Monthly Archives: September 2010

Remembering Me

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It takes about 15 minutes to scan back about a year with the “older entries” button at the bottom of the pages. I decided to take a look around, since this is the internet space I’ve created. Some things I’ve noticed:

  • We have done some really amazing projects to this house.
  • I first saw the house a year ago today! And it was snowing…
  • We’ve done things I’ve entirely missed out on blogging about because the things were too much.
  • We are so blessed to travel and/or have company like, every month.
  • Why am I finding typos, Momm? That’s your job!
  • You guys are involved after YEARS and still comment and talk with me.
  • The point of this space is for us to chat.
  • I would have forgotten some really great stuff that’s happened if I didn’t write it down.
  • I think that means I’m getting senile.
  • Aren’t I too young to get senile?
  • I have a headache…

The Great Pop Culture Debate

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While we were strategically planning our entry for the Ski Utah video contest (still waiting to hear back after making the top five) I put a bunch of ideas out on Facebook to try to see where our efforts would best pay off. Everyone liked the Old Spice commercial idea, and everyone denied knowing who Ke$ha was, even though I had a great song to the tune of “Tik Tok” all planned out… “Wake up in the morning/with hair like Glen Plake/There’s a smile on your face/when you see that first snow flake” or something like that.

So we went Old Spice. I totally stand by my video and had a blast making it something that really stood out from the competition. With this blog, and being slightly involved in Facebook, more so with Twitter, I am able to keep up with the world around me. I wouldn’t have known about the Old Spice campaign without Twitter, and have had to show that video to some friends/family before showing them mine.

It’s a big huge world and it’s hard to decide what is important. So many of my friends are pop culture junkies and seem to find the time to know something about everything. Then there are a few of you that make it a point to not be addicted. Your stories are still interesting when you DO know about something though, because you know it more in-depth. The nerves I get about potentially blogging about skiing totally relate to the fact that MAN there are a lot of ways you could go. Gear, mountains, traveling, food, drinks, nightlife, powder conditions, movies, ski news, famous skiers…

Included with this cultural exploration I’m making is the fact that we’ve gone back and forth over the last five years with and without cable. As much as I feel it’s every Americans right to wind down after a hard day at work with some really guilty pleasure crap TV, MK disagrees and reminds me constantly that I have no idea what a long hard day at work looks like anymore. Ouch. Then he tells me to paint the garage. Sigh.

I feel a little out of touch! I was super super sick today and I stayed in bed and caught up on some fall premieres that I’d missed with the whole no cable and being on vacation and surprise MIL visit. I miss TV already. So much can be seen online, whole seasons on Netflix even, but as Dadd pointed out, it’s hard to start a conversation like “Have you seen the Sopranos?” when it is no longer culturally relevant. It’s easy in this day and age to miss something if you wait a minute.

What do YOU choose to keep up with? I don’t know who’s been kicked off Dancing with the Stars. And my heart is still beating and I have other things to do. But I am a little curious…

The Aspens

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During our trip out to the Grand Canyon, we hired a local guide to drive us and take us around and tell us all the information he could. It was a great thing to do that I’d suggest to anyone – it went way beyond just checking out the view and made us feel connected to the environment we were experiencing.

I love the aspens all over Park City, and loved hiking through them this summer and skiing through them covered in snow in the winter. But I *really* loved seeing the aspens at the Grand Canyon. They changed earlier than the ones in Park City, and were the brightest yellow I’d ever seen. We were told by our guide a fun fact I didn’t know. The root systems of aspens are specially interconnected. It was a neat concept I pondered as we drove through the forests. A single seedling could give root to a whole large colony of the trees.

The interconnectedness of the trees goes a lot with the theories I’m exploring in my yoga journey right now. The concept of rooting is important, when you firmly place your feet in to the ground. I can stand taller, straighter, and balance better when I concentrate on my rooting. It also made me think of how important you connect to you particular role in life, as you are interconnected with all aspects of your life and those of others.

The Things You Do

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Breaking barriers is scary.

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Five Crazy Things I’ve Done For/Because Of Yoga:

  1. I’m eating quinoa, even though I’m still not sure what exactly it is.
  2. I’m trying to invert my body into poses I can’t believe.
  3. Adamant about hiking the Grand Canyon Rim to Rim.
  4. Letting so much not stress me out it seems foreign.
  5. Trying to keep putting myself out there and taking giant leaps of faith.

Amazing

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There’s no way for any picture to do the Grand Canyon justice. We took 1000 anyway. I’m so happy my parents invited us to AZ and we made the drive out. Getting to see it with my own eyes and experience it with them yesterday was remarkable. The white line you see at the top rim is 800 feet wide, 12 miles away from us.

Where Did They Go?

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I had Friday Fives right here waiting for you! They disappeared? MK upgraded me to IE9, which is insane fast. Apparently the price of fast insanity is disappearing blog posts…boo!

Other than that, I’d recommend it if you’re into this whole internet thing. Go to beautyoftheweb.com. I think that’s it.

Reading

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My book list goal was to catch up with the average of the three previous years. It dawned on me one morning in March that I hadn’t read a book in 2010. I’m no where near 38 books as you can see here – and winter and snow and ski fun will be here soon!

There’s been so much going on that I don’t have the luxury of curling up and getting cozy to read around here. MK demands a lot of assistance and playing fetch for tools while he’s rebuilding this place. I am happy to help but there’s no end in sight! I’m praying for the new couch in front of the fire to be the best seat in the house soon, so I can get in to some good books.

I’ve tried to start a few books on my Droid but wasn’t really feeling them, so I need to get some new ones. I went to the library twice, and couldn’t find the cool kids section, and got discouraged. I’d tell you to suggest me more books, but they probably don’t have them at our little library. I was so spoiled in Seattle to live downtown right by the main library. It was beautiful, and I walked there once a week with as many books as I could carry home.

Traveling

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What is your number one most favorite thing on earth? Ice cream? Deal or No Deal?

Broke or homeless, sick or healthy, no matter what we face in life, the one thing that really drew MK and I together was our love of travel and adventure. My grandma had me hooked at a very young age, coming home with pictures of places I wanted to see. Not the travel where you still eat at Chili’s (although when we got sick in New Zealand McDonald’s was all our sad little bodies could take) but the travel where you are forced out of your element and see new things with your own two eyes.

I foolishly always think everyone is like me but have gotten more perspective in my old age and realize it’s not for everyone, which makes me even happier I met MK. I spent my high school graduation money on a trip to France with my aunt (dunno if the relatives knew that’s what I did with that moolah) and had to take out student loans to finish school. No regrets. I learned more that month than a year in college, even though at the time Texas was a foreign land too. MK and I traveled a bunch together right when we started dating. I’ve traveled with roommates, family, and friends. I’ve loved having company travel to me, when we moved to Seattle, San Diego, and Park City. We’ve lived in some amazing places!

MK and I discuss what would happen if we couldn’t even afford to travel, although our amazing friends have made it so easy, especially in Park City and San Diego when we were running around in between. We reminisce about our New Zealand trip, our trip to St. Lucia. We crave more experiences like that, in even more foreign places. Fact of the matter is (sorry Momm and Dadd) we have toyed a bunch with the idea of going somewhere crazy for a couple of years. Even if we were working at a Coffee Shack, the idea of BVI sounds fun. You never know. I don’t ever want to be limited to a place when there is so much amazing world to see.

Where are the places you’d like to travel to most? I’m dying to see Hawaii, Greece, and China.

Windows And Doors

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How many pictures is too many? I don’t think I took enough to show just how much work this was. Of course these are just the little camera’s pics – I can’t even find the Nokia right now, where all the cool pics are. MK and MH have spent maybe three nights putting in my new windows and doors – and are about half way done. It is actually a ton of fun, the boys are hilarious and also are doing an amazing job. It is starting to get pretty cold here at night and last night we slept with tarps over MK’s office windows – a miracle the heat didn’t run all night.

Since there is no trim yet (my job) you might not notice just what a huge difference the changes make – but you will!  There was also an exciting hail storm and I painted the kitchen. The house has almost officially left the 80s and joined us in 2010. It’s really exciting. We still have so many more projects we want to start/finish, but right now it feels like a huge portion of the to do list is under attack. Everything is on rush before it stars to snow!

Click HERE for pictures.