The Riches Pat and Anna style

Christmas time

2011-12-29T11:06:00.000-07:00

Christmas 2011 has come, and gone and we are still dealing with the aftermath. Here are a few of the pictures and a few words about this Christmas and what it meant to Anna and I. There are more pictures in the gallery to the right.

So the theme of this years Christmas was family. Anna's family, or most of them, were in town this year.

Having them here and doing things with them is always fun. And of course my family is always here.

Which is always fun.

And then of course we had friends too.

Which is always fun. And lest we forget this was Amelia's first Christmas...

Which is fun, as she seems always to be be having a good time and we love her more and more each day.

Having it all....exhausting and wearing. With my families many many commitments like caroling to moots...

...candy making, and then Christmas Adam (the 23rd...Adam, before eve...get it.)

and then Christmas with children running around and making it nigh impossible to keep Amelia on a schedule, or even make sure she is sleeping enough was tough. Mix in the other family...

...and other parties...

not to mention cooking for all the parties, cleaning up after, shopping, working, etc....it adds up and conspires to suck all the good will Christmas brings along.

Its not to say that we didn't have a good time, only that this year both Anna and I both struggled with getting that Christmas spirit a lot.

Maybe its just that we hadn't applied ourselves to the true meaning of Christmas and the Saviors life and mission, Maybe it was just a function of pure biological exhaustion, but whatever it was, it just didn't feel like Christmas. We love our families, and our friends and we would do anything for them and do anything with them but this might be the last year we commit to to the whole ball of wax. Be on notice family and friends, next year we might say no to things and enjoy a little quiet Rich family time instead, but we still love you.

Anyway, I don't want to paint a sour picture, after all the moments are what it was all about it this year and there were plenty.

From Amelia being super cute, to...well

Amelia being extra super cute.

as well as other things.

a little snow

a little fog.

Some skiing

Some wii'ing

Some kids.

and some kidders.

All in all i can say we had a good time and for once, the shopping and gift giving was not the most stressful part of the year.

Merry Christmas everyone, and happy new year.

Climbing with the Pattersons

2011-12-20T12:18:00.000-07:00

Last night we decided to take advantage of Rich and Kate being in town and go climbing at the school.

Here's Kate tackling the white route, its a good route.

Even Amelia had a good time, though she was very VERY tired...

...she couldn't take her eyes off the action.

Thanks again for coming, it was fun!

Milies new chew toy

2011-12-13T13:13:00.000-07:00

This isn't really a groundbreaking post, and yeah, its just about my little girl.

She is teething and has been looking for something cold, easy to grab, and pokey and...well...i think she found something she likes. That makes me happy that a wiregate is her teething toy.

Also, here is Anna being sweet and reading to her. She likes it.

That's all.

playing catch up....again.

2011-12-09T14:29:00.002-07:00

Well, im back to playing catch up since i haven't posted thanksgiving and stuff has happened since Mexico.

So. Thanksgiving first?

This year was Anna's 7th annual drumstick dash and we had a great turnout this year. Thanks for everyone who got up early and came running, it was a lot of fun!

This must be the year of the little girls, here is the turnout; Emma, Amelia, Ruby, Vivian and Claire.

This year, Thanksgiving was held at Anna's cousin's wife's parents house. It was really nice and we want to thank the Johansens for the good food and a good time.

And now on to other things. I got a new job at Intermountain Healthcare. Since I was leaving I got to choose a place to eat for me last day at Sorenson Media; I chose Back East Cheesesteaks. I really like them and they have always been consistent and friendly to us. Anna likes to order the Pizza sub, which is just pepperoni, marinara sauce and cheese. They have been happy to accommodate the special order a couple of times and are even going to add something just like to the menu soon. Thats good news for Amelia who can't wait to get one of her own!

That's Randon and Dave in my cubicle making a giant L-Cube. Look at them, poor guys...they are devastated that I'm leaving.

Last night we put up the Christmas tree and decorated it. Amelia helped, but mostly by being interested.

So this is where I work now, downtown on the 11th floor. Its nice. I'm getting adjusted to things and waiting on some gear to come in so I can get to work, but I think I'm really going to like it here.

Amelia is excited! and not just because she has learned to sit, but because its random image time!

This is Jayden at a little party my mom put together for the kids. If you ask him, it was a great party...though he doesn't remember a lot of it.

This is a cookie my mom tried to microwave...I'm not sure why.

This is little Milie trying to decide if she wants to sleep. We got a new small little camera that means its easier to have a camera on hand for moments like this. This image almost makes it worth while alone.

Okay THIS picture makes it TOTALLY worth it!

Mexico, the Movie.

2011-11-30T19:40:00.003-07:00

Here is the Youtube HD version of the mexico video, i will have it in the top video player tomorrow.

Mexico

2011-11-25T15:37:00.003-07:00

Well, it's the Friday after Thanksgiving and I should be posting about Thanksgiving but I haven't posted about Mexico yet, and my mind is linear.

So this past week we were down in the Puerta Adventuras Area of the Mayan Rivera. Somewhere around here.

It was a Christmas trip from my parents and the first time Lance, Sara or Anna-Lisa had been down there.

We were greeted immediately by a nice swan

and a reminder about clothing policy.

It is a really pretty area, the sand, soft and white (except under the vollyball court) and the water clear and warm. Our beach had some issues with rocks and waves, but all-in-all it was a very pretty place.

I had really built Anna-Lisa up for this trip talking about the endless food, the tacos al pastor roof service, the great snorkeling and the fun cenotes in the area, as my family has been coming down to these resorts for years. I am happy to say that we enjoyed the cenotes a lot. The food, room service and the snorkeling were trouble items.

In years past we stayed at Iberostar resorts, but in the interest of cost we switched to Bahia Principe, which was nearly half as much money for the room and very VERY reasonable for all inclusive. That having been said there were about half as many good places to eat and no room service. But who are we to complain.

As for snorkeling, we were planing to go to Xelha, just down the road because I remember having such good time there as a kid. Turns our its nearly $100 per person to go now! We just couldn't justify spending almost $200 on snorkeling, which was sad. In lieu of XelHa, we found a free, open cove about a mile south of our resort (and only 2 miles north of Xelha) that we walked to on our own.

We had a nice quite swim and got to meet the local wildlife.

And then we went back with the family with resort gear to do some snorkeling.

We found this amazing little swing and private quiet spot too. It was a really neat place (snorkeling video will be uploaded when I'm done editing, soon hopefully).

It was pretty much how you hope a beach spot could be. Soft sand, coral reefs, quite lagoon. It was pretty sweet.

The next adventure was to Tulum. Plan A was to rent a van for a day and have them take us to Tulum, then to a centote or two. When we found out our van wasn't going to be available we went looking for another service which led us to Edventures.com

The plan again was to go to Tulum with those that wanted and then head back to get the group and go to the Cenotes. We got to Tulum and we were told about his "edventure" park (his name was eddie...get it?) which included Tulum. So, first things first. Tulum.

Tulum is an ancient Mayan city constructed on the coast as trading port and highly defended city (the walls are 15 feet high and just as thick)

Its only my opinion but a city like this would be a likely stepping off point for Lamanites or Nephites to go north up the coast to areas were its suspected that there were Nephites and Lamanites (New York area for example).

In any case, the city is rich with Mayan and therefore Lamanitish history.

In addition, its in a beautiful location

right on the beach.

Afterwards we met up in Eddie's store and he got us set for the "edventure."

It was one of the better bargins for something like this for sure

Step one is to ride about 40 minutes into the Jungle on a unimog. Unimogs are awesome and I would much rather have one of these over a hummer.

The edventure includes a 6 line jungle zip line which we all did, even mom and dad!

Rock climbing

which everyone tried, even those with "special ability."

Here is Ben and Bob proving my point. After you climb the Pyramid you rappel down the other side. Everyone made it to the top of the pyramid and everyone made it down without incident.

Then we went to the first of two cenotes.

(Pictures are missing because we were having too much fun jumping in and swimming around. There is a little in the video but not too much because it was soo dark. Cenotes, if you don't already know, are sinkholes where the underground aquafur eats away at the surface crust until it collapses and forms a swimming hole. Many Cenotes are part of an underground network of rivers and thus are actually tubes of water that go from one place to the next. and some used to be dry caves full of stalagtites and stalagmites until there was some event that flooded them. In either case, they are clear as day fresh water caves you can swim in!

Here is a sample of the second one we went into.

And here is what it looks like when you are in it.

It was a pretty cool experience.

After that it was home to the resort again.

Did I mention there were coconuts that dropped all over the place?

Here I am feeling pretty stoked that I got one open. It's not the hard case that's so hard to get through it's the meaty outside. But with patience (and a knife) I was successful.

Did I also mention there is a Dolphinarium at the resort?

What a trip, first I learned there was such a word as "dolphinarium" and then I got to see one!

This one has a name I'm sure but i just called them all "snorky".

Buoyed by the success of the coconut and the excitement of learning a new word we ventured to build a sand castle as a family;

with great success!

The Mayans would have been proud.

Aside from edventures, and fun in the ocean, this is what we did most for better or worse. It was nice to relax but it would have been nice to get out more too. Decisions, decisions.

In any case we had a great time with the family, but it was good to be back home too, to crisp air.

and happy little Girls.

There are a lot more pictures in the Album on the right and a video is coming as well.

Halloween

2011-11-24T13:27:00.001-07:00

yeah, its thanksgiving, but i wanted to put up a few halloween pictures and say thanks to Kari and Tom as well as Wade and Bri for fun halloween parties.

We were on Safari. Okay, Halloween over. now i can move on to Mexico or Thanksgiving!

Photo Contest Prizes

2011-11-20T10:00:00.002-07:00

Yes, this was a while ago and lots of stuff has happened since (like Halloween) but here are the prizes the three winners got.

all the winners got a black diamond Skin bag (coutesy of Dustin) a toy, some candy, some junk I had lying around the house and a random picture I had printed that was just lying around looking for a home.

Dan and Ashley Recieved.

Some Airplanes, highchew candy, an 11 tooth bike sprocket, and a picture of fudgee, the loveable fudge covered spoon.

Joe ans Anne-Marit got.

A finger bowling game, some peanut butter M&M's, a ski pole wrist strap, and a picture of the old temple quarry mill.

bob and Sara got.

Finger arrows, Cotton candy, a craftsman screwdriver keychain, a picture of some gopher, and a hulu girl because of when and how they would receive it.

in mexico.

For more information on Mexico, stay tuned to the blog.

Thanks for playing.

*not all prizes will be given out in Mexico.

2011-11-01T13:10:00.003-06:00

A few days overdue, but its finally time to announce the winners of the first ever Rich Family Photo constest.

In Category 1, we have
Some Kind of Rock by Joe and Anna-Marit Osmond, With 4 votes.

In Category 2 we have
Soccer by Dan and Ashley Wolf with 5 vote

And finally in Category 3 we have
Bra's across the Bridge by Bob and Sara Rich with 5 votes.

So, as you may have guessed by now, everyone that entered the contest won. Now don't you wish you would have entered? The gift bag of assorted goodness will be distributed in the coming week (unless your Bob and Sara, and you have to wait a few weeks.)

Thanks for the few that played, if this is something that people would like to take another stab at in the future let me know in the comments and it will be taken under consideration. Thanks Again!

Category 3

2011-10-25T17:16:00.003-06:00

Remember to vote by making a comment below.

Category 2

2011-10-25T17:16:00.002-06:00

Category 1

2011-10-25T17:16:00.001-06:00

Photo Contest

2011-10-25T17:16:00.000-06:00

Well the pictures are in, what few there are. Here is how the rest of this contest is going to work. I will post 3 posts after this one and each one will be for one of the three categories. All you need to do is vote (in your comments) for one picture in each category that is your favorite. Then we can see if Joe & Anne-Marit, Bob & Sara or Dan & Ashley with the prize.

PHOTO CONTEST REMINDER!

2011-10-19T12:33:00.000-06:00

Just a reminder that we are about half way into the photo contest. I have received a few pictures in the first 2 categories and they are looking great! Thanks for those who have sent in pictures already and a reminder to those who are procrastinating that if you really want that random brown bag of adventure (and who wouldn't?!) then you need to snap to it. Also, i had tried to use a commercial photo contest software for this and had it up for a little while but it wasn't any good so i have closed it down. if you submitted a photo to it then it has been added to the contest.

Again, you can send me up to 2 pictures in each category via mtr_photo1@live.com and i would prefer if they are either full size or at least 1600 pixels wide, but i will happily take what i can get. I recommend using picasa to re-size your pictures if you need to to email them, its free and easy.

On a semi related note, if you are interesting in learning a little more about picasa and picasaweb i put together a hasty and poorly orgnaized video tutorial on how to use it. Click here to check it out.

EDIT: the live.com address only accepts email messages 10 MB or less. if your emails aren't getting through try sending the pictures one at a time.

Goodbye summer, it was great. PHOTO CONTEST

2011-10-14T17:18:00.000-06:00

Well, summer is gone and Autumn (or winter) is nigh upon us. Autumn is by far my least favorite season because it doesn't know what it wants to be; It'll snow, but then it will be sunny, but its too wet and cold to do anything fun. MAKE UP YOUR MIND! So to celebrate on of mine, and most peoples favorite season I decided to hold a photo contest. Why a photo contest? Because I like the interaction that happened last time, because I think it would be fun, because most of us don't print pictures anymore so some of the best memories and aesthetically pleasing stuff we capture gets filed away electronically and rarely gets the attention it deserves. Mostly because every person I know has a DSLR and its about time to put it to use by entering some contests!

So, here is the deal. There are three categories for images:

1. summer, sunsets and scenic
2. family fun in the sun
3. bye bye summer

Anyone is welcome to participate and after one week (starting Oct. 15th ending Oct.22nd) I will close submission on the pictures and put the pictures up for a vote...by you. If you are a woot fan you will like the prize for the winners, that's right a prize! Basically what I will do is take a bag, load it with stuff (some good, some not) staple it up and send it to the winner. One for each category. Don't think of it so much as a random bag of crap so much as taking a gamble with adventure!

To enter email up to 2 pictures per category to mtr_photo1@live.com with your name, a title for your image, a brief description and what category its in. I prefer an original source size but you can make it smaller if you need. Photoshopping is on, just don't go nuts. The first two categories are as follows:

1. Anything that reminds you of summer; the lake, hiking, the park. Something pretty. It can have people in it but the focus of this image is to show of the mood and feeling of summer more than anything else. This can be any picture from this summer (june 1st to aug. 31st, 2011) don't cheat i can tell!
Example

2. This category is of the kids, the wife, the whole family. BUT this one isn't a family portrait, instead more about emotion and activity. Show me some people having fun! not just some smiling stiffs.

For the last one, this one is more about technique and style

3. Show me a picture that shows summer leaving or winter coming. Fall color pics, or snowfall pics or maybe something more interpretive. The catch here is that, unlike the first 2 categories, I will only accept pictures from the entry date to the end date (oct 15th to oct 22) so go out there, remember your composition rules and get creative!

As soon as the contest is over I will put the images up and we can vote for the winner, sure you can vote for yours, you can have friends vote for yours, be shameful its all good. You have one week folks...get crackin'!

First Snow.

2011-10-07T11:11:00.000-06:00

Snow fell this week in a first of many offensive moves by a season who's time is nigh. Twice each year an epic battle rages between the forces that shape and define Utah; Summer with its trail drying, water warming, clothing discouraging rays is now on the loosing side of a futile battle against its arch enemy, the Winter. A lot of people consider this an invasion, a plauge on the bright sunny lives that we should have all year long to those people i say, California and Arizona still have plenty or space left.

But seriously, why the hate? Is it because its colder and you have to wear more clothing? Consider it an opportunity to try new fashions!

is it because the snow is such an inconvenience? Is it...really? There are more traffic slowing heavy rainfalls in the valley in the summer than there are days with snow on roads in the winter and once its off the roads its mesmerisingly beautiful.

And its actually quite enabling! That's right, you can do MORE in the snow than you can without it. don't believe me? go into the mountains, look strait up the slope and try and climb it. Doesn't work with all the loose rocks and the steep inclines. but in the winter, that same slope is easily navigated.

and in the summer, once you get to the top you have to walk back down. I mean really...WALK! what is this the middle ages?

Winter makes me happy and I for one welcome our new temporary overlords. For those complainers out there that think that it should be California sun 24/7/365...its all yours.

check out the rest of the gallery here. Its a slideshow

Hikes!

2011-10-04T22:07:00.000-06:00

So this isn't the best picture I've ever taken, but its such a great picture too.

We have been getting all of our hiking done late in the season this year, right up to the end. To wit, the Monday Night Hike.

For the last few Monday's we have been on a few hikes. First to Ferguson Canyon in Big Cottonwood canyon.

Its a really pretty hike, and it goes a lot higher up that we went (baby and light constrained) but its worth doing again.

For round 2 we decided on Doughnut falls, something a little more mild that the steep hike.

I think this hike was more everyone's speed, but unfortunately it was pretty obvious that the hiking season was coming to an end. We got up there as quick as we could and hiked reasonably quick, but the light was not on our side and it wasn't to Mason's favor, as he fell down a good 3 times..

Amelia enjoyed her hike though and the falls, though crowded, were worth the hike.

The next hike we did (see, we were hiking like crazy!) was to a romantic little spot called Bloods lake.

Okay so despite the creepy name its actually quite breaktaking. Going the right time of year helps too.

this is a great short little hike and although a little steep, very baby friendly.

Finally, the last hike of the season, so far at least was less a hike and more a stroll, but a nice stroll. Taner park.

(for children)

This hike was quite as challenging so it sparked a little more of my creative side.

But my favorite subject is still my Girls.

Though i did get a few good shots of Jayden.

I like to call this one; "eatin' a sucker...like a boss"

I will have more pictures in the Gallery coming soon. The writing wasn't the greatest, but both anna and i have been pooped because of a cold that is taken a hold of milie. Check for videos in the video player up top as well.

Random Stuff

2011-09-16T16:52:00.000-06:00

I was searching my images for some pictures to print and i stumbled upon a few pictures that I thought would be fun to post.

What a Difference a few years makes. The top picture was taken by Anna (we were dating)

I didn't realize this picture was funny until just recently.

Dave Barry used to say that small dogs are basically "urine soaked cotton-balls with legs" oh Toby.

This is what Scott and I used to do before we could afford to ski. I landed that backflip BTW.

A classic. Good ol' mission times,

Ben Made this for me, its called "mongo"

This is a poster I made for Rich after he got a concussion trying a backflip on a jump that was too small for him after this epic per-season ski.

This is my first attempt at a backflip.

This is Fudgee, that is all.

This is pretty our our first date, long ago.

summer time hikes

2011-09-11T16:33:00.000-06:00

A little hike to willow lake this last weekend with the lanes.

The hike starts just north of bear trap in willow fork Big Cottonwood canyon and if your not looking for it, you will miss it, its VERY subtle. There is small granite marker at the trailhead on the north side of the road.

Its a great hike that goes right up through the middle of an aspen grove, Its a steep hike,

But very doable, even with babies on board. Check out the map for more detailed information.

Here are my girls, I love those two.

Here is Emma and Tom, Emma is always up for adventure!

Willow Lake 2

Bear lake - anytime any season...

2011-09-03T17:08:00.000-06:00

...its a great place to be.

The great thing about bear lake for us is that with Amelia we can make it up there between feedings...usually. If you get stuck in traffic and have to eat dinner you may end up accidentally going too far past feeding time and be forced to feed at a run down bar/gas station outside of Evanston, WY.

At least they were kind enough to fill up the bottle with water from the tap

But she got a great meal anyway.

We wanted to have a friends weekend so we invited our friends the Siddoways, the Lefflers and our new friends the Yipes.

We spent a lot of our time on the boat since it was nice boating weather, thankfully. There was a 40% chance of thunderstorms for the day but they didn't really bother us. Wade was glad to be out doing stuff too since he has been at home because of his neck and back.

The Siddoway's, Wade, Bri, and Taylor (aka Mr. T) It was Taylor's first time on a boat.

Amelia's too! Thanks for to the Sonnenberg's for letting us use their infant life-jackets (that were safely stored in our cabin for some reason).

Proud mothers of boating children. Taylor was much more out of it that Amelia, who liked to wake up every time I hit the throttle.

Here's Ranelle and Amelia having a good time. Ranelle tried out water skiing but the force was not with her that day as it wasn't with many of us.

Here I am crashing on a wakeskate.

And steve enjoying a good crash session a little later

Steve had a good outing on the wakeboard though. and his little Boy Dexter got his first boat ride too, a day of firsts.

That's Dexter not on a boat.

The water was great in the evening and with a few good friends on board the weight was just right for a great wakeboard outing for me. I usually don't wakeboard anymore because of how sore i get, but it was a lot of fun. I even tried a tantrum...

I was unsuccessful...

...Many times that day.

But still. what a day! After we put the boat away we had gourmet hot dogs while watching the thunderstorms crash to the north and east of us. It was a lot of fun and I hope we can do it again. If there is one thing mootsy taught me other than a love of cars, its that if you have something that makes you happy, share it and it will work all the better. She was so generous with Bear Lake, inviting friends and making new ones there and it enriched her life so much, I hope as the torch passes that I can have the privileged and responsibility to do that same.

Ssshh......it's a Cecret

2011-08-22T15:31:00.000-06:00

Millie has officially gone on two hikes. A few weeks ago we took her on my absolute favorite hike of all times - Cecret Lake. We always did this hike when we came to visit Utah and then when my family moved to Utah, it became a staple hike, to be done at least once/year. We've seen marmots, a big moose and tons of beautiful wildflowers on the trail.

This time was no exception. The trail was beautiful and had lots of water on it due to the crazy amounts of rain and snow we had during the spring. It was a fun hike but unfortunately, we couldn't stay at the top too long because Amelia wasn't having the best of times that night.

More fun stuff of the summer

2011-08-18T12:33:00.000-06:00

Well, we took another trip up the Bear Lake this summer. We are so lucky to have a place so close to get away for the weekends. This last weekend was My family reunion and a weekend at the cabin with Bob and Sara who came into town.

We took some fun family pictures thanks to Marianne who organized it. I'm so glad she did and she made it just so simple, well I thought so. She didn't ask anyone's opinion, she just said, we're wearing jeans and and aqua blue color and white. Find stuff. It made things so easy! Luckily, that aqua color is very in this season, and even more luckily, it totally matches the cabin!

Right after family pictures Pat and I hustled over to Lake Town for the annual Rich County Demolition Derby. I LOVE the demolition derby. It's so fun to be a little redneck sometimes and what better way than by watching people wreck cars! A special thanks to Joanne who watched Amelia for us so we could go!

Here's Amelia and I in our swimsuits at the beach. She finally fits in this adorable swimsuit that she got at a baby shower. I didn't think it would fit in time but since we've got a fat baby, it did!

Here's a few other random pictures just so our family can feel cool! Here's Ben and Coby, Pat's brothers on the best seat at Bear Lake and here's Olivia, our niece, asleep in what she thinks is the best seat at Bear Lake!

Amelia's baby blessing

2011-08-09T00:12:00.000-06:00

July 31th, 2011 we blessed Amelia Marie Rich in church. It was a pretty good blessing, but she didn't get her full bottle in time so she was a little grumpy. That's okay, she is cute enough to get away with it.

After the church blessing, everyone joined us at the Osmond's for Italian sodas (bummer - no pictures) and BBQ pork sandwiches. A special shout-out to Wade and Bri for helping out with the Italian sodas, we missed you!

We had a really nice turnout on both sides of the family. We were lucky that Anna's sister Megan and her family were passing through on their way to California so they could come and David could be in the blessing circle.

Here is Amelia and Vivian. Vivian was born 6 days after Amelia, yes we've got a fat baby. It's sad but true, and well.....kind of cute too!
Not to worry about Vivian. Clearly size is not an issue and she was able to put up a good fist fight!

After we saw Vivian and Amelia next to each other we added in Emma (click here for the first picture of Emma and Amelia together). Amelia's catching up!

The holidays

2011-07-27T10:35:00.000-06:00

No, not Christmas, the July holidays. Yes, its been a while since i updated the blog. So, here is where we left off.

Here we are at Kari and Toms for Harold and Rene's birthday dinner. Sorry Kari, i will get you these pictures right now.

So, on to the 24th.

We had the J.E.M.C.O. reunion over the 24th, powered by Ben and his generation and it was a lot of fun.

Here is the traditional pioneer day moose, who showed up just before the flag ceremony.

Just like a moose to be early.

Here are my girls, enjoying the nice mild bear lake weather. Looking good!

after the opening ceremonies we held the "special Olympics". Pretty much anytime we do something like this its pretty "special." For example, Here is the garbage can that Will took out trying to get to the water.

Look at the video up above for some good laughs.

Amelia and Mom were very proud of their dad's effort in the special olympics relay, if only because he didn't die. Sadly no pictures or video was taken of me flying sideways off the side of the sea wall after hitting the kayak trying to get to the lake. It was a leap of doom, and it will only live in our memories, everyone except mine...i don't seem to remember it well.

Here is the cabin, look at that water! Right up against the sea wall. It hasn't been like this for over a decade and it really is fun. Thanks for the rain and snow!

now for a little kid time. Here is Coby, Corbin, Jayden, And Mason chilling on the rocks.

Hi Lue! Can you hear me?

and finally a little nap time. Ahhh.

New Camera, New Blog

2011-07-19T16:21:00.001-06:00

So I finally got a new camera, i have been wanting one for a while. Its
a Panasonic GH2, not as well known as the Canon Rebel T2i or the Nikon
D90 like most people get and it was a pain to find, but I'm really
liking it. On a related note, i started a blog about digital imagery.
Its actually only related in the sense that I have been thinking about
doing it for a while and the Camera purchase gave me the impetus to go
ahead and do it. Its mostly a collection of my thoughts about digital
imagery and content creation for my benefit though it is for the benefit
of any and all. If you know me you know that I can go to town and back
and back again when it comes to talking about this stuff and hopefully
this will give me an outlet other than your ear, so when i say it
benefits any and all...I mean it. Anyway, its called TheBitMap and you
can link to it here or in the blog roll list to the side. Also, don't
forget to visit Anna's cookie project blog, and my outdoor blog, the UtahRiderCoalition. That
is all.

Amelia's First Hike

2011-07-19T16:08:00.000-06:00

This Saturday Anna Amelia and I went hiking up to Lake Mary in Big Cottonwood canyon and it was GREAT! the weather was perfect and even though there was snow in some parts of the trail it was a breeze.

Here we are ready to go all snuggled up in the Baby Bjorn.

And here we are just above the lower water falls looking north at the Wasatch crest.

The lake was gorgeous and COMPLETELY full.

See that little nub in the water?

Here it is in 2007 (on the right)

Its also about as all as the dam in this image from last year (i took this picture about halfway between the shore and nub)

Mom and Amelia. She did really good but we forgot to bring her bottle to the top, so we couldn't linger like we wanted. Fortunately she lasted the full 3 hours.

Then she had dinner 1 a the bottom on her very first chair. First tracks only X years AWAY!

Here is our MyTracks track of the hike for those who want to know more about it.

who likes snow cones?

2011-07-14T22:44:00.000-06:00

Um...I do.

Okay, lets go get you a snowcone.

Ah, that's better.

now how about a snuggle?

Great! now its time for mom's snowcone!

Passionfruit. With extra...passion!

No...we didn't really get Amelia a snowcone, she didn't like any of the flavors.

Cow Appreciation Day

2011-07-11T19:55:00.000-06:00

Last Friday was Cow Appreciation Day....YUM! That means free dinner at Chick-fil-a and no making dinner for me, YEAH! This year we were smart and just colored spots onto our shirts and we'll save them for next year. It's MUCH easier then cutting spots out of material and pinning them to our clothes. We kind of felt bad for all the people in Chic-fil-a who paid for their meals, hopefully they will catch on next year! We know one couple will, they asked us how we found out about Cow Appreciation Day - the internet - just goes to show, you can believe anything you read on the internet!

Don't worry, we're not neglecting our baby, she's right behind us sleeping away!

Happy 4th!

2011-07-06T11:21:00.000-06:00

Amelia had a great 4th of July and she would tell you about it but she slept through most of it so instead I will tell you about it.

We went to Bear Lake with the family and enjoyed some good times with a good group. Just the right size.

It was great weather to be at bear lake too, with mild temps (outside) great conditions and high water. Good times indeed.

We had fireworks, rockets and boats.

Good food

and good friends

And of course my Gals.

Even Bob and Sara made it, thanks to wireless tethering and skype.

It really was nice, and a great way to celibate our countries independence.

Ah, I really like bear Lake.

After Bear lake Anna and I went to Sandy City Fireworks! That was a great way to end the weekend.

Wait? where was I

Asleep with Mor Mor and Mor Far. Sleepy one.

almost a week later

2011-06-16T17:18:00.000-06:00

Here we are, almost one week later. Amazing. It feels much shorter than that only because the line between days blurs perilously these days. Things are going like they should, for the most part and like all new parents I suppose I am learning to take great joy in poops and wet diapers (counting their frequency at least). Though there have been a few good moments in changing too. Anyway, here are few new pictures and video to let everyone know how we are doing.

Her first day in her new home.

A little stretch in the basenet

And her cute little face. Her hair is already getting lighter, but it does do the wave, which is great.

Here she is with her 4 month old cousin Emma Lane. Can you believe Emma was smaller than that?

Here are the loves of my life, my girls, taking a nap...right now actually.

I guess i will go wake them up.

That's about it for us. We are doing pretty good aside from a feeding issue here and there and extreme tiredness (to be expected I'm sure). If you are thinking of making a visit please do, just call us first. Thanks. Also, check out the video above. Nothing special (action wise) but a nice clean shot of her little face.

Here is a bonus shot i meant to put up from the hospital but didn't.

Introducing........

2011-06-12T14:10:00.000-06:00

We finally decided on a name! Well, we had to before we could fill out the birth certificate information but, we are happy with it and it took us totally by surprise, so here goes:

Amelia Marie Rich

We'll post more pictures up of her but if you'd like to see the cute hospital ones, here's the website and the code: bellababyphotography.com

click on view photos and type in this code: 0610babygirlrich

BABY!!!

2011-06-10T20:58:00.000-06:00

Announcing...baby girl rich!

Our little girl, weighing in at 7 pounds 1 oz and 19.5 inches long was born June 10th, 2011 at 3:53 PM in salt lake city, UT. There isn't much to say that the pictures dont say. So here we go

More info and pics to come. Also, there is a movie in the player above. Not the best production values...but great acting. To Answer the question on everyone's mind; no we haven't chosen a name but yes we have a few we are thinking about.

Buster burger challenge

2011-05-26T17:51:00.001-06:00

Today my work went out to buster burger to enjoy another challengle. It works like this. You eat the biggest burger you can in 30 minutes. The burgers are built as n x n 1/4 lbs patties x slices or cheese starting with 4x4 going to 10x10. I competed a 4x4 in about 6 minutes previously so I want inclined to do it again. But all told we had over 6lbs of beef at or take this time. Enjoy

One more basement update

2011-05-17T10:29:00.000-06:00

We don't have too much going on besides this basement these days. Outside of trying to buy furniture, baby showers, work, and various other things. So...here is an update on the project.

Since last time we have tiled the hearth

put in the baseboards and casing and filled the holes

And patched the ceiling in the bathroom

Before we (joe) could patch the ceiling, we (Jim and Joe) had to fix the burst pipe that caused the hole this last Christmas eve.

Which taught me to be wary of hot tin which can drip during the joining process.

These are my burns on may 9th.

And here they are today, May 17th. To be fair, there was something wrong with one of the elbow joints and it wasn't accepting the tin and that's why it sloughed off and hit my arm and my dads foot.

Anyway. Thanks to help from Lance, Coby, Joe and to a lesser extend, Ben we got the furniture moved down this last Saturday so we can start enjoying our new room.

There is still a long way to go though. We need to finish the bathroom and then START on the nursery. I got the nursery, formerly known as the "room of doom" cleared out last night with the help of my friend Mike. Just check out how much stuff we took our of there!

For reference that is a trailer 4.5 feet deep by 11 feet long by 4.5 feet wide. or a little over 200 cubic feet of camping stuff and desk. Here is the result:

A clean Slate...mostly. In the next few days we will be cleaning, sanding, priming and painting. The we can start putting it all together.

Also, We will actually start posting baby stuff soon too. Anna isn't keen to have pregnancy pictures taken and posted but here is one with her and my mom.

So. There you have it. More basement news than any other news outlet covering the Rich's basement remodel. Guaranteed!

Quick update on the basement

2011-04-28T10:29:00.000-06:00

So i thought i would give a quick and dirty update on the basement. We are putting in baseboards and we have the door in place. This is whats left

tiling the fireplace
patching the paint job
putting up casing around the windows
patching the holes from the baseboard and casing
finding some furniture!

So, here is what we have so far. Small video above as well.

a little trip to St. George

2011-04-27T23:02:00.000-06:00

This Easter weekend we went down to St. George with the family [Coby/Tiff and kids, Marse/Lance and kid, Mom and Dad] and although we spent very little of our time in St. George we had a good time. We got down there at 6:45 in the first trial run with our new car on a road trip and had dinner, then Coby and I immediately took off to go camping with his friends. We had to camp because in the morning we were going to ride gooseberry mesa and its a bit of a drive to get to it from St. George. More on that here. After the ride on Saturday we decided to meet up in Hurricane to have a picnic lunch and then drive into Zion. It was PACKED! it was Easter weekend and it was national park week, which meant free admission. IT also meant that we had to park, then walk, then wait for the shuttle, then walk, then wait for another shuttle before we could even start our hike. This wasn't a big deal except for the ones with little children. They seemed to manage it pretty well though i thought.

Only Olivia was mildly concerned

But really, not too much trouble. We decided to hike to emerald pools because it would be nice and easy. It was actually a pretty nice little hike, though we didn't actually get to the pools

Sammy and Corbin were a lot of fun.

Jayden and Olivia were more on the sleepy side.

Jayden was fun to hang out with. I could get him all excited about stuff and tried to help him learn the song "super freak". He seemed to enjoy that.

That night we had an eastern egg hunt. We put cameras on the kids [coming soon] that proved to be pretty funny.

After that is was a good nights rest, then Sunday brunch and back to home.

Oh yeah, so I mentioned that it was our first road trip in the new car...it was a good one. The EPA says we are supposed to get 30/42 city/highway with our car and we have been averaging about 33 all city so we were expecting good things. We drove down there in 3/8 of a tank, then i took it to Hurricane were we met the camping folk, then back to St. George and home. The plan was to try and make it all the way home on the rest of the tank. Why not? it was over half full. leaving St. George the trip computer told me i could go 285 miles to empty and it was 280 to our house at that point. Sounds like a challenge! I like challenges. The range prediction stayed about 5 under the whole way and it was looking good (those range computers are always pessimistic anyway) at about 50 miles range left the computers forecast started taking a nosedive, despite getting a little better mileage on the computer than before. We were dipping into the red zone in the gauge, and fast. At about 10 miles predicted range left i was on empty and about 2 miles south of thanksgiving point (about 15 miles from home) and decided that i couldn't take the pressure. To preface my choice for bailing I should mention that when a gas engine runs out you just get more gas and your on your way. When a diesel runs out it gets towed and have service preformed just to get it going again. I just didn't feel like getting towed my last 15 miles {and paying to have it serviced...at least $100) So we pulled in and put 14.54 gallons of D2 in the tank. the tank holds 14.5 gallons. WHEW! Still, we made it 616 miles on 14.5 gallons for an average of 42.4 MPG. Not bad. We know know a few things about our little car; 1. its a very nice highway cruiser. 2. We can easily make it to St. George and back without fillup...if that's all we do. 3. Empty REALLY means empty. So, yeah, kind of a long story about that and a brief write up on Easter. Oooops.

On that note I want to express my gratitude for Easter, and what it means. I remember going to be Saturday night and expressing in my prayers about what the Atonement really meant to me. It was shocking to me to feel the power of my testimony on the matter, i guess it kind of took my by surprise. Its good to be alive, its good to have purpose, and its great to know that we can make it in this life and beyond.

*Pictures furnished by Coby...my camera didn't get much use.

New video

2011-04-25T11:33:00.001-06:00

So we are finally updating our video gallery above, it includes some video we shot of the goslings in our complex

UPDATE! Saddest goose in the world

2011-04-19T19:52:00.000-06:00

Remember the Saddest goose in the world? I do. Turns out the saddest goose in the world wasn't sad at all! I took a picture of that same goose tonight, looking much more relaxed.

Turns out he wasn't planning on jumping in front of a car, or trying to find his car, or anything like that. He was just a pensive father to be!

That's right! He is the proud father of goslings, Though we counted 5 I only saw the one this time around. Congratulations dad! With the advantage of hindsight we might picture him standing out there in the rain, oblivious to us as he contemplates being a dad, one sympathizes. Anyway, since one person needs to win the contest, i say it was Bob...good job. Here are basement pics

These are the walls right after we dry-walled and mudded.

And here is what they look like as of tonight

Its Coming along! In no small part thanks to Joe, not to mention Anna-marit, Jim & Joanne. Thanks for helping paint.

As you can see the walls, most of them, are "beach house" blue with the last wall being prepped to be painted "Woodrow Wilson putty" and the accents painted some kind of white. The wall that isn't painted also has a new door for the mechanical room which should help keep out the drafts and the noise. Its getting closer, now its only tiling, wall paint, ceiling paint, and trim left! Coming along indeed.

The saddest goose in the world.

2011-04-11T11:24:00.000-06:00

Yup, there he is, just letting the rain pelt him as his stand his solid vigil. Whats he doing out there? Gaurding the house? Pondering Goose things? Waiting for his ride?

If only we knew.

He was there for literally hours like that. He would let us walk right past him. What are you thinking about you silly goose?

Come up with a caption for this picture and win a solid gold honor!

Basement re-do

2011-03-21T21:27:00.000-06:00

So we are re-doing our basement and its been a long time coming. For one, the previous owner thought that painting over thick vinyl wallpaper, and outlets and baseboards and some lights....was a good idea. It was not. But the main reason that we are re-doing it is because our house is 3 levels and each of those levels has a room. This has worked out pretty well for us because our re-done upstairs loft is our bedroom, our main level room is our cool ski den and the basement room has been a ...well...room of great shame. But now with little _______ on her way we knew we would need a room for her. I didn't feel like running up and down stairs in the middle of the night and the basement will be much cooler in the summer so we decided to make that main active area into our bedroom, with the nursery in the formerly shameful room. So, re-do the basement!

Step one was to get more light. For the entire basement, including the "room of doom", there were 5 can lights, we had to add lamps to make it even remotely bright down there. So, out when 5 cans and in their place? 12 new cans! Its now the brightest place in our house. Step 2. Remove the crappy "improvements" of the former occupant.

Here is anna, going to town on the wall paper/paint.

This part was fun and easy, it peeled right off, well, except the glue, so we were encouraged that it wouldn't be a tough project.

Here is the wall with the paper/paint removed. It actually looks better like this.

Step 3 was to finish getting all the residual glue and paper off of the walls.

For one wall this was very easy, a little vinegar and some scrapping and it was essentially gone. The other wall...Well lets just say that after 3 days of steaming, spraying and scrapping...it was time for plan B

Actually, taking the wall apart was my plan A from the start, but the one wall went so smoothly in the trials that we invested probably a little more time than we should have going the traditional route.

This worked out good though because i needed to figure out why our basement was so drafty. I found out and the results were interesting;

1. It wasn't the insulation - polystyrene is actually a very good insulator, if poorly fire retardant.

2. The people who installed the gas fireplace didn't read the instructions very carefully or chose to ignore them completely - Major safety issues were addressed by Joe and I to get it closed to code. Also we tore out the ugly brick hearth.

3. Leaving a gaping hole to the chimney space is bad for insulation - That space above the fireplace you can see above wasn't covered (presumably to adhere to code that no combustibles be installed above that space), instead it was just left open but covered by a lacquered wood mantle that gushed air. Also, Lacquered wood is a definite combustible, BTW. We will replace it with non-combustible hardibacker cement board.

4. Combustion air is a big deal. We are going to be completely re-designing our furnace in terms of combustion air.

Okay, back to the basics. The nice thing about this whole project is that I FINALLY go to run my cables! Previously our cable went all the way around our house on the exterior then in through the big bay window in the basement...through the window! Then down an ugly cord into the wall where it made a series of odd patches to the room of doom. Then it ran, via a long cable hastely strung into the mechanical room and finally up to the den. Yeah. So the new route goes strait into the mechanical room from the outside and out from there. It was a pain to run...but it will be worth it. The old cable, in addition to being super kludgy and unsightly, was of poor shielding and quality and would consistently affect our TV and internet connection.

Here is the good stuff! Quad shielded cable running from the mechanical room to 5 different points directly. Oh...so happy! I was also planning on speaker wire and cat6, but determined that I will save that for our next house. Our N router is broadcasting down the street at 100mbps as it is. Nerd talk, oh well.

That brings us to Step 4. Rebuilding the walls. With the cable routed and the insulation problems getting patched up we are now free to re-drywall. A task I don't really mind all that much, in fact i think I'm pretty good at it. Of course its been great having Anna's dad Joe "helping" us out. Helping in quotes because its been pretty much him doing the work with us helping out. Anyway, here is the progress so far! Coming along...

There is still MUCH to do:

Fireplace hearth

Fireplace mantle

Patching holes in the ceiling

Texturing the ceiling

patching and texturing the BIG hole in the ceiling left over from the pipe burst on christmas eve in the bathroom.

Putting the carpet back together

Putting a door up in the mechanical room

insulating the mechanical room

and painting...

So...stay tuned for more exciting updates!

Baby Names

2011-03-02T21:28:00.000-07:00

Let it be known that we don't officially have a name for the little one yet - just some ideas but nothing official!

Cruising in Style

2011-02-28T17:59:00.000-07:00

Well - Our long awaited "babymoon" vacation has come and gone. Despite a few mishaps, we had a great time on our cruise to the Mexican Riviera.

Last Saturday, on my birthday, we packed up and caught a plane to LA and boarded our ship. It went very smoothly and we determined that the ship was no where near capacity. That was good and bad, there were no crowds but also, we had a tough time finding other young people. At 5:30 (after waiting for two late comers) the ship finally set sail from a cold and rainy LA. We had an 8:15 dinner assignment which we ended up switching to anytime dining because 8:15 is just too late for a pregnant woman to eat dinner, plus, we were missing a lot of the late night shows. Anytime dining was the way to go. Well, that first night night I ordered pasta with tomato sauce and I know what you're thinking, you can have anything on that menu, and you chose pasta? But I'm a picky eater so this was the safest thing for me to partake of! Unfortunately, we have determined that it was probably the least safest thing for me to eat because I was sick for the next two days.....bummer! We made the best of it and still tried to go to everything the ship had to offer.

Day's 2 and 3 were sailing down to Puerto Vallarta. Here is our lovely formal night, thanks to my mom I had some nice things to where. My apologies to my mom as this picture was right before I had to run out of the dining room to throw up in a tree/on her dress as the bathroom was too far away! From this day forward I mainly ate cereal and bread for each meal....well, until I had that pasta again (big mistake!).

In Puerto Vallarta we caught a taxi downtown and did a little shopping. We didn't really care about souveniers, but we had a desperate need for vanilla so that is what we got. Then we strolled around the beach for a little while. Right along the board walk there are statues, street performers and people building immaculate sand sculptures so we just enjoyed some of the sights before we shared a taxi with some other people back to the ship. Then, I'm embarrassed to say, we walk over to Walmart to get some forgotten necessities, yes, we went to Walmart on our Mexican vacation!

Mazatlan was our next stop. I think we will both agree that this was our least favorite stop. We didn't really plan anything but there is a resort there that lets cruise ship passengers use their bathrooms, pool and hottub so we caught a taxi to it and then hung out on the beach. You can't go 2 minutes without someone wanting to sell you something. I understand, it's how they are making money but it's just annoying, especially when it's the same people coming by to sell you stuff, even after you've said no. I mentioned to Pat that they should try selling something better then the junk that they sell. If they really thought of the demographics they could make a lot of money - what they need to do is buy a cooler, ice and a bunch of cokes, beer, etc. and sell that. They could sell it for $1/bottle no problem. They wouldn't need to approach anybody, people would be flocking to them. Just a thought.

Cabo was our third and final day in Port and probably the BEST day we had (I started feeling better after my second bout of ordering pasta - that's when we figured out not to order it anymore!), it was warm and just great. We hired a glass bottom boat, The Sex Machine was it's name, to take us out and around to the pacific side and to El Arco to see the rock formations. Our captian, Captain Flash dropped us off at Lover's Beach so swim at the beach. Lover's beach is an out cropping of land that faces the gulf of California so the waters are calm. The sand is soft and debree free, and it's very sheltered from the wind. It was awesome. There are a bunch of rocks you can climb on a play in and then you can walk to the other side of this out cropping to Divorce Beach. It's on the Pacific side, the waves are definately not calm, they come crashing to the shore. Captain Flash made us promise not to play in the water on Divorce Beach, though we had such great memories of last time we were here and how much fun it was to let the waves crash into you.

We now have a tradition to right our names in the sand on Divorce Beach (I know - kind of odd, seeing as it's Divorce Beach, but it has the right sand consistency to do it). So, we busied ourselves with that, plus we made one for the new addition to our family too! She was on the trip with us so she might as well have her picture too right? When we got back over to Lover's Beach Captain Flash and the Sex Machine were waiting for us, bummer because we had such a nice time but our day at port was short and we had to get back to the ship.

Here's a picture I took for my M&M loving family - lucky I did too since my mom had a bag of peanut butter M&M's waiting for us on our doorstep when we got home!

We cruised on Princess and the ship was huge - TONS of pools and they were fresh water, no saline in them at all, that was a plus! Here is a view of 2 of 5 pools:

All in all, we had a wonderful time on our last baby-free vacation, now time to start getting our house ready!!

That's what little ? are made of!!

2011-01-28T16:17:00.000-07:00

Sugar and spice and everything nice - that's hopefully what our little girl will be made of!

Yesterday I got to have my 20 week ultrasound - fun......except the water drinking part - of which I totally forgot and downed like 28 oz in 30 minutes, and then the tech made me drink more. It was painful to say the least. But all for the best and everything turned out great! Now - just another 20 weeks.......

Christmas...finally

2011-01-17T16:18:00.000-07:00

Christmas was great...as always! We enjoyed my sister Megan and her family as well as Pat's brother Bobby and his family coming into town. Sometimes splitting up our time to make sure it's equal and to make sure we don't miss anything fun can be quite a headache, but in the end, we always have a good time with everybody.

This year, we started our festivities with our annual Turtleneck Eggnog Party. What a blast - we enjoyed good food (thanks to everyone who brought something to share!). We also played the "Unwrap the present game" and a Christmas Family Feud game - guys vs. girls. As soon as the guys figured out how Family Feud works, they ended up winning even with me cheating for the girls!

Once Bobby and Sara came into town, the Rich family went out to see White Christmas at Pioneer Theater. It was a cute show - fun dancing and a really good set. I was nervouse because the first act was INCREDIBLY long but luckily, the second act had shorter songs!

The next night was our Christmas Adam celebration with the Rich family. I've explained it before, but just so there's no confusion, we have Christmas Adam dinner because Adam came before Eve and we don't get together on Christmas Eve. Joanne prepared a delicious dinner and it was fun to get together. At Christmas Adam, we all give our gifts to Jim and Joanne and we also exchange sibling gifts. We also did a nativity - the cutest part was all the babies in their angel wings.

Christmas Eve came next, we spent it with the Osmond family....at my cousin's house. It's one of my favorite meals of the ENTIRE year - Norwegian meatballs, mashed potatoes and gravy, homemade rolls - YUM! This meal is second only to Christmas morning breakfast - though it's really a close call.

After dinner we had yet another nativity but in this one we actually used a real baby for baby Jesus, instead of a doll. It had to be the liveliest Nativity I've ever seen because "Mary," my niece Emily, put "baby Jesus," my cousin's baby Claire, on the hay upside down! She immediately started crying yet we just kept her there as we proceeded with the Nativity. Everyone was more concerned with filming it or getting pictures because it was really funny. (don't worry, we did put "baby Jesus" right-side up!)

Dessert is our traditional pudding with and almond hidden in it. This year, Emily and Josh worked really hard - eating more and more pudding even though they were full and finally found the almonds! Well, We're pretty sure Josh got an almond, he accidentally ate it before he announced that he found it!

Christmas day involved lot's of traveling, as always. Luckily, our parents live so close together. I admit that sometimes I wish we only had to do one house on Christmas day but that just doesn't work out. We got up and opened our own presents then headed over to the Riches for breakfast. After breakfast and opening more presents we went over to my parents house. It was a small bummer because my sister and her family were down with her in-laws so we missed them but I guess that's how it goes. We spent the evening with my parents and with Mormor and played some games.

January Madness

2011-01-13T10:38:00.000-07:00

The 6th grade basketball season officially ended on Tuesday evening. We had a great season, ended up taking 3rd in the regular season and then 3rd again in the tournament.

These girls were so much fun to coach - I'm going to miss them next year when they go into 7th grade.

Miscelanious non-christmas related post

2011-01-01T23:37:00.000-07:00

No, this isn't the post that covers Christmas, I will let Anna-Lisa cover that one. This post is more just the bits that are interesting that may have fallen between the cracks during the holiday times. First things first, does anyone know of a place to get a good replacement face, cause I guess I ruined mine. My friend Wade and I went up skiing at the bird this last Friday (check out the URC for more info) and it was COLD! When we looked into it, about -4 static and between -20 and -30 at the summit with wind chill. So back to my face.

Take a close look people...THIS is the face of frostbite.

Okay, so its more accurately severe frostnip, but it is essentially stage 1 frostbite! Anyway, the tip of my nose, and both smile lines (hey, I was using 'em!) are reddish and slightly blistery. My nose got the worst of it and has already started to peel. I think i will live though...so I got that going for me.

Okay, so what else...how bout this.

Cool huh. This is one of the many "Well's" in our complex, they aren't really that cool on their own, but after we got all that snow and with the Christmas lights on them, they are pretty sweet. I took this picture with my little point and shoot. Its doubtful very many people care about the details, but since this isn't a very well read blog; it was shot at ISO 100 on tripod with a 5 second exposure, then again at 3.2 and 8. I merged the three images to an HDR in photoshop to bring out the bright light and the dark sky. Neat, huh?

Speaking of neat, these are the gingerbread houses we made a week before Christmas.

Anna wanted them out of the house so I put them outside in the snow, added some trees and set the mood with a back diamond orbit lantern (check out the moon shadows!) They are going to sit there until they get eaten by a neighbor cat or start getting gross enough to chuck, hopefully the cat gets to the first.
Last but not least.

This is the shoe cabinet from IKEA that we got for Christmas.

We built it and mounted it today. It really looks great, classes up the place, and we finally have a home for all our wayward shoes!

Okay, that's about it. I will let Anna-Lisa do the next post, but be sure to check out the URC blog for more up to date happenings with me (shameless plug) and Anna-Lisa's cookie blog for her. Links on the side.

Gingerbread Bread Houses

2010-12-21T07:42:00.000-07:00

About the first weekend in December, my cousin Kari and her husband came over to make gingerbread houses. We all headed over to WinCo (the absolute best place to buy bulk candy!) to pick out supplies. We each ended up making our own house. This was mainly because Pat kept picking out candy without consulting me. I felt it was ugly candy, so we decided to make our own!

In the end, I will admit that Pat's gingerbread house is pretty awesome, and mine....well, mine is a cute, classic gingerbread house but it doesn't compare to how cool Pat's is. Here are a few pictures of our creations.

Kari recruited her architect husband Tom to help finish her gingerbread house!

Meanwhile, Tom's "House of Cards" collapsed. Props to Tom still, he had a really unique idea!

I wanted my gingerbread house to be a classic house, full of candy, so I put up strips of sour gummy siding. As Pat pointed out, mine probably has the best insulation and protection against the elements.

Pat's on the other hand, comes complete with a rock candy chimney, yummy gummy trees AND the person who lives in his house is a fisherman. You can see the fish rack right outside the house....of course, I think he might be an illegal fisherman because those aren't Swedish fish, they happen to be gummy sharks!

My Halloween Card...again

2010-12-10T17:16:00.000-07:00

Do you remember this fun Halloween card I made for Pat way back at the beginning of October?

Well, now you guys get to see the inside of the card:

If you still don't get it....we having a baby in June!

(Note - the card seems a bit morbid now, but it was Halloween so I found it to be quite fitting.)

Thanksgiving Activities!

2010-12-05T21:58:00.000-07:00

Thanksgiving was a treat this year. We started the day with my 6th annual Drumstick Dash. The turn-out was the lowest I've ever had but - I'm accounting it to the extremely COLD weather and possibly the fact that no one wants to get up at 8:00 to go running, who knows! At 8:30 is was 13 degrees, but really, once we started it wasn't too bad. And the company made it all the more better - my cousin Kari and neighbor, Erica joined us and of course, my awesome mom and dad who hosted the event and provided yummy hot cocoa and apple cider walked the course. For those of you who are thinking you missed out - even my mom said she had fun and it wasn't cold so you were right, you did miss out! Hope to see you next year though!

We spent dinner or lunch, whichever you'd like to call it, with Pat's family. YUM!!!! Everything was so delicious. Joanne really is a great hostess. She made fun little sequence of event cards, whenever one person did something, another had to say something else and so on. Once we all figured it out, we had a few laughs. She made so many desserts but we didn't taste any since we were headed to my parents for delicious treats.

I made a Thanksgiving cookie bouquet for dessert at my mom's and we just played games and read through the newspaper to find the Black Friday deals; we didn't even go out early morning so it didn't matter, but it was fun to dream. No pictures - but still a very nice evening.

Now to the absolute BEST part of the weekend. It snowed ALL day Sunday and night. I got a phone call at 6:20 Monday morning saying we had a snow day! HIZAH, Waterford hasn't had a snow day since 1995 - I was in 8th grade. In fact, I remember getting that snow day too. Anyway, that was a pleasant little treat to top of my break. I spent it cleaning, okay not so cool but the results were worth it.

Then, my mom and I got to go to the Rockettes. Probably one of the coolest shows ever. I like plays but I get bored of them. The Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular kept me entertained the whole time. In fact, when it was over we were shocked. We felt like we'd only been sitting there for 15 minutes because it was so entertaining. The dancing was really fun to watch, it's a amazing how precise they were. The best example was when they were marching like toy soldiers and 20 of them stayed in a complete straight line as they turned in circles. My favorite dance was at the very beginning when they danced to the 12 Days of Christmas. It was really fun to see. And (just one more awesome thing to say about the Rockettes) the scenery was spectacular. It looked so real I literally felt like I was in the scene with them. Totally worth going to see - I can't wait to see them again some day. You can see some videos of the show up top.

So, that's that, now the countdown for Christmas Break begins.

October...What a month.

2010-11-02T10:31:00.000-06:00

So not much has happened since our last little post...oh wait. I mean a LOT has happened. Since that Moab trip we have been non-stop. Anna has been busy with School and various and sundry after school activities including teaching zumba to the staff at Waterford. I've Been SUPER busy creating videos for Sorenson Media and a new product launch. check them out ---> HERE ,<---, also, ---> HERE ,<--- After School and Work we would both work on our Laundry room, for which we again thank Anna's Dad Joe for all the help and support. Its finally done! Mostly. Anna wanted to post pictures after we got the final shelf installed but We just haven't done it yet. So here they are.

We ripped up the old linoleum floor, leveled the floor, and tiled with 16 inch tiles. Then added a dryer vent box and one whole wall's worth of drywall. Then painted "harmonious" Blue and "Caribbean walk" white on the trim and sills. New light fixture and Ikea shelf to top it all off. In the very near future we are going to add another Ikea shelf above the first where we have white linen baskets for...um...linens. So that's the repair work we have been doing on the house. Since a while back my car started making a clunking noise over bumps and while carrying heavy loads. In Glacier this summer it got worse so i determined to fix it. I first replaced the sway bar end links but that wasn't doing it, so i looked at the Strut top mounts next on a recommendation from my forum people...yup, I'm a car forum guy. So I bought Group N rally mounts from my new favorite toy store RallySport Direct. Its right down the street from my office! Its basically a subaru Nutters dream house. Anyway, so I rented a spring compressor and took apart my struts and put them back together with the new top mounts. I learned a lot about how struts work. The front suspension of my car is only held on with 5...5! bolts. Anyway that and new sway bar bushings solved the clunking problem but a new more scary noise surfaced so i took it to a mechanic to look at and he said it was my strut. He wanted $450, which included $250 for a new strut. Having just done my own strut work i decided against his advice. I went and bought a new strut (for $150 from the dealer) and prepared myself for another strut re-build. When I pulled off my wheel, however, I noticed this.

This is a swaybar endlink. Its not supposed to look like that. Its supposed to have a black bushing where that hole is and its not supposed to be all chewed up. Found my new noise! I took the strut back and decided I wont go to that mechanic again. too bad, he used to be so good. Anyway, RallySport came through again with the bushing I needed for $12 and i put it all back together...no more noise! I did this last Saturday with my friend as we were looking as to why his outback was making such a racket. Funny story, someone put his suspension on upside down. While working on his car we noticed something loud and red coming up the street. It was my parents neighbor with his new car.

Yup. Ferrari F430. To see the other pictures of this and his OTHER mid engine supercar, the Mercedes McClaren SLR. click ---> HERE <---

Oh, speaking of new cars. Here is ours!

Its a 2011 VW Jetta SportWagen TDi. We felt we got a pretty good deal on it and it gets 50 MPG highway and between 30-40 city. Anna's venerable old Passat had 107000 miles on it and needed $1800 in suspension repairs and it had leaking engine mounts and the check engine light was coming on...so we traded it in. We got a pretty decent trade considering the repair needed. All in all we got $4500 in cash for the dealer for the trade. Anna is a little sad about saying goodbye to the old girl, but she really likes the new one. So now we have 2 cars with sticks and turbos that take special gas (diesel and premium). But the upshot is the $650 tax credit for alternative fuel vehicles. Take that Prius! Sad story is that we have car payments again...but such is life. Oh, we also refinanced our house.

For Halloween Anna came up with a pretty rad costume. Guess what it is.

Need a hint? Click ---> HERE <---

We also had a great time at our friend Wades new place in West Layton. Here are a few pictures.

Turns out I leanred two things at this party. I blow. Literally Bre had minute to win it games and the two I participated in were blowing games and i schooled 'em! Second, Bre puts on a pretty good party and wade...you make a mean chili. BTW, we want that recipe. Thanks for the good times!
Almost forgot, On Saturday the 30th we made dinner at the Ronald McDonald house with the Lee's, a tradition of theirs. And then partied at their house after wards. It was a lot of fun, thanks you guys for having a fun party.

So that was October, pretty crazy eh? What will those Rich's do next.
p.s. check out the new video in the video player above. There is some supercar madness and Halloween goodness.

A new addition to the house!

2010-10-18T21:40:00.000-06:00

Thats right, there is a new little addition to our house!

A Hitchhiker that apparently stowed away in some of my camping gear from my recent trip to moab. I was about to put on my shoe and he was there. Just checking things out. Thats all for now. If you want to see more about my trip to Moab, check out www.utahridercoalition.blogspot.com

Halloween is Here!

2010-10-11T16:21:00.000-06:00

Well - Halloween is almost upon us and I am sooo excited I just can't wait. So, to help me along the way, I made Pat a fun Halloween treat.....that I'm going to give him today (because now that it's made, I just can't wait to give it to him!).

So, here is a picture of the card I made and the treat I decorated for him. I got the idea for it here. It's the coolest website for dates and fun stuff if any of you want to check it out.

We're back...finally.

2010-10-10T13:06:00.000-06:00

So after a month...okay...TWO month long sabbatical, Pat and Anna-Lisa are back in the blogging business. The reason for not posting doesn't have anything to do with laziness, or lack of time...just lack of pictures. We have been very busy indeed, including Waterford girls tennis for Anna-Lisa (2nd in state!), working on a laundry room redo and getting out on bike rides for me. Check out the URC blog for the only pictures we have really taken. Well, we did do a few things with pictures. This is willow lake. Pretty huh.

Its a really fun and short little hike up near guardsmen pass in BCC. You hike through typical North BCC willow tree autumnal-ness.

Then you get to the lace which had these really great ducks that didn't seem to care one bit that we were there. They walked right up to us. It was odd.

Here is some gratuitous duck butt.

Anna really likes when they stick their head under and paddle with their feet and their little duck butts sticking up. Anyway, it was a good little hike.

So, now that we are back we will try and not go so long between postings.

Meet Paul....and other fun stuff we've been doing!

2010-08-23T13:28:00.000-06:00

Well - this is Paul the cat. Paul the cat came to us at Bear Lake and Pat and I just couldn't let it roam free up there because Paul the cat is really just Paul the kitten. Many of you might wonder how we got the name Paul, especially since Paul is a female kitten! It all goes back to a very special Family Guy episode about naming a cat Paul - Wish I could show you guys but I can't find any good videos of it on youtube (crazy, I know!).

Family Guy - S5E06 - Prick Up Your Ears

Anyway, to answer a few questions, no Paul is not going to live with us forever, no matter how much we'd like her to. We are in the process of finding her a good home. In the mean time, we are spending lots of time playing with her and making her chase after yarn, tennis balls and ping pong balls, pulling her down from trees and just making sure she has a good home. I tried to talk my mom and even Mormor into keeping her but alas, Paul isn't staying in the family (unless my brother-in-law, Ben decides he wants her).

Now, other fun stuff we've been doing!

Okay, the first thing is the Pat's cousin Richie, who was one of Pat's best friends back in the days of skiing non-stop got married! We are just so darn excited that he got married and to the super-cute Kate Lindsay, now Patterson! I was pretty excited to go since we haven't been to a wedding since Pat's sister Marianne got married in Dec. 2007 and weddings are fun! This one was no exception, the sealing was so neat to listen to, the luncheon was DELICIOUS, and the reception was a blast. That's quite a compliment too because receptions can often be really BORING. This reception made me want to get married all over again....to Pat of course!

Here's the Rich siblings at the wedding luncheon. The servers at the Joseph Smith Memorial were awesome and had no problem bring us extra rolls! YUM

And here are the Riches right after the wedding.

Other news - Pat and I hiked up to Mt. Superior but we didn't make it all the way to the top. A thunder and lightning storm came in and for some reason Pat didn't want to stick around! Actually, I'm glad we went down because it started pouring on us about 5 minutes from the car and the temperature in the mountains drops when it starts raining.

And here is a picture of me and my nephew Mason husking corn. His mom went on a trip to Ohio so he stayed with Joanne for the weekend at Bear Lake. He was such a fantastic little helper and a lot of fun to be with.

Well, that's pretty much it for August. We haven't done anything too exciting but we've been keeping busy all the same.

2009 - in pictures

2010-08-11T08:37:00.000-06:00

2009

Bees!!!!

2010-07-29T18:16:00.000-06:00

Last night, Sorenson Media had a company party at a Salt Lake Bee's game. Pat and I aren't the biggest fans of baseball but it was still an eventful evening and it brought back a lot of memories for me. I went to at least one Seattle Mariner's game when we lived in Tacoma, my dad and brother went to a few Atlanta Braves games and brought back hats, and my roommates and I used to go to BYU baseball games for fun. Plus, sporting events always play the best music to pump up the fans (I used to want that job at BYU football games).

The turnout for the dinner and game was not huge, so there was lot's of food left over. Since it was paid for, the Rich clan, Coby, Tiffany and family and Pat and I decided we better stock up. Before they came and took the food away we filled our pockets with soda and cookies. Then, off to our seats for the game. Coby got Corbin this cool bat to start practicing with! (I think he better start with the giant, red whiffle ball bats though...might have better luck!)

Here's the crew - Corbin (Kind of, he fell asleep but he's there beside Coby), Coby and Jayden, Tiffany, and their friend Brent, and Pat up top - YEAH for baseball!

Glacier National Park

2010-07-26T10:03:00.000-06:00

Pat and I have been planning a trip to Glacier National Park for quite some time now and it has finally come! Last week we took the 12 hour drive up to the park and had a great time....our only regret - we wish we had planned a longer trip!

We started the drive on Tuesday evening after Pat finished work. We drove to Butte, MT to stay the night. There are good things and bad things about splitting the drive into two days. The good thing is, it's a nicer trip with shorter drives. The bad thing is, we miss a whole half day of being in the park the next day and it's expensive to stay in hotels (even the crappy one we stayed in!)

Wednesday morning we got up and started out. We were pleased at first because the drive was really wind-y (lot's of curves, not wind!) and pretty (seriously, I15 gets quite exciting between Butte and Helena). Unfortunately, that soon changes to BORING! We were amazed and a bit disappointed in the Montana landscape. We finally made it to Glacier at about 2:00 and set up camp....right in time for the rain to come. So we hung out in the tent, took a nap and when Pat couldn't take the lightning storm anymore, we joined the masses at the visitor's center. Luckily, the rain only lasted a couple of hours and we were able to go out and see some BEAUTIFUL sites! It was as Pat refers to it, "The Golden Hour," when the light is perfect for pictures. To add to it, everything had a mist on it because of the rain. I'm just going to put the pictures up, with little explanation just so you can see Glacier....it's such a neat place!

Sunrift Gorge


St. Mary Falls - I think this was Pat's favorite hike


Black Bear #1 (This one was caught near our campground)

Lake McDonald Lodge

Avalanche Lake


Pat, Amanda Hoover, Van Hoover - Van and Scott Barnes rode their bikes to Glacier	)


Hike to Twin Falls in the Two Medicine area - Katie, Van and Theo Hoover, Amanda, Scott Barnes and Pat

Theo hanging out on the left side of the boat, everyone else checking out bear #3 on the right side of the boat

Grinnell Lake - the blue, blue water is a sign that it's Glacier fed. When a glacier carves its way, it grinds the rocks up and forms glacer silt. The glacier silt goes in the water and absorbs all the colors except that torquois blue.

We had to hike through a waterfall on the way to Grinnell Glacier - I made Pat stay in for a while so I could take a picture


Grinnell Glacier - a 12 mile hike but totally worth it, besides hiking at Glacier is a lot easier than hiking in the Wasatch!

The famous Many Glacier Lodge

Trail of the Cedars - the trees here are 600 years old and the soil is only 1 foot deep

We are sooo glad we got to see glacier.

The historical things we learned - At Many Glacier Lodge they have pictures of Grinnell Glacier from back in the late 1800's and now and the Glacier is a TON smaller. It was named after George Grinnell who climbed up to it in 1887 and they say that 90% of what he saw is gone now. In 1850 there were 150 glaciers in the park and today there are only 25. People joke that they need to get up and see it before the Glaciers are gone but the pictures really prove that the glaciers are retreating. They've predicted that the glaciers will be gone in 2020, that's in 10 years!

The practical trip planning things we learned - Glacier is just like Norway, it rains, and it rains a lot. That's why everything is so green! Take rain gear and don't leave your camp shelter behind because you don't have room for it! Also - plan for at least 5 days, there is just so much to do. I'm already planning our next trip so we can do the things we missed out on like hiking to Hidden Lake, the Highline Trail and going up to Canada to see the Prince of Whales Hotel.

We've got tons more pictures in the photo album on the side bar if you want to see all of them. We're quite proud of them!

Cow Appreciation Day

2010-07-11T15:55:00.000-06:00

Friday was National Cow Appreciation Day. To celebrate, Chick Fil A gave anyone who was dressed up like a cow a free combo meal. Last year my sisters and their families did it. This year, Pat and I decided to join the fun. The things we will do for a free meal! Of course, this wasn't the first time I've dressed up like a cow. In high school I got a job at a costume shop. My job description - dress up like a cow or a gorilla and wave to cars on the street. I did it, no questions asked.....it was really good money too!

After our delicious meal of chicken strips, fries and a drink we headed over to REI, with our spots on. Most of the workers at REI were jealous and started calling their friends to bring them cow stuff so they could get Chick Fil A too. What a fun place REI is!

Happy Cow Day everyone!

4th of July

2010-07-06T09:50:00.000-06:00

Once again we spent the 4th of July up at Bear Lake. It was a colder weekend but still a lot of fun.

Saturday morning we got up early to go out on the lake but unfortunately, the water wasn't too great so instead we played some volleyball and some Kicky McStevens and just enjoyed everyone's company. Since it was a colder weekend than normal, a lot of time was spent in the hot tub.

It was really fun to hang out with Richie and his fiance Kate. She's a lot of fun and we're excited to have her in the family.

Later in the afternoon we went out on the boat and the little kids did some tubing. Pat and I kind of wussed out for tubing but the boat ride was still nice. Plus, it was a lot of fun to see Mason and Samantha go on the tube. We have such fun nieces and nephews.

Saturday night we did fireworks but unfortunately, they got cut short by the fire marshal who was really nice and just gave us a warning instead of a ticket for illegal fireworks. Props to Ben for taking the heat on that one, no one else really stepped up! It was a bit of a bummer since my favorite part of the 4th is fireworks but it was fun while it lasted.

Joanne had a treat for us at the bonfire, GIANT marshmallows to roast. They were kind of hard to roast all the way through before they fell of the stick but everyone had fun with these mallows. Pat did a seriously good job at roasting his. It's absolutely PERFECT! They seriously are so messy but so fun. By the time I finished mine, I had marshmallow in my hair, all over my hands and on my pants.

Sunday was more relaxing. We went to church on Sunday (one of the three sacrament meetings they hold for all the visitors on the 4th!), and fit in some corn hole games. Here are the 4th of the July cookies I made for a lunchtime treat.

On Monday, we relaxed on the porch and played in the water. Here are a few of my sisters-in-law, Whitney and Sara and their babies and Joanne having some porch time.

Thanks Jim and Joanne for making Bear Lake so nice and fun for all of us!

New Video

2010-06-20T16:24:00.000-06:00

Anna and I have posted some new video from the California trip. Check it out.

Give a Day, Get a Day

2010-06-14T08:49:00.000-06:00

This year Disney advertised "Give a Day, Get a Day." If you signed up to do a day of service, they would give you free Disneyland/world tickets. I jumped on that one and Pat and I made 4 pillow cases. In return, we got to go to Disneyland. Since we were already down in Palm Springs, we made the two hour drive over to Anaheim, got a hotel (LOVE Anaheim, since there are so many hotels, it's super cheap even for a nice hotel!) and spent a day on Disney. Actually, it wasn't entirely on Disney, we paid $25/ticket so that we could go to both California Adventure and Disneyland. Completely worth it.

It was the first time either of us had been to California Adventure. It was a lot of fun though not as exciting as I was thinking it was. I thought it was more like 6 Flags. It had a few BIG rides, my favorite was Tower of Terror and the River Ride (which would have been perfect if it was a bit warmer). Soarin' was also REALLY neat.

After a couple hours there we went outside the gates to look for Jack's (my nephew) brick. Luckily, you can look up specific numbers at a desk, otherwise, it would have taken maybe 8 years to find his brick. My brother and sister-in-law got this brick for him since they all really liked going to Disneyland together.

Then, on to Disneyland. It was so fun and definately not crowded. Completely opposite of our trip to Disneyworld last year - no crowds, overcast and pleasant temperature. The longest we waited in line was for Space Mountain but really, it's worth it. The shortest we waited in line was for Star Tours and for Captain Eo - a Tribute. But really, we had to go see that. I never had seen it because as a child, we always went to Disneyworld not land. It's a bit dumb and TOTALLY 80's, but I guess that fits with all the 80's trends now right?

I always give a thanks to the providers of the vacation - so thanks to Disneyland for giving us tickets to your park! We had a blast.

Spring in the Desert

2010-06-13T14:51:00.000-06:00

Well - technically the title of the post is correct, it's still spring and we did go on a vacation to the desert - Palm Springs/Desert. But in reality, summer was in full force. It was 102-108 degrees and like a million degrees in the shade. It was a Rich Family vacation full of well, hanging out at the pool since that was the only pleasant place to hang out!

I had only heard of Palm Springs from my students who go down a lot in the winter for tennis tournaments and from my brother who might have been stationed at 29 Palms Marine Base and wasn't too excited about it. But, it is a beautiful place to visit. Plants that grow in the desert have to be the prettiest things EVER. They have such bright colors. And, the resort we stayed at was really nice. There were lots of cottontail rabbits and jack rabbits hopping all over the place. They're quick little things but I almost caught one.

The resort is situated on a golf course and most of the boys in the family decided to brave the elements and go golfing. The 15th hole was right behind our room so we got to see them hit.

Here are a few shots:

Pat, Bobby and I decided to brave the elements in our own way - at the Knott's Soak City. I was pretty excited about going to the water park. Pat and I LOVE water parks, what better way to cool off?! I was really excited about this one because it is affiliated with Knott's Berry Farm so it had to be awesome. It was fun, but not Knott's Berry Farm caliber - just your classic Raging Water's style park. None-the-less, quite fun in the long run.

We also spent the time coloring with nieces and nephews, fixing yummy dinners, playing tennis and celebrating Pat's 28th birthday! After the cupcakes, Jim became entranced by some milk, food coloring and dish soap. He stared at this dish for about 15 minutes!

Palm Springs was lot's of fun - thanks Jim and Joanne for inviting us all down there!

Summer So Far

2010-06-13T14:26:00.000-06:00

Well - Pat and I have had a busy summer so far (that says something since it is officially not summer for a few more days!). But my vacation has been quite full. The first day of my vacation was spent cleaning out the PE closet at school. Then I met Joseph, my brother and his wife and my dad for a game of Frisbee golf at a park. That evening Pat and I went to our last ballroom dance lesson - I hope we don't forget everything we learned! At the end of class, I got a frantic phone call from a fellow teacher. They needed a last minute sub to chaperone the senior trip that left the next morning. I figured - I don't have anything else I need to be doing so, why not. So I quickly packed my bags and left at 8:00 the next morning to go on a 3 day river trip down the Colorado. It was fun - but the rapids aren't too exciting.

Since the following weekend was Memorial day weekend, I called Pat and told him to meet me in Moab for some camping and hiking. We camped in a site called Kane Springs campground. If you end up in Moab with no place to camp - you'll always get a spot here. It's just a big empty field and you can set up wherever you like.

Saturday we had a lazy morning and then we drove out to Klondike Bluffs. Now - if any of you read our last blog about camping in Moab (click here) then you will know that our mountain bike experience didn't turn out too great. Well this one was totally awesome. Once I got over the cattle guard (serious fear of the cattle guard) I could actually ride and I only got off my bike to walk it a few times. And the weather was absolutely PERFECT!!

Sunday we found a beautiful hike called Negro Bill Canyon, or as our friend Scott refers to it, Nizzle Bizzle Canyon. We recommend this hike to anyone in the Moab area. It's super easy and not too long either. And, lot's of the hike is in the shade so it's not too hot. At the top there is a bridge called Morning Glory Bridge. Some people were repelling down, it's the end of a slot canyon called Medevil Chambor. Next time we're in Moab we are going do that one.

Later we found a nice park and practiced slack-lining. If you haven't already seen - there's a movie of me attempting to slack line above. That night we had dinner and roasted marshmallows with our friends Dustin, Lisa and Scott. Moab always has goods times!

New video player

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

There is now an easy way to view the videos that i put on the site. check out the new video player at the top of the page. this will updated with all the latest videos. View one, or view them all. or just skip them and head down to the posts.

Just for fun

2010-05-27T13:02:00.001-06:00

This is part of a video I made for my mom for her Christmas gift in 2007. I made a short video of each of her kids. This is my section, its also how she found out I was engaged. BE ADVISED: IF YOU HAVE ANY PROBLEM WITH SPEEDO'S...well, that's actually pretty normal.

pat and anna

Shutterfly House Party

2010-05-20T17:17:00.000-06:00

In March I applied to be a Shutterfly Party Host. I did it because I got a free book out of it and so did all of my guests. That seemed like a great incentive to apply. They picked me so last Saturday I hosted my party.

I love hosting parties and this was no exception. I decided to have a "Girl's Night Out" with my Olafsson side of the family and all my sisters-in-law on the Rich side. It was a lot of fun to get together and play games and at the end I attempted to teach a little about Shutterfly. Before people got to the party I snapped a few pictures of the decorations. I hosted a baby shower that morning so here is the topiary with left-over strawberries that I re-used. And the basket is full of the handouts that Shutterfly provided: a re-usable shopping bag, pen, free Shutterfly book and 12 free greeting cards (I was very impressed with the goodies they provided!)

Technically we were supposed to actually make our Shutterfly books at the party but I didn't want to tell everyone to bring their laptops (and that's assuming that everyone has a laptop). So my first challenge was to think of stuff to do but also incorporate Shutterfly. So to start, we made pizza together. Marianne is on the left spreading out the dough and Liv took over to put cheese on the pizzas (except for our lovely Sara - someday soon you'll be drinking milk again!)

While the pizza's were rising and baking we played Burn The House Down. It's a really fun game but it didn't work out as well as I planned. It's a dice game similar to Bunko but the object of the game is to build a house before anyone else does without it burning down. I would have loved to play Bunko but I never knew how hard it is to get a firm commitment out of people of whether they are coming or not. Props to all of you Bunko groups out there - it's really tough I'm sure to get it going. If anyone has room for a 12th player - give me a call, I'm dying to play!

Just wanted to put some pictures up of my party. Thanks to all of those who came, I had lot's of fun!

The gulch, in video.

2010-05-02T16:04:00.001-06:00

Coyote Gulch 2

Wylie the Coyote.....Gulch, that is!

2010-04-26T20:41:00.000-06:00

This weekend we decided to head out to Escalante and Coyote Gulch. It's a hike that we've been looking into for a couple of years and finally got the guts to do. Unfortunately, because it was a quick decision we couldn't backpack it as is suggested. I figured that we could day hike it. I've read many accounts of people day hiking it...it's a long trip but it can be done. What we learned - it's not a day hike if you do most of it bare foot. But we couldn't help it, the stream bed was so darn soft as soon as we reached water, our shoes came off. (Halfway through, I was NOT very happy about this decision as one of my feet is very sunburned, I stepped on TONS of burrs and I'm peeling off excess skin on the inside of my big toe.) None-the-less, I will provide as detailed a route description as I can for those of you who might attempt this BEAUTIFUL hike. You can probably can good info elsewhere, but for me, everything I found on the gulch was very ambiguous.

There are many routes to enter and leave the gulch. We chose to enter through the "Crack in the Wall."

Myth #1 - Park at the water tanks at the 40 Mile Ridge Road because the last two miles are really sandy and you might have trouble.
The Reality - We drive a Subaru Forester and it made it through with no trouble at all. Yes the sand is deep; you will want 4WD but other than that you're fine. If there's cows on the trail just honk at them a bunch and they'll move so you don't have to stop.

After parking, it's about a two mile walk to the crack on a sandy trail and then slick rock.

Myth #2 - Once on the slick rock it's really hard to find your way to the crack because the cairns are all over the place.
The Reality - Any hiker who has ANY sense of direction will be able to find their way with these cairns.

We arrived at the end of the slick rock and looked down, one side was a HUGE sand dune, the other an amazing cliff. We knew this was the entrance to the crack so we looked around and sure enough, found "the crack." Here's a picture of it! Sorry we just thought this picture would be funny, but on a more humorous note, on the way back up and out fo the crack, Pat did rip his pants...all the way on two!

At the crack, you must take off your backpacks and walk sideways down and out. Pretty impressive though the day before we did Spooky Canyon so it wasn't as impressive as it could have been. Then it's a hike down a sand dune until the river.

The river is gorgeous with lot's of trees, rocks and soft sand. We decided to hike barefoot because you are in and out of the river so much and we only had hiking boots. People suggested bringing waders for this part....THIS IS NOT A MYTH - IT'S A GREAT IDEA!! We saw three or four neat waterfalls that you must navigate around - it's totally easy, just look around and you'll see a path. We ate lunch at one and looked up to see an out house up a path. That was a great site (really, I'm not being sarcastic, we were primitive camping so it was the first outhouse I'd seen for a while).

Myth #3 - the scenery in between Cliff Arch and Jacob Hamblin Arch is the best.
The Reality - Well, we didn't make it all the way to Jacob Hamblin arch before we had to turn around but seriously, if you are just day hiking it, you are NOT missing a thing if you just hang out and explore the lower portion to the Cliff Arch. It's seriously amazing. The waterfalls are pretty and the cliff walls that you hike along are awesome (meaning HUGE and awe-inspiring).

It was unfortunate that we didn't make it all the way. We wanted to do a loop from the crack in the wall, up Jacob Hamblin Arch and back to the car but we just didn't have time because we were enjoying ourselves n the canyon and taking our time. The last portion up the arch is reported to be the sketchy part. A lady at the grocery store in town has done it though and we think if she could do it, we probably could do it too but oh well. We didn't want to risk getting all the way to the arch and then not having the guts to do it so we turned when we could. We plan on doing the hike again maybe next year, including staying a few nights in the canyon. Now that we know more about it we will be a lot more confident about the whole excursion.

At the end of our 8 hours of hiking we were so glad to reach our car and get back to our camping site. We made dinner and sat by the fire roasting marshmallows. YUM!!

Now - I mentioned that we spent the weekend there. What did we do the other days? Well, on Saturday we headed to the popular areas of Spooky and Peek-a-boo. Or as I mistakenly continued to call them "Pooky and Speak-a-boo." They are pretty neat. After getting some advise from the locals, we chose to go up Spooky and down Peek-a-boo. This direction is definately neat but we were going against the grain. Most people go the other way so if you are in this canyon during a holiday weekend, you might not want to go the way we went. Spooky is a super skinny slot....if you are bit on the oversized list, you might not want to attempt this. Here's a picture of Pat in a very wide portion of Spooky. Spooky was very impressive but we both like Peek-a-boo better. Here is a little tunnel in Peek-a-boo. You can crawl under it or go around.

Well, I know this was a LONG post. I did it so that if any of you decide to hike Coyote Gulch you can maybe get some straight answers from it. I had hoped to give a complete route description but we'll just have to get that next year. You can check out our other pictures on the side bar.

Salt Lake 5K!

2010-04-19T18:29:00.000-06:00

Saturday morning we joined the masses and ran the 5K in the Salt Lake City Marathon. Pat's company paid for a group of us to run. We all had T-shirts that said, "And you thought Squeeze was fast," on the back. It was advertising for the company - and a great idea though I'm not sure what it says about the Squeeze product since we all were kind of slow during the race. Pat and I came in first of the Sorenson group at 28:06 and 27:33. But I will say this - Squeeze really is fast and if any of you want to know what the actual product is, you need to ask Pat, not me.

5K's are extremely fun and they made me realize how much I miss races. It's been 5 years since I ran a marathon and I'm just itching for a new one. Pat is also in the race mood, hopefully he'll enter a triathlon sometime this summer.

Playing at school on a Friday night?!

2010-04-10T09:09:00.000-06:00

Many who know me know that I count down for the weekend (and till the end of school, 6 more weeks!) - it's not that I don't like my job (I LOVE it!). It's just that not working is sooo much better! That brings me to the question - what was I doing at school on Friday night? Pat and I decided to take advantage of the rock climbing wall at Waterford. What a great and inexpensive way to spend a weekend night.

And to top it all off, Bobby and Sara came to play too! It was fun to spend some time with them as we don't get to very often.

Currently the wall is being redone so some of the routes are still incomplete, at least we hope they are or else these are REALLY HARD routes. It took me a while to give in and cheat. I wanted to be a purist on these routes and stick to the marked route, after all, Bobby and Pat did it so why can't I. But soon, I gave in and cheated a bit in order to make it to the top.

After Bobby and Sara left we took a small break to practice some of our new moves to the cha cha that we learned in our ballroom dance class. Thanks to Pandora, I just had to type in cha cha in the music box and plenty of songs came on just for us. We LOVE Pandora! Since we only know three different steps we couldn't practice too long, then we each took one more climb.

It was so fun to be there climbing. I'm kind of hooked on being stuck on the wall, figuring out how to solve the problem, and using my strength (whatever I have!) to accomplish the task. After last night, I think I might be a climbing addict!

Click here to see a video.

New Blog

2010-03-14T14:59:00.000-06:00

I am starting a new blog so that I can keep a record of all the cookies and cupcakes that I make and decorate. That's all it is but if you would like to check it out from time to time here is the new address:

annascookieproject.blogspot.com

Tell them I'm in the bathroom or something!

2010-03-14T12:33:00.000-06:00

Okay, only my brother will think the title of this blog is funny....that is, if he remembers our old answering machine messages! But the truth is, I think Pat and I will be spending a lot more time in our basement bathroom because it's finally done! We are so excited and yes, extremely proud of our remodeling job. As many of you know, it turned out to be a much bigger job than we had intended but in the end, it was worth it! It's so pretty and everything in it is new, even the flusher on the toilet!

First we painted, then we tore out the walls and painted again. Then after I tiled the shower surround, we had to sand to get all the adhesive off and painted yet again! Lesson learned - PAINT LAST!! You can see the beginning of the jobs here and here.

So without delay, we present our new bathroom with new paint on the walls, shower surround, shower curtain, towel rods and accessories, toilet seat and flusher, light fixture and painted vanity and medicine cabinet.

And an extremely HUGE, GIGANTIC thank you to my dad for all the work and hours he spent to help us get it done.

Pat is sick and has ants in his pants

2010-03-12T11:13:00.000-07:00

So i am at home sick today, Anna and i were supposed to use our warren miller passes to ski at the canyons today, but instead I am at home being antsy about what to do. I dont feel good enough to play outside, but i feel good enough to want to get something done. So here it is. I will blog. I found a fun video today that I did for school and I thought you would like to see it. This one is called Blu-Fi. Its a bluegrass sci-fi thriller! check it out
Blue-Fi

Blue-Fi

Also, i will be taking photos of our bathroom and some sewing updates on ski pants mark II. stayed tuned to the "Pats sick and tired of being sick and tired" show!

Here is more video. This is a long one (30 minutes) and you don't have to watch the whole thing. its a photomotage of 2008 through music and pictures. Scrub through it when you have the chance

build-1

Home Economics 101

2010-02-24T20:48:00.000-07:00

Okay, so not quite your average Home Ec. class but while working with my dad this week I've found a few comparisons to all those crafty, home-y things one learns in middle school home ec., or TLC as we call it in Utah.

The first is that cutting tile is quite like sewing, only a little bit messier and a lot louder. The advantages to cutting tile are as follows: one - it is MUCH easier to cut in a straight line than it is to sew in a straight line. Two - if you finger accidentally touches the cutter, it won't slice your finger off. Now, a sewing machine won't slice your finger off either but I've heard that it can sew right through it. Anyway - cutting tile is quite a treat and the finished product is just as fun to look at as a sewing project.

The other thing I learned in my basement home economics class is that spreading out the thin set can be compared to frosting a cake. You get to plop this goopy stuff onto the floor with a spatula and then you get to spread it out and make pretty lines in it with a trough. If you know me and frosting things (cookies, cake, cupcakes), then you'll probably understand that I was very excited to start frosting the bathroom floor. Unfortunately, my dad didn't trust me to do this job (has he not seen my culinary expertise?!) since we were laying the tile on concrete. He had to work very hard to make sure everything was level. So, I just watched, cut tile, and cleaned things when he asked me too.

So there you have it, how construction work is simply just home economics.

Happy Birthday to Anna-Lisa

2010-02-23T18:11:00.000-07:00

It's my birthday! Well, it was, last Friday and Pat did a great job making my birthday fun and special. I've always loved birthdays, I never really had a problem with them and usually loudly advertised that my b-day was coming up. Yes, I still did this this year but for once, I've been concerned with the fact that I am indeed getting older. I have a wrinkle under my left eye to prove it. And here's the thing - make-up just makes wrinkles look worse. Bummer.

Friday night we used one of my birthday coupons to get a free hamburger at Ruby Tuesday's. YUM!! It was very good and they had bottomless fries like Red Robin...only much better then Red Robin all around. Then we went to see Avatar.......I am putting this in the smallest font available because even though I am publicly saying this, I still don't want any serious repercussions from it, but, I just didn't like the movie. It was too long. Sure the scenery was pretty but, I live in Utah and I'm surrounded by beautiful mountains everyday! Okay, back to normal again, despite the movie issue, I had a great birthday.

On Saturday, we got together with a bunch of friends for my traditional Lazer Quest party. Out of 19 people, I came out 13th....not so good. But I still had fun, and I appreciate my friend Dustin, who truly felt bad if he hit me on my birthday. It's okay, I can take it, even if he did get 4th place (I think, some high number like that!). Then it was off to my parents for treats and games. As stated before, our basement is torn-up so we couldn't really do anything there. My mom made a lovely rice-crispy treat cake, Kari made delicious brownies and we had a sugar cookie decorating contest. All of my favorite desserts right there in one room (no wonder when I went to the doctor this morning I had gained 7 pounds, not the best birthday present!).

Here's Tom with two out of the three cookies he created. Though the eyes were VERY artistic...well, one of them was, they just didn't have enough to win the contest!

Lisa's cookie won, no one understood why. This is why....it looked like the delicious donuts from a place called Beyond Glazed. YUM! These donuts are just plain glazed donuts, nothing spectacular there but then there are YUMMY toppings on top and they are all beautiful. Eric Leonard came in second with his tennis court cookie, it was pretty rad, and Kari took third because she made the Olympic Rings....not as complicated as some of the others but I LOVE the Olympics. Seriously, I do!

And I know anna hates embedded video...but darn it! its what I do! so here is the cookie contest video

Baby Showers Everywhere

2010-02-11T20:50:00.000-07:00

Tis the season for baby showers I guess. In the past 5 days I have been to two showers already and I have another one on Saturday, and next Saturday too! Not to mention one a few weeks ago. Well after I got three invites to showers within two days, I decided to make a few home-made gifts. It was fun and challenging but I did it. I made these burp cloths out of cloth diapers. It turned out to be quite fun. I didn't take a picture of all of them but you get the idea.

Last summer, my best friend and brother Joseph and his wife had a little boy and I decided to make home-made booties for them along with giving them a Baby Bjorn (which all my siblings swear by). Anyway, the booties turned out to be fun to make and kind of cute so I decided to make more for gifts. Here are the two that I made for Marse and Sara for the diaper cakes we gave them.

Speaking of diaper cakes, here they are too! Whitney, Tiffany and I put these together for Marianne and Sara's shower. Marianne was in on the cake for Sara but we couldn't let her help because then she'd see her gift too(sorry Marse). They were so fun to put together and we were really proud of the result. I don't think any of us really knew what to expect but in the end they worked! If only Sara could have been at her shower to enjoy the centerpiece! Oh well - I'm sure she enjoyed her own little bundle of joy at the hospital! She had her son, Duncan James Rich the morning of the shower at 5:30. We all missed having her at the party.

I also made bear sugar cookies for handouts at the shower. Bless my mom - the best and most patient sugar cookie froster in the world. She came over and helped me frost 43 bear cookies and that is definately NOT her favorite past-time. I enjoy making and decorating cookies but this turned out to be a huge job. There are a few more pictures of the shower in the side bar if you'd like to see them.

This is one of my favorite pictures. Here's Joanne and her sister Janette and Sara....well you might not be able to see Sara. She's kind of hard to make out but she's right there, in the computer. Johnny Etchemendy set up a web cam for us to talk to Sara and Bobby in the hospital. Hizah, she really did come to the shower!

Meanwhile, the whole five hours we frosted, the best dad in the whole world was down in the basement with Pat, doing some major renovations. The renovations at first were to be very simple - paint and tile. We already painted, and tore out the floor when we discovered that the inside of the walls in our bathroom and laundry room were rotting away. BUMMER - we watched our beautiful paint job get torn out along with the shower walls. We are currently left with lots of tile for our floor and now tile for the shower walls. Oh, and a big hole in the wall that will have to be repainted when it's fixed. Again - BUMMER! But, in the end, we are going to have a really nice bathroom! Too bad it's not in our master bedroom. But live and learn - and hey, say goodbye to smelly bathrooms.

SNOW!!!

2010-02-11T09:24:00.000-07:00

I was very pleasantly surprised this morning when I walked downstairs to see snow falling....FINALLY. We have had absolutely way too much 40+ degree weather for January and February. I was just getting tired of it. So I have been smiling since I saw the snow this morning and in respect of the snow, I'm wearing my ski jacket - we just haven't even had coat wearing weather. (I've been feeling sheepish putting on all my coats and jackets but I just love them and have to wear them!)

I know, most of you in Utah don't like the snow and to that I say, move! Okay, that was a little harsh, and I like you so I don't want you to move, but we do live in a climate that is supposed to have snow so, no more complaining when we get it okay? Instead, celebrate this beautiful weather and take a moment to listen to the snow falling. It's one of the BEST sounds EVER. (For those of you currently living on the East coast and getting hammered by the storms, you may complain...specifically for the lack of milk, bread and diet coke!)

Have a wonderful snowy day and don't worry, it'll clear up for another 40+ degree day tomorrow I'm sure.

Picture contest!

2010-01-24T21:36:00.000-07:00

Dear reader(s) of our blog, we need your help! We finally took some cute artsy type pictures of ourselves up in the mountains and we need your help deciding which one we like the best. That's right, this is your chance to tell us what to to think! Make your vote by leaving a comment under each picture. If your picture gets the most votes you win!*

Let us know what we think!
Choices are:
"Winter, on the rocks"
"Product placement in love"
"Sweaters in the key of white"
"Sitting in water"

VOTE NOW!
*some sort of elephant, or maybe candy or just extra respect...yeah.

"winter, on the rocks"

2010-01-24T21:34:00.000-07:00

"product placement in love"

2010-01-24T21:29:00.001-07:00

"sweaters in the key of white"

2010-01-24T21:28:00.001-07:00

"sitting in water"

2010-01-24T21:27:00.001-07:00

Island Park

2010-01-20T19:06:00.001-07:00

Martin Luther King Weekend we were able to go up to Island Park with our friends Wade and Bri. Wade's Grandmother has a cabin up there. It was beautiful weather - sunny and warm. We spent the days out in the snow and the nights playing games. It was a weekend of good fun, good times and great oldies.

On Saturday, we spent the morning driving around looking for ski-able terrain for the boys. Finally we stopped at a snowmobile rental place and they told us, potty-mouth and all, that the snow was altogether way too dangerous to ski in. Plus, there was no place to go unless we had snowmobiles. So in the afternoon the boys made the wise decision to stay on the golf course and do some beacon training. We all took a turn hiding a pack and looking for it with beacons. (click on picture for a video)

After this, the real fun was to be had. Pat and Wade came up with the idea to have the Olympic Games - perfect! I LOVE the Olympics, and they're coming up really soon! Here are the results:

Team China

Team Russia

Team Argentina

Team USA

In the Javelin - we had a male and female event. For the men, Team Russia won gold. Team USA took the gold for the women.

Then we moved on to the long jump. Overall, Team China took the gold (I think).

In the 50 meter snow dash with pushing USA triumphed again (USA and Argentina did get a 4 second head start though).

The last event took some imagination. We all know that curling is an Olympic event....but what is it really. Our interpretation was to balance huge blocks of snow on our shovels and run to the finish. It was a relay - USA teamed up with China (yep it's true, USA and China really do get along!) and Argentina pared up with Russia. Argentina and Russia won, hands down!

Overall - it was a wonderful Olympics.

We also took off on a snowmobile path toward Henry's Fork...we did not make it. WAY TOO FAR! But we skinned and snowshoe-ed and enjoyed the outdoors.

Island Park - Highly Recommended.
Watching the Winter Olympics - Even higher - it's a must see!

Winter Time at Bear Lake

2010-01-20T18:52:00.000-07:00

The first weekend in January, Pat's cousin Richie invited us up to Bear Lake to hang out with friends. What a blast! Saturday we headed up the canyon to do some skiing - it was a long trek up. Pat and I are the only ones who actually hiked the whole thing. Everyone else was lucky enough to get snowmobile rides up. Then, we found a fun place to ski down - there wasn't too much new snow but it was still good snow. We only wish we could have done it again!

Saturday afternoon Richie had to fulfill a long overdue promise (click to see) to our friend Dustin. That was - he had to fully submerse himself into the frozen Bear Lake. After a long time trying to crack the ice, a hole was finally big enough for Richie. Now, Richie not only went through with this totally ridiculous notion (click to see), but he did it TWICE! That's right, TWICE, because his hand didn't got completely under (click to see). Needless to say, Richie did not step outside again for the evening.

Later that night, most of us (nope, not Richie) went back out to the lake to launch bottle rockets under the ice and send off fireworks over the lake. The bottle rockets under the ice was pretty neat, they would shake the ice all around.

Thanks Richie for a fun weekend!

Basketball Mania

2010-01-15T08:47:00.000-07:00

This year I did a first - I coached a basketball team! No, not the actual high school team (they get people who know how to play basketball to do that!). I coached the 6th grade girls team and it was sooo fun! I absolutely loved it - I think even more than coaching tennis! The girls were so much fun (I think I've mentioned before how I LOVE the 6th graders this year and how I want to take each one of them home with me!).

My ultimate goal was to teach these girls a lay-up because they were really get at stealing the ball and making a fast break down the court. Getting it up into the basket was a different story. The ball usually just fumbled off their hands and rolled out of the court! But, they understood the idea and bless their hearts, really tried hard. In fact, though we only took 5th place out of 8, all the games were very close, often we were in the lead the whole game and then the opposing team would make two baskets in the last 45 seconds or so.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a Good Night!

2010-01-01T11:25:00.000-07:00

Well, once again, Christmas has come and gone. Each year it seems to go by faster and it amazes me that I used to start counting down to Christmas in October! Now it just sneaks up on me.

Our Christmas was fantastic and busy as usual. With our parents living so close to each other, we get the blessing of being able to visit with both families on Christmas day but we also have the time crunch of visiting both families on Christmas day.

Our Christmas traditions start on Dec. 23 when the Rich family gets together for Christmas "Adam." (I know, it took me a while to figure this out - Adam came before Eve so we have Christmas Adam before Christmas Eve.) This is our Christmas Eve celebration.

My assignment for this dinner was to bring frosted sugar cookies, YUM! I worked really hard on these to make them pretty but was a little disappointed in the red food coloring. I got Wilton no taste red but it never got quite red, just a dark pink.

We give brothers, sisters, and parents their gifts. Our big project this year was to make Jim and my dad Cornhole games with Ben, Whitney, Marianne and Lance. Joseph and Kathryn also helped out by getting official material to make the beanbags. With that being said, it's a beanbag toss game that is really popular in Ohio - and for once, the midwest is right, it's REALLY fun!

Here are our niece and nephews dressed up for the Nativity story. As a child, I really only remember dressing up for this once, so I really enjoy it now....I kind of wanted to be the angel but we didn't have one.

We got a griddle for camping and a cool Norway skiing poster that we can't wait to put up from Coby and Tiffany. And Joanne always gives us PJ's to wear on Christmas morning but this year there was a twist. The boys got remote control cars instead....Pat and Bobby found a great way to entertain by playing pool with the cars.

Next came Christmas Eve, spent with the Osmond/Olafsson clan - the second best meal of the year in my opinion! It's tradition to have kjotttkaker, mashed potatoes, homemade rolls and of course, kalerabe (no idea how to spell). We're all just glad that ribbe made it off the menu! To end the meal we had riskrem (rice pudding) with an almond hidden in it. Whoever finds the almonds gets a chocolate santa, Tom and Sis. Madsen got it.

Christmas Eve soon came to an end, time for sleep and Christmas Morning. Pat and I opened our presents to each other in the morning. Pat got a backcountry ski themed Christmas, I got a nice thick yoga mat, a ball hopper and much other fun things. Then we hustled over to my parents for breakfast (the best meal of the year...period). We gave my dad his cornhole game and played a few rounds then hurried over to the Riches for Christmas brunch and presents from Santa. Pat and I got a springbar tent from Kirkhams...cool huh?! After this, we went back to my parents to open presents there - fun stuff!

Both our parents are so fun and really work hard to make Christmas fun and memorable. We are glad to live so close to each of them. Well, that's it for this fantastic first day of 2010.

Happy New Year!

Ankle Sprains and Taping

2009-12-29T11:01:00.001-07:00

Sunday evening after leaving the Riches house, I sprained my ankle. I haven't sprained my ankle in years, even with teaching step, zumba and just plain running around. Everyone asks me how I sprained it, and I'm really not sure how (I think that is when people injure themselves, if they see the fall coming, then they are prepared to take the brunt. It's the falls that sneak up on you that cause problems). All I do know is, ham went flying and I took out a wicker deer.

The main point of this story is that though I sprained it, I still need to exercise. Luckily it was a minor sprain so today I headed for the gym. But first, I taped my ankle. Those of you who know how to tape ankles might appreciate that I did it by myself and I did a really good job - better even then when I tape other people's ankles - no wrinkles and my heel locks looked great. (I guess my college education paid off!) I was so proud of myself that I took pictures (I know, I'm totally bragging but I just can't help it.)

Turtlenecks and eggnog - There's still nothing else quite like it!

2009-12-23T15:44:00.000-07:00

Five years and still running, we just had my annual Turtleneck/eggnog party and for the second year in a row, we combined it with our friend's Lisa and Dustin and their white elephant party. What fun - though I was sad to notice that people are really lax on my rule of wearing turtlenecks - it's pretty self-explanatory!

This year, in addition to the white elephant exchange, we puzzled everyone with a Christmas Carol picture puzzle, Pat's brother and wife, Coby and Tiffany won.....I think they might cheat.....they won a Christmas Carol word scramble at our cousin's house last week, and they were upstairs away from everyone when they completed the puzzle...hmmm. I'll also except that since the radio plays Christmas songs for two months prior to Dec. 25 they might just know a lot of songs!

We also played the Paper Bag Game (creative name - I know). All you need is a paper bag and scissors and the ability to laugh at yourself and others. Here are a few pictures of people picking up the bag with their teeth - nothing but their foot can touch the ground. Eric Leonard impressed us all with his amazing abilities and Scott Barnes was a CLOSE second! Props to our two yoga-istic friends!

Here's Scott, Ashley Wolfe and Mike Lefler working to get the bag.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!