The Morgan's

Summer '11

2011-08-11T13:36:00.000-07:00

So Dan was excited for the summer to come. Because with the summer came no school. No more teachers (students), no more books! But before he finished we had to go to Prom. You know get the whole high school experience. Well I actually never went to my prom. So if was fun to go. Our prom pictures!!
So he was excited to have a break. So in his spare time he did a lot of work on our Ford Focus which reached 100 thousand miles and he started helping people by changing their oil. Quite the handy man mechanic!

Well right when Dan was finishing school Dan's Dad came to visit. We showed him around town and did all the fun stuff to do in Houston. We went to NASA and Kemah board walk. Good thing we got year round passes to NASA because we sure used them well!

Dan had his birthday in June. So I threw him a great birthday party!

My good friend Yesenia Garcia got married at the end of June. She was such a good friend to me when I interned hear in Houston and was all alone. It was so great to be there when she went through for her endownment and for her sealing. It really reminds me what a great gift we have to know the gospel of Jesus Christ and be able to be sealed for time and all eternity.

Congrats Yesenia!!
We have good memories in Houston together. I'll miss seeing you.

My brother came home from his mission in London, England. So we had to go and see him!

It was really great to go home. My sister and Hunter also went home so we were almost all together missing Mike. We did a lot of fun stuff as a family. We went downtown Ottawa on Canada Day. We went hiking, and strawberry picking. And we went camping in upstate New York. We went to the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Unfortunatly, the week went by way to fast because we had to go back to Houston and work. It was so great to see Niall again!

I forgot my camera on the trip so I will have to get pictures from my parents. But I did find some pics on my Ipod touch!

Spring '11

2011-08-11T13:27:00.000-07:00

So unfortunately because we went to Seattle for Christmas we missed out on the snow. It did snow 1-2" of snow a couple days before we left which was great. And with January and February brought nothing but very nice weather. No winter! Well I was a little sad but it was nice not to have to wear jackets.

March - My parents and Kala, Mike and Hunter came to visit us. They all had March break/ Spring break at the same time. So we had a whole week of fun. (Well I still had to work!). But we had fun we went to the beach (yep the beach is nice in March). And we went to a Dallas Stars hockey game.

Unfortunately, none of my pics are on this computer.

April- Mark and Katrina came to visit us. Katrina had just graduated from BYU and had some time off. It was really great to have them visit with us. By April we had really nice weather and we bought a boogy board and had lots of fun at Galveston beach. Mark served his mission in Galveston so he gave us a good tour. We went to NASA and a Houston Astros game.

NASA

Christmas '10

2011-08-11T13:20:00.000-07:00

So for Christmas last year we went to Dan's home. It was really great because Heather came home too as well as her little boy Jackson. It was great to be able to see Heather and Jackson.

So for Dan's family we still have yet to be all together, because we were missing Andrew.

A great part about returning to Seattle was that my friend Janie moved to Seattle. So it was go great. I was able to hang out with Janie twice on our visit. Miss ya Janie.
Katrina and Mark

Heather and Jackson

We also had a great New Year's Eve with Dan's Mom. We went to the movies and had Chinese, a little tradition in my family!

October & November '10

2011-08-11T13:11:00.000-07:00

So, we were still playing soccer all the time. But we found time to eat lots of the holidays. We had friends and the missionaries over for Canadian Thanksgiving.
We had a missionary from Canada. Elder Leishman. and it was a good reason for me to cook a nice Canadian Thanksgivin meal.

Than, came American Thanksgivin and I love to cook so I had our friends over and my sister Kala, Mike and Hunter came to visit.
It was great being able to see my sister again. It is nice how we are only 4 hour driving distance. Too bad now we will be pretty far distance from each other. Anyways, since Kala was there for Thanksgiving we celebrated an early Christmas because we weren't going home.

September '10

2011-08-11T13:00:00.000-07:00

So by September we had good friends and had fun things to do. We also started coaching soccer teams. I coached 2 teams a boys U7 and a girls U9 team. Dan coached a boys U10 team. It was a lot of fun, it did take 4 days of the week and most of our weekends.

We also went to the Dynamo (professional) Houston soccer team with our friends. And high school football and soccer games.

We tried to go to the temple as often as we could. We have a great temple in Houston, and it is only 1 1/2 hours drive. Not too bad.

As well in September, we were able to go to Washington, D.C to see Dan's cousin Jessica get married. It was really great to be there for her.
And I loved being able to go and see the Washington, D.C. temple (is where my parents were married)

We stayed an extra day to be able to tour the sites. We got to see a lot but we will probably go back again someday to spend more time visiting all the museums.

August '10

2011-08-11T12:53:00.000-07:00

After moving into Houston everyone said we moved at the wrong time of the year. Well, it was pretty crazy. The temperature in Houston is pretty ridiculous it is about 38C / 100F. And that is without the humidity of 90%. It is hot everywhere, the shade does not help. And at night it gets down to maybe 30C/85F if you're lucky!. Well we learned that most people just don't go outside. But not us no way.

We still tried to visit and do lots of things in Houston. My parents came to visit us in August. Which was really nice. We went to a Houston Astros game and the beach.

Dan got a job being a physics high school teacher in west Houston. So his commute was 1 1/2 hours each way. Pretty crazy.

Catch Up June '10

2011-08-11T12:36:00.000-07:00

So in June'10 I started my job.

My title is an Analyzer Systems Engineer. And I was so excited to get business cards with my name on it that said Dow Chemical.

So my job has been really great. I really enjoy the work I do and I like my co-workers. It is crazy how much more I know now than I did when I started. It was a lot to learn at first but now I am plugging away, doing about 7-10 projects all at once with projects ranging from $ 30 thousand to $ 2 million. (small projects).

But actually before starting my job we went to Ottawa to visit my family (it had been a whole year and a half since i'd been home) and we went home for my cousin's wedding. it was also really nice because my sister went home to visit too.

Shona married Dan Kean. It was great to be able to be there for her wedding.

I also got to see Trafaun Tang. One of my best friends! we have so many great memories!

I showed Dan some of the cool things in Ottawa. Here are the Parliament Buildings.

We actually left our apartment in a mess before we left for Ottawa. So I came home to cleaning, unpacking and starting my new job!

Catch Up Cont. Europe

2011-08-11T11:31:00.001-07:00

So Catch up continues. May 2010

After Graduation Dan and I took 3 weeks and went back packing across Europe. We literally just took a backpack each and we slept in hostels. We bought an Ipod touch right before we left which was so great because we found lots of WiFi spots and was able to get maps and book hostels. So Dan served his mission in Barcelona, Spain and always wanted to go back. And I did a study abroad in Europe and it was great to show Dan some of the places I had been. oh yeah and I speak French, so language wise we got along pretty well. We went to Spain, France and Italy and spent about a 1 week in each country. We had lots of fun and got lots more memories. So here is some highlights of our trip.

We started our trip in Malaga, Spain

Then Dan really wanted to see La Alhambra which is a Muslim palace built in the 14th century. It is really cool, because it is very different than European architecture.
An overview of the whole palace. The palace is in Granada. We also saw Flamanco dancing in Granada as well.

We then travelled to Madrid. We went to a bull fight during the big festival in Madrid. It was pretty cool to watch.

In Madrid we also saw the Royal Palace of Madrid where the King lives. And lots of other attractions. We went to the temple too.

We went to El Prado in Madrid as well. Which we really like going to great art galleries in the world. Dan always tells me he looks like Hadrian (the roman) which now I see it, he really does look like him.

After Madrid, we travelled to Zaragoza. One of Dan's mission areas. They had great castles there.

And beautiful basilica's. Zaragoza.

We then travelled to Barcelona. We had both seen a lot of the sights in Barcelona, so we saw new sites. Gaudi apartments.

We just walked around a lot of Barcelona, and in the parks. We also took a trip to Terragona, and visited an old friend from the mission.

After Spain, we took our touring to France. Where we it was really nice to be able to speak French again. I wasn't so rusty as I had thought it came back. So here we are in Avignon. Sur le pont d'Avignon. L'on y danse, l'on y danse. It's a famous song!

Avignon also has the Pope palace when they had 2 pope's they built this huge palace its pretty cool!

Then we went to one of my favorite cities. Marseille. We went to see the chateau d'If (from count of Monte Cristo)

We also just had a little more time than the last time I was there to walk around the city.

After Marseille, we kept to the south of France and visited the French Riviera. Which has beautiful blue water. Here we are in Nice.

We took a day trip to Cannes, because we happened to be there during the famous film festival. Didn't see anyone famous, but who would I know. I guess we say the red carpet of a film and saw famous directors!

So then we headed to Italy. I love visiting Italia. Too bad I don't speak Italian, I could fit right in! Well we went to Genova first and then went to Pisa. (Dan has all our cool pictures holding up the tour).

We then continued to Firenze. Which has so many wonderful things to see. We first went to the Uffizi. We saw David in the square and did lots of other sites.

We then shared a rental car and went to tour Tuscany. Tuscany is so pretty, we will have to come back and spend a whole week in Tuscany!

A view of Firenze.

Then we went to my favorite city. ROMA. I love everything about Rome. It is full of old roman architecture and lots of things to see. Here is the Trevi Fountain.

We also visited the Vatican and St Peter's Basilica. We actually even went to mass there with a Cardinal.

Dan loved seeing the Colosseum.

That conclude our trip. We flew out of Rome and we were sad to leave. We had tons of fun and hopefully will make it back again. But we will travel the rest of the world first. My next trip is to Asia, maybe China or Singapore.

Catch Up

2011-08-11T10:59:00.000-07:00

So I have had this week off for vacation and Dan is starting med school so he is busy in orientation so my sister requested I catch up on my blog. So this post will be a long catch up for what has happened in our lives this past year. So since we graduated college.
Here is a basic overview:
After graduation we took some time off before starting jobs. So we visited Dan's family in Seattle and then took a nice long 3 week backpacking tour of Europe. We went back to Dan's mission and went through Spain, France and Italy. (Pictures to come).
Then I started my job at Dow Chemical as an engineer last June. Which so far my job is great, I love my job and the people I work with.
My parents came to visit us in August '10, and Dan got a job right before school started as a high school physics teacher. (He liked the teaching, but he commuted 1.5 hours everyday)
Then we started to get involved in the community, both Dan and I coached soccer so that left our weeknights busy with practice and weekends full with games. I was called to the Young women presidency and Dan was called to Elder's quorum presidency. Our callings, community involvement and jobs kept us really busy. We also had great friends here Willford's and Matthew's who are close in age to us and we would spend lots of time hanging out with them.

In September '10 Dan's cousin got married in Washington D.C., and we went to support her. So we took the weekend to enjoy her wedding and see some of the sights.

October and November we celebrated Thanksgiving (Canadian and US) with lots of friends. Kala, Mike and Hunter came to join us for U.S Thanksgiving. And we had an early Christmas with them!

December we were ready to take a break (since when you work full time there is a lot less vacation!!) We went to Seattle for Christmas and was able to spend 2 weeks with Dan's family. I was also lucky to spend time with one of my best friends Janie Sandberg. (college roommate) Janie now lives only a couple minutes from Dan's grandparents.

January and February we started our normal lives again. We started up a pick up soccer game on Saturdays. Our soccer games grew from 4 people to now we have 15-20 people come every Saturday! we love playing soccer. Unfortunately, we missed the snow and was not able to get time off or money to go on a ski trip up in Utah.

March - Came March break or sping break as you may call it. My Mum, Mike and Dan all had the same scheduled break. So my parents, my sister and her family all came to spend the week with me because I still had to work! Oh well. We enjoyed time at the beach, and went to Dallas for a hockey game.

April- We had a nice visit from Mark and Katrina. Katrina graduate BYU and they came for a week's visit. We went to NASA, galveston and had lots of fun together.

June- Dan's Dad came to visit, we took him to NASA and Kemah. Dan was glad to be finished school! We enjoyed the time off and fixed up our car. We had a party for Dan's birthday. My friend Yesenia was married at the Houston temple.

July - I got to go home to Ottawa!! Niall returned from his mission and we went to see the whole family. We spend lots of time together and enjoyed Canada Day, strawberry picking, hiking, and we went camping in upstate New York and went to the Hill Cumorah Pageant.
The month ended with us doing lots of stuff in Houston before we took off to Kirksville.

Aug- Which is almost all caught up. We packed up our apartment and drove to Kirksville, Missouri. Dan is starting MedSchool at A.T. Still University studying to be a Doctor of Osteopathy. I am so proud of him. And he is excited to get started on school and his career.

So actually, I will be keeping my Dow job in Houston until December and Dan will be doing school in Kirksville. So, yes we will be apart for a while. But I will visit Dan when I can and we always have Skype!

So, we had lots of fun in Houston, TX. And loved having visitors. So if you ever want to come by Kirksville, Missouri give us a call. But it is not so much in the middle of nowhere, yes it is a small town. We are only 2 hours from Nauvoo, IL and that is actually our stake and temple disctric! Sweet!

Graduation

2010-07-12T17:08:00.000-07:00

So its been a really, really long time since I've posted. So here is an update of graduation, our Europe trip and life in Lake Jackson, TX is to come.

Dan and I graduated together in April. It was great to be able to walk together. My parents came to see us graduate. Kala and Hunter were also able to come visit. It was great to have my family there.

The last day of finals I had a beaver tail party which I invited all my friends. It was a great way to say goodbye to lots of my friends I had during my 5 years at BYU. It was sad to say goodbye but hopefully our paths will cross again. The next day was commencement with Elder Christofferson as the keynote speaker. The marriott center was packed with graduates, they actually ran out of space for the graduates and had to move the families back many rows. Dan and I sat beside Jeremy at commencement. I was able to see my best friend Janie one more time before we both took off to the real world!
I also wanted to thank my parents for all their support they gave me during my college years. They have always been there over the past 5 years. Thank you Mum and Dad! As a thank you I gave them a stole of gratitude.
We went to went to dinner at the alumni center afterward.

The next day was convocation. Since we are both engineers we had the same convocation. I still sat with my chemical engineering friends and Dan was with his friends. But we saw each other walk. I walked with Elizabeth Call my best friend in ChemE. It was fun to graduate with her. We went to Europe together, then we were room mates the hard core junior year of engineering and we really helped each other out. Junior year we both dated guys and got engaged. After convocation the Engineering department had a lunch for all the graduates and their families. It was also a good time to say thanks to all my teachers and goodbye to fellow classmates.

We had to take a picture in front of the Clyde. It was our second home for the last 3 + years. We have spent many hours and late, late nights at the Clyde.

That evening we had a wonderful graduation dinner. My mum has always wanted to have dinner at the roof restaurant. So we enjoyed a wonderful dinner and a beautiful sunset behind the temple.

I love skiing with my dad because he taught me so well. But I have now surpassed the teacher! We go skiing every time my dad comes to visit. This time we went to Snowbird and Dan came too.
Family picture with beautiful spring blossoms. Hunter was not too happy with the sun in his eyes.

Well I had 5 great years at BYU and learned a lot. Now I am an engineer and I guess its time to move on and new experiences and new goals to accomplish.

History of Creativity Project

2010-04-10T15:16:00.000-07:00

Currently, I am in History of Creativity II. We are covering history from Renaissance to present day. The class requires a very large final project that makes up a 1/3 of your grade. So I chose to creatively invent new recipes for desserts that relate to people and persons in history.

Everyone should check it out

LENSWEETS.BLOGSPOT.COM

It will now be my dessert/food blog. So you should keep checking it out. I'll update it with great recipes I have found or invented so everyone can try them. Thanks to everyone who helped me with my project. I will start updating more often now that school is almost over!
Here is a little preview:

Delicious Surprise Cookies Rich Raspberry Truffles

Fall Recap

2010-02-17T00:13:00.000-08:00

Well, I hope you have enjoyed the recap of our last fall semester. The beginning of Winter semester is to come shortly. But just so everyone knows, I have accepted my job with Dow Chemical as an analyzer engineer and will start mid June. We will be moving to the Houston, Texas area. I am so excited and can't wait. Dan did get accepted to some great DO schools, but deferred his enrollment until next year. He let me live my dream job for a little while. He really is the greatest husband. He is also taking mcat prep classes and retaking the mcat to achieve a higher score in hopes of getting into schools in Houston next year.

Right now, I am enjoying a relaxed final semester and watching all the Olympics I can and sporting my Canadian mittens which I love. They are really hard to get but my mum is the best and gave them to Kala and I for Christmas. GO CANADA GO!

December 09

2010-02-16T23:44:00.000-08:00

With December came the end of our fall semester. It was nice to be finished. I actually learned a lot in my graduate classes. I did learn a lot of useful ChemE related material. But if nothing else I did gain a lot more confidence in myself in becoming a great chemical engineer. I was slightly afraid of grad school and thought I would not be good enough but after these classes I did very well in, I realized I can really do anything and I will be a great Engineer. I heard back from my supervisor at Dow when I was working there that they filed the patent I was working on. So in the near future I can have a patent with my name on it. Pretty cool eh!
In December I worked with the College of Engineering and Technology and but together many school outreaches. We went to five different schools and had 8 visits to different elementary and high school classes. I love teaching people about how great engineering is especially chemical engineering and plastics!

December was also a difficult month on decisions to be made. I received my job offer from Dow to work as an analyzer engineer. I was really excited because as most of you know I have wanted to work for Dow for the past 3 years and now it is finally coming true. Although, we still wanted Dan to be able to go to Med school. And Dan heard good news as well, he scheduled three school visits to DO (doctor of osteopath) schools. I postponed my acceptance to Dow until Jan 4th in order to give us time to think over the decision. After finals we drove to Seattle for Christmas break although now we did not have our Subaru. Fortunately enough Tiffany had the Honda Civic which we drove. It was good weather driving there. We enjoyed a great couple weeks with Dan's mum and dad. We did a bunch of Christmas shopping as well as bowling with both families.

We enjoyed dinner and a play (White Christmas) with Dan's dad's side of the family. I enjoyed going downtown Seattle with the beautiful Christmas lights.

Dan's sister Katrina was married in the Seattle temple to Mark on Dec 29. It was a beautiful wedding. They looked so happy.

Although some would have said it was a cold day. Katrina did a great job sticking through the cold with short sleeves.

Can you see the cold air?

The Morgan's

Dan's second family the Riley's. Pat is his best friend.

We had a great Christmas and wedding. It actually was very nice weather. Every time I go to Seattle it has only rained one day out of my entire holiday. I guess I bring the sun! A little ray of sunshine. Even though the weather was nice, I really missed the snow. So we drove to Rexburg to get our fix. Well, my parents were visiting Kala for Christmas and helping her with the baby. We drove to Rexburg spend a couple days with my parents. We surprised them on New Year's Eve.

November 09

2010-02-16T22:21:00.000-08:00

I went to the AIChE National Conference in Nashville, Tennessee. I was giving a presentation at the event. My presentation went well and I had a fun weekend. We stayed at this beautiful hotel it is next to the grand ole opry and is the largest hotel in the states that does not have a casino. Since it was November we also got to enjoy many of the Christmas lights.

Kala and Mike came to Provo for Thanksgiving. We were heading to the Utah Grizzly's hockey game when we got into an accident. We were heading straight on center street and a young driver turned left and did not yield to us.

So our car was totaled. The car that did not yield to us had insurance but they were very hard to get a hold of it took over two months for us to get out money for the car.
We still went to the hockey game and it was really fun, not very full though.

We had fun with Dan's family at Thanksgiving. We had dinner with Grandma Morgan and went to the movies and bowling.

We also enjoyed the Christmas lights on temple square.

At the end of Thanksgiving we enjoyed going to the BYU vs Utah game. It was a great game and ended great with BYU winning.

October 09

2010-02-16T22:03:00.001-08:00

In October we once again enjoyed receiving tickets to General Conference. Kala and Mike came to Salt Lake for conference weekend.

It was also career fair time and lots of competition to get a good job. I had a few interviews with companies here at BYU. I also got an onsite interview with Dow in Freeport, Texas plant. I flew to Texas and was able to spend a couple days with my friend Yesenia Garcia. I also enjoyed good Texas BBQ again. I was also offered an onsite interview with 3M but it was in a remote location with no med school prospects so I declined it.

Dan and I also had fun at Halloween. Our ward had a trunk or treat. So we went all out.

So Dan went as Mark Anthony and I was Cleopatra we made our costumes and from fabric we bought at DI and a couple things from the dollar store. We also decorated our car like Africa, Egypt. So we used all of our wood carving and linens from Ghana.

We had lots of fun handing out candy to the kids.

We also made and decorated brownies like frankestein.

September 09

2010-02-16T21:50:00.000-08:00

With September came another year of school and another birthday for me! Dan and I started our last year of school which was really exciting. Dan volunteered to be a Y group leader. At the beginning of the semester I started with 17.5 credits which included 9 credits of graduate ChemE classes. So after I debated and Dan told me I did not have enough time for them all I dropped Spanish 101 which I am now taking. It turned out a full load of graduate classes in 9 credits and I had the full load plus a couple undergraduate business classes. Needless to say last semester was really busy. I was taking graduate Thermo, Eng Stats and Kinetics for FUN!
I also had my 22 birthday. Dan was great and made me a delicious stake dinner and bought me flowers and chick flicks (which I love).

Dan and I also bought all sports passes and enjoyed going to the football games.

A long awaited update

2010-02-16T21:31:00.000-08:00

So, I have been really lazy on updating my blog. I had a good excuse last semester, I was really busy. So I am finally updated my blog for the last 5 months. I'll go through one month at a time recapping the exciting moments. I am also an Aunt as of 6 weeks ago and my sister is doing well and still in Rexburg and my brother is doing really well on his mission in London.

Drive To Provo/ Anniversary

2009-08-27T17:57:00.000-07:00

So I finished my internship last Thursday. It was really busy at the end because I had procrastinated writing my final report. I really enjoyed my internship and working for Dow, and they seemed to like me! I think they are still on a hiring freeze so none of the interns got job offers. But they told me to keep in touch and tell them where Dan is going to med school and they will do their best to find me a job. Its kinda scary not knowing where or when I'll get a job for next year but somehow it will work out.
Anyways, Dan and I said our goodbyes to our friends in Lake Jackson Thursday night and hit the road on Friday. We drove 14 hrs all the way to Lordsburg, New Mexico, which was this really, really small run down town. (We almost stopped in Las Cruces but we still had some energy to keep going.) We took I-10 to Pheonix and we had to plan our gas stops because there is so few towns. We continued our drive on Saturday we were heading to Las Vegas for our anniversary. We decided to take a detour to the Grand Canyon since I've never been. The grand canyon was cool, it is so massive.

We arrived in Vegas at 11 after driving the whole day. But we had to enjoy Vegas night life! Sunday we walked pretty much from one side of the strip to the other and saw all the hotels. We stayed at the Excalibur which was really fun.

We stayed on the 24 floor and had a great view from our hotel room.

Dan really wanted to go to the Tournament of Kings so we enjoyed that on Sunday night. It was really cool we had dinner from medieval times, so we ate roasted chicken with our hands. The show was really good, with kings, horses, jousting and sword fights and a dragon! Dan thought it was awesome!

Of course we saw a few Bellagio fountain shows. I really like the fountains!
Monday, we went to the Bodies exhibit at the Luxor. Dan really wanted to go because its pretty much like an anatomy text book come to life. So my future doctor wanted to see all the cadavers. It was cool because you got to see all the nerves and muscles that are in our bodies. Then we had a great night out for our anniversary we went to the Grand Lux Cafe in the Venetian and then went to Phantom of the Opera. It was absolutely amazing! I bought the cheapest tickets cause we are still poor when we reached our seats a hostess asked us if we wanted to move closer. Of course we said yes and she moved us to the center of the third row! WOW! it was so awesome, Phantom was the best show Dan and I have ever seen. I would highly recommend it to everyone. After that we drove the 5-6 hours back to Provo arriving at 4 in the morning. Dan had to attend a training for Y Group Leaders. That ends our wonderful travels this summer, now its back to school for our last year!

San Antonio & Houston

2009-08-27T12:50:00.000-07:00

So one of our last weeks in Houston we decided to explore more of Texas and visit San Antonio. We left early Saturday morning and then explored the river walk and the Alamo. We had lots of fun. San Antonio was is really pretty city because it has beautiful old buildings. We met up with one of Dan's companions from the mission Elder Villareal. We had dinner and the guys reminisced about good times in the mission. We left after dinner, so it was a really nice day trip to San Antonio!

Dan and I really enjoyed living in Houston. We made lots of friends and I loved my job!! Dan and I enjoyed going to the Miller Outdoor Theatre for some free entertainment our last couple weeks. We saw Twelfth Night (Shakespeare) and we saw The WIZ (version of wizard of oz). We were able to meet up with our friends Yesenia Garcia and Dan Paul one more time before we left Houston.

Unfortunately our time in Houston has to come to an end and we need to head back to BYU for one more year of school. It would be really nice if we could return to Houston when we are finished school but we'll see!

Mum and Dad's Visit

2009-08-09T16:00:00.001-07:00

I was fortunate enough to have my parents visit me last week. It was lots of fun and it was great to see them again. My parents drove the 30 hrs to Texas in their new Subaru. They stopped to see Kirtland and Grace Land on the way. Mum and Dad arrived in Lake Jackson right when I finished work on Tuesday, perfect timing. We sat and talked for ever until we realized it was getting late and we should have dinner. We'll I wanted to take them to the famous BBQ place in town but is was closed and we barely made it to a Mexican restaurant it was so late. We went to El TORO which is one of my favourite Tex-Mex places. It has really good food.
Wednesday, I had to work so Mum and Dad rode around town and went to Wal-Mart! They tried to find the beach but got lost and ended up swimming in my pool. I had to teach piano lessons and Dan went and played tennis while they kept swimming. So then wanted to try BBQ again and it turned out the restaurant was on holiday until my parents were leaving. To bad. So we tried seafood. The golf coast has good seafood. We went to a Greek Cajun Seafood restaurant and everyone ordered catfish. If was good stuff.
Thursday I took the day off to spend time with my parents. We went to the local Sea Center (aquarium of the golf of Mexico). Dan was also able to get the time off. We also went to Galveston and went downtown. Saw all the cool beach houses on the way. We spent the day at the beach. The water was warm and had lots of waves.

The day did not end there, we came home and showered and they headed up to Houston and went to the Temple. It was really nice to be able to go to the temple again with my parents. After the temple we went to see the Danner family. We hung out with Heather and Shea and their kids for a while. After a long day we didn't end up getting home until 1 in the morning!

So our adventures continued on Friday, I took the day off on Friday as well. We spent the day in Clear Lake. We first went to NASA space center. My dad was way excited to see all the cool space stuff. We started off with a tour of where the astronauts train. The tour ended early because there was a thunder storm. (its funny cause Houston has been in a drought this whole summer and when my parents come they bring rain!) so we went to all the movies and saw all the space artifacts. We ended with a tour to mission control and the huge rocket Saturn V.

After NASA I took my parents to my old apartment and where I worked for Celanese last summer. We then went to Hwy 225. I wanted to show my parents the huge chemical plants and oil refineries. I think its pretty cool just because of the how many plants there are. We drove for 20 min and we still didn't reach the end. The chemical plants look really cool when they are all lite up at night. We then headed to Kemah for dinner. Dan and I treated my parents to a fancy dinner at Laundry's. We had really good sea food. We walked around Kemah which has fair rides and booths. There was a jazz band playing and a juggler in the square. It seemed like my Dad really enjoyed it because we didn't leave until midnight. So once again we didn't get home until 1am because of the drive home.

Saturday my ward had a pancake breakfast in the park. After breakfast, my parents, Dan and I headed to Houston for the day. We had bought a houston pass with when we went to NASA. The pass consisted of 3 museums, the zoo and the aquarium. It was a really good deal. We started at the Natural Science Museum. We learned a lot with the cool chemistry and oil exhibits. The museum was really fun and interactive. We then headed to the museum of Health. Dan really wanted to go to learn all about the body. (My future doctor!)

After that we strode through Hermann Park and toured the Zoo. We saw Lions, Tigers and the Bear was sleeping. Oh My! we saw elephants, giraffes and lots of monkeys.

We headed to dinner and my Dad finally got his Texan BBQ. We went to Pappa's BBQ. It was really good and lots of meat. Well, of course our day could not end yet it was still only 9pm. So we headed to the Houston Aquarium. Dan really had fun with the sting ray.

After a busy 3 days we were ready to relax. Sunday, we went to church and relaxed afterward. I made dinner and we played games. My parents left Monday morning. It was sad to see them go but we had a great time together.

Fun with the Danner Family

2009-07-19T21:36:00.000-07:00

Friday, Dan and I went to the temple after work. We made it just in time for the 8pm session. Afterward we had dinner at Sonic (huge fan of Sonic slushes). We wanted to spend some time with Heather Danner (Kyle) and her family. After the temple we went to Heather's home, she lives 15 minutes from the temple. We spent the night at their house on Friday and stayed all day Saturday.
Saturday, Dan and I babysat Landon and Brooklyn for a few hours while Heather did some shopping. Shae and Carson were at a eagle scout project for most of the day.
Landon and Brooklyn had lots of fun playing games on our cell phones!

Later in the day we went swimming at the community pool. We had to leave early because a thunderstorm was coming through.

We enjoyed dinner with the Danner's and watched the USA vs Panama soccer game. Dan and I had to come home to write our talks for Sunday.

Dodge ball Tournament

2009-07-19T21:31:00.001-07:00

The Dow NPN (New Professional Network) put on a dodge ball tournament. In order to encourage networking, each team needed a co-op student, a NPN employee and a dow leader. Janeth, Monica and I played in the tournament with a few other interns. It was lots of fun. My team did well but Janeth's team won. I guess I didn't have the strategy like Janeth did!
After the tournament we went to Chili's for appetizers. Unfortunately Dan missed out on the fun because he was working. =(

Soccer Game

2009-07-19T18:47:00.000-07:00

Dan and I went to the Concacaf soccer gold cup game in Houston. We went with my intern friends Janeth and Michelle. There were two games back to back. The first game was Gadaloupe vs Nicaragua, it was a good game with great goals from Gadaloupe 2-0. The second game is what everyone came for. Mexico vs Panama. Being in Houston I think 99% of the fans were routing for Mexico. The game was really good. The first half there were 2 red cards one for each team. The second half started out 10 on 10. With 10 minutes to go a Mexico player was pushed and everything was crazy after that. The Mexico coach was thrown out as well as a Panama player was red carded. The Mexico fans were so mad about the push (and drunk) they started throwing food and beer at the Panama bench. The player were in an uproar and didn't want to resume play with those conditions. Play started 10 minutes later. A Panama player was injured so they took him off with a gurney. As soon as the player crossed the sideline fans started throwing food and beer at him. Pretty much the fans were out of control. It just escalated from there. A guy sitting behind us started throwing beer and was escorted off by the police. Then a couple minutes later a brawl broke out in the front seats of the crowd. The soccer players continued to play but they were hardly playing because they were distracted by the brawl. Anyways, the game ended after 15 minutes of added time. (CRAZY!) The score of the game was 1-1. (The game was a round robin and could end in a tie). Needless to say we had lots of fun. It definitely was an exciting game to go to and Dan's first prof soccer game.

Houston Culture

2009-06-28T15:58:00.000-07:00

Dan and I went to see the Houston symphony on Friday. It was a free concert at the Miller outdoor theatre. It was really fun we went with four other interns working at Dow. It was really nice to listen to classical music performed very well by the Houston symphony. They had a concert pianist as their guest performer. I really enjoyed listening to the concerto. He had a great time with friends and expanded our houston experiences.

Dan's Birthday

2009-06-28T15:30:00.001-07:00

Dan turned 25 on June 18th. I'm just getting around to posting what we did. For his birthday present I bought him a ticket to Salt Lake City so he could see Jon Buck's wedding. Dan and Jon are best friends and they lived together in Roman Gardens. Jon was in our wedding party and now Dan was in Jon's wedding party. Jon and Annie were married June 20th in the Timpanogos temple. Dan flew out on thursday (his birthday) in order to be there for the festivities on Friday.

Since Dan left on his birthday we celebrated a day earlier. I planned a really nice dinner and to have cake with an old roommate (BYU-Idaho)of his that lives in lake jackson (Adam). But Dan decided to play tennis with some co-worker so the dinner was set back to have after dessert. I surprised him with a tasty ice cream cake celebrated with friends. Adam's little girls drew Dan beautiful pictures for his birthday and we enjoy the ice cream cake together. Afterward, we came home and I made Dan a stake dinner with shrimp, twice baked potatoes and broccoli with cheese sauce. We were both very full, probably from having too much cake before hand. I also bought him a aero polo, and he received cards from his parents and my parents.
It was a wonderful evening!! I love Dan so much, he is a wonderful husband and he always makes me laugh and brightens my day.

The next day I drove Dan to the airport and he spent the weekend at his grandma's and went to Jon's wedding. His family was having a family reunion the following week and started congregating at his grandma's house on sunday. So Dan was able to see his dad on Father's day as well as his sisters Tiffany and Heather. He hasn't seen Heather for a year and a half now that she lives in Australia, so it was good timing! But it is unfortunate, we are the only members of his family on his dad's side that aren't going to the family reunion. We both couldn't get a whole week off work.

Mum's Birthday

2009-06-13T12:44:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my mum's birthday! unfortunately I was not there to show my love or bake her a cake. Actually my mum went to dinner with the missionaries and the bishop (dad) to this elderly ladies house. And then my brother and dad spent the rest of the evening watching the hockey game. So no special evening for my mum. Mum I'll make it up to you when you come to Lake Jackson!

I just want to thank my mum for all she has done. She has supported me in all my schooling, traveling experiences and all the sports games I ever had. My favourite thing to do is talk on the phone with my mum. She always makes my day much better! We can talk about everything. Thanks mum for all you've done! Have a great birthday!

Lake Jackson

2009-06-13T12:04:00.000-07:00

So we have now been in Lake Jackson, TX for a month. Its crazy how time flies. So if you are wondering where Lake Jackson is its 1 hour south of Houston. Pretty much it was a town built for the workers of Dow back in the 50's. I am working at Dow in Freeport. Also called Texas operations because it is so huge. There are 3 sites included in the texas operations all in freeport. I work at one of the closest buildings to the town. I'm really lucky cause my drive to work is only 10 min. I really like my job. I'm working with polypropylene (its anything with a #5 in the recycle triangle) and used for a lot of containers. I get to work with an operator and make samples from injection molding and soon extruding plastic sheet. These machines make all the containers you see in stores. Anyways, on the weekend we've been exploring Houston and Lake Jackson. We went to the Houston temple a couple weeks ago. They have a beautiful temple.

Just last week we went to Galveston and enjoyed their annual sand castle competition. It was so crowded at the beach. The water is nice and warm and there are lots of jumping fish! Here are some pics of the sandcastles.
Dan is working on his tan!

The Colisseum

More Ghana Pics

2009-06-01T19:16:00.000-07:00

So the first post of Ghana was just the start. Actually, my computer's wireless card stopped working so I haven't had the internet for a week. So I decided to use Dan's pics now!
These are pictures of us building and installing the windmill.

These are the children we were building the windmill for to give then light to read at night.

This merry-go-round produces electricity for the children to recharge their lanterns, now our windmills electricity will be stored in the same battery and will give the children the opportunity to charge 15 more lanterns.

Under the giant mango tree the 5th grade meets. The mangos on the tree really were huge.

we met the kids who live in the village Myna where we installed the windmill. They were so shy its like they never saw a white girl before.

They eventually warmed up.

This is the windmill producing light! yeah it worked!

These children do not have much as seen by they still live in mud huts. They are farmers but have of the year there is a drought where they live.

Ghana

2009-05-25T08:04:00.000-07:00

Dan and I went to Ghana for 2 weeks. We went with 5 other BYU students and our advisor. We went as part of the BYU engineering class, Engineers Without Borders. The class includes designing and building an engineering project. Dan and I were assigned to design and build a windmill that will used to generate electricity. We took 8 months to optimize our design, and then we went to Ghana to build a windmill and teach the people how to build more. Ghana was definitely an eye opener. There are so many people who have nothing. We installed our windmill next in a town where the people live in mud huts and their roofs are made from palm tree leaves. Their homes are so small and they sleep on the mud floor. Their bathroom in a pit latrine that is half a mile away because it smells so much. After returning from Ghana I felt so blessed to have such a high standard of living and have so much.

All Ghanians carry their packages on their head. They learn when they are really little.

This is where the poor people live. They don't have any place to put their garbage so it piles up in the rivers or they just burn it.

We were able to do a session in the Ghana Temple.

We also went to visit the missionaries in the Ghana MTC.

Start to summer

2009-05-25T07:30:00.001-07:00

After school ended, Dan and I rushed to pack our apartment. We packed everything in 1 day it was pretty crazy. We headed to Seattle to visited Dan's family and we drove with Katrina and her boyfriend Marc. We went to a Mariners game with Dan's dad and grandma. Unfortunately, the Mariners lost really badly.

Then we spent time with his mom on Camano Island. We went to the beaches around the puget sound.

We also explored some museums in Seattle including the Seattle Science Center, the EMP and SCI-FI museum.

Easter

2009-04-17T22:24:00.001-07:00

Kala came down from Rexburg for Easter.
She came for the weekend to attend a friends wedding at Salt Lake. It was nice to see her again. It was Katrina's birthday on Friday, so I made her a cake and she celebrated on Saturday with friends. Afterward, Kala, Mike, Dan and I went bowling at the Wilk. Also, it was really random because we ran into Gene Kyle(BF from Ottawa). It was really fun, except that Dan kept beating me by 2 points. I tried!!
We played games and hung out. I love my sister and her husband (Mike) they are so fun. I always laugh so much with my sister it makes us both cry!!
I love spring it starts getting colorful again!

Niall's Mission Call

2009-04-17T12:51:00.001-07:00

My brother received his mission call last week. He was so excited. He called me right after he opened it. He asked me to guess where he is going. I totally guessed the country right!!

He is going to the London, England mission.

So, he leaves July 3rd. He will going straight to the England MTC.
Niall already has a UK passport, it will be like he is going HOME!!
i think London is the perfect mission for him. Niall will be able to get into many doors based on his love of football (soccer). I am so excited for him and wish him good luck! It will be very rainy and probably a hard mission, but he has grown up so much (spiritually and physically). I think Niall will be a great missionary.

In case you don't know where London is:

Niall and his friend Dexter are leaving on their mission within a couple months of each other. Dexter is going to Los Angeles(region, mandarin speaking!

Internship this Summer

2009-04-03T12:31:00.001-07:00

I accepted an internship this summer Dow Chemical. I will be going to Freeport Texas. Freeport is approximately 1 hr outside of Houston.
I am really excited to work for Dow. They are one or THE largest chemical company in the world. I have always wanted to work for them, well ever since I started ChemE. It is like a dream come true!!

So here is a picture of the beautiful chemical plant I will be working at this summer.

Well at the plant in Freeport there are many different positions. I am so excited for the job I will be doing this summer. I will be working in TS&D, technical sales and development. i will be working with plastic films and oxygen barriers. i will work with the developing a better process for making the films and do research and testing on the plastic films. I will also be evaluating the economics and marketing aspects of my project! This job is also perfect for me, I get to be in a nice clean office and doing jobs I love.

So I'm so excited I get to work at the perfect job at the perfect company and with perfect company!! (DAN) I will not be alone this time! WHOO!.

This is a picture of Freeport. I hope to convince Dan that Texas, specifically Houston is a great place to live!!

March Madness

2009-03-26T21:42:00.000-07:00

So I love march madness! Its really fun to watch all the games, and make a bracket.
So I've only had a (small) TV junior year. All my other years in college I have done without a TV. So here are some stories of what lengths I will go through to watch the NCAA tournament basketball games.

Sophomore year: Other than getting the games online, I would always invade on the guys apartment right across my mine to watch all the games. It was so fun because we would also go get pizza and have big parties. And Dane would always cheer really loud!!

Junior year was good because I had a TV but I did some wrestling with my roommates who most of them probably hadn't even heard of ESPN!

Senior year, now I'm married, but no TV. And I'm a bigger sport (watching) fan than my husband but that's ok, cause he'll always watch the games with me!! So I watch all the games online that I can. So Fridays is Dan and my date night, and I wanted to watch basketball. So he took me to Wingers were we stayed until all the games were over!! Then on Saturday night, I called up multiple friends to watch the games with. Unfortunately they were busy or 'LOST' their phone (I've heard that story before!!jk!) So Dan and i took off to watch the games on campus in the Clyde building! (As if I don't live their already!) It was fun, we brought a pizza and had a big screen and comfy chairs.

I look forward to Thursday when the Madness starts again. So I asked Dan yesterday what was happening tomorrow (I was looking for March Madness but didnt totally expect it) he said uhhhh our 7 month anniversary! And I said "oh well i guess, but March Madness starts again tomorrow!! haha! oh well 7 months isn't all that important right!

Exercise

2009-03-19T15:21:00.000-07:00

So I ran in the Rex Lee Run last Saturday. It was really fun except I didn't have anyone to run with me. I really just ran to prove to myself I am really out of shape. This would be a good way to get started. And well, I ran a 5K in 29 min.
So it goes to show i am really slow. I guess I could blame getting married and not having time to exercise. Needless to say, I need to start exercising again and playing intramural soccer every two weeks will not help me get in shape!!

My Wedding Pics

2008-10-28T09:11:00.000-07:00

So i have my wedding pics and I am finally posting them! I hope you all enjoy.
If you want to see more go to picasaweb.google.com/amazinglen !
Ill do some more updating on the actual event later!

Kala's Wedding

2008-10-28T08:11:00.000-07:00

So I haven't posted for a while. This is due to my crazy busy life! but still no excuse. Since I left Houston I went home for a week and got to see my grandma (who lives in Scotland) she is so awesome and fun. She came for the summer for my brothers highshcool graduation and for my sisters wedding. Unfortunately, with timing she couldn't go to my wedding. After I was home for a couple days my parents and their best friends took me to the Montreal temple to receive my endownments. It was also really nice to have my sister and her husband Mike there. Just a couple days later, my family and I drove down to Palmyra New York for my sisters wedding. It was really fun, we the kids van with my sister, Mike, my brother,and I, all driving together. We stayed in the Palmyra inn which was really cool because the rooms were huge with living room and kitchen area. So the next day I woke up early with my sister and drove her to get her hair done. I thought that was early and then I realized I was getting married an hour earlier than her!! Her wedding was great! Unfortunately, we were taking pics afterwards and it started to rain. but Ciccika had a cute black and white umbrella to protect from rain but still have cute pics. So when i can back to have my reception in Ottawa I used the umbrella too. So we have similar pics!!
Anyways we went back to the hotel and had a luncheon. Her colors were balck and pink and Ciccika and I were her bridesmaids. We wore black dresses with pink sashes and had pink gerber daisies for bouquets. We then returned home, but other friends had come down for her wedding that we had so many cars. It was just Ciccika, Niall and I driving home in the van. funny story, Ciccika rolled the window down when we were downtown Palmyra and then tried to roll it back up when he were on the highway but the mechanics were stuck. We drove home the whole way which is 4 1/2 hours with the window down, freezing by te end of it.

The next evening was my sisters reception. It was a nice sit down dinner, program and dance. earlier my dad had decorated the gym with a canopy. We had italian buffet with lasagna, canelloni, and manacoti. We also had a juice fountain (very italian), and gelato and biscoti for dessert. My sister and mike entered the room while being piped by a piper. (scotish heritage). the evening was followed with a slideshow, speeches while my dad cryied (lol) and a great dance, with my cousin as the DJ. It was great and one of the only (Mormon) weddings were people actually stayed to the end. And of course my family was left to clean up!! The next day was sunday and grandma was leaving back to scotland. So there ended my week at home and my next blog with be the adventure to Utah and MY Wedding!

Batman: The Dark Night

2008-07-29T19:08:00.000-07:00

So I waited a week to see Batman and I was all hyped up and excited to see it. I was definitely not dissapointed. It was one of the best films I have seen in a while. Even though the movie was about 2 1/2 hours it was filled with action, explosions and suspense it kept me on the edge of my seat.
Christian Bale was great once again and Heath Ledger played the joker so well he was so frightening and very disturbed.
The movie really made you think and had a deeper meaning.
Anyways, if you haven't seen it yet I assure you will definitely be satisfied with this great movie. So go check it out.

I saw Batman on Friday. Then spent the rest of the weekend with Yesenia (Friend from Baytown) We went bowling on Saturday and then went to YSA dance which was 'Prom' themed so we dressed up all looking pretty. We didnt stay long at the dance though, it was well attended but the music was not very good. So we had some refreshments and headed out. Then Sunday I went to church and FHE with Yesenia. It was a great weekend and its always fun to spend time with friends!!

Ball Game

2008-07-23T19:55:00.001-07:00

So last weekend I went to my first MLB game! ive seen baseball games before but no pro games. Celanese had all the interns in Houston attend an Astros game.
THe astros were playing against the CUBS.
It was great, the company had a box so we had all the food you could eat and we had texas BBQ and brisquet for dinner. SO GOOD! All the drinks you want. and there were peanuts and cracker jacks for every seat!!
The game was slow at first but still good. Well what I could tell im not much of a baseball fan. In the 5th inning came dessert were there was ice cream sundaes and brownies and cobbler!!
Well needless to say I was fed well and had a good time.
Astros won 2-1 in the bottom of the 9th. Nice finish to the game!
It was friday night so they had amazing fireworks to end the night.

To finish off the weekend I stayed with Heather Kyle. Heather is the sister to one of my good friends in Ottawa 'Gene'. Heather has 3 way fun kids I got to play with all weekend and well I actually babysat! I did get to spend all saturday by the pool and get a great tan and cool off in the pool! Mostly it was just nice to be in a home with a great family!
So that pretty much wraps up my summer till now well aside from my apartment difficulties. i live in a ghetto dump. but i may post all those awesome stories soon. I dont have any pics to these post cause I found my camera died on me sometime in june?? dont know what happened. maybe I should get an new camera!! for my b-day!! just like yours amanda!

Week at the Plant

2008-07-23T19:46:00.000-07:00

So this summer I have been doing a Research and Development internship. SO i work in the lab a lot and do experiments and the like. I have really enjoyed it.
well a couple weeks ago I did an intern exchange and went to 'shadow' another intern at the Pasedena plant. I jumped into full coveralls and steel toe boots, hard hat and googles. i was completely covered. and it was 95 deg with crazy high humidity. i was deathly hot. So i guess i was happy that I got an internship where i was in a/c 72 deg clean building.
I actually really enjoyed being at the plant. I was able to see and work with everything I learned it my clases. Also everything I was doing in R&D was upscaled to huge sizes!!
The following week the intern at the plant came and shadowed me to see what R&D was like.
My company also had a career conference. Where all the interns in the country flew to Houston to gather together and get an outlook on the company. It was a great conference unfortunately since it was in Houston I didnt get to fly anywhere or even stay in a huge hotel room all to myself. oh well! We did get a cool dinner cruise in the golf of mexico.

Summer flies by

2008-07-23T19:23:00.000-07:00

So I cant believe it. I have 2 1/2 weeks left in Houston! Wow! its crazy how time flies. So since I havent been so great at updating my blog i'll recap some of the events of my summer here is Houston. Since I live in the middle of no where and live on my own I decided to stop feeling sorry for being so lonely and I went out with the sister missionaries. I taught with them a few times and it has been really great experience to teach the gospel with these amazing ladies!! the benefits asides from company and the spirit, is sometimes I get dinner appointments too!! I met a friend at church, he really likes music and had an extra ticket to lifehouse. So I went to the lifehouse concert and we were really close to the front. it was really fun! and lifehouse are really good live!!

I went to a YSA activity in May and met 2 really fun girls, although one lived an hour away from me, the other girl, Yesenia decided to hang out with me for the rest of the summer, she lives 15 min away. Since then I have spent pretty much every weekend with Yesenia and her friends and family. Its been so nice to have friends and people to be with on the weekends. We have gone swimming, gone to YSA activities, a baby shower. And we definitely went shopping and out to some great restaurants in the area.
I spent 4th of July with Yesenia and her family. We had an amazing fajita lunch her family made. We then went to Kingwood and had a block party with her sisters neighbors, they even had the fire truck come and entertain the kids! Then we went back to Baytown to enjoy the fireworks. It was a great 4th of July!! Great food! Great friends! and Great fireworks!! my favorite!

Biking to Work

2008-07-13T20:31:00.000-07:00

So without a car in Texas you are pretty much an outcast. There is hardly any sidewalks and definitely no public transportation. So its a truck or maybe a car or nothing. And for me I dont own a car, I flew to Houston. I fortunately had friends in North Houston lent me a mountain bike for the summer. I have been biking to work. This past week I worked at a plant off a highway so it was not really accessible to bike to work and I got a ride from another intern. But the two weeks before that I rode my bike to work everyday and I am assuming this coming week I will also have to ride my bike to work. Its like a 10 mile bike ride each way. And sometimes its really draining in the Houston hot and humide weather. So when I get to work I am definitely nasty sweaty, but my work has a really nice "emergency shower". One of the disadvantages is that I have to leave for work at like 7:00 and I still only start at 8:15. it gets to be a long day sometimes. I may be able to find a ride again but we will see.!! As for now I guess its a good workout! Eh!!

Papa Martinelli

2008-07-13T18:52:00.000-07:00

After a great visit with Janie and Jeremy Sandberg. I had some very unfortunate news. My Papa (Stan Martinelli) passed away on May 26 2008 (Memorial Day).
So then on Monday night my family made arrangements for me to fly to Buffalo the next day. I went into work Tuesday and had to hope they would give me the rest of the week off for an emergency funeral and they were very understanding. One of my coworkers was even nice enough to drive me to the airport ( I would have had to take the bus.) So I only took a backpack so I wouldnt have to check any bags and make things complicated with the airlines. Oh, but with my luck there was still problems. There was storms over Houston so we ended up being 1hr and half late to catch my connection to Buffalo, which was the last flight out. That meant I had to sleep at the Philelphia airport. (add another airport sleepover to the list) So, I arrived in Buffalo the next morning. My parents picked me up. It was so good to see them again. I love the way my dad greets me at airports, he is always so excited to see me! My mom has family in Buffalo and we had lunch with them and then headed to Burlington for my Papa's wake. We went to an afternoon wake and then an evening wake. But it was closed coffin (good thing). THe following day we had funeral for my Papa which all his family participated in either my sciptures, speaking, eulogy or ball bearer. My Papa was Lutheran so we had a Lutheran ceremony, it was really different and weird when they receited prayers.
My Papa was an awesome man. He served in World War II in the Navy for Canada. He had a bunch of medals and lots of stories of his boat. He operated the sonar system on the big submarines. He was always really fun! I will miss him alot. I remember we would see hime at least twice a year. During the summer for BBQ and pool parties at his condo and in November when we would have an early Christmas with him and cousins in Barry. Good Memories!! At the end of his life he had Dementia and was slowly going down hill. It was his time to leave this life and stop suffuring. I love my Papa!
It was very nice to be able to be with my family though. I got to spend almost four days with them. another good thing that came out of this was i got to give my mom a better view of my wedding plans 'in person'

Janie's visit

2008-06-07T18:29:00.001-07:00

I guess I'm back tracking a little but one of my best friends from school, Janie Sandberg came to visit me in houston. Janie and her husband Jeremy came during the memorial day long weekend. I thoroughly enjoyed having company and it was so nice to spend the weekend with Janie and Jeremy because they're so fun! So they came Friday night and threw me a bridal shower! It was so much fun. Janie asked Dan questions earlier to during the 'shower'. So for every question I answered incorrectly Janie had a big marshmallow waiting for me to fill my mouth with. I do have to say I did very well but still got many wrong, which led to a mouth being full of marshmallows!! Thanks Janie for the shower!! So on Saturday we went to the Kemah boardwalk and watch all the boats to out to the ocean. Then Janie took me to Jack in the box for the first time! and it was really good. The afternoon we spent at the Houston Space Center!! 'Houston we have a problem'!! we took a tour of the command center at NASA! it was really fun although it was also very busy due to memorial day weekend. Then Janie and Jeremy took me out to eat at a Italian restaurant. I loved it! it was a perfect day! which we ended in shopping at walmart to fill my cupboard with food for the next month which was wonderful because I only have a bike! So it was wonderful to have Janie and Jeremy come visit!

Living in Houston

2008-06-07T13:23:00.000-07:00

So moving to houston on my own was very difficult. But I survived. I did not realize how different and hard it would be to move away from the student life. So I headed to Houston after visiting with Dan's family. I headed to Dallas to be there for my friend Kenny Kyle's wedding. I stayed with his family which are practically my second family. They then drove me to Houston where Heather Kyle lives in North Houston. Heather gave me a bike and drove me to my apt. So when I got to my apt there was no electricity or a/c. Oh man! My phone had also died and I was all alone. So needless to say I didn't have much, no car, no phone, no internet, and no electricity. I did however have furniture thanks to my very nice landlord. So i lived without electricity for 3 days. It was very long. My parents mailed me kala's phone and I went grocery shopping on my bike.

But all the hardship is mostly over. Now im pretty much lonely. I have a phone, internet, electricity and a/c which hardly works and a bike. still no car. So I bike everywhere, except work is 10 miles away so I have always seemed to be able to find a ride to work! i love my coworkers.
Weather in Houston is crazy hot and very humide. During the summer most people go from their a/c house to a/c car to a/c work. Me on the other hand, I ride a bike and sweat to death and then I go home and sweat some more. My a/c does not like me and does not like to work. Fortunately, work is very cold! Before I came here I thought i would be outside and tan after work. No way! It never cools down and so I pretty much stay inside until 7pm when the sun isnt so hot. In my loneliness I have been able to read many books. It is very enjoyable to be able to read books outside of school work!!

Trip to Seattle

2008-06-07T11:21:00.000-07:00

So I started a blog for all my wonderful friends to know what new things are happening in my life! But mostly for Amanda!!

For an update. My parents came to Salt Lake for my sisters graduation from BYU-I. They also happened to come the week earlier for see conference. Oh lets say about after 15 minutes of meeting my dad my wonderful boyfriend (Dan Morgan) at the time asked permission to marry me. Then two days later proposed without a ring! He just couldn't wait. So we are getting married Aug 26th in Salt Lake temple. This made it very hard to concentrate and get everything done during finals week. I had the amazing help of Amanda to help me dress shop!! and then I spent my remainder of the time studying and packing up for the summer. After finals Dan and I drove to Seattle were I was to meet his family!

I really loved going to Seattle, it is beautiful! I did have very good luck and it seemed to only rain during the night! I spent time with his mom and sister exploring downtown Seattle. We went to the waterfront, we did the underground tour and explored pikes market with the flying fish!! I also went back downtown with Dan later and we went to a glass blowing shop, were we got to see them in action! We also went up the space needle. So, Dan actually lives on Camano Island which is in puget sound. So we went island hoping in the puget sound! we took a fairy to friday harbor. Seattle was a lot of fun. Dan's family adored me! well they seemed to like me a lot. And best of all I got to spend all day and every day without any school or work for a week with Dan!