Alaska

I am a little late in posting, but in May Brett and I made our way to the great state of Alaska! We started out in Seattle and made our way to Vancouver via Amtrak.

Once there we boarded the Rhapsody of the Seas and set sail.

I talked Brett into getting dressed up for dinner one night.

We hiked to the Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau,

and we rode another train in Skagway on the "Scenic Railway of the World".

For you nerds like us out there, this bridge was an engineering marvel of the world when it was built in 1898.

We got up at 4 in the morning to see views like this,

and we hiked to a rainforest in Ketchikan Alaska (where it rains 160+ inches a year).

We got to see some awesome totem poles,

and wear our new raincoats.

We also ate the best clam chowder we have ever had, saw orcas and humpback whales almost every day from the ship, had lots of free soft serve ice cream, went to a few shows on the ship, and even stopped at three Harley stores! It was wonderful, relaxing vacation! And for our next destination.....?

The Butcher Shop

Every year between Christmas and New Year's Brett gets to pretend he is a butcher.  His Grandpa Richins raises cattle, and every year they kill some of the cattle, cut it, wrap it up, and freeze it for the next year.  The butcher shop is on his grandpa's property, and has a huge meat saw and a machine to make hamburger.  Brett has learned how to take a huge slab of beef and cut it up properly into the steaks, roasts, and hamburger we know so well.  I get to wrap and label the cuts of meat and take the pictures.  Growing up I never thought I would get to see how a whole cow becomes the meat you buy at the grocery store - it is a unique experience!

Brett and his grandpa

That slab of meat becomes a Rib Eye Steak...

can you taste it grilled up already?

I got to wrap the meat up with Syd and Jenn

Brett's cousin Nathaniel was very proud of his oven roast

Glider

Yep - Lindsay and I are having a baby.  We are very excited.

Canning Fools

This past weekend Brett and I continued our latest cooking experiment - canning. If YOU want to get involved, here is what you need to do:

1. Find some generous folks who have lots of tomatoes and vegetables to share (thanks Mom and Dad! Can you believe they grew all this and more in their wonderful garden?)

2. Recruit more generous people to help you blanch tomatoes, cut onions and peppers, peel garlic, etc. (the Housleys assisted here).
3. Mix everything together in the biggest pot you can find.

4. Cook and stir and cook and stir some more. If you're good like Brett you can manage two at once. After a couple of hours of this, put your creation in your jars and use a steam canner to cook and seal them.

5. Ta Da! There you have it. Work at it for a few days and you too can have 2 kinds of salsa, spaghetti sauce, and diced tomatoes! Don't you feel more domestic already?

Yellowstone

Lindsay and I try to go to yellowstone in the fall whenever we get a chance.  Lindsay was on camera today, so here are some pictures that she took.  We will update it when we get more pictures.

Summer Summary

 As fall is upon us, I wanted to write a Top 10 list of things that we did this summer.  I was having a hard time ranking them, so instead of a numerical or even chronological list, here is an alphabetical list of our summer adventures:

                   We hiked Arches National Park!  While in the Moab area, we took a  

                                     Boat tour of the Colorado River, called

                                     Canyonlands by Night, all expenses paid for by the company I work for, as I 
                                                     was delivering a part to a water plant down there.

                                     Denver was one of the highlights of the summer, as we visited several sites 
                                                      there on our wonderful vacation with Syd and Clif.  

                                     Echo Reservoir and the Rail Trail, where we walked Penny nearly every day.
                  F is for the Flowers we tried to grow.  In fact, we planted some irises last week. Penny’s
                                                      favorite game is to dig them up every single day.  We’ll see how things
                                                      go next year.  

 We planted our first Garden together.  Too bad all the tomatoes froze in August!

                                     Harley Davidson Motorcycle riding.  Of course.  

                                     Iron County Fair and visiting Parowan.

        The wedding of Jenn and Carter Peterson.
    We hung out with Kami and David, our friends and neighbors.  We went to several movies
                                                with them this summer. 

                                     Lindsay’s Birthday.  It actually takes place every summer.  

              Brett grew a Moustache.  It wasn’t so creepy when he had the goatee to go with it.  

                                     New York.  No, we didn’t actually visit but my brother left for his mission there. 

                                     Oh Penny.  She was always entertaining us this summer in one way or another.

                                     Pickleville Playhouse, where we watched “Crazy for You”.

                             MesQuite where Brett got to spend a number of 110 F+ days (best Q I could come 
                                               up with).

             We went to a Real Salt Lake Soccer Game with the Robinson's.  A real Re-al soccer game.
We put a brand new Sprinkler system into our yard!  Before, the grass really was greener on our
                                              neighbors' sides of the fence.

        The Sheep Dog Trials at Solder Hollow, a tribute to the intelligence of Penny and her fellow 
                                              border collies.  

                               An Umbrella is what we should have had at the Rockies game, where we got 
                                         both soaked and sunburned at the longest game ever played at Coor’s field.  

                                     Vacationing various places throughout the summer.  

                                     Wild Animal Sanctuary - lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

                                                We decided we needed to own all of the
                    Disney-PiXar movies, so we bought them all (another stretch for X).

                                      Yardwork.  It seemed like we did quite a bit of that this summer.  

                             Last, Zions Harley Davidson.  Brett got a nice shirt there.

Vacation

The start of the adventure

Brett and I had the wonderful opportunity to visit Syd (Brett's sister) and Clif (her husband) in the one-and-only Fort Morgan, Colorado over the 4th of July weekend. Fort Morgan is home to the famous I-76 dirt speedway, which we got to experience on Saturday night. For several hours we cheered on a variety of different styles of race cars, got to see a crash or two, and watch all of the other red-neck fans. We were covered in dirt by the end of it, and my favorite (and smartest) fans were the 80 year old couple that cheered louder than anyone and had on full green chemistry style goggles.

Lightning McQueen

Cars

In addition to the wonders of Fort Morgan, nearby Greeley, and Brush! (the name really has an exclamation mark at the end, as in Brush! Fire Department), we got to experience some of the sites of Denver. For example, we can brag that we attended the longest Rockies game ever played at Coors Field - 5 hours and 24 minutes! We stayed to every minute of it and got sunburned and soaked in a rainstorm throughout the course of the game. It was a good thing the Rockies finally won after 15 innings of play. But is was fun to do both the 7th and the 14th inning stretch!

Lindsay playin us a tune in downtown Denver

Coors Field

Us at baseball game

Rockies game

The Denver Aquarium was awesome - we saw everything from trout to clown fish to sea turtles to sharks. They had a really neat setup, with different areas representing different habitats. We started in the Rocky Mountains and then travelled through deserts, rain forests, and the deep ocean.

Lindsay swimming with a fish

Brett with fish

Bruce

We saw more wild life at the Wild Animal Sanctuary. The animal sanctuary is home to over 200 large wild mammals including tigers, lions, leopards, wolves, and grizzly and black bears. Most of the animals came from people who had them as pets or in fur farms. I might be naive, but I had no idea that in many states people can purchase a pet tiger cheaper than they can get a dog. Most of these animals eventually end up abandoned when there owners realize what they got themselves into, and so the Sanctuary takes in as many of these kind of animals as they can. We got to see these animals up close and in large open fenced areas, not just confined in a tiny cage like at a zoo. It was an eye opening experience for me.

Tiger

Leopards

Liger

Other highlights of the trip included eating at Rodizios, huge 4th of July cupcakes, visiting three Harley stores, taking the pretty drive home through Colorado, seeing Meeker, Colorado (in honor of Penny), and of course catching up with family. Special thanks to our hosts for a great time!

Lindsay in Meeker

Traveling through the Rockies