To: Abby and Brice

ALL OF MY LOVE. <3

Tragedy

I just found out who got the title I position...it is who I thought it was--Kori. She was there for a long term sub position as our head of title I department (and I really kinda didn't like her then) AND she was there for an intensive math program for kids who were at risk in their math skills. Well, she got the position...and I still didn't really kinda like her then also. She reminded me of that type of person I was always afraid of in high school--too uppity and just pretended to be nice. One day she was really nice and the next day she's mean and doesn't care what you're saying to her--like she could care less about what's going on in your life. Oh well...my friend, Karen, told me the news just now and she told me that another first grade teacher called her to tell the news and also said she was not happy with who it was. That's my satisfaction. I know that the teachers that I worked with this past spring will be unhappy with the "new" person. Well, at least I will still somewhat be attached to them by subbing for them. You know, I wouldn't be as annoyed if they had just hired someone else for the job--for instance, Karen told me that there were a whole bunch of title I tutors from another school that got displaced because of a school shutting down and he didn't even hire them--even though they had like 10 years experience or more. Why didn't he hire one of them? Is he trying to please someone? This Kori girl has a full teaching license and still wanted this job. She could teach anywhere she wanted! I have an Idaho license also but it's specialized for German, which there aren't any positions currently available. Why would she take this job? Oh well, guess I'll never know her reasons. I just know that her mother works there at Garfield so maybe that's the reason. Just sayin'. Errrr....

Stayin Alive

The cure to all jogging woes: disco music!! Especially when the music involves Donna Summer and the BeeGees! hahaha....I love that music and I never even thought about putting it on my MP3 player in order to work out to it. It has the disco driving beat that keeps me going. Oh, by the way, this week I worked really hard and ended up losing 1.4 pounds at weigh-in this morning--woohoo!! Also, I bought a runner's magazine because it had a section in it about how to succeed at half-marathons. How appropriate! So now I have a program to follow because there's an article in there for a beginner who started running all of the sudden and wanted to make it a part of her daily routine and was aiming to run in a half-marathon. So, I'm going to follow that one and I've already started it--today. I'm excited! I guess my plateau worries are done for (as of now).

EUREKA!

Polenta chips are awesome! (they're not quite as crunchy as regular chips but they're good anyway):

• Any kind of polenta you want or can find (I just used sun-dried tomato and basil flavored polenta)
• cooking spray

Preheat oven to 375. Slice the polenta as thin as you can and place them onto the greased cookie sheet. Place them in the oven for 20-25 minutes. Be careful though--they can go from brown to incinerated pretty quickly! Just keep an eye on them. Mine took about 21 or 22 minutes, I think. You can eat these "chips" with taco salad or salsa or whatever sauces/dips you like! The best thing about these too is that on Weightwatchers, they're "free" for Core plan users! I've never tried polenta before but I had heard about the different recipe ideas from fellow weightwatcher members. So, go ahead and try it already!

Antelope Island, the great Salt Lake, and some BUFFALO!!

On the way to Antelope Island, we saw some oil refineries and Kyle said that I must get a picture of at least one.
On the causeway to Antelope Island/the great Salt Lake.
The lake SMELLS!!!!!!!

We were approaching the beach where everyone goes to get into the nasty, briny water.

It was so sunny and as a result, I have a really nice sunburn on my back and Kyle only got like a little strip of sun on the back of his neck.
Maybe I got the burn because I was wearing a tanktop instead of a tshirt?
That black stuff on the beach is dead (brine) flies. When we walked closer, there were clouds of brine flies swarming all around our feet---NASTY!!!!!!

Kyle was gonna go see what all this bouyancy thing was all about...I opted out.
While waiting on Kyle to get deeper into the water, I took some scenery pictures.
He really is floating! He said that it was the strangest feeling ever--he even exhaled all of the air out of his lungs and he still remained floating!
This was even in shallower water and he still wasn't sinking to the ground.
The nasty (dead) brine flies.

Whoa! Buffalo crossing sign! I've never seen buffalo before!
Here they are! We drove to the ranch on the island and saw some buffalo in the distance. There was a sign that said that bison were dangerous and we shouldn't approach them.


Fascinating!

Temple Square and the surroundings

Assembly hall
Gigantic temple that only the mormonest of the Mormons could go in.
We watched an organ recital in the Tabernacle--it was sooooo coooool!!

They did an acoustics demonstration where the organ player dropped a pin at the front and you could hear it all the way in the back!

Our tour guides--the one on the left is from Nottingham, England and the other one is from Washington, D.C. and they kept calling each other "sister".
Here's some information about the temple but you'll have to read the picture below this one in order to get the info in order.


Assembly hall again (I think).

Now, we went up on the 26th floor of the church office and could see the whole city. This is the capitol building.
The temple from afar.
There were so many flowers around Temple Square!
The Christus statue.
This was the scene we saw leading up to the Christus statue.

The office of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
This mural was inside the lobby of the office.
A view of the Wasatch Mountains from the office top floor.
The temple from the top in all its glory!

Our hotel room and the view

We were on the 11th floor in the Radisson.

We had our hotel in the middle of downtown Salt Lake and we had a great view of the Wasatch Mountains!

Really, really bad form!

Just to let you all know: I'm extremely PO'd!!!!!!!!!!! I got notice through email that the position that I had this past spring (and then they laid me off at the end of the year but opened a spot up again) just got filled...not by me. As the principal was telling me the bad news that they might not need my services next year, he said should a position open up, we'll call you and interview you again. Well, he didn't and now the position is magically filled. *sigh* I guess this will give me an opportunity to sub again and now that I know a bunch of teachers at that school, it should be pretty easy to get plenty of jobs. Argh...It's not that I'm really sad about not having the position, it's just the principle of the thing--not calling me and making me wait. sheesh. Okay, I'm done.

Oh, by the way (again)

I'm turning my hair back to blonde...but not bleachy blonde. It's a rather subdued blonde. I already dyed it medium golden blonde but it's not light enough because it really doesn't look that different--I can still see some of the red coming out if the light hits it just right. I might try a little bit lighter, if I'm brave enough. I've gone for so long with a darker color that I'm kind of afraid so I'm changing it gradually so as not to freak anyone (especially myself) out. :)

"Get your bags packed, you're moving to the Rainforest!"

Is what we heard as we sat outside this restaurant that was recommended to us. It's called Mayan Adventure. Oh, by the way, yes we made it to Salt Lake City. We got to the city about 4:30pm and got checked into our hotel before venturing out for dinner. We have a hotel room in the Radisson with a sleep number bed! Oh, and they're not worth it...at least we don't think so. Unless the thing works for you, then that's cool. Anyway, we decided to venture out about 20 minutes out of the city to this Mayan restaurant. It took about 30 minutes to be seated but that's not really bad because as you already might know, the Salt Lake area is majorly LDS and a lot of things are closed on Sundays, which means that there's hardly any traffic on the streets! So, we thought that no matter what the wait, we were sure it'd be worth it! When we sat down in the lobby while waiting on our table, the restaurant had all these background noises like a rainforest would have--along with flickering lights to make it seem like we were in some sort of cave or something. There were old pots sitting around and large boxes piled on top of each other, some with the word "specimen" on them. HA! Our name was finally called and we were led into the eating area portion of the restaurant. The dining area was dark except for those few flickering lights and multicolored lights for mood/tropical feeling. In the middle of everyone was a huge cliff with a large body of water that was, of course, fenced in so that we wouldn't jump in. Kyle and I were seated at the side of the pool and were soothed by running water off of the cliff. As we were waiting on our drinks to be brought out, this person walked out from a door with tribal clothing on and a head piece and started yelling at us--we couldn't really understand it for all the water sounds and background forest calls. All of a sudden, there was a HUGE splash in the pool--and then another! and another! There were people standing on top of that cliff and they were jumping off and doing flips into the water!!! Where we were seated, though, we couldn't exactly see why they were doing it. So, we got up and walked to the front of the exhibit (I guess you could call it that). The person with all the tribal stuff on was doing some sort of ritual play acting type thing. There was a voice that was recorded and would play every few minutes between the diving that we guess was explaining the rituals but we really couldn't hear it. It was awesome, nonetheless! Unfortunately, we were dummies and forgot to bring the camera! However, the place was pretty dark and the pictures might not have come out so well. Eh...it'll be ok, you'll live.

The food was decent. I mean, it wasn't gourmet or anything but it was good. It was basically a Mexican type of food with your tacos and burritos and whatnot. I know, I know...real authentic, right? Well, regardless, it was a great experience and that place is known as SLC's largest themed restaurant! After dinner, we went back to the hotel and let our food digest a little more before hitting the fitness room. I jogged for about 20 minutes. We also got into the pool after I rinsed off in the shower in the hotel room.

Tomorrow we will stay in the city and go to Temple Square, which is where (you guessed it) the HUGE LDS temple is that is recognized all over! It was begun in 1853 and dedicated in 1893 by the Mormon pioneers. The temple has 6 towers topped with finial spires. Sadly, since we're not LDS we won't be getting any tours into that gigantic place (my information comes from a brochure we picked up in the entryway of the hotel). Oh well, we'll be sure to take plenty of pictures of the outside for ya'll. We might also go see a thirty minute organ recital at the Tabernacle. My friend, Maren, told us to also go see the Family History Museum and maybe see if we can look up any of our family. We probably won't spend a lot of time there but we'll just go out of curiosity. Anyway, I don't want to spoil the rest of the entries so I'll stop here. We'll keep ya posted on the things that we've seen and did over these next 2 days. Love ya!

Our vacation plans

We're leaving on Sunday morning to go to Salt Lake City. We've decided that we're taking our belated 2 year anniversary trip. We'll be sure to take plenty of pictures.


I've been a "Sex and the City" junkie lately since I was able to complete my collection of the DVDs through birthday presents from Kyle and my in-laws! :) I promise, I've been getting out of the house (occasionally).

I don't know what to title this entry...

Kyle and I are beginning to prepare for our running goal. We ran yesterday but it was so hot that I had to keep stopping and walking. It was hard to run in the heat. Luckily, the marathon will be in October, which means cooler weather. Today I went to the gym with Maren and I guess I better go with her more often because I ended up pushing myself to run for 40 minutes instead of my usual 30...either that, or the treadmill is different at the Park Center gym in Boise than it is at the Meridian one--which is highly possible also. Anyway, I was proud of myself nonetheless. Now, I'll try to keep it at 40 minutes for the next few times and then keep pushing it up, up and up (without killing myself, of course).

New Goal...

NEW GOAL:

KYLE AND I ARE SERIOUSLY THINKING ABOUT SIGNING UP FOR A HALF-MARATHON...it's on October 5th and it's about 13 miles long. I think we can do it.

The Campbell visit and the trip to McCall, ID

A little Idaho country with some snow-capped mountains in the distance.
This was on a dirt road somewhere in the middle of nowhere while we were trying to find the hot springs.
Still on the dirt road searching for the hot springs that were closed anyway...on a Tuesday.

We met some cows along the way on the road. If a cow walks into the road and you hit it, you're at fault and have to pay the damages to the cow (and the owner) as per Idaho driving laws.

Steve and Rose in front of the bear at our hotel.
You know who we are, of course.

Our hotel, the Holiday Inn Express Hunt Lodge.

We decided to visit the local ski resort in McCall--Brundage.

Steve is being spontaneous by getting on one of the lifts.
It's amazing how green the ski slopes are when it's not snowing...haha.