing in disguise really). Then since my lame-O friend punked out on me again with our running routine (which it turns out she actually did have a good excuse for, this time), my mom rode her bike next to me while I jogged ~3 mi - Thanks mom :D Now I'm just getting to eating dinner which is the best part of all *drumroll* 2 stale Costco muffin tops - one chocolate chocolate chip, and one poppie seed - and some Ramen noodles that I'm not going to even bother to put into a bowl (that's just another dirty dish to wash, right?)...hey, when there's no one to impress, that's what you get. I think that I'll eat while watching a little Men in Black II and then it's off to bed. I can't wait for Skyler to get home!

Disappointment

2009-06-30T08:08:00.000-07:00

Have you ever tried to plan something with the best of intentions and everything seems to be going great? You've got your group of people and all the assignments sorted; the date and the times are set - it is going to be a blast...Then all of the sudden a couple of people drop out here and then a couple more drop out there until only 4 of the 14+ people who were going to go can actually make it (and that's including you). THEN the details and plans start to fall apart and you really start to question if this is going to be more work and stress then it is fun, or maybe that you shouldn't be going because this is a sign that something horribly tragic is going to happen?? It is so disappointing when this happens, I just want to scream/cry....

Yay, yay, yay, yay, yaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyy!!

2009-06-09T17:52:00.000-07:00

So I got the call today, and....I made it into the nursing program! YAY! Applications were due on March 31st and I gathered (from those who've gotten in before me) that it would take just over 2 months to hear "yay" or "nay." I couldn't even stand to talk about it while waiting to hear because I would get such bad anxiety. LOL Well, it's been just over 2 months - guess they were right on the dot about that! The reason this is so exciting is because I applied through Intermountain Health Care/Salt Lake Community College (IHC - who I work for). It's a way for IHC employees to apply competitively instead of getting on a 2 year waiting list. They say that they get about 200 applicants every time and only let in about 40, so we feel very blessed. After all of the prayers and fasting I know that Heavenly Father has prepared us for any outcome, but this is the best we could have hoped for :) My work will be paying full tuition as well as partially covering books - This alone is a major blessing! Then once I graduate I will have a 2 year work agreement with them. I just wanted to share the exciting news with everybody and can't wait to get started this fall...YAAAAYYYY!

2009-05-26T16:23:00.000-07:00

Here are some videos of us at Slide Rock on our way down to AZ. The water was SO cold it took my breath away every time. The first video is right after Skyler coaxed me into jumping off the rock into the water for the first time. Did I mention it was cold?!
This one is of me going down.

Memorial Day Activities

2009-05-26T15:48:00.000-07:00

We woke up Monday morning to go help prepare the Memorial Day breakfast at the Graves'. No, it's not what it sounds like exactly - the Graves are our neighbors - but how fitting none the less :) Skyler's job was to cook the sausage. Mine?...I supervised

And took self portraits

There was a really good turn out. The Grave's always make sure to invite all of the neighbors as well as the entire ward. We love the Graves!

Here's one of Skyler's scouts, Adam. We sat next to him on top of the hill to eat.

Here's Skyler enjoying a breakfast made in Heaven (his heaven) - eggs loaded with cheese, hashbrowns cooked in bacon grease, pork sausage, and bacon which was sitting in a pool of...lets call it flavor :)

Once breakfast was done Skyler and I got changes and went up Big Cottonwood Canyon to go on a hike. We ended up hiking on the Dog Lake trail, although there was too much snow to hike down to the lake. We got close though. Only about a mile or so away.

Then, once we were done with the hike I had Skyler take us to The Silver Fork Lodge. It's a little diner up Big Cottonwood Canyon that my dad always used to take my brother and I to when we were younger. We ate out on the deck overlooking the gorgeous mountains.

The prices were higher then I remembered so Skyler and I had a healthy lunch of cheese fries and the BEST chocolate fudge cake I have ever had - Mmmmmmmm....that sounds really good. I think I'll go eat some chocolate cake now :)

Fun in the Sun (no doubt about it)

2009-05-18T13:58:00.000-07:00

We were able to take a vacation down to Arizona the week of 5/11. After work that Monday I rushed home to help finalize our packing. We loaded the Corolla and hit the road! We found that splitting up the trip makes the drive seem a lot shorter so our goal for the night was to reach Kanab, UT. We made it around 9:30p, ate dinner and then proceeded to find a camping spot...When I say camping spot, I really mean in a two man tent in a wash off the side of the road. It seemed safe enough since the skies were clear, and we survived. Plus it was FREE! and much more comfortable then the car (our usual method). We woke up early the next morning so we could make a stop at Slide Rock National Park near (or in?) Sedona. We were the first ones through the gates and some of the ONLY ones in the water LOL It was a mild 41 degrees. Brrrrr.

When we finally reached AZ we really just enjoyed the ~105 degree weather with blue skies, and visiting with family and friends (Thanks mom and dad Nelson for putting up with us!) We couldn't believe a year passed since we last were there and had seen some of them. We made a list of our favorite places/things to eat and tried to get to them all:
1) Grimaldi's (Best pizza EVER - thanks for taking us Mom and Dad!)
2) QT's Horchata Slurpee

Mmmmmmmmmm :P

3) Serrano's Bean Dip and Salsa
*And a couple places we didn't get to that we'll have to hit up next time*
4) Higley Hot Dog
5) Nielsen's Frozen Custard - the one in UT just isn't the same :(

We also got to visit our favorite mall (very exciting I know...) Actually we were just needing to waste some time and it was pretty hot for outdoor activities :)

We were especially fond of these glasses. What do you think??

We got to visit Matt and McKenna and their little girl Eila, Strider and Jana and their little boy Grayson and we were SO excited to be able to congradulate Skyler's little sis' Aubrie and her husband Jake on their soon-to-be little one (Can't wait until Nov/Dec).
Here's cute Aubs with Skyler. I should have got a pic of her tummy - she's already showing!!

I got to visit with my buddy Lauren who is ROCKING at being a teacher (hope geocaching went well LOL), and with my aunt Barb, cousin Cameron, Tawni and her little boys. We also got to meet my aunt Cyndi's boys Josh, Adam, and Austin (Jeremy cound't make it) for some ice cream. It had been several years since we'd seen some of them and Josh was leaving for his mission that coming Sunday so we were lucky. They have grown so much!

Gotta throw in the "Goofy Face" pic

We got to kayak the Salt River thanks to Skyler's buddy Jake and his dad who is always so nice to let us borrow the kayaks.

We were able to attend Jacobs graduation from ASU - Congradulations!! - and we were invited to Strider's and Cherish's ASU graduation party that same night. Good job guys. Sister Pittam makes the BEST food (just ask Skyler) and we still need to call her for a couple of recipies from the BBQ ;)

Here's Skyler and I at the BBQ. I really should just ask people to takes pics of us, but I'm getting so good at this self portrait, one arm thing.

Kai, Clarissa, and Brinley hung out with us all after the graduation. I don't think little Brinley likes getting her hair done...

We even lucked out that Jace (Skyler's bro) and Melinda and the kids (including the newest member little Hinckley) came in town that Friday and were there for Saturday and Sunday. It was fun to be able to spend time with them and hear about their fun lives and activities. They should actually be coming to UT soon so we'll even get to see them again in not-too-long.
What a great uncle my sweetie is :D

Here we are at the park with Trae, Kali, and Kamea. So much fun!

We missed out on seeing Destry, Heather, Brody and Brooklyn who wont be getting to AZ until June, but we hope they have as much fun as we did!

All in all it was a wonderful trip. Mom and Dad Nelson took great care of us and were so willing (as always) to open their doors - home, car, cupboard, fridge :) - to us. And although we were glad to be home again, we look forward to another trip out to see our quickly and forever changing family.

2009-05-02T13:20:00.000-07:00

Skyler and I were able to participate again this year in Utah's Walk Now For Autism. Last year (our first time) we walked with Miles 4 Maia. This year we signed up as volunteers and we got to be in charges of the kids games. It POURED rain the entire time, but there was still a good turn out which we were all grateful for. I was so glad that Skyler grabbed the poncho for me otherwise I would have been miserable. He braved the rain in his hunting jacket :) Here's what their official website (http://www.walknowforautism.org/) said about the turn out this year:

"We did it Utah!
On Saturday, May 2nd, over 2,000 people
braved the rain to attend the 2nd annual Utah Walk Now for Autism at Utah Valley
University in Orem, Utah and raised over $145,000 for Autism Speaks so far,
funding work in research, family services, advocacy and awareness. Without each
of you, this would not have been possible, and for that, we thank you. A special
thank you to our newly inducted Grand Club Members, donors, sponsors, Team
Captains, walkers, in-kind sponsors, committee, walk day volunteers, Resource
Fair Vendors, entertainers, supporters and friends. Together, we made a
difference in the lives of so many. THANK YOU to all of you for joining
together to raise our voices for autism awareness in the Utah!"
Here are some pics from that day. Skyler and I even got to challenge a couple of kids to the fighting ring LOL

2009-05-01T17:22:00.000-07:00

All the way back in...May I think...we went to Duchesne to help my dad work on the cabin. I couldn't believe how much it has changed since I saw it last year. I worked on painting while they worked on putting up what I'd painted - good team work!

I have to catch you all up!

2009-04-30T09:29:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics of what we've been up to this year - most recent to not-most-recent

This is my sister, Heidi, yesterday after she had her surgery to fuse her neck. My mom and I went to visit her at the hospital. I was actually going to record her because she was being hilarious, but just as I got out the camera she went back to being in pain (as you can see in the pic) This is me and hubby a few days ago. We had been studying for finals like crazy! Do we look drained or what?

This is a random pic I took of myself to see what I looked like in a hat...Usually they make me look like a cone head, so this wasn't bad.

Sunday (4/19) was when Heidi decided she needed to go to the ER for her neck. We ended up taking the girls, Alyssa and Abby, to church with us and then to my dad's and Joans for dinner. The girls were wonderful! Especially at church which was their second time going that Sunday. After, we took them to the park to play on the playground and fly a kite. Abby loved chasing after the kite in the sky. This pic is of my dad playing his banjo with a little help from Abby. She was fascinated by it. I think he loved having them over, but SORRY DAD, you won't have grandkids from me for a couple more years :(

The dinner at their house was to say "bye" to Clay before he left for base training. He joined the Army Reserves and has been in training for about 2 weeks now.

He's so good with the kids and they love him!

Just the Saturday before, Skyler and I went to the zoo with Heidi, Nick, and the girls. It was the first time Skyler had been to the Hogle zoo here. It was so much fun. These were the only pictures we got on our camera before it died :(

I'm holding Abby and sitting next to Heidi. In the front is cute Alyssa.

These are some pictures of our Easter morning. It was such a nice day that Skyler and I hid each other's Easter baskets outside. Skyler made us carry around this flashlight because "it is our spotlight to help find the Easter baskets" LOL He is such a goof, and I love him.

The Muhlestein's had their Easter party and Skyler and I got to hide all of the eggs. It was probably the most fun part!

Good old pinewood durby! Our ward did a "Soup-er Durby" dinner night. I made mine into...well you can see what I made mine into :)

Skyler was very proud of his creation. Although it didn't contain any pinewood - or wood at all - it was probably THE coolest car there (other than the durby car that had the motor). I think it was only 2 lbs over the weight limit - Not Bad!

Happy Belated St. Patricks Day! Our Muhlestein family went to the St. Patty's Day parade down at the Gateway. It was a 2 hour parade full of the most random, green things you've ever seen LOL

This is what happens when the woman is taller than the man - any other Sista's out there know what I'm sayin'!?
We even got to see my mom and Vince there. It was so cute to see her groovin' to the music. Although, I never thought I would witness my mom pulling some of those moves!

This was the group Skyler got together for my "surprise" Valentines Day party. It turned out to be a BLAST! We went shooting, at dutch oven peach cobbler, and went to our Stake Adult Valentines Day dance...yes, he got all of these people to agree to go to our stake dance LOL It turned out to be the best part!

Since it was Valentines, we had to do the kissy picture. And that is what we've been up to in-a-jist (I'm not sure if that's a word...)

It Begins...

2009-04-29T17:57:00.000-07:00

The weather is finally getting to a consistent temp that it's time to get out and start running (or in my case jogging) again. Luckily with our gym membership this winter, we haven't gotten TOO out of shape. Have you ever noticed how quickly you get out of shape?? I swear, one week of slacking (let alone a few months) and it's back to a turtles pace and an asthma attack - okay, not literally, but it sure feels like it sometimes - The sign-up's for Hobble Creek 1/2 marathon opens up on May 2nd (this Saturday) and Skyler and I are going to register again. I'm determined to beat my 2hr 11min time WITH OUT getting sick as a dog like before. Hopefully we can recruit some others to suffer, I mean, train along side with us :) Today was a perfect running-weather day. I just finished a quick 3 mi jog in 27 min which is not too bad for me. And that's with stopping to talk to my friend Amanda, AND stopping for a CHICKEN...yes, a chicken. It ran out in front of me from someones yard and I didn't want to chase it into the road so I stopped until the dumb thing went back where it came from. Anyway, we look forward to sweating and getting tan in the sunshine. If you know of any free/cheap fun runs or 5K's to run for training, let us know!

Huh?!

2009-04-20T13:04:00.000-07:00

It snowed last week...It's going to reach 80s this week...I shouldn't be amazed, yet here I am, - amazed!

The blog fad

2009-04-15T19:12:00.000-07:00

So we finally gave in and started a blog - it just became socially necessary. I tried to avoid it as long as possible since it's just the two of us and our life is pretty routine right now. Hopefully I will get the hang of this thing so I can organize our profile and add something interesting to the page like pics or some amazing link. Anyway, I really should be doing homework and Skyler is at scouts so it's the perfect time - better get on that...

~Lyndsey

My Grandpa Pinky

2009-01-20T19:39:00.000-08:00

My Grandpa Pinky passed away this month. Many things went through my mind when I heard the news. Unfortunately I had regrets about not talking to him more or getting to visit or that Skyler never met him. We were so blessed to be able to send me back to Pennsylvania for the funeral. It was a beautiful service and there were so many people there who had nothing but loving words to say about him. It was nice to hear how he touched so many lives with his big heart and his laughter.
Despite the circumstances I have to admit that we also a lot of fun together. My sister Heidi was able to be there as well. This was neat for her. It was probably the only time that so many of the family members could be in one place together and she was able to meet so many of them. Plus we got to hang out more just the two of us :)
I got to see my cousin Leslie who I haven't seen in FOREVER!! That was a lot of fun.
It was nice to be with my grandma during this time. We played dress up and Heidi - the amazing photographer - took some nice shots of her. This is one of my favorites.
Like I said, we had a little fun. My initial reaction is guilt, but when I think about it we were all there together reminicing about Grandpa and enjoying each other. I think he was probably glad to see us all together.

Step-dad Vince

Grandma Pinky

Cousin Leslie

Sister Heidi

Me :)
Aunt Aly
Aunt Barb (this one is my favorite!)

Aunt Cyndi

Mom's aunt Verna

Mom

Mom's Uncle Joe (Verna's Husband)