May 11th- Driving to Omaha, Nebraska

Our drive today was about 596 miles. After Keystone is the city of Rapid City. We tried to find the chapel so we could go to church, but we couldn't find it. The drive through did make us familiar with the little town. We saw this zoo on our drive and thought it was a funny statue. Then the goats started moving, it was real! We had to turn around to take a picture of the "goat bridge." 

As we were driving through South Dakota, and the middle of no where, Ja decided he wanted to see ho many miles we could go on one tank. It wasn't to our destination because our gas light came on. Of course it went one right after 

we passed the only gas station for a long time. He is a very lucky man because right when I was going to get really mad if we ran out of gas, an exit for Sinclair gas station came. Unfortunately the gas station was 3.8 miles from the freeway so we "saw more of the country." That became a often used phrase when we got lost. We didn't say we were lost, we were seeing more of the country.

The part of the state of Iowa we saw was your stereotypical mid

-west state. Flat and grassy. A lot of farms too. So far in our trip I have been amazed by the number of farmers and huge farms.

 While driving through the farms of Iowa we asked ourselves a few questions. Feel free to answer them if you know the answer.1. Are only the black and white cows milk cows? Or are the brown cows used for milk too?

2. Are the black and white cow named Jersey cows?

3. Why is super unleaded gas cheaper than unleaded? 

4. What makes the super gas super?

5. Why does Highway 90 have a red tint to it?

As we crossed over the Missouri River we entered Nebraska. Luckily we had 2 chances to enter Nebraska because I missed taking the picture of the sign the first time.   

This is just a picture to show how dirty our windshield was at this point. 

May 11th- Visiting Mount Rushmore

This morning we visited Mount Rushmore. It was a beautiful sunny, and cool morning. At first we didn't think the statues would be very cool, but when we got a better view they are amazing. There is a whole visitor center and big memorial site, and amphitheatre to walk around. 

We took the "strenuous trail" to see a closer up view. We went down a lot of stairs at first then we learned why they called it the strenuous trail becau

se you have to go up all the stairs at the end. We took some good pictures but they are mostly of one of us at a time. We realized when someone asks us if they want to take a picture of both of us we should take them up on their offer. That is the only way we both can be in a picture.

This is the overview of the mountain.

Facts about Rushmore:

The project started in 1927 and was finished in 1941. Even though it was 14 years, about 6 1/2 years were actually spent working. The winter weather would stop work each year. 

Gutzon Borglum sculpted the faces. 

The mountain was named after a New York City Lawyer named Rushmore. 

Most of the mountain was sculpted using dynamite.  

As we were driving out of the park, we saw this wooly goat. It as unsuccessfully trying to blend in with his surroundings. 

We made it to Mount Rushmore!

Since we don't get reception up here I figured I would write a post saying we made it safely. It was an 11 hour drive up here but it didn't seem long at all because we listened to "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" the whole drive up. The drive was also fun because neither of us had driven that way before so we were excited with the new landscapes. There are more cows in Wyoming than people, but it sure is beautiful. What we've seen of South Dakota is beautiful too. We will drive all the way across SD tomorrow so we'll see more then. The highlight of the day was having to slam on the brakes so we didn't hit the 5 deer that were standing in the road. Now I really understand the saying "deer in the headlights." We did take some pictures today but I will post them later because the camera cord is in the car and it's really cold outside so I don't want to go out. We are having a fun trip so far! 

May 10th- Drive through Wyoming & South Dakota

Today we drove safely from Provo, Utah to Keystone, South Dakota. We drove a total of 673.2 miles today. The drive through Wyoming was beautiful. 

The sky is bigger in Wyoming. Even though most of Wyoming was flat, there are different rock formations, prairies, and little canyons. 

Wyoming is ranked 50th out of the states for population. Now we understand why, there are more cows than people. We didn't see many people at all while we drove through. There is a town called Lost Springs that has a recorded population of 1. 

We did stop in Rawlins, Wyoming for some gas. On the map it looked like a bigger town, but we think this sign says it all about Rawlins:

As we crossed over to South Dakota the scenery changed a little bit. We actually saw a school bus sign which means people actually live there. The western part of South Dakota has a lot of evergreen trees and huge rock formations. It was no wonder to us why Mount Rushmore is in South Dakota. The eastern part of South Dakota was really flat and had few trees and rocks.

We almost hit 5 deer in South Dakota. We were looking around at the rocks and then all of the sudden we see 5 deer standing in the road. I saw them in time not to hit them, but it was a little scary, and fun. We also drove past a farm that had buffalo instead of cows. What do they do with the buffalo?

This was our hotel in Keystone. Washington Inn & Suites. The town of Keystone is very, very small. I would not like to be there during busy season, which is end of May to early September. One good thing about it being small is that every thing is within walking distance. We walked the downtown in about 5 minutes, that's how small it is. In case you stay here, be careful, they don't have shampoo or conditioner. 

Like I said on another post, the drive was great since we listened to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn on CD. I really recommend books on cd for any long trip!

Tribute to a very smart man

I wanted to make a shout out for Ja. He got his grades 2 days ago and he got all A-'s. That means he got all A-'s for his entire Junior Core experience. Those are very good grades considering the type of workload and intensity those classes involve. He was so excited he started jumping up and down and yelling. Then he checked 2 more times to make sure those were in fact his scores and that he really could celebrate. They were his grades, so he jumped around some more, hugged me a lot, repeated how excited he was a million times, then made some phone calls. I am so proud of him  for working so hard and studying so much. Even though the junior core was as hard as everyone said, I think Ja had a really good time making new friends and having great recruiting experiences. I think I can say we are both very happy the junior core is over! Good job Ja!

Graduation Pictures

Here is a link to see pictures from Graduation April 2008. Thank you very much for everyone who came, I really meant a lot to me!

The Price is Right

Last friday BYU had a Senior Celebration for all the graduating seniors. (which is me!) Certain schools within BYU set up booths with fun games, food, prizes, and even caricatures. The accounting group BAP decided to have a booth for the School of Accountancy. Ja and his friends got together and decided to do a "Price is Right" booth. Ja went and bought the materials to make the booths for the beginning of the show. They looked great. Shea did a good job too cutting out the letters.



Bob Barker was nice enough to come out of retirement for a night and host the game show for BAP. He would ask them money or accounting related questions (the person who one usually did so by chance) and the person to guess the closest without going over went on to the next game.




If the contestant had taken any accounting classes before then they played an accounting game. They had to tell what is a debit and what is a credit, or make a correct accounting equation with flash cards. I have taken an accounting class but failed miserably at the account equation game, Ja had to help me.

If the contestant hadn't taken accounting then they moved on to the table of Ja and James. James's game was guessing the price of grocery store items. If you got within $1 of the total you won. Most people were a few dollars off. I was the first winner, getting within 80 cents. One girl got within 7 cents, she was the closest of the night. (Except for Amy who helped James buy the items.) They had things like dish soap, soda, spaghetti o's, sharpie marker, and little debbie chocolate rolls. People liked that game.

Ja's game was also a lot of fun. He did the game "lower or higher" where people have to guess if the price of the item is lower or higher than the price listed. He started out switching 6 different items out, but some were too easy. He stuck with Rainbow sandals, the perfect push-up, and a financial calculator. Those were the three most common missed items. People were always surprised by how cheap the perfect push is (Ja had it at $30 but they are only $20 at Wal-mart), and by how expensive Rainbow sandals are. Ja had those marked at $29.95 and people always said, "Oh, they have to be lower. That is too expensive for sandals." But if any of you have every purchased those sandals you know that's not the case. So, if the contestant got 2 of the 3 right then they got 2 chances to find the taffy under one of 5 cups. Then if they got the taffy they got the real prize of a candy bar. But don't worry, the school of accountancy never leaves you empty handed, if they didn't get the taffy they got either a notepad, pen, or taffy. People really enjoyed this game and loved Ja putting on a show.



Overall the night was a big success. There was always a constant stream of people wanting to play the price is right. All the people who helped with it kept talking about how much fun they had. They even won a huge check!

Jazz Game

On March 22nd we went to a Utah Jazz game with some people from the accounting group BAP. This was only my second time ever watching a live basketball game, and my first NBA game. It was a lot of fun. As you can tell, our seats were very high up, in fact, as high as you can get. It didn't really matter because you could still see everything just fine. When we got to our seats our friend said, "We are even higher than the jumbo-tron!" The Jazz won so we had a good time.

The court looks so little.



Our group consisting of friends and Ja's professor Hobson.


We had a great time!

For those Office Watchers...

Ok, who is counting down the days until Jim proposes to Pam?! I know it will be a while but I can't wait for it to happen! I'm so happy that Jim and Pam are back...

You have got to be kidding me!

Ok, I am officially sick of this weather! Yesterday was a high of 75 degrees and today it is 37 degrees, but with the wind feels like 30! It was just snowing a few minutes ago too. I can't make up my mind on what to wear, what to do outside, or what season it is. Yesterday I had the car air conditioner on and today I had the heater on. Crazy. It's no wonder why Utah has so many cases of mental illness; I'm becoming depressed and bi-polar because of this weather! I need to get out of here!

Now it's really Spring

My last blog about it being Spring was a fake. It snowed a few times after I posted that! But today is officially spring weather. It's sunny outside and the sun is actually warm. I'm wearing capirs and no jacket and I'm not cold. It's currently 57 degrees, which sounds cold but it's not for us since it's been in the 40's lately.

There is a cherry blossom tree on our street that is blooming, and the tree right outside our window is also blooming! I am so excited. We can finally open our windows for a breeze and not be freezing.

In case you can't tell, I love the warm weather!

Why I love Jonathan

Tonight we went to a Deloitte recruiting dinner. We had dinner talked to a lot of employees of Deloitte and then watched the final March Madness game. Set up, was the arcade style basketball game, where two people shoot the basketball and try to make the most baskets. Ja and his friend Shea, decided to go play the game during a commercial. I look over and they are trying to make "free throw" shots from far away during one turn. Then their next turn they try to throw the basketball under their leg. Then they are doing hook shots. Then they are trying to spin the basketball on their finger, and while the ball is spinning, throw the ball into the basket. I thought it was so cute to see Ja being so creative while playing a simple game. Now I can see why Brigham loves Jedi training so much, because Ja has so many fun ideas.

Pandora

No, I'm not talking about the curious Greek Goddess who opened the box from Epimetheus that contained all the evils that would trouble humanity. I'm talking about Pandora Radio. It's an online radio that I have recently discovered and I am very happy I did. You type in your favorite artist or song and Pandora will set up a playlist full of music that is similar. It's great for me to listen to at work. I started listening to live stream from radio stations but I grew tired very quickly of all the commercials. Luckily, Pandora doesn't have any commercials. You can rate a song, such as "I really like this song-play more like it" or "I don't like this song-this station shouldn't play songs like this" and "I'm tired of this song- don't play it for a month." Now I have four different playlists modeled after my favorite artists: Michael Jackson, U2, Jack Johnson, and Sarah MacLachlan. I can easily change between the four if my mood changes. And best of all, it's all free. It's what a radio station should be. It plays the music I actually like and it's commercial free. I really enjoy listening to it so I thought I would share it with you. The website is pandora.com

Jonathan's Birthday

Since we would be in D.C. over Ja's birthday, he decided to open his presents from me before he left. It's a good thing he did because he wore what he got on our trip. He would have been under clothed if he didn't open his presents. He greatly enjoyed opening his present. He threw the tissue paper around, unfortunately I couldn't capture it on camera.



I gave Ja his favorite chap stick, Bert's Bees Wax. Now his lips are always moist and minty.


Ja really loved these pants, until he tried them on. They were his size but for some reason were really short on him! Good thing we can return things.



This sweater was a medium, so I should have guessed it was too small. But some of his things are mediums so I was hopeful. Since the pants were too small and this was too small Ja said he felt like he was opening some other kid's birthday present because everything was off.


These jeans and sweater fit him perfectly! It's a good thing otherwise he would have been really sad. Doesn't he look really good in his new birthday clothes?! He also got these shoes for his birthday.



I think Ja had a great birthday. He is now 25! I can't believe it, it seems so old, but young at the same time.

My little talent thanks to Emily

My whole life I have wanted to whistle. I have tried and tried, with no avail, until now. And I have one little girl to thank, her name is Emily Groesbeck. I watch her every morning and we would watch the show "My friends Tigger and Pooh" some mornings. One morning Pooh really wanted to whistle because Tigger and Darcy could both whistle. So Tigger and Darcy show Pooh how they whistle and little tricks to help, such as licking the lips and blow softly. There was a part on the show that us watching in the audience should try and whistle. I tried it, and I could! It was a solid whistle and I was so proud. I think I scared Emily because I shrieked out of excitement. Ever since then I have continued to whistle to make sure I don't lose it. I can't whistle a tune yet but I'm still hopeful!