donde vivas?

en Purdue Village!

:-D

Presenting, the long awaited pictures of our pretty new apartment!!

Moving-in Stories:

We got back to Lafayette and had time to check into our new apartment in Purdue Village before Mark had to run to his new grad student orientation. I got to unpack the car a bit to get out living stuff out-dishes, clothes, the bedding, etc. -and got things settled a little; i went to the store, got some food, ... found out that when we had been packing and unpacking the car, we had accidentally popped a giagantic hole into the air mattress we had slept on all summer (oops!). We made a noble effort to "patch" the mattress with duct tape and bike patches BUT... to no avail. :o( It was pretty fun to sleep in though-as long as you were not going for that "rested" feel in the morning :o) It left you with the distinct impression of sleeping... in an inflatable taco. It was pretty cool because the sides roll you to the middle and knock you into each other in the night- its almost like forced cuddle therapy. :-D To prevent accidentally elbowing mark repeatedly in the face ( :o( sorry mark! ) I tried to move to the edges to try to equalize the pressure distribution :o) All in all, it felt kinnda like those carnival bouncey inflatable palace things. I really just wanted to jump on the remains of the air mattress to see what would happen. In my mind, it would be the greatest ever if it would bounce me back out again--that would SO be the greatest toy EVER. What prevented me from doing this was the simultaneous vision of me jumping on it and the mattress exploding and my face smashing into the tile floor. No fun. I guess I'm just not that brave.

The next day we had angels--in the form of Emanuel Castro, the Elders, Alex Hill, and Brother and Sister Higareda-- come to help us move our stuff from storage into our apartment. They carried SO MUCH STUFF up those stairs! The elders stayed to even help us move the stuff we didnt bring to the apartment into another smaller storage unit at the storage place.It was so great of them to help. Then Mark accidentally locked the keys in the rental truck when they were turning the truck in...whoopsies! Everything got resolved though, and after we got the elders home we went to a welcome BBQ for AFROTC for Mark. Then we went and got text books and school supplies for the semester that started up on Monday.

Then we came home, set up the bed, and passed out.

In other words...

...it had been a veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery long summer!

And, we're, back on the road!

So! The muffler escapade was the most exciting thing that happened while we were driving home, but here are some more highlights of the drive: :o)

This cloud looks like an alligator!

This one is kinnda hard to see...but, this cloud looks like the Great Sphinx of Giza, with an eagle head!


Lush greenery. Pretty cool. It reminds me of the time that goose and I were discussing how living in the desert makes you sensitive to slight changes in the "green-ness" level of native weeds. For example, after a good rain in the spring and summer the dessert will green up really beautifully and wild flowers and all kinds of stuff will start popping up that "foreign outsiders" never knew lurked under all that hard dry stuff we call "sand". AND, after a REALLY wet stretch all this grass-ish stuff comes up in patches TOO! And THEN when youre driving you can't HELP but exclaim " OH! WHAT LUSH, VERDENT GRASSLAND! FEAST YOUR EYES ON THE GREENERY!"

...in reality, if you were to ask anyone else, they would still see just barren desert.

Ah how fickle perspective paints the world ;o)

Approach to cool bridge on the mississippiCool Bridge
Mississippi

Missouri Arch. We didnt go under it since we kept going through at the wrong time--rush hour :o(
hmmm...i think we may be in indiana...(hint, the blurry sign says: "Hoosier Park, thataway!")
Yep! Were back in Indiana! Thar 'b them flat corn feilds! :-D

We made it to Indiana AND Muncie safe and sound and got to visit with Mark's family for a few days/ recover from driving. :o) It was really nice to get to spend some more time with them, and sadly, I took no photos :o( I do have one story though...

..its pretty funny ( in retrospect) :

While we were visiting with Marks family, Mark gave jimminy a tune up and an oil change. During the oil change, we accidentally thought that the starter was cracked, so we may have removed it. Once we removed it, we may have discovered that it was not cracked. Oh no. Instead it had been ingeniously welded to look like it was cracked, while infact it was perfectly sound. Silly starter! Its not halloween! :-D So then, we may have had the fun time of putting it back it ("we" being "Mark" since mostly I just laid on the grown under the car watching him and getting leaves in my hair and black yucky stuff on my face offering meager moral support). Mark is so great! But after having done it twice on jimminy, I hope we (poor Mark) never have to do it again. :o( They are really heavy and you have to hold them over your head and then bolt them into place, and the bolts are in veeeeeery obscure places. Mostly I had visions of it straight out dropping onto your face while you are precariously holding it over your head with one hand to screw it in.

FYI, I wanted to take pictures of the starter for photographic evidence that it did really really look cracked...but in the moments it was just not the time ;o)

And we are Back on the road heading to...LAFAYETTE!!

:-)

OH MY GOODNESS!! THERE IS THE EXIT!! QUUUUUIIIIIICK! TUUUUUURN!!

Ah...we made it. home sweet home. :-D

CLANK! *scraaaape*

"Oo, that didn't sound good"

"What was that?"

"I don't know... but it didn't sound good..."

(~1 hour later on the interstate)

*CLANK* *WHHHHHHHHAAAREEEEEERRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRR* *SCRAAAAAAAAAPE**

"What was THAT!?"

(pull over on the side of the interstate)

WHOOSH! WHOOSH! (cars going by really really fast)

"The MUFFLER fell off!"

"oh NO!"

"Do we have anything to tie it up with? Wire or something?"

"Um, we have some clothes hangers from our nice clothes..."

"GREAT! That will work! We will just wire it up!"

"Um....so, turns out we left our nice clothes in teeks closet...and all these other hangers are

plastic...oops!"

"oh ok...so...do we have anything else?"

(rummage in the car)

"we have this BUNGEE CORD! :-D"

"Sure! lets used that! Then we need to really really get to a gas station to get some wire! "

:-D

It is important to recall that allllll this driving to Washington and Reno and San Diego and Sherman and now back to IN have been done in our really really really loaded down jimminy :o) Way to go Jimminy!

It just seems that that last trip backing out of Kiora's driveway on the way to Indiana was too much :o) We think the loud sound we heard was us hitting it on the way out, and then it just jiggled itself lose while we were a'drivin!'

The bungee cord (and LOTS of prayers) kept us pretty good until we got to the gas station. I spent my time staring intently in my side view mirror watching for flying parts; Mark spent his time driving like a champion (he is so great!). If the end of the world is coming all I can say is I am so glad to be with Mark! He will mostly likely think it is really fun :0) ANYWAY, we made it to a gas station and then mark went in and got some electrical wire, we drove the car up onto the curb to give mark some room, and he wired up the muffler , and we drove home!

We were VERY blessed, in that we still had the muffler and everything was ok, and also that we contined to drive with the muffler that way for about a semester and a half before mark fixed it, including several trips to muncie and chicago to the temple. It is SUCH a blessing that our car still runs and can take us to where we need to go.

Here are some pictures:

Mark is so smart! Here he is making a lovely little bright orange electrical wire net for the muffler to nestle comfortably in ;o) (you can also see the black smudge left by the melted bungee chord)

And speaking of melted bungee chords...

Did you know that bungee chords are made of elastic plastic? Did you know a property of elastic plastic is a very low melting temperature? Did you know mufflers are quite hot?

...All things considered, that bungee chord will never be the same!! :-) There is it hanging down altered for life (and there is my handsome mark!)

We still used it to put tension into the electrical wire by bungeeing it to the trunk.

we tied a knot in the melted part to lend it some structural integrity...sortta...

We felt pretty cool driving home. :-)

Lessons learned: Watch that curb, its a doosie.

At the Teek's and the wedding!

We stayed at the teeks house por un ratito and then fuimos a huston por la boda de mi prima! :-D

I took NO photos of houston, or the wedding, or any of my cousins, or Mark's brother...or anything :o(

So! here is a link to my mothers blog about the wedding. It was really wonderful, we went to Rachael's endowment session and to the wedding, (I was SO glad that I was able to get into the wedding as I forgot my temple recommend :o( YIKES!! ) while we were in Houston and we stayed in a really nice, really fun hotel with everyone :o) and we got to help Rachael get ready in the morning and she looked SO PRETTY! :o) and then we went down and visited with uncle Greg's family and went to the beach and played with the cousins and we got to see Martin (he came down from Austin for a few days) and it was SO nice! :o)

embarrassing but funny story at the hotel in houston:
SO! We are packing up the car to go to the reception lunch after the wedding and then head south to uncle gregs house. I have a arm full of stuff, and two sets of keys in my hands, the keys to the van AND to the car.

Put the stuff in the trunk of the car.

look at hands; yep, there is ONE set of keys there.

Good.

Slam! (Close lid to trunk)

walk back to hotel.

turn around to lock the car....with the VAN keys!

OH NO!!!

oh, yes. Yes, I managed to lock the keys to the convertible into its trunk. Funny thing about convertibles, they have this safety interlock that means even if you call the lock smith to come open the car up, you cant push the 'open the trunk' button in the car WITHOUT the keys being in the ignition. Ha ha...ha. Yep. So, we had the imense fun of trying to break into the trunk of our car with the locksmith man. We pulled up the stuff behind the steat and pulled appart the insulation and crawled in through this liiiiiiiittle tiny whole in the back. Funny thing too, its really hard to find a little set of keys inside the back of a HIGHLY packed trunk through a little whole in the dark. :o) MARK SAVED US AGAIN! :-D he is so great :o) Me and my daddy and mark were sweating really really a LOT after that; it is HOT in august in south texas!

Anyway, we made it safely to south texas, and we got to help set up for the reception and it was really fun, there were SO many little kids running around and playing, and it was great to get to visit with family again :o) As I am getting older, I think the only time that I see my family is around weddings :o) Which makes them all the more fun! :-D Then the kids went to the beach and got to play and swim. It was lots of fun to go with Kristen and Aarron and Katerine and Jacob and Adam and Laura and Alex :o) We drove down and swam for a while and then headed home again :o) When we got to Uncle Greg's house we jumped into the pool to clean off and then went back to the hotel to get cleanded up for the reception :o) The reception was really really lovely, and it was a lot of fun to see the new couple and get to dance, and especially to watch the little kids dancing and playing with one another :o) Martin came over after the reception and it was really great to spend time with him too, he was able to stay with us at the hotel we were at and play with him some more then. :o)

funny story at the hotel: alex got the COOLEST hot wheel tracks from my dad. At the hotel, my dad was diligently trying to put it together using the VERY obscure instructions (only pictures; no words). I was standing in the kitchen of the hotel room visiting and little alex runs in and says "help grandpa, help grandpa! Come help grandpa!" :-D He was SO distressed that grandpa couldn't get the hotwheel tracks to work :o) So I went to go "help grandpa"- as did some others- and we finally got the cool track to work for the totally excited little alex :o) He LOVED it! I have to admit. It was pretty durn coolio :o)

That last sunday we went to church at the Spanish branch with Uncle Greg since he was speaking there, and it was really really nice. :o)

We couldn't stay for very long since Iwalani and Chantel needed to get back for school, so they and teek and Alex left after Church and Mark and I stayed and visited some more with Martin, but then we had to bid adiue and leave as well :o(
And, I am pretty sure that we have some family pictures floating around someone where...because I remember sitting in the park on the way to church getting eaten alive by mosquitoes taking pictures...and I remember losing my sunglasses in said park taking pictures.... and once again I REALLY remember the mosquitoes...but I have no pictures from vaguely remembered event, so I will have to ask around to get my hands on those :o) So stay tuned for that!

So! Then we drove back up to the Teek's house and me and mark and mom and dad got to stay for a FEW WHOLE DAYS IN ONE PLACE WITH THE TEEK AND IT WAS THE GREATEST!! :-D

We watched the olympics (SO FUN!) and we made yummy food and visited and got to sleep in and stay up late and play with the kids

I LOVED being at the Teek's house! I had never seen it before, it is a cute little "parsonage house" and its ADORABLE :o) In retrospect, I didn't take, like, any pictures of the house becasue I was too busy having SO MUCH FUN! :o)

Here are a few pictures:
The boys having some "manly bonding" playing chess on the front porch (note that mark is wearing my super-awesome T-shirt from Teek that says "I love Aunt -T" on it with a big picture of alex on it :o) )

Alex and alex...such a handsome pair!! :-D
More manly bonding :o) Alex has a super cool chess board, and it was so nice outside :o)
He he! alex looks a little confused...
SO HANDSOME! ...and still a liiiittle distressed... :-D

:-D

it was SO WONDERFUL to get to visit with the teek and with uncle gregs family and my parents and the nani and the GOOSE :o) WE LOVE YOU ALL! :-D

¿a donde va?

...a nuevo mexico!! :-D

We wanted to stay longer and visit with Jessica and her family, but we had to run: we had less than 48 hours to travel over 1500 miles to make it to south Texas for my cousins wedding.

BUT! before we headed out again, we spent some time visiting with Jessica's mom and Michael and Lee and Thane, and it was lots of fun. We painted toenails, and went to the beach to body board, and if we could have stayed another day, mark was going to go deep see fishing with the boys and us girls were going to go out to lunch and spend the day together…but we had to leave to go home, so mark went out to lunch with us. It was SO delicious, and I ate WAY too much (my tummy was hurting, but happy) :o)

Here we are at the hose the first night we got there before the wedding: (pretty much everyone is exhausted ;o)


Here are some more pictures of us hanging out at the house:



And here are some pictures of the beach (courtesy of Jessica’s mommy! :-D ):



And these are the hair pins that I put in Lee’s hair; before we left to go to the beach, I put them all into little neat lines, for which I was promptly teased, and when I came back, this is what they looked like! :o)


We left about 5:00 pm and headed east to NM in the setting sun. It sure was hard to say godbye (I cried). It was SOO nice to get to hang out and visit with jessica and her family again, I hadn't realized how much I had missed her and her fam until I was there! I was so glad we were able to go to the wedding ,and I hope that we get to see them in the very near future.

Here are some pretty pictures of the drive:



highlights:

This picture looks exactly like a seal is on top of the rock. I think the people at SeaWorld are having an influence on the cloud formation in southern california...what do you think?:


WE ARE SO CLOSE...oh wait, not really :o) As you can see, I started counting down preeeeety early to get home.
There is the mountain from the east side of ABQ!! :-D
We went by the highshool first thing when we got into town (RRHS) to go to... marching band practice. Oh the irony! :o) I really wanted to go see the colorguard girls again (i miss them a lot too!) and the plan was we would call the Goose and go over to the school when practice got out. Or so was the plan. We had a REALLY late night driving, and we left not at early as we wanted to (which is VERY relative as we got to the motel at like...1:30 am, and then slept till 7:00 am... ) We were pushing pretty hard to get to NM, but we had to be realistic, especially in the "getting enough sleep as to not crash" category :o)

So, we did NOT get to see most of the girls as we missed the end of practice (we got lost in ABQ, and let this be a warning: the Unser exit from I-40 does NOT connect to the Unser in Rio Rancho. There is a big ol' dead end next to a school :o) ) it was pretty funny. But we DID get to see a few like Whitnerz, so it was all worth it :o)

theeeeen.... we drove ...home! AND THERE WAS MY MOUNTAIN FROM THE TOP OF THE HILL! (very big deal)
So I took two pictures of it:

And there is my house!!! :-D :-D And here are some pictures of visiting. It was SO nice to be home, I walked in and it just felt plain wonderful :o) I sure appreciate all the work that my family, especially my mom, put into making the home have such a sweet spirit in it. So wonderful! It was like a big blanket hug walking into the house! All I wanted to do was pass out on the couch and sleep for a week :o) And! Aunt Cathy drove all the way over to visit with us and she spent a lot of time visiting with Mark and I and that meant a LOT to us :o) Thanks Aunt Cathy!



i look preeeeety tired and car crazy in this picture. Keep in mind that mark and I had been driving for a looooooooooong time at this point (he is taking the pictures :o) )

We REALLY wanted to stay longer, but pretty much all we had time to do was eat, (YUMMY MOMMY FOOD!! !! :-D ) shower, (very appreciated), repack the car (mommy gave us an end table and we gave goosie my mountain bike gary! Its good to know that goosie had a nice bike friend! :o) ) and head back out again!

We did an ALL NIGHT DRIVE to Kiora's house. We were REALLY REALLY tired. We had team drivers and we switched cars and drivers between the van, the convertible, and our car jimminny to keep one another awake. And we had good ol' Hary Potter to listen to :o) Mark and I had never read the fourth book so that is what WE listened to (or what I listened to, since Mark slept a lot, poor thing, he had been driving so much!) and it was a lot of fun. Mommy had DELICIOUS snacks that she had packed for us, and bread and brie for me! (my FAVORITE!) and lots of nummy fruit :o) And each car had a cell phone, so we called and talked to one another on speaker phone. :o)

I am really glad that we didn't crash, and that we were able to make it safely to Teeks house. It is pretty crazy to think about, but from the beginning of this blog we were in southern California, and at the end of it we were in texas (read te-has). And we did it in under 48 hours. Its all kind of a blur... I mostly remember....

:-D haha! JK!