Our Winter Drive

On Thursday and Friday we packed up the Mustang and drove to Oregon for Christmas. We were anxiously checking weather reports and road conditions to see if the drive would be alright. Although we heard that the roads and weather were not that good we still decided to make the drive because the reports predicted that it was only going to get worse. The first half of our trip went well and we weren't even too concerned when we got to a mountain pass that required chains. We came prepared and we were ready to take it slow. We got over the first mountain pass and decided we were ok to take off the chains. All of the sudden I heard Sean say "great, we have a flat tire". I looked out and the tire didn't look flat but then I say a chain link sticking out of the tire and air leaking out. All over the road were chains that had broken off from trucks. We thought we had done our best to miss them but apparently not. Luckily we were only 9 miles away from a Les Schwab.


At Les Schwab we inspected the other tires as well only to find that the other rear tire also had a chain sticking in it and looked flater then the first. What are the chance of that?!

There was a huge line so we decided to make a snowy treck to Roosters dinner.

After an hour and a half pit stop our tires were fixed and we were able to get back on the road. Unfortunately, it was now a little latter then we would of liked. A few more hours into the drive is when the snow started. Thick white powder quickly started accumulating on the roads and as it got darker out our viability decreased and the storm thickened. We were grateful when we saw the snow plows come up behind us but we then became bitter when we learned that the plows were not allowed to scrape the road in Oregon and as they plowed their only contribution to the roads were to pack the snow even more. We tried to just go slow so we would not have to put on our chains in the dark but as we drove there were moments that we could not see cars in front or behind us and the snow was coming down so fast that the tracks from the other cars were being covered up. After driving 15 miles an hour for a few hours we finally gave in and pulled in front of another car that was putting on chains to use the light form his head lights to help us put on chains. We returned the favor as another car pulled in front of us. The chains gave us a little more confidence so were were then able to drive 30 miles an hour.

The drive that would have normally taken us 8 hours to make took us 17 hours! It was one crazy adventure but have no fear, we made it safe and sound.

Things We'll Miss About Utah...

Our house is in boxes and we are moving in three days now. We don't know if we will be coming back to Utah or where life will take us so here are a few things we will miss about Utah.

FRIENDS!
(sorry we don't have pictures with everyone)

Our jobs

Sean will miss being a teacher at the MTC

I will miss my job as an Athletic Trainer, especially at East High School

Our Home


BYU


Hiking Adventures


Skiing


And much more...

Christmas Craft

With Christmas nearing I decided to make some little gifts. Costco had Stephen's Hot Chocolate on sale so I figured I could come up with some way to make them nice Christmas presents. We bought a bunch of them and then I wrapped them up, made nice little bows and cards to go with them and whala, a classy, easy Christmas gift. Merry Christmas!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This year we made a last minute decision to drive to Oregon for Thanksgiving. We were originally going to stay in Utah but with gas at $1.66 we just couldn't resist!
Before we get to Thanksgiving we would like to thank Chris Paolini for the book Brisinger which we listened to all the way on our 14 hour drive to Eugene and home again. Listening to these books has become a road trip tradition that has gotten us through many long drives. Thanks Chris.

This trip gave Sean the perfect opportunity to play around with our new camera. Here are some random pictures we ended up with:

Plugs and Sarge

Me studying up for London and an orange

Thanksgiving was filled with love, laughter, football and lots of food. Sean's Mom and I cooked all day while the boys went out and proved their manliness at the annual ward Turkey Bowel and then came home and watched more football.

Cooking...

The artsy table shot

Turkey is ready!

Sean's mom gave great turkey carving lessons. I hope Sean took notes.


Mmmm... Turkey!

Setting the table.

The Big Bread Story: We had a bag of 72 frozen white rolls but somehow the freezer was left open and we were left with a big mound of dough. We were able to pick off enough to make about 24 rolls but we were still leflt with all this dough so we figured why not bake it the way it is; and so was born the big bread. It ended up being a great hit and it made delicious french toast the following morning.
Thanksgiving was great! There is nothing better then being sorrounded by people you love and eating some good food.

The Drive Home

Classic Oregon Winter weather.

We just happened to stop at a rest stop with a great view during sunset.

Moments like this sure make the drive worth it. And for all those other moments there's always Brisinger...

More about London

So I realize that a lot of people don't know what we'll be doing in London so here is the official update. Sean will be working in the Palace at Westminster, which is the building in the picture above. He will be assigned to the SNP (Scottish National Party), who have a constituency (congressional district) right next to the palace! It will be a great experience, especially since they are currently campaigning to seperate themselves from the UK. He will be going to debates, taking notes, campaigning if there is an election, and doing research so they can go and have heated debates. It should all be jolly good. Meanwhile I will be in London doing.... well I'm not quite sure yet but here are the ideas so far. Beacause my dad was born in England I can get what is called the "Right to Abode". It's basically a little card that goes in your passport and says that you can legaly live and work in the UK for as long as you want. So if that works out hopefully I will be working. If I can find a job that is similar to what I am doing now that would be great but if not I'll pretty much settle on doing anything (within reason). On top of that, I have recently been working on doing my family history so I would like to continue doing that and possibly meet some long lost seccond cousins. Thats the plan for now. We'll be sure to update our blog with pictures and exciting and random stories so stay tuned!

London here we come!

It's official! Sean got an email the other day letting him know that he was accepted into the London Parliament Internship. We leave January 7th for our 4 month adventure in the UK. Stay tuneded for exciting updates during our trip.

Law School Update

The official results from the LSAT are back and Sean got a 156! I am so proud of him! The process has now begun to apply for schools. We are applying all over Utah, Oregon, and California. Here is the list so far:
Utah: BYU and University of Utah
Oregon: Willamette, University of Oregon and Lewis and Clark
California:UC Davis, UC Hastings, Cornell, Pepperdine and University of San Diego
The crazy thing is that we will find out what law schools we get into while we are in Europe so right now we have no idea where we will be coming home to. We are excited to see where life takes us and what adventures await.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SEAN!

Yesterday was Sean's Birthday! We didn't do anything too fancy because the dreaded LSAT is coming up this weekend but we did celebrate with his favorite meal, cake and a few presents. After a quick rendition of Happy Birthday, sung solo by me, Sean was off to the library for the night. He is working so hard with school and work and studying for the LSAT. I am sure lucky to have such a hard working and loving man.

Happy Birthday My Love!

ARUBA

In August Sean and I went to ARUBA with his family. I had no idea where Aruba even was before we when so for those of you who are wondering, it is a tiny island in the Caribbean just off the coast of Venezuela. It is actaully a Dutch protectorate and still has a lot of Dutch influence in the achitecture and culture. The peole there learn Dutch in school but also speak English, Spanish, Portugies, their native language of Papiamento and some French. On this tiney island of just over 100, 000 people, the LDS Curch actually has 10 missionaries serving there (we ran into them at a grocery store). These pictures pretty much summarize our trip...

Reading and relaxing on the beach

We took a road trip to the South tip of the island where there was a great snorkeling beach. The water in Aruba is so warm!

Man, these guys are so strong!

One of the big events of the trip was a boys only deep sea fishing trip. They woke up super early and were out on the ocean for 4 hours. Unfortunately they didn't catch anything but at least they had some good manly bonding time.

One of the most famous land marks on the small island of Aruba is the lighthouse.

There is a great view of the island from up by the lighthouse and, if you're lucky, you may even spot a goat or two.

After enjoying the great view we then enjoyed some great shaved ice on a nearby beach.

The sunsets were all beautiful so one night that we decided that we had to take picture.

Only one side of the island is developed. The other side is only accessible by four wheel drive vehicles so one day we went on a jeep tour to explore.

Our last night in Aruba we went to a fancy restaurant where I decided to get adventurous and ordered conch. It was actually really good. The locals say that it is the escargot of the Caribbean.

The meal was so good that Sean's mom and brothers decided to do a dance outside of the restaurant.

We had so much fun in Aruba. Like the license plates say, Aruba really is

ONE HAPPY ISLAND!