Summer Adventures

Other than the fact that June has been unusually hot (the hottest June since I've been in Atlanta), life seems pretty awesome.

We're settling into our new house nicely. I haven't got the nursery painted or set up yet, but most of our other stuff is out and organized. I went on a garage sale / estate sale shopping trip this last weekend and found some great stuff: two matching 6' bookcases, some old kids books, some nice slacks for Chase, and best of all, my reading corner chair! I've been wanting a nice plush chair to put in the corner of our bedroom for a reading corner and I found the perfect one at an estate sale. Since it was the last day of a three day sale, it was 50% off - only $100!

My awesome reading corner with a beautiful chair and big bookcase!

I also found this super terrifying doll. But I didn't buy it - $20, seriously!?

I've been trying pretty hard to stay fairly active despite the heat and the increasing difficulty of simple tasks like putting on shoes. A couple of weeks ago we went to the cabin with our friends, Brad and Sarah Yates. On Saturday morning we hiked a little 3 mile portion of the Appalachian trail - it was gorgeous!

Oh yeah, funny story. While we were moving, Chase "found" his old hiking boots (they had been hiding from him at the bottom of his closet - where his shoes theoretically belonged). He was so excited to wear them hiking. Less than 5 minutes into our hike, the sole flopped off of his boot, attached only at the heel. He shrugged it off and wanted to keep going until two minutes later...FLOP. The other sole disattached. So we had to go back to the car so he could change out to his normal tennis shoes. Good thing, too, because we discovered we'd been going the wrong way! We eventually made it to Preacher's rock, which had this awesome view.

Chase's family likes to go camping up at Lake Lanier three or four times every year. And finally, two years after joining the family, I was actually able to join them. They were all there from Wednesday to Saturday, but Chase and I only made it up for Friday night and Saturday clean up. I slept in my hammock, which was surprisingly comfortable. Plus, the view when I woke up in the morning was amazing!

I got to go up to North Carolina  on a "work trip". This means that Fockele has a couple of sites in the Raleigh/Durham area that we sub-contract out to another company and we like to check up on them quarterly. I happily volunteer to go, since I get to see Mindy and Jeran. Plus, my company pays for my drive time, so that's awesome. I had fun hanging out with the Stratfords, even if baby Allison had a bit of a cold. She liked sitting on the hammock with me. It makes me very excited for a couple of months from now!

And now a quick pregnancy update - everything is going great. I am 33 weeks +5 days (meaning my week mark is on Tuesay. So this coming Tuesday I will be 34 weeks pregnant). I have had a little bit of ankle swelling, but so far it's not a permanent thing - just once in a while. Sleeping is sometimes difficult, but I really like (and/or need) an afternoon nape. I really don't like being outside in the heat (I'm not sure that's actually a pregnancy symptom, but I have a good excuse for staying inside more!). My right ribs feel pretty bruised. So pretty much, this pregnancy is going really well and I have nothing to complain about!

Homesick

It has been 154 days since I left Utah for Atlanta (or 5 months and 2 days) and I'm officially homesick. Previously, the longest I'd been away from home was...like, 2 months. Maybe. Probably more like a month and a half when I lived in Virginia. Don't get me wrong, Atlanta is great, and I'm enjoying life here, but it's just Not Home. Here are some things that I'm missing:

Family - I love my family tons, and I feel like I haven't seen them in forever! With the exception of Mindy and Jeran, because I actually see them tons more now, which is great. Dad did manage to stop by once on a twelve hour layover, which was good. I did get to visit Andrew and Lindsay and Riley in Pittsburgh, too. They're not Utah family though. So, special shout out to Mom and Alyna, both of whom I really really miss a lot! Extended family, too. (Lisa and Cameron, I miss you guys too, but you don't live in Utah. I'll come visit sometime though!)  

Friends - I'm getting lots of friends here, but that doesn't stop me from missing my friends in Logan and in Provo. Especially Erilyn Heintz, Sarah Hafen, April Atkin, and Mindy Pinson. Well, April is actually on her mission, so I wouldn't be able to see her anyway, but I still miss her. (Kalie, you're in Rexburg and I never saw you. We talk more now, but I can't wait to see you again!) 

Desert - I miss the open spaces and sparse beauty of Utah's deserts, especially the red rock areas. I enjoy having trees here, but they give a very uniform look to the landscape.  

Mountains - They're just so majestic and comforting to have near. Also, real hiking involves going up a mountain, not winding around some little trail next to a flat boring river or tiny little park.

Dry heat - It's hot here. Like, ridiculous - 95 degrees and it's only May. I think I might die this summer. The worst part is the humidity which makes the heat suffocating and makes you sweat about 7x more easily. I honestly don't know how people live in places even more hot and humid than this. 

Some aspects of my life at BYU - including my Landscape Management friends and professors, lots of people to go running with (that live nearby), BYU tree crew and all of the fun and chill-ness that implies, Spicy Thai restaurant, J-Dawgs, Jamba Juice, Zupa's, being able to just not go to classes if that's what I really wanted. 

And probably a bunch of other small things. Yep, I'm homesick. Even one of my coworkers noticed and commented on it. His advice was to go home as often as possible, even just for the weekend (yeah, because that works with a $500 plane ticket). I am planning on coming out for a good week and some odd days in August, so I just have to survive another 68 days. 

Something Like Spring Break

Since it's been about four years since I've had a spring break, this past weekend was a fun little experience for me. Some friends from church really wanted to go to Savannah or Charleston for the weekend and invited me. It ended up being me, Maurine, Christina, and Holly.

Maurine, Holly, me, Christina

SO MUCH FUN!

We drove down on Friday evening and came back Sunday afternoon. 

Some of the random fun things that added to this memory were: each of us brought a bunch of snacks to share - mostly sugar, I discovered Zaxby's for the first time (chicken fast food place, but very different from Chik-fil-A), a bunch of college kids also on spring break, a fire alarm going off at the hotel.

Saturday was packed with all sorts of goodness:

Going to the beach

 Flying kites

 Getting rained on

 Walking down River Street in Savannah

Exploring the candy stores 

 Eating at The Cotton Exchange (fried cheesecake!)

Walking around Forsyth Park

It was really pretty with the rain/mist and the Spanish moss hanging off the live oaks. I love this city.

Sunday we drove back after watching the morning session of conference at a nearby church building. Could a weekend get any better?

Visiting Virginia

Since moving to Atlanta, one of the things I have really been wanting to do was drive to Virginia and visit people I know there from my internship in summer 2010. While I am much closer than I was in Utah, it's still about a ten hour drive each way. Or eleven hours if I split it into two drives and spend a night in North Carolina. I tried it both ways.

I had decided to go up on Presidents Day weekend, because I need the extra day for the long travel time. And then I decided in order to see everyone I wanted to, I needed another day. Luckily my boss seemed to have no problem giving me that Friday off as well (it's our slow season right now, so that helps).

I actually stayed in Durham on Thursday night with Mindy and Jeran's friends, Mary and Adam, since Mindy and Jeran were in Utah visiting. It was kind of nice having the drive split up in two, and talking to my mom all the way through South Carolina helped, too. I really enjoy the bluetooth feature in my car that allows me to talk to people while I drive. Legally. Talking to people really makes the driving time disappear - on the way home I had plentiful time to talk to many people, so that was very fun. This was the first long solo road trip, and I was quite happy that it went so well and really didn't seem that difficult.

There were four main groups/people that I visited with: The Care of Trees office in Dulles (where I interned), the Anderson family (where I lived), Ryan Royston (best friend), and the Jenkins (good friends of the Andersons and now mine).

My visit to TCOT was rather impromptu and unannounced. I just drove over for fun, to see the once-familiar route and hopefully be able to chat with some old coworkers. Luck was with me, and I arrived at the office just near the end of the day, so I was able to surprise everyone with my random visit. I talked with Jeremy (boss and friend) for a while, but also Dave, Dean, Mark, Doug, and Ron as they were coming back from their work days. It was fun to see them again, and to know that I could go work there whenever I wanted - according to Jeremy.

I spent a lot of time at the Andersons', since that's where I was staying for the weekend, but we didn't really do anything together. It was more casual than that, like I belonged there and it wasn't at all different for me to stay there. It was a whole lot of fun memories though. Like the picture frame on the wall with the store-provided photos, or the chocolate crispies for breakfast.

Ryan and I spent quite a lot of time together. Dinner on Friday night at IHOP, where we compared our nice new cars and dealership stories (he'd gotten his car that day, so it was fun to compare notes. Our cars are quite similar). Saturday afternoon we went to McKay Used Books, Inc in Manassas. SO FUN! They have so many books, movies, music, everything. We spent hours there. I ended up buying some movies, a famous buildings of the world book, and a beautiful big book of Sherlock Holmes - it has every single Conan Doyle story, and it looks like it's never been opened before. Fun! Then we had dinner and watched some movies (including the home video his little brother had just finished editing together. I rather liked Thor, but watching Count of Monte Cristo just makes me upset at how completely inferior it is to the book. In every way. It was so good to see Ryan again - it's been almost five months since I've seen him, and two months since I've spent significant time with a close friend who's not also a family member. It was sad to leave because who knows when the next opportunity to visit will be.

I spent Sunday evening with the Jenkins' at Pemberley (that's what their house is called. They're both very big Jane Austen fans). We had a nice pot roast dinner and visited for a while.

I really loved my visit to Virginia, it felt a lot like being at home. Not home home, but a home. Very familiar and comfortable, lots of friends and family type people. I wish I could visit again soon, but it's a really long drive and I have so many other places to visit and explore.

The final hurdle

I'm near the end of this great long race known as the 2009-2010 school year, and I'm almost done with it...but there's one last hurdle in between me and the finish line: the last three days of finals. This is truly how I feel. I'm so excited for the semester to be over and go on to my summer activities at home in Logan and in Virginia, but I just don't know if I have it in me to get over that last hurdle first.

Four Finals left:

Econ (the beastliest - will kill me)

Arboriculture - I'll study for it and do ok.

Plant Prop - I'll probably study a little

Design - I get to draw all day tomorrow

Other than those four obstacles, I just have to pack and stuff and I'm home free!!!

But there are people and things that I have loved about this school year and will miss dearly:

Mindy Hall - We've been roommates for almost 20 months. But Hooray! She's getting married!

212 girls - Erilyn, April, Sarah, Stacy, Claire, and Mari - they have let me be their adopted roommate all year! Love you all!

The BYU Tree Crew - Max Darrington (boss), Nate, Preston, Michelle, Andrew, Katie, Matt, Jason, Kalie (but i'll be with her all summer, so that's HAPPY!), and the work in general!

Landscape Mgmt people, esp. those graduating - Benji, Cecilia, Meghan, Preston, Cameron, Jason, Brooke, et al

Blues dancing - dancing!, Dave, David, Andy, Kaitlyn, Laura, Hales, John, Anneke, Amanda, et al

It's been a great year, and next time I post, I will not be in Provo or my sophomore year anymore!!!

Landscape Major

I know you all think I'm slightly ridiculous, with all of my trees and plant classes and such, but I just have to say that I love my major, my job, all my friends from work and school, and I love life. I'm getting ready for my big competition in Atlanta in April - the PLANet Student Career Days, where I will be competing in Woody plant ID and Arboriculture Technical skills. Before you start making skeptical faces at the screen, let me explain that the most important part of this trip is not the competitions, it's the networking with major green industry companies from all over the country, which will help me get internships and jobs in the future. And one of the best ways for me to make a good impression on these potential employers is to do really well in my competitions, so I'm putting forth a lot of effort to do well. Actually, I also just want to place 1st. :-)

Also I've been spending more time with people in my major, and it's been great. I love being friends with these people! We have such common interests and understanding and future, but still so diverse in our options, that it's so much fun to talk to everyone! I look forward to being good friends with them all.

So really, Landscape Mgmt major describes about 2/3 of my life - school and work. Dance and econ and hanging out with apt. 212 is the other 1/3. I'm really enjoying life right now.