Idaho Falls Duck Races

Just as an intro, everything that I am going to tell you in this post is true. I am not making it up at all. I don't think I could if I tried. :) Every year, Idaho Falls has what's called "Duck Races." Anyone in the community who wants to, buys a little yellow rubber ducky for $7. Then we all go to the Snake River. They set up a crane, and attach a huge dumpster thing with all the ducks in it. They then pour all the ducks into the river at one time and we watch this huge mass of yellow float down the river, anticipating which duck will decide to get ahead of all the rest and fall down the water falls first. I know, people pretty much have anxiety attacks over this. The person connected with the duck that went down first wins a car. A CAR! For buying a $7 child bath toy! WOW.

The huge mass of rubber ducks floating down the river Anyway, they have a whole bunch of other activities and happenings go on all day long around the river that lead up to the releasing of the ducks that I got to help out a lot with. We watched speed boat races. We had a tug-a-war across the river. That's right, across the whole river. I got to be the person who stood on the bridge in the middle and blow the air horn to let the teams know when to start. So the first round, I blow the horn and two seconds after, the rope broke. HAHA So we got it all fixed and tied again, so I blew the horn and the two teams sat there tugging at the rope forever. Nobody slid down the grass into the river. Nobody let go of the rope all of a sudden making the other team fall on their bums. Nobody even got too tired and let the other team win. They just pulled forever and we called it off and declared a winner. It was pretty much the lamest tug-a-war I have ever seen. :) But it was still fun to help out. Another awesome thing they do is have a helicoptor fly over and drop a whole lot of ping pong balls down and all the kids rush and grab a ball. If they get a red one they get a toy, and if they get a white ball, they get a cookie. So I helped hand out all the prizes and such to the kids. We were definitely bombarded by the kids. There were even some crazy parents who wanted to make sure their kid got the red ball and not a white one! Also lined up by the river were a bunch of old cars that people brought to show off. My branch president owns a whole barn full of old cars. That's his hobby and he has some really nice ones. We have a lot of branch activities down at his car barn where we get to look at them as we BBQ or watch a movie or go four wheeling. So at the end of the day I got to help drive one of the cars back to his garage and it was so awesome! I didn't get a picture of me in it, but this is a picture that I took of Jared while we were at the car barn one time, and the car I drove is the one on the right. :)

It was definitely a very eventful day and lots of fun. And who can complain when they get to eat a huge bag of kettle corn while watching a bunch of rubber duckies float down the river? I definitely can't. :) I can't wait for next years! HAHA

Me and a huge blow up of what the mini rubber ducks looked like. :)

Dwight Schrute: Once I brought in a duck to prepare for lunch, and people got upset. Apparently they got attached to the duck and didn't want to see it killed.

Lake Tahoe

You don't have to say it....I already know. I suck at blogging. It's been a whole month, and there have definitely been some awesome happenings in my life these past 4 weeks that I want to share. I just don't have pictures for those adventures and so that is what has been keeping me from posting anything. But I definitely want to post about my awesome family reunion I went to last weekend! I drove down to Provo and met Doug and Bethany there and then we all drove to Lake Tahoe together. There were about 46 of us there and we had a blast together. I got to see so many of my cousins and aunts and uncles. I got to see my brother who I hadn't seen in many years. I finally got to meet my great neice (my neice's daughter who is already 16 months!). We got to stay in a really nice, big cabin. Friday night we had a big BBQ and just chatted and caught up with everybody. Saturday we spent the day at the lake. Laying out in the sun, playing sand volleyball, Doug and I went kayaking in the lake, and then we got to go out in Sherine's boat and go tubing! Heather and I went in the tube together, and Rob drove the boat so fast and crazy we got thrown around like rag dolls. :) We were so sore the next day it was out of control. After the lake we went to the city pool and hung out and had a great BBQ there. Sunday we got to go rafting down the river! It was so much fun! It was a very popular day for people to float the river. We even saw some people going down on air mattresses! :) haha At the bottom of the river they have this really cool patio restaurant where we ate. The rest of the day was spent hanging out, playing games, eating pizza, and having an awesome dance party. My family is so fun and awesome! It was so good to see them and be able to get away and have fun together. I really hope that we will be able to make this a tradition. Thanks Sherine for all the work you put into it and making it happen! Thank you Beth and Doug for letting me bum a ride off of you. It was a great trip!

















Me and Heather tubing

Me and Doug about to raft

Me and Mom

Hanging at the lake

Getting a little camera happy

Rafting Traffic

Heather and my boat hair

Michael Scott: You know a lot of these people, this is the only family they have. So, as far as I'm concerned [picks up 'World's Best Boss' mug] this says World's Best Dad.

Baby Ryder

I was able to go down to Provo this past week to see my new nephew be born! It was such an amazing experience, it's kind of hard to put it in words. I drove down early Thursday morning since Beth was going to go in to get induced that day. I left Idaho Falls at 5:30am, stopped at the Salt Lake airport to pick up my mom who was flying in from Sacramento, and then headed to the Orem hospital! Once we arrived there, Beth had just gotten her epidural and was feeling great! We hung out in their room, talked, took pictures, and anticipated the birth. At 10:30am the nurse checked her and she was at 4.5cm. We were hoping it wouldn't take that much longer. Well, the nurse surprised us when she came back at 12pm and told us she was at 10cm!! It really didn't take long at all! So she called the doctor to get him over to the hospital so Beth could start pushing! Seriously, Beth only pushed like 6 times and Ryder was out! It was so cool to see him born. It really is a miraculous experience. The doctor pulled him out and got him him breathing, Doug cut the umbilical cord and got blood squirted all over him :), and then I watched the nurses clean him all up before they handed him over to Bethany.

He was 6 pounds 3 ounces, 19 inches long! The rest of the day we spent holding him, looking at him, and loving him. Beth did such a great job through the whole thing and we were so grateful there were no complications. He is the cutest and best behaved baby ever (well, until my babies are born that is...:) It has been so much fun playing with a new baby, being with my family, and getting to just relax the whole weekend. Bethany and Doug are going to make WONDERFUL parents and I am so excited to watch Ryder grow up.

He already has some cool tricks! :)Going home from the hospital!

Michael Scott: It does not matter to me at all whether this baby is biologically mine. I’m going to love it. It’s like when the dog nurses the tiger cub. Have you seen that video? It is so bizarre and unnatural, but, it... it happens.

I really really want to write about the awesome white water rafting trip I went on last week, but I don't want to do it without pictures!! I am trying to find someone who took pictures and get them from them so I can! So if you went on the trip and you have pictures from it, let me know! :) I am sorry to make you all wait, but it will be so much better with pictures.

Idaho Falls Chukars!!

Last Tuesday I got to go to my very first baseball game! Our local minor league team, the Chukars, was having their opening game and I got to go. :) The place where I work (The Apple Athletic Club) was having a tailgate party, and doing a barbeque for members and anyone else who wanted to come, so I went to help out and have some fun! Through my work we were even able to order shirts with our names and the chukar picture on it. What the heck is a chukar anyway?! I have no idea....:) So Steph and I went to help out, eat great barbeque, and enjoy the scenery of baseball boys. :) It didn't take me long to realize that the fun parts about baseball games is the social aspect of it. Haha The actual game was pretty boring. It definitely couldn't keep my attention for very long, and about the beginning of the 3rd inning, we decided it was time to go and get some ice cream. :)

Me and Steph

Me and the Chukar! :)

Us and our awesome shirts we got

Kelly: What about 'second base'? Like, if Michael said he got to second base with you, does that mean, like, you closed a deal?
Jan: Excuse me?
Kelly: I mean that's a baseball term, right?
Jan: I don't know what Michael was talking about.

Love is in the Air

Yesterday I had the privilege of taking my friends Ian and Brittni's engagement pictures! I had such a blast! I was a little nervous since it was my first time doing this. I love taking pictures and would love to do it more and get better. Ian and Brittni are definitely giving me some practice too! I went and did their engagements last night and then I am also going to do Britt's Pre-Bridals too! So much fun! We went down by the river, and took pictures all over the falls, rocks, and then went to tautphaus (I have no idea how to spell that) park and did a few there. Here are my top 5. I have lots more that you can see too. Now remember, this was my first time so don't make fun of me! :)


Creed: So hey. I wanna, set you up with my daughter.
Jim Halpert: Oh I'm engaged to Pam.
Creed: I thought you were gay.
Jim Halpert: Then why would you want to set me up with your daughter.
Creed: I don't know.

Playing Catch Up

I know I know.....I am so behind! So I am just going to take a minute to catch up real quick! It's gonna be fast and not a lot of detail since I have waited so long to blog about these few happenings in my life.

Memorial Day weekend was AWESOME! My bestest friend Sarah came up from Provo to visit me and stay for 4 days with me! We spend our time going to Texas Roadhouse, dying Sarah's hair, going on a triple date out in the mountains grilling burgers and playing games, watching Harry Potter, visiting the cemetary where her great grandma was buried, and staying in a cabin with a bunch of people from my ward. The cabin was lots of fun! Even though the other people that were there would say that Sarah and I were pretty boring and stayed in our room the whole time (which we did :), we still had a blast. There were lots of people there in that cabin. It was kind of a weird mixture of people so I think that's why we mostly stayed in our bed eating our snacks we brought, talked, and watched "Yes Man" on Dusty's iTouch. We got to see the beautiful scenery out there, swing on this cool swing in the trees, eat dutch oven dinners, and just have fun with our friends. It was so much fun having Sarah up here with me and she got to see Idaho for the first time! Yay! We made sure she experienced Idaho Falls to the fullest: going to the awesome Teton Mall, driving by the Temple, and seeing the great Snake River! HAHA Good Times in IF. ;)

On our walk and found a patch of SNOW so we made snowballs...:)

Friends at the Cabin! Jon, Summer, Sarah, Me, Chad

Summer and I UP CLOSE

Couldn't get a good picture of me actually on the swing :)

Just being ourselves...:)

Last weekend I went down to Provo to do Bethany's baby shower! She is due in two weeks! It has gone by so fast, I can't believe little Ryder is going to be here soon! I am not ready!!! HAHA It was a really good trip. Beth and Doug are always so good in letting me stay at their house. We went to Cafe Rio which is ALWAYS awesome and rented "Mall Cop". I am not gonna lie, that movie was pretty dumb. :) But there were definitely some funny parts and that one Indian guy ( I think he was Indian. I am never good with that stuff) totally made the movie! Saturday was the shower and it turned out really well! I was afraid there was only going to be me, Beth, and Callie (we had it at Callie's house) there and that would have made me so sad! But we had a good turn out, the food was just right, and I think it was a pretty successful shower! Thank you for everyone that was able to make it! You rock! I spent the rest of the day visiting my friend Amelia and her new adorable baby Jayden, and hanging out with Sarah! We made yummy burritos and watched Step Up 2! I am still in the process of getting her up to date on all the movies she missed while she was on her mission....;) I went to Sarah's ward on Sunday and then got to go to our family dinner before I drove back up to Idaho Falls. I miss our Fast Sunday family dinners so much! Always good food, good conversation, and good people.

Waiting for Doug to be done watching the horse races so we could go to Cafe Rio....haha

The Shower Gang (minus Sarah: she is taking the picture)

Me and Beth at the Shower

Me and Baby Jayden! Kevin: Michael, the baby's already been born.
Michael Scott: Yeah, duhh.
Kevin: Yea, so, we had games planned, but the baby ruins all of 'em.
Michael Scott: No, the baby doesn't ruin anything, Kevin. Okay? The baby multiplies the fun. So let's just do what you were going to do.
Kevin: Okay... Who wants to guess when the baby will be born.