Camping and the Carlsbad Caverns

A couple weeks ago Ken and I took the dogs to Carlsbad so we could camp at the lake and introduce Harley to the water! Maddie was NOT a fan of swimming when we first introduced her to it, so we figured both dogs would put up a fight for our first outing this summer, but we were pleasantly suprised!! Both Maddie and Harley absolutely LOVED the water! It was such a blast, even with the 50 mph winds! :)

Ken and I also had the opportunity to go see the Carlsbad Caverns! Wow it was crazy down there! I have never been caving before so I was pretty nervous, but once we got down inside it was totally worth the butterflies!

The Entrance for the 1.5 mile hike to reach the depth 780ft underground!

Crazy popcorn walls...

There were tons of little crevices leading to who knows where, for who knows how far...

The stalagtites and stalagmites! There were a few rooms where the ceiling was covered with so many that I thought for sure they were going to fall and I would be a goner!

It was such an awesome trip! I can't wait for my family or friends to come visit us so we can show them all the sights!!

THE CAKE!

Those of you who know me, even a little, know that I have very few culinary skills, but lack of skill has never been enough to stop me from trying anything! Here are the pics from the very first cake I have ever baked all by myself :) It was pretty fun actually, even though I couldn't get the cake out of the pan, what little cake I did get out broke in half, and it ended up being 3/4 icing and 1/4 actual cake :) ENJOY!

Easter

Here are some long overdue pics of our Easter Basket and our SUPER SWEET eggs we dyed! I can't even remember the last time I got to dye eggs, we had a BLAST!!

Hello All! On this gorgeous Easter day I am so grateful for this beautifl Earth which we have been given to enjoy, for my amazing families to help me through life's struggles, for the gospel that blesses my life even when I may not be deserving, and most of all for my Husband, who loves me, takes care of me, and works hard for our little family! He is my best friend, my partner in crime, and the love of my life! I love him with all that I am, and I am so thankful that through Christ we can be together forever! Happy Easter!

So much has been going on in the last few weeks and when I'm not feeling so contentedly lazy I will get to posting about everything!!

Spring Break ROADTRIP 2010!!

Last week Ken and I drove up to Pocatello to haul the rest of our belongings back to Texas and pick Sam and jake up so they could stay with us for spring break! I wanted to share these pictures of our trip!!

This is the sun rising in Texas on our way north!
We drove for 18 hours! Trust me it felt like FOREVER!

Sweet hill/plateau thing in New Mexico!

When we FINALLY made it to Idaho I was soooooo glad to see my SISTERS!

Ken and Jake loading up the truck! They were very creative, and we also had a small Uhaul trailer

My super sweet sister in law Cassie and her kiddos Emmy and Jake (who I absolutely ADORE!) left Ken and I a CandyGram! I love them sooooo much and miss them ALL the time!

On the road again! The return trip took about 22 hours of total driving time! We stopped in Vernal on the way though and took a break to visit Ken's family! It was so nice to see everyone again, but the car ride was brutal, and you can see we got PRETTY bored. We were trying to stretch out our noses........ oh the things you think up when stuck in a car!

Ken got a couple of PATTERSON drilling caps so we were showing PATTERSON some love!

Ken takes good pictures.......So jealous.....

These rock formations are from Moab Ut, what a BEAUTIFUL place!

And these are from New Mexico......SOME of that place is beautiful! :)

Anyway I didn't get many pictures from our trip there due to a failing camera battery, but we left Texas and passed through New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and then into Idaho, and on the way back went through Idaho back to Wyoming, through Utah, snipped the corner of Arizona, then went all the way across New Mexico, and finally back into Texas! A 7 state trip! It was fun, but done in 4 days! So very exhausting! I'm glad to be HOME!

Fridge Fiasco!

So a couple of days ago (on Ken's Birthday to be exact) our refrigerator started acting up. We noticed a SLIGHTLY funky smell coming from the kitchen that morning but couldn't really pinpoint its origin so we dismissed it as funky Texas weather..... It does get pretty stinky here sometimes. SO we went about our business for the day and didn't think much of it, UNTIL we came home from a softball game (my usual weekly ritual of stalking the local high school softball team....I can't help it, I'm ADDICTED!) and the WHOLE house was consumed in the putrid smell of burning plastic! You know, that smell SO STRONG it makes your stomach turn! So we pulled out all the fans in an attempt to air out some of the rooms so we could 1. BREATHE and 2. find the SOURCE of the disgusting smell...... Well low and behold we found the source to be our refrigerator..... Or the outlet it was plugged into. So we initaited 2 tests to find out which it was. Our first test consisted of unplugging the fridge and seeing if the smell would go away, but the smell was so potent that it lingered and we couldn't really tell. So then we called Jake's dad, who just happens to be an electrician by some stroke of luck! He told us to plug in a hair dryer to the outlet and see if it trips the breaker, because the refrigerator had, and a hair dryer uses more electricity..... well the blow dryer did not trip the breaker so we concluded that IT WAS IN FACT the fridge. So we emptied the food we could from the big fridge into Kens mini-fridge (this is the second time I've been incredibly thankful for that dumb little fridge!) and called the landlord (who is totally awesome by the way). He said he couldn't make it until the next morning, but he would be here first thing. Well he kept to his word (sort of, it was 11am :) and brought us a new fridge (well an old fridge, but new to us!) that was bigger than our last one, keeps our food cold, and DOESN'T smell like yucky burning plastic!! (AND he LOVED my paint job!!!!! He said it looked VERY sharp, the best this house has ever looked!! WHOOP WHOOP) SO we were able to move the food back into the new fridge and carry on with our lives! And THAT is my tale of our fridge fiasco....... I hope you enjoyed it :)

P.S. You know when you say a certain word over and over like a hundred times it stops sounding like a word at all...... that happened to me with fridge and refrigerator during this post ha ha try saying refrigerator 20 times as fast as you can!!!!

Ken's Birthday EXTRAVAGANZA!!!

Yesterday, March 23rd, was Ken's Birthday! Sam and Jake are on spring break from school and have been spending it with us here in Texas, so we decided to decorate and make a super special birthday suprise for Ken! As you can see we blew up blue and white balloons (UK style, Kens favorite!) And as you can't see, we also hung blue and white streamers all through the house!

For the extra super special birthday suprise we built a double decker cheesecake (strawberry on bottom and pineapple on top) with a blackberry filling! Cheesecake is Ken's FAVORITE dessert, and he doesn't like cake much, so we decided to go all out for him! However putting the cheesecakes together ended up being a little more difficult then we imagined, and I am NOT a great dessert baker (or any kind of cook or baker for that matter :) so it ended up a little messy, but the cracks in the top crust served as great places to put 24 CANDLES! (WOW he is getting OLD!)

We pretty much just made 2 cheesecakes and flipped on top of the other after spreading the filling in between :) But it was sure YUMMY!!

That is A LOT of candles :)

Ken thought the candle design actually looked like a Christmas tree :) But it just worked out that way on accident, I PROMISE!

It pretty much looks like I'm carrying a massive fireball, haha it was awesome!!

He LOVED his suprise, but didn't have much time to appreciate it, poor guy. Of course his birthday fell on a rig move day, so he was out the door at 4am and didn't get home until 10pm, so it was a quick party, but he loved it and that is all that matters! :)

THUNDER STORM!

So this morning I awoke with quite a start! The entire house was shaking! It was still pitch black outside so I knew it had to be pretty early, but then I remembered that Ken had already left, so it was alteast 5am. Again the whole house rattled and was momentarily lit up with a flash! So I flew out of bed, finally realizing what was going on and that i was missing one of the famous Texas thunderstorms everyone has been telling me about! I got to the window in the front room just in time to see another huge flash of lightning, and find out that it was actually 8am! WOW it was still as dark as midnight with the heavy cloud cover! It was crazy! I must have caught just the tail end of the storm and slept through most of it because it didn't last much longer, but what I did see and FEEL was incredible! I have never experienced thunder like that before! It was POWERFUL! And honestly the slightest bit scary too! One of the rumbles went on and on for almost a full minute! HOW CRAZY IS THAT!? It looks like its going to be a wet and cold day in West Texas!