October Madness

Madness might be an understatement. October has been busy! Lots of homework, lots of stress, and lots of fun. But who wants to hear about our homework or stress?? So about the fun...

The main event (or so I like to think) was my birthday. Yep, 23 and rolling. We celebrated by taking the day off work and biking down Bennie Creek in Payson Canyon with my bro David, Dan's dad, and brother, Jake. It was pretty intense; some spots were so steep that I had to get off my bike and walk it down, but it was still so much fun! I was afraid I would die on my birthday, but I didn't even wreck! (We've already been 2 more times.) Later that night we met up with some friends and ate at Outback. I got a kitchen mixer (which I LOVE) and an i-pod (which I broke already). That Sunday we celebrated with my mom and siblings. She made a delicious meal, as usual! We played volleyball in the back yard in the pouring rain.

Another fun event was pumpkin carving with friends. Ours turned out pretty good for no stencils... We also played catch phrase (which always gets more hilarious the later the night gets).

Group shot

Another event was Jensen family FHE. It is supposed to be a monthly thing, but rarely works out that way lol. I am blogging about this FHE because something small and insignificant to most people happened that made me realize how lucky I am to have married into such a great family. Dan and I were walking out the door, down the front steps when one of my earrings fell out. It was a pretty big one, and I thought I had seen were it landed, but Dan and I started searching for it in the grass and couldn't see it anywhere. One by one people came outside and started helping us look. Gpa J was on his hands and knees in the wet grass, aunts and uncles, cousins, and siblings came out just to help us find my stupid earring. We looked for about 20 mins when Dan and I had to go; it was only a cheap pair of earrings, and I was fine with letting it go. But the family was determined to find my earring, and sure enough they finally did. They must have been out there looking in the dark for about 40 minutes. On the way home Gpa Jensen dropped it off at our house. Such a small thing, but they were willing to stop everything until they found my earring. This is true of them in all aspects, when someone needs help, they are there to give it! It's refreshing to be surrounded by a family that is so selfless, positive, and just plain good!


Usually Dan and I don't make too much of a fuss on Halloween. Last year we just painted each others' faces and called it good. This year, however, we went all out. We decided it would be fun to have a Halloween party with friends, so we had to think of some clever costumes...I had lots of ideas, but we finally settled on garden gnomes. It was fun putting together our costumes! We made a simple felt skirt and Dan's belt and the hats. I found the shirts and shoes at DI, and just sorta put the look together with stuff we had lying around. We did buy the boot covers and the beard. The party was fun! We visited with friends whom we hadn't seen in a few months, and played catch phrase (it's a party favorite). There were plenty of yummy treats. I was the only non-pregnant woman there, but I am pretty sure I ate the most :) Halloween only comes around once a year, so I made sure we got plenty of pictures in our costumes!

Okay...the sign might be a little overboard lol.

My favorite part of the outfit. These shoes were a great $5 find at DI and I bedazzled them.

Pumpkin Creme pies with cream cheese filling, yum!

Ace and Easton, such cuties!

Oh yeah, Jersery Shore yeah (Pauly D anyone?)

Who ya gonna call? (I had this song stuck in my head all night)

When we got home and looked through the pictures, I realized none of the ones of Dan and I had worked, so, of course, I made us take a few. I wish we had a front lawn...

Dan is so good to put off with me and my crazy ideas :)

I have a few more costumes up my sleeve for other zumba parties this weekend; it should be fun!

Fishing the Provo River and Big Spring Hollow

Saturday morning we woke up at the crack of dawn (literally...6 am!) to fish the Provo River. We met Lorin, Bridgette, and Brent up there. It was a "first time" experience for many reasons: 1. First time wearing waders, 2. first time trying to shove a foot the sign of a football into a size 7 tennis shoe (thanks to the waders), 3. first time fishing waist deep in a river, 4. first time losing 3 lures in one fishing trip (snag after snag after snag!). I caught one fish, but it got off my line before I could get a picture. Dan caught three. These trout were much bigger than the fish I caught earlier on this year up Payson Canyon and down at Scofield, so reeling mine in was fun! Yes, I had fun...though it is not something I can see myself doing more than once a year.

Lorin with his first catch, and very first cast of the day!

While my shoes felt five sizes too small, my wader were five sizes too big!

Later on we decided to take our first "off road" mountain bike ride. We found Big Spring Hollow trail, a "must see classic" according to utahmountainbiking.com, and decided to give it a try. It was a short ride, about 4 miles is all, but man, for a beginner like me that was enough! It is steady climb the whole way up. At one point I was walking my bike up the trail. The way down was a bit scary at first. I was flying without even touching my pedals, and it took me a minute to get used to the rocky trail, but once I did I had a blast! Riding down hill is quite the adrenaline rush, the feeling is almost addicting...now I am not an adrenaline junkie or anything, but I can't wait for the next ride! It took us about an hour to get up (mostly because I wanted to take so many pictures, but okay, if I'm being honest, taking pictures was my excuse to take a breather lol) and only 20 minutes (at the most) to get down. The scenery was amazing! It truly was a "must see." The leaves have started changing colors, and you ride over several wooden bridges that cross over Big Spring Creek; all of which made for awesome pictures, and if there's one thing I love, it's pictures!

a beautiful meadow

I was praying for a 4-wheeler, a horse, really anything that would carry me up the mountain lol

The fun part! Flying down the trail

Once we got back down we took a short nap on the grass.

Masquerade 2010...

....has come and gone. Dan and I had a fun night, but I wasn't as amazed as I was last year (sshh)! We started the night off in the Mediterranean area where they served us a Greek Lamb salad and watched some belly dancers perform, then later on in the night a magician performed (well one of those magicians who is supposed to be funny because he is that bad...think of Chipps Cooney from AGT). We then made our way to the castle where it was Spanish themed. We had yummy stuffed mushrooms and veggies; the entertainment was a sword fight between men fighting for the same woman. Next, we made our way inside the grand ballroom to the Italian area. They served Alfredo and Spaghetti, and we watched a couple do a nice ballroom routine.

There was a live band playing music all night, and people were free to dance...Dan, however, wasn't too keen on the idea, and I was wearing 20 inch heels, so we skipped that activity. We got a professional picture taken inside the art gallery. There was also a silent auction, but all the prizes up for grabs were too expensive for us! They also had "It's a Beautiful Life" showing outside on a big screen TV with a bunch of couches set up for lounging. The rest of the night we were free to roam around the grounds, and because the property is so exquisite, we spend most of the night wandering around taking fun pictures. It was a nice night for a good cause.

And now, picture overload:

I like to take pics of myself while in the car...no, I wasn't the driver, this time.

Dan made a new friend.

I made a new friend

Belly dancers

freaky! (i may be talking about the woman and the snake)

My handsome man-some

These guys were on stilts and reminded me of the scary guys on Lord of the Rings

Us **post eating, I might add**

Dan and Ron, the owner/operator of the property/event

The castle, and yes, it's located in Ron's "backyard"

I leave Dan alone for two minutes, and this is where I find him

Yee-haw!

When I was in third grade, my favorite thing to do at recess was swing, meanwhile singing Ace of Base's "I saw the Sign" at the top of my lungs. Every time I swing, I think of this. No lie.

Serenading the crowd

We had a lot of fun! If you missed it this year, you need to come next year!

Labor Day Shenanigans

Can I just say I have a love/hate relationship with long weekends. Of course I love having an extra day off, to play and sleep in, and do whatever I please. But it makes it that much harder to get back to real life after-wards. This Labor Day was a hoot. Dan had spent Friday and Saturday away from home playing with friends and family, so Monday was a relief to finally have him home to spend all day with me! We woke up early and headed down to the Onion Days Grand Parade. My sister Kelee was on one of the floats; she was dressed as a scarecrow and got to hand out fliers...lucky her :) We walked around the park, and I bought a $16 necklace that seriously is worth $1. I don't know what I was thinking. I also got a cute bracelet, and got a free scarf (that I will probably never wear because I can never pull off the whole scarf look, but still, it was free!) We spent the afternoon with Dan's family which consisted of eating yummy food, and having our annual Labor Day volleyball tournament. I made banana cream and french silk pies.

Dan, Brent, and Lorin got their monster trucks out for one last bash before winter. They took them off some sweet jumps up in west mtn, but both Brent and Dan ended up wrecking hard, so the fun was over pretty quickly.

And now, some pictures of the fun:

Kelee AKA scare crow

Dan-the-handy-man tuning up the ol truck

Banana Cream

My fluting skills have improved greatly, if I do say so myself.

French Silk

Yuki did a lot of this

and this...Ava is her best friend ha ha

Christmas

Christmas came early at our house... for a few reasons.

1. Because the gifts we wanted (bikes) are not very useful in the winter time, and

2. because it is the end of the 2010 biking season so the bikes we wanted were at a really, really good price, and

3. because when I see something I want, I have a really, really hard time waiting to buy it. It can be a bit of a problem, but not this time. :)

Dan and I crossed our hearts, hoped to die, and stick a needle through our eye, to each other that this would in fact be our entire Christmas to each other.

So, yes, we now have bikes! 2010 Specialized hardrocks to be exact. I don't wanna go into detail on the specs, since most of you don't know or care anyways, but they are top of the line for entry level mountain bikers/recreational riders....which fits me to a T. It has been so much fun. The first day we got them we biked 12 miles around West Mtn/Orem. My butt was killing me the next day, but I have gotten used to it now. We also have a class Tues/Thurs at UVU at the same time, so we have been biking to school and back. It takes us about the same time as driving because we don't have to deal with traffic and parking issues.

We bought a rear basket for Yuki to be able to ride in. I took her for a short ride around our facility to get her used to the idea. When I first put her in it and strapped her down she was shaking and so scared. I felt kinda bad and wondered if it was even going to work out, but I think towards the end of the ride she was used to it. We haven't taken her on any of our longer rides because of the extra weight and such though. We plan on biking down the sundance or provo canyon bike trail this weekend, and I can't wait. I found a hobby I can see myself really getting in to! I haven't gotten a pic of Dan on his bike yet, but here are some of Yuki and me on her first ride :)