October and November 2010

We have been super busy ever since we got home from Alaska. We got home the end of September and have been out of town every weekend since! (SLC, Provo, Mesquite, Cali, Wyoming...I could go on) And it doesn't look like it's going to slow down. We did, however, manage to take a few trips for us and have some fun!

The end of October we went to visit Ryan and Mindy in LA. We went to Six Flags one day and then to a Charger's game in San Diego. On our way home we ate lunch at Habit Burger with Chad, Tami and the girls. Kailey had plenty to tell me about trick-or-treating for Halloween. Chad said Maddie followed the other kids around holding her bucket out...she knew exactly what she was doing and how to get all the candy!

Last night we were lucky to get some Jazz tickets from Craig. They were 2nd row tickets with a VIP pass which included dinner! It made Chris pretty jealous because he's a big Jazz fan. My parents came with us and it was a really good game against OK City!

NERD ALERT!

So my mom has gotten me into Couponing...at first I thought it was pretty lame, and after the first experience I thought I would never do it again! Now that I've done it for a few weeks I am getting the hang of it and it has taken over my life...it's actually pretty fun!

My mom and I go to Walgreen's every Monday morning at 8. That way I can do my couponing with the least amount of people in the store. This last Monday we stopped by Staples then Smith's to get great deals! This is what I bought...

• 1 - All Laundry Detergent
• 4 - Edge Shaving Creams
• 4 - Boxes of Cheerios
• 4 - Nivea Body Wash
• 4 - Old Spice Body Wash
• 2 - Gillette Body Wash
• 6 - Miracle Whip
• 6 - Fuze Drinks
• 2 - Reams of Staples Paper
• 1 - Soy Milk
• 2 - Kraft BBQ Sauce
• 1 - Smart Balance Butter
• 7 - Crest Toothpaste
• 2 - Energizer Batteries (4 pk)
• 1 - Duracell Batteries (10 pk)
• 1 - Reach Dental Floss
• 1 - Ghiradelli Chocolate Bar
• 6 - Peanut M&M
• 1 - Wii Remote Candy Holder
• 1 - Dinosaur Toothbrush Holder
• 1 - Reynold's Tin Foil (75 sq ft)

So I got $233.55 worth of product, Spent $75.19, Saved $158.36 with a total of 68% savings! That's not even the best that I've done. I have put them all on a spreadsheet and for the month have saved 74% :) Now I finally have stuff to put in storage! Now if only I had a storage room haha

APX Backend Party

Nitro Circus came and performed at the APX Backend Party!

My camera couldn't get any good pictures when it got dark (I still don't know how to use it) so I only got a couple of pictures.

This was the track they were building all week. They put it up in the parking lot in front of the APX Building in Provo.

Travis Pastrona and the other guys in the crew all skydived in. It was cool cuz they jumped out of the plane and came shooting straight down and then ejected their shutes and came landing in the track. Travis actually ran into a dirt jump. haha

Beau was holding Jeter (Craig and Julie Andersen's) when they came landing in and he was so cute just staring up at the sky. He thought it was way cool!

Travis Pastrona and the Jazz Bear

APX Corporate...Travis did a jump over them.

This was also our FIRST YEAR ANNIVERSARY! Wahoo! What a torrific year Beau and I had...well maybe you should ask Beau if he thinks different haha But after the party we went and stayed at Hines Mason, a bed and breakfast in downtown Provo. We had alot of fun and would recommend staying there!

Wildlife Tour - Seward, AK

We were lucky to be able to go on a Wildlife Tour! Beau wanted to take his guys for an incentive :) So there was a big group of 15 that went...and I'm mad I didn't take a picture of people on the boat, mostly the wild.

Tessa before we boarded...she's a model :)

Bram and Tessa

Tessa, Bram, Chris

A cute little otter, busy eating

All my pictures of the Bald Eagles were blurry...it was hard to take a picture really far away and while the boat was rocking. We were even lucky to see an Eagle's nest!

It was a beautiful ride, there is still a lot of snow so it was pretty cold.

Sea Lions

King of the Mountain

Mountain Goat

I was really looking forward to seeing this little guy! We saw quite a few but they wouldn't let us get close, they would just fly away....Puffins! It's the one little bird off to the left by itself.

There are tons of birds! You can see little white specks in the next picture. I can't remember what they're called, but they're about the size of a pigeon but all white.

Other Birds....

Can you see what is in this picture?! Look close! You can see 3 fins of killer whales! :)

It was tons of fun, but it wore us out! We weren't excited about the 2 hour drive home afterwards, and Kelli got reallyl sick on the trip :(

California Trip - Ryan's Surprise Birthday!

So for a month Mindy was planning a surprise birthday for her husband Ryan. 5 of us (Bucky, Tyler, Carlie, Beau and I) were planning on going to LA and visiting and of course go to a baseball game! When we showed up we were at Ryan's front door pounding on it until he answered and totally surprised him! I wish I would have gotten a picture of it because it was HILARIOUS!

This is Ryan and Mindy @ PF Chang's

We went to the Flea Market and these guys were there promoting a movie coming out...

We went to a SUPER YUMMY cupcake store called Sprinkles! The Red Velvet was divine!!

Bucky and Mindy playing at the beach. We played beach volleyball...I need to get the pictures from Carlie, she took a bunch :)

Ryan, Beau, Tyler and Bucky @ the beach

The guys

We were actually able to go to 2 baseball games! Both Angel's vs Dodgers but one game at each park!

Dodger Stadium

Angel's Stadium

HOLY COW! I BLOGGED!!! :) ***Drive to Alaska***

So I am finally blogging again! Now that I am not in school I have more time. I have posted some pictures from the drive out...I didn't think about it but I didn't get any of the people that we went with, just scenery and animals haha

So let me tell you about our experience...
Day 1: Beau, Chris, Meagan and I left Saturday morning, stopped in Provo for a while at the APX building then made the last of the drive to Shelby, MT.
Day 2: We woke up early the next morning and drove to the boarder. The boarder crossing was a nightmare! We were their really early so we could drive really far that day. We had to wait there for 2 hours because the notes we took were screwed up and they said they were invalid and uncredible. So we had to call from a payphone because there is no cell service...call Craig in Florida, have him call someone in Provo (because for some INSANE reason the phone wouldn't call 801 numbers) then wait for a while and call back, etc, etc. But we needed someone to go over to the APX building (it's Sunday mind you) and get all our contracts we signed and fax them to the boarder. SO...two hours later we got them and finally was able to go on. Driving in Canada was confusing because the gas is in Liters. The cheapest gas we were able to get was in Calgary and it was $0.98/Liter, other than that it was like $1.15/Liter avg. Our next stop was in Dawson Creek, BC. We met up with Jimmy (Meagan's husband) there and found a hotel.
Day 3: We went on to drive to Whitehorse, YT and stay the night. The roads on this day were pretty bad though. We never saw one cop the whole drive so we were driving about 25 km/hr over the speed limit (80mph) and the roads, out of nowhere, were way damaged and had huge pot holes in them. It was weird to be pulling into our next city because not only did we lose an hour each day but the sun was still up till the time we fell asleep and it was already up when we got going again.
Day 4: We finally got back to US soil and couldn't wait! We thought the roads were bad from Dawson Creek -> Whitehorse....they were WAY worse from Whitehorse to the boarder! And as were showing the guys at the boarder our papers you could see people working on the roads on the other side! haha Our last little bit of drive in Canada might have had terrible roads but it was by far the most beautiful scenery! Huge mountains, frozen lakes...it was just green and white! Needless to say, we finally made it! Anchorage is kinda dumpy right now, but I can't wait for it to be green and pretty!

Here is the map I used when we were in the Yukon Territory...so this is about 1/3 of our drive! The mileage from Cedar was 3,400 miles! We went straight up I-15 to Calgary and Edmonton, then over on the Alaska Highway to Dawson Creek, Whitehorse, then to Alaska.

This is Mt. Logan (by Whitehorse) It's the tallest point in Canada :)

19551 ft tall!!
Just some pictures. There was TONS of lakes and rivers. Most were frozen or unthawing.

**Jimmy and Meagan in the blue truck, and Chris in the red car.

an iced lake

There were all kinds of animals crossing the roads. It was really dangerous at night, not only because of the animals (which are HUGE) but I think all their snow washes off their painted lines because SO many roads are missing lines and Anchorage's roads are like that now. It's weird having a 4 lane highway with no lines...I'm surprised their aren't accidents!

Caribou Bison

Sheep

Moose

some snowy mountains

Paul Bunyan is even in Canada!

So the drive was so boring and ugly (you know what So. Idaho looks like...no mountains and no trees or anything) but once we got on the Alaska Highway after Edmonton we got more trees and then we came to mountains and out of nowhere there was this huge valley with this little city in the bottom. It was really pretty but my picture doesn't do it justice.

Then we finally saw it! ALASKA! We were so excited to be back on USA soil! There were many reasons why everyone hated Canada, but the reason I did was because they didn't have any FOUNTAIN soda! And when we crossed the boarder there was a gas station with a fountain! Thank you America!