One Crazy GAL!

Wow a lot has been going on in this month! Its been crazy but fun. We had Daryl's sister and her family out here at the end of May and that was CRAZY, but fun. That must be theme of this blog, crazy but fun. :) Daryl had been talking about them coming almost since the moment his sister let him know they were planning the trip. It seemed the closer the end of May came, the more they talked and made plans for what we were doing. It was so funny, but I was excited too. We LOVE having people come and see us.
So they left on a friday afternoon, I think it was the 22nd and headed our way. Of course I had to run around and get my house nice and clean. We have to make people think that our house is always clean. :) I am such a procrastinator that if I would just clean a little every day I wouldn't be running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to clean the whole place. But oh well I don't mind it.
Going on, on saturday about noon they showed up at our door and we were ecstatic. We hadn't seen our niece Isabel since Thanksgiving and now she was two and bigger. Of course she didn't want anything to do with us at first because we were these scary people she couldn't really remember. Of course kids love me and it didn't take her very long to warm up to me, Daryl on the other hand, it took a little while longer. But that was okay, he was more interested in partying with his brother in law then anything else. Those two stayed up until four in the morning almost every night playing golf on the wii. Crazy boys!
Anyways, while they were here Kate wanted to go fishing up on Strawberry Lake on a pontoon boat. So of course we couldn't pass that up because it is sooooo much fun! Isabel hadn't been feeling good for a few days and the poor thing had a fever. So before our trip they took her to an instacare to see if they knew what was wrong with her. It just seemed to be a bug that she picked up and as long as we kept her medicated all would be well. So she was happy when her fever wasn't bothering her and not soooo happy when it was. Like screaming not happy. Obviously Daryl and I weren't used to the screaming, so ibuprofen was always at hand for headaches. :)
When we got to strawberry lake we were literally the only people staying in the lodge that they had there. It was kind of eerie. I'm so used to that place being busy and so it was nice to have it mostly to ourselves. That first night we were there it was raining off and on through the evening, but luckily for us it turned out a very beautiful rainbow.

This is a picture of the storm rolling in.

Here is the really awesome rainbow that showed up and stuck around for a little while. It was really pretty on the lake.


That night we just hung out and talked, enjoying each others company. The next morning it was absolutely gorgeous outside and were extremely excited about going out on our fishing trip. Yusef and Lil' Y (or Yusef Jr.) came up to join us on our fishing adventure. So Daryl and Mark picked out the pontoon, which wasn't hard since we were the only ones renting a pontoon boat that day. Then we loaded up and headed out to catch some fish.

Daryl took us to a spot the summer before we had great success, catching three fish at once. One was mine, one was his mom's, and one was his dad's. Of course its a different time of year and we sat there for about an hour with no luck. So we moved onto another spot and I thought it would be a good time to get a picture of our awesome crew. Yes that is Daryl cracking open a beer. I guess it makes him a better fisherman.

See how pretty and glass like the lake was? It was really great. It wasn't too long after this picture that we started catching fish. I think Daryl was the first to catch a fish, but I can't quite remember. But by the end of the fishing, everyone but Yusef had caught a fish. Probably because he bailed early when it started to cool down and another storm began rolling in. But here are a few more pictures from our trip.

Kate's first catch of the day.

Strawberry Lake

Little miss Isabel. All in all the trip was really fun, even though we only got to keep one of the fish that we caught. It just so happened to be the ONLY one that I caught that day, but at least we got to keep it. :) It went home to Daryl's dad because he loves fish and we don't. Its that simple.

It really was fun having them out here with us and it was great to spend time with Isabel. We don't get to see our niece and nephews more than a few times a year, so we try and spend as much time with them as we can. The funny thing was that Isabel never called me by my name, she always called me Adee (pronounced eighty...like the number). At first I had no clue who she was talking to, but by the end of the trip I knew and she was my best little friend.

Since that trip Daryl and I have celebrated our four year anniversary! Can you believe it? Its just plain crazy. We didn't do a whole lot, just went out to dinner and gave each other gifts. I wanted a puppy......but I didn't get one. :) Which is fine, I've decided since then that I can wait to get a dog, we don't have room for a dog here. I got some money for my Itunes, so that was awesome! I love music! Then on June 13th, dum de dum, I celebrated my 27th birthday! YIKES! We had a barbeque over at a friends house and a whole bunch of friends came over to celebrate. I got a small digital camera from Daryl, one that we can slip in our pockets and take it wherever we want to. We pretty much partied throughout the day and I enjoyed every minute of it. I didn't get the pinata I wanted but there is always next year. :) Yes I sound like I'm turning ten because I want a pinata.

I also recently had a yard sale to get rid of a lot of crap. I didn't make a lot of money, but I made some and got rid of crap we don't need anymore. It was kind of refreshing to get rid of it all, since most of it was mine. I have this problem with holding onto things that I keep for sentimental value alone. Eventually I have to let it go and I decided that now was the time. Now I miss it all. No I'm kidding. Its nice to have those things gone and room in my closet. I plan on having another one later on in the summer, only this time I'm getting my parents involved as well and seeing how much stuff we can get rid of.

I guess I rambled enough for today. Wanted to try and get everything in there that I could. I'll just end this blog with a picture of one of our major running rivers because of all the rain we've gotten in the past few weeks and a few more pics of my cute niece that I took. ENJOY! TATA FOR NOW!

What Happened To Spring?

I'm done with school unitl August, when I go back for what should be my last semester. I've checked and double checked with everything, but I'm always worried that they are going to point something out that I need to do before I can graduate. But its looking pretty good and I'm really looking forward to it. I did okay with the last few weeks of school, but I was stressed and very mean. That happens though. Thankfully the weather was warming up and we decided to go on a weekend camping trip. So once school was done, on the first weekend of May we took a trip down to Moab. My brother Dustee was invited to come along, because his birthday was May 2nd, and I thought he would enjoy camping for his birthday. He turned 21! It makes me feel kind of old because he is my baby brother. But I'm not old....I have to keep telling myself that. :)

Because you can't reserve a campsite in the campgrounds that Daryl and his buddies wanted to stay in, Daryl offered to go down early and find one. So Daryl, Me, and Dustee loaded the car up on Thursday April 30th and headed down to Moab. We left at about four in the afternoon and knew that we would probably be pitching a tent in the dark, but figured it wouldn't be that late when we got there. We also figured, that by going down there thursday night, we would be able to find a camping spot. BOY WERE WE WRONG!

Let me just say that the minute there is a weekend with good weather, everybody in the world packs up their campers and heads off to Moab....I KID YOU NOT! We rolled in at about nine o clock that night and I couldn't believe the amount of cars that were with us heading in. IT WAS CRAZY! When I looked over at the campsites at the beginning of town they were all extremely packed, but we still had faith that we could find one somewhere. So we headed down this road that has about six campgrounds, all along the colorado river. The first campground was full, the second campground was full, you get the idea, they were all full. We hoped that the campground we wanted to go to would have some empty spots because it was the farthest one away, but its also the most popular for that reason, so yes it was full as well. Of course we didn't want to give up, there had to be campgrounds that had openings somewhere, so we headed back to town. Remember those first campgrounds I saw at the beginning of town. Half an hour later, when we got back, there were signs up saying that they were completely full...I couldn't believe it. So we drove around town and Daryl said he had a buddy that told him about these very out of the way campsites that no one would know about and would probably be empty. So we went down this road that looked not so nice and headed for the hunt in the dark for these campsites. I thought my husband was crazy because we started heading down this steep, small road that ran along a cliff. I think he has no idea where he is going and is just making things up. Dustee is in the back laughing because when Daryl asks me if I think he is crazy I answer Yes I do. Then I see this headlights behind us and we're in the middle of nowhere and I think..great now someone has come to kill us. (Thats my overactive imagination coming into play. It does that a lot when I'm tired and think my husbands crazy.) We finally reach the bottom of this canyon and find the campground...which I was shocked was even there. But guess what....completely full. Even this one out in the middle of nowhere, where killers follow you down the canyon in the dark, there were already people there.

By this time I'm tired...its eleven, we've been looking for two hours and I don't want to look for a campground anymore. I want to find a hotel and just lay down. So we head back into town to find a hotel to sleep at for the night. Once back in town, there are a lot of hotels......a lot of hotels with NO VACANCY signs lit up! We start checking the ones that don't have the signs on and they are all priced at a hundred dollars or more. We findi this one hotel that looks crappy and cheap...but go figure..its a hundered and twenty dollars a night to stay there.

By now its almost midnight and I'm ready to cry! I'm so mad that the whole idea of sticking around and camping seems like a horrible idea and I'm even considering just driving home that night. So we stop at a gas station to fill up, Daryl calls his buddies who are supposed to be meeting us the next day and tells them to not even bother coming. We hit the road and head back to Green River Utah, forty miles away, and find a hotel there for the night. As soon as we get in and situated, I become a lot happier because I don't have to wonder if we'll find a place and I can go to sleep.

If you had asked me that night if I would go camping or head home, I would have said head home. But come morning, I figured we should at least try one more time to find a campground because we were right there by Arches National Park and Dustee couldn't remember what it looked like, since the last time we were there was when he was just a little kid. So guess what we did? Yes this crazy trio packed up, got back in the car and started looking for another camping spot. We hoped beyond hope that someone would be leaving that morning and we would be able to find a place to camp. So yes we headed back up the same road from the night before and at the first campground, there were three spots open! We decided to push on because we wanted to see if the specific campground we wanted to stay at had any empty campsites. With our luck though, we pulled in seconds behind another group and lost that campsite. So we hurried back to the first campsite and guess what....in the fifteen minutes we were gone, they ALL FILLED UP! Can you believe it?! UGH! So now I'm mad again, until I notice this other couple packing up their van and I ask them if they are leaving. The guy says yes and I tell Daryl, pull in there...even though they were still packing up. HAPPY DAY we got a camp spot. I was so happy I did a happy dance for about an hour. Okay, not really, but I was really happy.


By the end of the day, all of Daryl's buddies were there, camp was set up and we were ready for camping! The next day, we headed into Arches to hike up to the Delicate Arch, you know the really famous arch that looks like a pair of jeans. I didn't take my camera on the hike because it was raining by the time we started hiking and I had no place to keep it dry. OF course, the higher up we got, the less it rained until it stopped. UGH. So I took a few pics from the bottom of the mountain but it was a lot of fun. We had some friends take their cameras with them so I'll see if I can't find those and post a few on here for ya.








An interesting thing that we found out while we were there is that they give night tours up the colorado river. They have this giant spotlight truck that follows them and lights up the sides of the canyon walls while the tour guide gives them a tour. It was crazy! All of a sudden the canyon wall is glowing and we couldn't figure out why. It happened both nights that we were there and it was crazy. I took a few pics of the canyon walls all lit up by the light and I'll post some for ya here.

All in all the trip turned out to be a lot of fun overall. It was nice to get out and go camping. Of course, from now on....I'm going to make sure we camp at a campground that we can reserve and we won't have this same hassle again.

The guys I went camping with! I was the only girl! Yee haw!!!

Its April?! HOLY COW!

Hey ya'll! Surprised to hear from me already? ME TOO! I'm actually a little bored right now and I thought I would post a few more pictures I've taken for my photography class on here for all to see. I'm not sure how I feel about all of them yet, so don't tell me they suck. :)
Anyways, there is only a few weeks left of school and its crunch time. YIKES! But I'm kind of excited. See I've been working on a research project all semester long. As a sociology major we are required to conduct our own research project before we can graduate. So that is what I've been doing. Its about the Ideal Mate for men and women and what we think the opposite sex wants, compared to what they really want. If that doesn't make sense, its probably because I've been talking about it for so long now my head is ready to explode. But anyways, Weber State has a Undergraduate Research Conference every spring for Sociology majors to present their work. Not only is it a good experience for you, but it looks really good on your resume AND it looks really good if you want to go on to graduate school. Anyways, I turned in my stuff yesterday and it sounds like I will get to present two weeks from today. YIKES! I'm excited and nervous at the same time. Granted it will be in front of students, but there will be professors there as well and you're putting your work out there for all to hear. So its exciting and scary. It just means I'm that much closer to FINALLY getting this all done. If all works out I should be graduating in December of this year, which was my goal since I got back into school. So keep your fingers crossed for me. :)
Anyways, not much else is going on right now. Daryl and I went to see Monsters Vs. Aliens last night and I liked it, Daryl not so much. But thats okay. I'm a kid at heart and I always love those movies. It was nice to go out for a night and not have to think of school work. YEAH!!!
I thought I would let you all know that the bus driver I seem to always have on my way to school is crazy. Its really kind of funny, because there are a lot of students that are taking the public transportation to school and so by the time we're about five miles away from the school, we're crammed in there like a bunch of sardines. At the school there are two round abouts that we need to go around and every time he yells back "HOLD ON!" then I really think he floors it. Because the next thing you know people are screaming and falling into each other and all you can think is I'M GOING TO DIE! And remember there are two, so once we get through the first one, a minute later we're going through the second one. The same thing happens. I've come to a conclusion about this guy, he is crazy and this is his daily entertainment. Granted I'm always sitting so I don't have to hold on for dear life, so it is kind of funny until some stranger ends up in your lap. Oh well, it sure wakes us up in the morning, which may be his whole point. Hmmm...smart man.
Anyways, here are a few pics I've taken using glow sticks liquid. Its actually a lot of fun and I hope you guys like it. TOODLES!!!

The Things I Do To Myself.

Hey Everybody! My life is boring so that is why you barely ever hear from me. As well as the fact that school is keeping me busy this semester and I'm completely ready for the final weeks before the summer break.
I recently had my spring break and I must say that it was fun. I spent the first few days cleaning and organizing because Daryl's parents were coming out here for the rest of the week. We just ran ourselves ragged but had a blast. They decided to go skiing the first day out and I know I can't ski and I would probably break something, so I opted out. Although I'm sure that I would have been completely entertaining to all those around watching. I did see a little girl, probably three years old skiing down the mountain and that just isn't cool. They have a smaller length to fall then me and look how awesome she can already ski. UGH! Oh well, I will not humilate myself for others amusement. At least not there.
After that day we went to the Sportsmans show where they have all sorts of booths there with information on hunting expeditions and camping, trips, and boating and so on. They even had the splash dogs there which are the dogs that jump into a pool after a toy, then they meausre how far they can jump. I swear, I thought this one dog was going to jump right into our lap. That pool had to be about thirty feet long and I thought he was coming right for me at the other end. It was awesome. I decided that I want to get a dog and do that. I'm going to get a chocolate lab, name him Chocolate, and have him jump in a pool of chocolate. I'm original you know. :) Although I'm not good at making animals listen to me, so it could be an intersting undertaking.
After that we did a little shopping, hung out with his parents and just had an overall good time. THe last day that they were here we did go golfing and I thought I could do pretty good. NOT REALLY! I'm lucky if I hit the ball AND I'm lucky if I see where the ball is going. I need a really bright pink ball so that I don't lose it. Luckily I missed all the water on the course, mostly because I missed the ball. AND I'm a really scary golf cart driver. I thought for sure I was going to dump us out a few times, but didn't. I'm like a nascar driver in a golf cart, if only they could go faster!
Anyways, I'm back in the final weeks of school, the weeks I like to call H E DOUBLE HOCKEY STICKS WEEKS!!! But we're just cruising along. Only about six weeks to go then I'll be done til next fall. I'm hoping to get into this volunteer group that you do so many hours of work and they will give you a thousand dollars towards your education. So I want to do that over the summer so that I can put it towards tuition in the fall.
Thats everything exciting happening right now. Except for one thing. Everyone knows that I can hurt myself easily it seems. I think I'm taking after my Aunt Della who has a tendency to get hurt a lot. But I found interesting ways to do it. Last night I got out a pot to cook rice in and apparantly I didn't set it all the way on the counter. Who knew. Anyways, it fell and landed with the handle pointing down, on my toe. IT HURT!! I did a little jig, called the jig of pain and ran around the room for a minute. I don't scream in pain, I just continuously say OWIE!!! Anyways, I put ice on it and when I went to bed, I just saw a red mark there. This morning, however I found this.



You can kind of see the bruise that runs down my toe and to the top of my foot. Ignore the gross feet please!! If Jodi is reading this she is hating me right now because she doesn't like feet. They haven't seen the light of day in months. Anyways, needless to say I have a limp now because of this and it hurts like the dickens. But OH WELL. Eventually it will heal and NO ITS NOT BROKEN!!!!
Thats all for now. I hope you enjoyed this blog Will, I know you've been desperately waiting for one. :) I'm kidding. LOVE YA!!! See you all next time! Toodles!!

A month in the life of BranDee and Daryl....mostly BranDee

Hey all. Sorry its taken me so long to write another blog. Christmas break flew by, school all of a sudden started, and I've been on my toes ever since school started. This semseter is going to be a hard one and its already stressful. But let me back up and tell you a little bit about Christmas.
Christmas was a blast. We spent the day with my parents at their house. A huge snow storm moved in the day, so my brother and his wife couldn't make it down on christmas, which was sad. But they came down a little later. My Aunt Della made us all Utah Jazz scarfs that are nice and warm and very cool. I need to get a picture of Daryl in that scarf since he isn't much of a fan. :) Daryl got his electric razor that he has been begging me for, for a very long time. He also got an awesome new robe that is really warm and comfy, he wears it ALL the time. I also got him a lot of Kansas State stuff, like key chains, magnets, a pen, a sign that say #1 Wildcat Fan, and a Kansas State mug you put in the freezer. He didn't get as spoiled as me, but he got plenty of things. He seemed very happy with everything that he got.
I of course, got my car, books and games from my parents, and a tripod from my sister in law, which I absolutely love! It comes in real handy and I don't have to borrow one from other people. AWESOME!!! It turned out to be a really fun day. We played this game called Uno Flash and that game is crazy! If you have never played it, you really need to. There is no telling who is going to win. You each have your own button and you have four seconds to lay down a card and hit your button, or you have to draw four cards. You don't get to choose who gets skipped, the game does, and you feel on edge the whole time. Its TONZ of fun. I had a blast with it. Its kind of an expensive game, so I'm waiting for my birthday to get it for myself. :)
The Monday after Christmas, I came home from being out and about to find a very sick husband. Daryl ended up getting really bad food poisoning that stuck around that whole week. I felt so bad for him, because he was really sick. On New Year's Eve, which was also my older brother Will's birthday, I came down with a cold. We ended up spending New Year's Eve with just the two of us, hoping that we would make it to Midnight. We barely made it, but as soon as twelve oh one hit, we were already in our bed fast asleep. It wasn't a very fun day for us.
School started back up for me on the 5th of January and I've been going ever since. I only have three classes but they are jam packed. I have my Senior Capstone class this semseter and this is the last class you take when you are done with your major in sociology. You spend the semester doing a research project on something that you find intersting. It is not easy. First you have to decide you topic, then its a lot of research, survey questionnaires, more research, and a lot of writing. Its tough, but I have an awesome professor to help me through it. My topic is on gender and behavior. I'm basically looking at Men's perception on how they fell they should be treated by women, and vice versa for the women. Its kind of interesting.
They other hectic class is my photography class. We get to work on one body of work throughout the entire semester AND we have to apply to three different art shows. I'm really scared about the art shows, because I have yet to do that. YIKES!!!! But it will be really good experience for me. I originally went back to an idea I did a year ago with Body by Candlelight, and I wanted to do it all in color. Well after the first pictures came out, I wasn't to happy with them and a little lost. My professor gave me some artists to look at that work with low light and I found some very ineresting that involved light movement. ANyways, Daryl and I got the idea of glowsticks and went out this past weekend hunting them donw. After we did, I spent an evening, with the help of Daryl, and a few friends, and we came up with some great pics.

In this pic, we took glow sticks and tied them together with string, then let them spin. Our friends son, Christian is the kid in the pick reaching for the glowing world.

In this pic we cut open a glow stick and put the liquid in water, then let it swirl around. It turned out really good and Daryl says it looks like the galaxy.


Daryl calls this one the autopsy of an alien. This was when we just started having fun with the glowsticks. It actually turned out really interesting and my professor told me today that he is very intrigued by it. So I'm EXCITED!! Now I have tonz of ideas flowing through my head and I can't wait to see where we go with this. Its been lots of fun.
Anyways, not much else is going on. Daryl is waiting on word to see if the union goes on strike at the refinery. If that happens, then he will be working seven days a week, twelve hour shifts. Not something I'm hoping for. Plus his parents were talking about possibly coming out here next month, so I'm hoping it doesn't happen. The money would be nice, but I would hardly get to see him.
I guess thats all that is happening now. OH, one other thing. This past weekend we spent the day with our friends James and Michelle, because saturday was Michelle's birthday. I got to decorate a gingerbread man and I made him in Daryl's image. Tell me what you think. Oh and by the way, the green candy is his sideburns.
TOODLES!!!