Las Vegas Motor Speedway (NHRA)

October 30, 2008--

Jeremy finally took a vacation! Way to go, Jeremy! He's currently in Vegas with Mom and Don at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway Drag Track for the NHRA drag races. They (Mom and Don) are both NHRA racers and they often frequent these big venues in their quest for points for the title at the end of the year (sorry Mom & Don if I don't get the race jargon right, please forgive me!). Anyway, as a crew member, Jeremy gets to go down the staging lanes with them and stand at the start line. He took this picture of Mom's car (Diana) presumably just before she did her burn-out in the water box--hence the water under her back tires but no smoke yet--before she staged at the tree and went down the quarter-mile track for a test-n-tune run. Jeremy reports that he is having a great time and if I get more pictures I'll update the blog as I can.~

Pumpkin Seeking & Carving

October 25, 26 & 29, 2008--

Melissa and I set out on a mission to find pumpkins to carve before Halloween so our first idea was to hit the pumpkin patch at the corn maze (you may have heard about this corn maze, it has Obama's & McCain's faces as the maze route). (Below is a picture of us on one of the bridges in the gigantic maze.) We went through the maze first because we didn't want to carry our pumpkins around and didn't want to walk them back out to the car (the place was packed and we had to park far, far away) but by the time we were done with the maze it was dark and we didn't bring flashlights. We thought about coming back on Sunday but found out they would be closed.

So we ventured out again on early Sunday evening looking for pumpkins (not just any grocery store pumpkin would do!) and headed toward another local corn maze, only to find that it, too, was closed on Sunday. So we ended up at one of my favorite little family farms called Spyglass Gardens and we walked through their patch (see picture below) and then found a couple perfect-sized ones sitting on a stand near the front of the property.

While we were carving our pumpkins on Wednesday night (sans the husbands who were out of town), we were treated to a surprise guest, Lee, our beloved pet-sitter. She was in town sitting for some friends of ours so she stopped by! In the picture directly below this paragraph, Lee is helping Melissa tape the pattern on her pumpkin.

Here is the final product! Stacey's pumpkin is the classic pumpkin on the left and Mel's is the cool one on the right.~

STAR Course Completed!

October 24-26, 2008--

After having been a passenger behind our husbands on our motorcycles for several years, my friend Melissa and I decided to enroll in the STAR Course to see if piloting our own motorcycle was something that interested us. (STAR stands for Skills Training Advantage for Riders - see graphic below for more details.) We had a fabulous time, despite the fact that our range hours (time scheduled for hands-on motorcycle training) were 8 am - Noon on the first day and 8 am - 1 pm the second day (it was around 40 degrees in the early morning hours the first day and around 30 degrees in the early morning hours the second day). Lucky for us, having been passengers on motorcycles already, we already owned all the warm weather gear needed for that temperature...but it was STILL cold! In the picture above, we are on a break between exercises, trying to warm up.

We took the "Basic I" course and the motorcycles were provided for our course so the bikes were perfectly sized for Melissa and I who are vertically-challenged (short!). We were both on little 125cc Suzukis (see us below by our assigned bikes) and they were perfect to practice on. Overall we had about 9 hours of range time and probably about 9 hours of classroom time. Melissa and I both passed the range evaluation (it's basically the equivalent of a "road test") and the written exam. All that's left is taking the written test at the DMV and we'll have our motorcycle endorsement! We are now seriously considering getting our own motorcycles so watch out world! Ha-ha! In all seriousness, if we learned nothing else this weekend, we learned that it's everyone ELSE we need to watch out for!~

Retreat on the Lake in the Mountains

October 17-19, 2008--

I had a wonderful time relaxing and recharging this weekend at a retreat on the lake in the mountains. I was blessed to be with some great friends (new and old)! Check out the scenery...isn't it amazing?!

Goodbye...you'll be missed!

October 17, 2008--

My brother Doug, my nephews Tristan and Ethan, and my niece Madison left town today on an airplane headed way up North to cold country. I'm sending a shout-out telling you that you are loved and you will be missed. Keep in touch!~

Jill, Jerod & Karsten Visit!

October 16, 2008--

Jill, Jerod & Karsten were in town with family and we had them over for dinner and a tour of the house! It was great to finally connect with them because they have been in town several times in the past 6 months or so and we are always busy. Karsten is growing up so fast and he's now on the move. He was too shy to show us his newest talent (walking) but I'm sure he'll be cruising along next time we see him!~

Earliest Snow on Record!

October 10, 2008--

Can you believe it? We got snow! It's not so hard to believe, really, since we live in this great mountainous State, but our home is in a relatively mild weather area so it was surprising. It was the earliest snow on record (since they started keeping track of these things in our area back in the 1930's)! It was unseasonably cold but the snow was worth it. It was beautiful! I didn't get a chance to take a picture of the snow until after dark but you can probably see enough of it in this picture to get the idea.~

Another great WWF!

October 2-4, 2008--

We had another great WWF (weekend with family)! Our cousins, Kole and Logan, didn't have school on Thursday or Friday so they, along with their parents (Uncle Kim and Aunt Lori), came to town for a few days! It was a lot of fun (despite the fact that Jeremy and I had to work on Thursday and Friday!) because they love to play games, a favorite pastime of ours usually only reserved for the holidays when we are with lots of family!~

A post out of order...and a BIG thank you!

October 3, 2008--

I was looking through my digital pictures today at lunch and realized that I totally missed blogging these photos! We owe a BIG thank you to Mom and Grandma for coming to our house a couple of weeks ago (September 16) and fixing dinner for us. It was such a treat!

On top of bringing and cooking a fantastic dinner (swedish meatballs with zuchinni!) they brought tons of fresh fruit and vegetables from Grandma and Grandpa's garden. (See picture at the bottom of this post.)

All of the fresh fruit and vegetables they brought (and the dinner they cooked) were great but the one thing I really have to brag about were Grandpa's table grapes...simply amazing. He's got quite a green thumb.




Thanks again Mom & Grandma (& Grandpa)!~