We Made It!

Our journey began last Sunday as we left Farmington, Utah and headed east.  The journey finally came to an end on Wednesday afternoon as we pulled into Durham, North Carolina.  While the journey was quite long, it was an amazing adventure.  We were able to drive across the United States and see the different landscapes and some different people.  Ashton summed up the cultural unity of the United States by stating that you could always expect a McDonalds to be at the next exit.  Anyway, as I am not the typical blog author (in fact, I am only testing some software) I will end for now. 

From Sea To Shining Sea

In the next few weeks, our family will have driven from coast to coast! We've been visiting Calvin's family here in Nevada for the past week, and we took a couple of days out to go on our own little trip. We headed out early Thursday morning and drove to San Francisco! The drive through the Sierra mountains was beautiful.

In San Francisco, we explored Pier 39. Our hotel was only a block from the Pier, which was perfect. We saw the sea lions who have made a home there at the pier since the earthquake in 1989. We also went on a boat tour of the bay. The boat sailed out and under the Golden Gate bridge. Then it turned and went around Alcatraz. They told us all about the prision that used to be there. It was pretty spooky. We even saw some dolphins swimming out in the bay!

After the boat tour, we went to the aquarium. Camden loved going through the tunnels under the aquariums and looking at all the fish, sting rays, and sharks. In one of the tanks, they had some of the biggest fish I have ever seen. I am definitely going to think twice before I go swimming in the ocean again. In this shallow pool, we got to touch the sharks and the rays. They also had some pools where we got to touch some star fish.

Our next stop was China town. We walked all 14 blocks there and 14 blocks back. It was so much fun to watch Calvin speaking Chinese to all the people there. They would get so surprised when he started speaking to them! We got some really good treats from a couple of Chinese bakeries.

On our way back to the pier, we stopped at Ghirardelli square. We couldn't resist some of the famous chocolate and and some really good ice cream.

On the second and last day of our trip, we got up and drove across the Golden Gate bridge. We then made our way up to Napa Valley. The vineyards and rolling hills were beautiful. After our sight-seeing, we went to Six Flags, Discovery Kingdom. The roller coasters were awesome! They also had some pretty cool animal exhibits and a neat killer whale show. Camden even got to go on a little ride! Overall, we had a very fun trip!

Graduation

Here is the proud graduate! We had a great time last weekend for graduation. Calvin is officially done! It was so nice to have his parents there too. We're grateful to both of our families for being there. We started the day bright and early at Amy's husband Danny's graduation. We then went to Calvin's graduation, followed by lunch at Magleby's. It was a great day! Calvin graduated Magna Cum Laude, we are so proud of him!

Springtime is Here

We are so excited for the sunny, warm weather! Today, Camden and I helped weed and plant flowers. Camden had a lot of fun playing in the dirt and pulling on the plants.

We are also so excited for Calvin to graduate!! He finished his last final yesterday. Now he just has to finish up his TA grading work and then walk across that stage! I really can't believe this part of our lives is over. We will be leaving BYU. How lucky we are to have had this great school play a part in our lives. So many little things came together allowing us to meet and be married; it really is amazing how many things you could name that had they been just a little bit different, we never would be where we are today. I am so grateful for those little things that made all the difference in my life.

So in just a few short weeks, we will be heading out to North Carolina. I am going to cherish every last minute I have here with my family. I am so glad we've had this time to spend with them and I'm grateful for thier hospitality. We are going to miss them!

Camden is becoming more and more vocal. Here's a little video.

Easter Egg Hunting and More

We had a really fun Easter weekend! There was a neighborhood easter egg hunt that we took Camden to. He had a lot of fun crawling around on the grass picking up the eggs. They had them all in zip lock bags in case it rained or snowed, haha. The way it was organized was really great. The night before the hunt, you had to drop off 12 eggs for each kid you were going to bring. You just dropped them off at the lady's house who organized it and wrote down on the sign up sheet what age group your kid would be in (0-4, 5-9, 10-12). Then the next morning, the eggs were put in different neighbor's yards along the same street for each age group. They announced which yards you should hunt in for each age group and said that once your kid had found 12 eggs, they were done. If they couldn't find 12, then they said to come talk to them because they had some extras. It worked out really well! Everyone seemed to find plenty of eggs. After the easter egg hunt, everyone brough breakfast treats to share!


We also spent some time doing some hunting of our own! On Saturday, Calvin, my Dad, Camden, and I went up to the Bountiful shooting range. Camden slept in the car while we shot some clay pigeons with our shot guns. We borrowed a spring-loaded thrower, which was actually a lot of fun. Then we went up to the range and shot some targets. I am much better at target shooting. Then on Sunday, my Dad, Calvin, and Danny shot the bow. It was kind of funny watching Calvin and Danny try to pull back the bow that was a little too long for thier arms. They did pretty good though! They even hit the target!


Here are just a couple other pictures of what we've been doing lately. Calvin brought me these beautiful roses just because he loves me! (And maybe because I've been hinting that I would really like some :)
Calvin proved what an awesome mechanic he is by diagnosing and fixing the broken water pump on my car. In case you didn't know, he went to the National Ford auto competition when he was in High School. What a catch!

Catching Up

It seems like catching up is what I am trying to do every day! I will now try to catch up on our blog.

Well, we sold our house and moved out. We are so lucky to have such a great family. My sisters came and helped clean and helped put on an awesome yard sale. I've never had a yard sale before, and let me tell you, I never knew people would pay for such junk! I also never knew I had so much junk to sell!

My parents are letting us stay at thier house in Farmington until we head off to North Carolina. They are in Hawaii right now with my two youngest sisters, so we've had the house to ourselves. This is Camden in his new bedroom; the large closet in our room.

We had a nice general conference weekend. Calvin had a mission reunion on Friday night, and on Saturday night we went down to Provo again for a bridal shower for my friend Carrie. Calvin just turned in his last paper this week, so it was nice to finally spend some time together. We have been so busy trying to pack and move, plus Calvin trying to make sure he graduates, it has been hard to find time to just relax and have fun.

Just like everyone else, we are ready to be done with Winter! I really hope that with this Easter weekend, Spring will come and we will be done with snow for good.

Getting Out Of Our Empty House!

Well, we now have several empty rooms! All of our couches are gone, our big screen TV, the washer and dryer, and the furniture in the extra bedroom. It's kind of sad! We're really excited though that we've been able to sell most of the big things so far so that we can just move with a light load and then get some new stuff when we get there!

Yesterday, we spent the whole day out and about. Calvin finally finished his three busy weeks of homework, a huge paper, and three tests. After we settled a few transactions, including the sale of the sectional and the TV, we set out for the South Towne Expo Center. We had a booth there for the Bear River Lodge. I had worked on Thursday and Friday, and I wanted to show Calvin and Camden all the cool stuff. My two favorite things were the baby bear cubs and the splash dogs!

We then went to the BYU baseball game against the U of U. BYU won 11 to 3. We then stopped and got some frozen yogurt (our new favorite 80 calorie treat) and then did some shopping! After that we even got to go to BYU for some bowling, and then a dollar movie at the Varsity Theater. It was a really fun day!