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Mighty Zeus and his favorite wife Hera

I need to start blogging more because I have sooo many fun pictures to show you! I know halloween was a while ago but I just have to share because it pretty much consumed our lives for about 2 months prior to the big day. Lindsay and Regan came over to our house during the last week of September and looked a little surprised to see about 50% of our halloween decorations already out, ok maybe they were less surprised and more just thought we were kind of crazy.

Anyway, we had a blast driving around to all the great antique malls nearby and snatching up old stuff that we thought might be halloweenish. For instance, behold the coffee table (that Brent remembered to snap a picture of after the party was over!):

See that book in the foreground that looks like it's seen better days? It probably has, since it's actually a Bible that was published in 1863!! We found it at an "Antique Fair" in Salisbury a couple of weeks before the party, along with several of our costume accessories, found in the "junk jewelry" section. The triple threat candle stick holder is an antique mall find, as are the other single candle holders and the old glass bottles.

Brent masterminded the hanging of spiderwebs from our chandelier to various corners of the room and eventually they kind of took over our house, and I ran into random webs and got tangled in them every single day. And it was kind of annoying when I wanted to like, open a window, or take a book off the shelf, but I couldn't for 6 weeks because they were completely covered in webs. But it was SOO WORTH IT!! haha. Jk. But they did look pretty awesome with all the spooky lights on, no?

This was for sure the coolest part of our decorations! Ok, that's hard to say because they were all so amazing, but come on! Brent carved that pumpkin into a punch bowl! With a tiny saw!! He did get the idea from Martha, but you know she didn't actually do the carving on hers. And Brent was a total naysayer when I said that we should put the pumpkin in our fabulous antique wet bar globe thingy, but look, it worked! And the dry ice just takes it to another level entirely.

Unfortunately, this is the only photo I have of the "making" of our costumes, but sufficeth to say that there was a lot of glitter involved.

Oh yeah, one more great addition to our decor came from Brent's mom Ellen who found us this huuuge glass jar that we could turn upside down and use for presenting creepy specimens...or glitter skulls (see the tiny skull stack in the background??).

Ok, moving on from decorations, that is quite enough! We had some really good food at this party! Did I mention there was a party? We had all of our "young couple" friends over for dinner and games and it was sooo fun. Teri and Lindsay both brought chili (how did I not get pictures of that?) and lots of others brought treats and snacks - everything was to die for! Including this cheesecake that Brent made, mostly because the crust is made out of crushed thin mints, which you pack into the pan, then pour melted chocolate over...

Alright, I know you just want to see the costumes, so here you go! I don't think we got everyone, but we did our best...

The amazing hippie Tiffany getting me all goddessed up!

And getting Rob and Teri's ears all pointy with super glue!

The trekkies!

Liz Lemon and Kenneth!

Plug and Socket!

A Pimp and his Cowgirl!

Witch, Tinkerbell, Cowboy and Tigger!

Baby Boxer minus his coaches!

70s? Hippies or in Andrew's case Creepy guy who won our best costume contest
and hence, our glitter skull trophy!
Tiffany just happened to win our Halloween trivia game and won that sweet afro
so she could match Andrew!

Other costumes we got pictures of during the games...

Yep, it was a good time! And I wish all of you could have been there...except that it was so crowded in our tiny apartment that I could hardly squeeze from one end to the other, but perhaps we will have a bigger venue next year...speaking of which...

Brent is currently applying to residency! He has heard back from about half of the schools now and has scheduled some interviews, which is very exciting. Hopefully we will be heading for a town near you in the near future!

Happy Halloweeeeeeeen...

I'm HooOOOooome!!!

Where to begin? Ok, so I started this post approximately 2 months ago and just never finished it. It's getting ridiculous now that I'll only be here for a couple more weeks, so I'm just going to do it!! There are about a billion things I could post about, but I think I'll do our trip to Idaho first since I've already edited the pictures...

Ok, ok, so a couple of weeks ago my whole fam plus Brent drove out to the great potato state to see my grandparents in Rexburg(er) and Brent's family who live in Idaho Falls. We spent the night in Elko, NV, which was a horrible, terrible, awful experience and could take up an entire post by itself. BUT, I'll spare you the pain and just say that we were one hotel room short (though we reserved two) and got sent down the street to a different hotel where we were eventually sent into a room that already had people in it!! haha. Funny now, but not so funny then.

Eventually we made it to Idaho and dropped Brentie off with his fam in IF then went on to Rexburg! We hurried and got ready to speed off to West Yellowstone for the Playmill's version of Beauty and the Beast. It was fun, but I was soooo tired from all the driving and the four hours of sleep I had the night before.

The next day we were up bright and early for a trip to Porters for knitting supplies (Maddie and Lauren are obsessed!!) then jet-skiing with my Grandad on the snake by the Idaho Falls Temple! Maddie was all about driving full-throttle, and I clung onto her and feared for my life.

Brent taking his chances with Maddie...

Not sure what this story was about...

Lauren was a bit nervous about the jet-skiis in general and when I took her out she kept saying "I just want to go reeeeally slow" I warned her that if you go too slow on a jet-ski you lose control of the steering but would she listen??? No. Eventually she made me slow down so much that we tipped over mid-river and she was soooo mad at me!! But we got back on and dried off in no time...it was fun, right Lauren?? haha.

The next day we headed out bright and early to "The Dunes" (again with Grandad, he is AWESOME) for some gnarly four-wheeling! I didn't really know what the big deal was with "The Dunes" but they are insane! Apparently there is a giant 35 mile stretch of them about 20 minutes outside of Rexburg, who knew?? It was kind of scary (I thought for sure I was going to roll my 4-wheeler down the side of a dune and have sand in EVERY crevice of my body) but reeeeally fun.

Poor little Chasey got stuck once, but don't worry, we dug him out.

I took a picture of these tracks because I thought they looked cool, but now I think they're weird...what made them?? Anyone?

Look! I was there making really cool faces...

Ok this is getting long, and we were only there for 2 days! Utah will have to wait...

Lauren!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's my sister Lauren's birthday TODAY! I'm pretty sure she's the cutest 10 year old in the whole world, so I thought I'd write a song about her, and here it is:





My adobe premiere expert brother Alex helped me out with the video (thanks!). Now we're off to see Peter Pan in San Francisco!! And I'm in California right now, by the way. I'm having a blast going up to the city for school and I'm so excited for Brent to come out and join me in a couple of weeks!

Happy b-day Lolo! Love you.

Beach Nightlife...

of a different sort.







After we took these pictures we went out on the beach to look at the stars and listen to the waves for a while, though as you can see in the first picture, the moon was reeeeally bright. After it got a little higher in the sky we could barely see the stars anymore! I love the beach at night almost as much as during the day. I mean, at night it's nice and quiet, usually uncrowded, and you can have bonfires! I guess I should just live at the beach so I can be there 24/7.

I can dream right?

Chasing Sting Rays...and Sunglasses.

Carolina Beach part two! Where was I...oh yes, there was also a lot of me trying to get Maizey to go in the water:





Do what I say!





Rob did finally get her in, but only by carrying her! I love how she's holding her bum out of the water in this one...



And there were even some hand stands:





and attempted hand stands...



and sabotaged hand stands! Caught red-handed.



We drove out to Fort Fisher again on our last day (Memorial Day) and it was pretty crowded. But luckily a group of sting rays showed up and scared everyone out of the water! Except me, of course. I had my trusty waterproof camera case and made it my mission to get at least one good picture of them underwater.

The water was super murky so at first they were just turning out like this:



Not too exciting. But finally I got close enough for a good one!







I love sea creatures. As if I need to state the obvious. It was funny that these cownose rays showed up though, because the night before we had watched River Monsters about the biggest (and deadliest??) river fish of all time...a giant sting ray! So when they started getting curious about me and darting by me at top speed within an inch or two of my legs I decided I probably had enough pictures...

And I almost forgot...shortly after taking these pictures (literally 30 minutes before we left to go home) I was out catching some waves and lost ANOTHER pair of sunglasses. I also lost a pair in Australia in the surf, and at Virginia Beach last year the same exact way. This is why my sunglasses come from Target...not quite as sad when you lose a $10 pair. Yet I still searched up and down the beach for them for at least half an hour...why?? I should know from experience that it's hopeless. Brent thinks I should invest in a more expensive pair, and that way I wouldn't risk taking them into dangerous situations...but what's the fun in that?? haha.

So that was our trip. Here are some more randoms, because I know you haven't had enough yet!







hahahahaaa...doesn't she look like she's having fun??







Wish we could do it again this weekend...but Brent and I will be in ATLANTA!! Brent is taking step 2CS (so specific!) of the boards...plus we're going on an adventure while we're there! More about that later...