Ode to trekking poles

Without knowing it, I married a man who loves to hike. Now, this comes from a girl who would do ANYTHING IN THE WORLD to get out of participating in the hike at girl's camp when I was younger. This summer, we are going to go on many vacations with hiking involved. We are going to Mesa Verde, Arches National Park, Zion's National Park, and Bryce Canyon National Park. A few weeks ago, we decided to do a hike up Rock Canyon in Provo. After the hike, Chris suggested that we get some trekking poles to help our journey. Today, we tried them out. They make hiking a lot easier and more bearable! They help with balance, and take the strain off of my knees. I am in favor of trekking poles, although they did make my arms a little sore!

Friends are the best!

I love my friends!  I haven't seen this friend in YEARS, and it was just like old times getting together with her.  Last time I saw her, she was getting married in 2005.  Now, she has a beautiful baby, and I have a husband too.  Yeah that we are still friends!

Happy Birthday week!

We have three birthdays in our families in the same week--whew!  Mom Rusch's was yesterday, Mom Davis's is today, and Matt's is tomorrow.  We sent Mom Rusch flowers, gave Mom Davis some books while we were home for Mother's Day, and had dinner with Matt and Nate today for Matt's birthday.  Happy Birthday to all!

New Haircut

What do you think?  Sometimes it's nice to get a good summer haircut!

Dumpster Diving

On Saturday, I went through my closet and found clothes that I haven't worn in a while and wanted to take to the D.I.  Of course, I hadn't totally parted with them, so I wanted them to go to my car for a few days so that I could think about it.  So, I put them by our door in a garbage sack and went to see a friend who was in town.  When I got back, the sack had disappeared.  This was the conversation that ensued.
Me: Where did my D.I. clothes go?
Chris: Where did you put them?
Me: By the door.
Chris: I think I threw them away.
Me: We had a conversation about how it was my D.I. pile.
Chris: Well, you shouldn't have put them by the other garbage by the door
Me: The other garbage was NOT by the door when I put them there.  You moved it!
We went out to the dumpster to see if they were by chance on top of the big, smelly heap of garbage.  They were not.  Chris offered to put on boots and dig through it to see if he could find the missing clothes.  I informed him that even if he did find the clothes, I would not wear them once they had been dug out of the trash.

One Year Down, Eternity to go!

So, this is a picture of us about a year ago . . .

And this is a picture of us now . . .

OK, so we look a little stoned and not all gussied up in this picture, but really not much has changed!

April 11th is our one year anniversary!  Because we both had Spring Break the week before (thank you, school districts, for making them happen at the same time!), we pretty much celebrated our anniversary all week.
First, we went home to Idaho Falls, and went to the cabin with Mom and Dad.  Casey was in Florida with the band, so it was just us!  It was a lot of fun, and kind of a special treat to be at the cabin with just Mom and Dad.  On the way up, it was blizzarding hard.  Chris asked if we could go snowmobiling, to which Mom and Dad said that there was probably no way.  Well, we got up there and decided that between sessions of General Conference, we should try it.  It was a blast!  We actually broke trail on trails in some spots!

We knew that we needed to get anniversary gifts for each other.  If you look up traditional and modern anniversary gifts, they are paper and clocks.  Instead, we decided to get each other sandals to help start out the summer!

After great fun in Island Park and Idaho Falls, we came home, cleaned our house, packed up, and headed to Salt Lake City for a couple of days.  We had a great time!  We went to the Church Historic Library, the new Deseret Book flagship store, and hung out at Gateway Mall for a while.  We went to the new Alice in Wonderland movie (fantastic, by the way), and had dinner at the Stoneground Restaurant in Salt Lake.  We got a groupon to eat there, and thought it was fantastic.  It's a little "hole in the wall" restaurant that is actually on the second floor of a building.

It was way cool.  We have a tradition at the Gateway of getting cookies to eat, because they are very good, and it's a lot of fun to do.

Then, on Saturday, we drove to Pocatello and saw the Dodge National Circuit Finals Rodeo.  We met Mom and Dad and Grandma and Grandpa Davis there.  It was a really long trip (3 hours there, and 3 hours back), but a lot of fun!

That's the anniversary in a nutshell!

One year

Like Chris has said, it is almost Spring Break.  Spring Break starts on Monday, but to me, it starts today at 3:00.  That is when we are headed out for a long weekend with my family.
Spring Break also means that it has been a year since we got married.  That is kind of hard to believe!  Part of me thinks that it seems a lot longer ago that we got married, part of me thinks that we got married last week, and part of me thinks that one year seems just about right.
I have learned a lot in the last year, and so has Chris.  I am excited that I will learn much more as this experience continues, and that we will do it together.