The Family That Flees Together, Trees Together

I'm a huge HUGE fan of the NPR Radio Show This American Life.  The other day at work I was streaming an episode called American Limbo this episode actually aired back in 2001, but was reaired last week.  I was particularly struck by the first act about the Jarvis family, a family of eight who's on the run from the law for seven years. During this seven year span the family lives on a boat, in a swamp, in a tree house. The crazy part is all the kids turn out to be pretty normal and fairly unfazed about the whole thing.  I found it amazing to hear a story of this family that just makes due with what they have and also learning different trades and handy work to get by month by month.  I mean if I had to share a 8x8 bedroom with my three sisters for three years I don't think I could make it.  Don't get me wrong I love my sisters, but I have to be honest I'd go nuts. I love the way they presented the family in this episode, they paint a beautiful picture of simplicity and unity. It's a good reminder that sometimes living simply, brings out what matters most and in this case it's a great family bond. While I don't necessarily support them running from the law, but somehow by the end of the episode I found myself routing for this family not to get caught. I'm almost tempted to sale everything and go live on a boat for the next five years. If you have some spare time you should listen to this episode.  http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/177/american-limbo, or just listen to the first act it really is amazing. To end this blog post I'd like to give a shout out to This American Life for bringing a new perspective to the table week after week, for making me think outside of the box from time to time, and for the entertainment you have brought me episode after episode (check out the radio show archives). 

Summer Time and The Livin's Easy

FRUIT PIZZA:

It's the perfect reminder that it's still summer.  Nothing better than fresh summer fruit on a fresh summer night.  Making this lovely dessert brought me back to highschool cooking class days.  I loved that class so much I took it twice.  To bad none of those skills stuck with me. 

Long live the Fruit Pizza... (you better eat it fast it gets soggy after a day)

Uinta This?

Last weekend a group of us took a weekend trip to the Uintas. We camped at Butterfly Lake and made a dutch oven feast fit for a king.

Brownies:

 

Corn on The Fire:

Dutch Oven Potatoes and Popcorn:

Niki, Amanda, and I set up our own little tent:

The next morning we went on a hike and did some climbing.

These next two pictures we're going to play a game of can you spot the cool guy, you know the kind of games they used to put on cereal boxes?

Overall, it was a great weekend.  It was nice to beat the Salt Lake City heat. If you've never been to the Uintas you should get up there ASAP, the summer season is short (July -  August) I'm hoping to get up there again before the summer ends. 

Ohhhhh Baby Baby!

Here's a little video I put together of the flip cam footage we took in Tahoe.  As a side note there's a part where my sister says she farted, she really didn't she was saying that for a funny little dare game we were playing. I just wanted to save her the embarrassment that wasn't even real.  Enjoy...  for some reason the video embedding is not working, so please click on the link to watch the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUAZ_eHZ5s0

Keep Tahoe Blue

First let me start with this:

That's right people KEEP TAHOE BLUE... they say it for a reason.

I recently went to Lake Tahoe for a nice 10 day get away. The weather couldn't have been better.  I honestly don't think I saw a cloud for 7 days straight.  All kinds of different activities kept us busy such as:

Wake boarding:

Skiing:

Wake Surfing:

Tennis (private courts right on the water):

Bike Rides Along the Truckee River:

Photography Making:

My mom's whole family came out including all three of my cousins.  Here's all of the cousins together. The "kids" table never gets old... it's actually a privilege to be part of it.

I'd like to give a shout out to the boat captain! Thanks for the awesome trip.

Doppelganger??

A few weeks ago I was on a solo flight back to Salt Lake City and I had the joy and the pleasure of sitting next to a fifty something lady named Patrice.  She really set the mood right away by asking me my name shaking my hand 3-4 times and then it happened... she turned to the guy next to us and said this verbatim "Doesn't she look like a gringo version of Beyonce Knowles."  I'd thought I heard it all, turns out I haven't.  I mean I've always thought Beyonce and I had a lot of similarities: Curvy bodies, similar skin tones, long brown hair, great singing voices, married to a famous rapper.... NOT.

Check us out side by side.  Doppelganger?

Probably the weirdest/funniest thing I've heard in my life.  I think Patrice was a little drunk on that flight. She did ask me for a ride home when we taxied into the flight gate...but I'll take it! BEYONCE OR BUST!

Celebration of A Nation

Last weekend for the 4th of July I went to California with Kimberlee, Jane and Maggie to visit Kristine.  I was also able to see some of my family out there.  We had a very successful weekend! It all started with this...

That's right people it's Buffalo Bill's... You know that weird hotel about 30 miles outside of Vegas that suddenly shows up out of no where.  We stayed in the Big Red Barn for a night.

As soon as we got to California we went straight to the beach:

You may be wondering who the amazingly cute kids are in these photos.  Those are Jane's and Kristine's Nieces and Nephews.  Such a cute family.

The next day I spent the day with my Grandma and Aunt and Uncle.  Later that night met back up with the girls and went to a fire work show on Huntington Beach:

Kimberlee got hit in the head with a comet...

So glad we could visit this girl! She's the BEST...

Who doesn't love a good pyramid? 

Wasatch Your Back

A few weeks back I participated in my second annual Wasatch Back: Logan to Park City 190 mile 12 person (running) relay race. Yes, I know it's a mouth full.  Anwyays a bunch of us who ran it last year decided that this year we wanted a little competition, so we put together two teams (24 people) so we could race against eachother.  On our team we thought it'd be fun to split it, so van 1 was all girls and van 2 was all boys.  Turned out it was genius.

Van 1:

We had a caboodle, we read trashy magazine, we ate (healthy) homemade cookies, we had girl talk for 27 hours straight. We supported our runners better than you could imagine. 

I was runner 5.  I had a nasty 7.5 mile straight uphill climb over Avon pass.  The scenery was beautiful, but the dusty road and the heat at 1:30 pm climbing over that pass... Not beautiful.  As I came up the last hill to exchange with Krista we both got a little teary eyed. I was SO happy to be done with that leg of the race. Thanks for the support Krista!!!!

I'd like to give a shout out to Mr. Bushnell who set up a huge 10 man tent for us, so we could get a good nights rest of 3 1/2 hours of much needed sleep.

You may ask how can running through the heat of the day, all hours of the night, with minimal sleep, stuffed in a small van for 27 hours, no showers, no flushing toilets, be fun?  It may be inexplicable, but we had the time of our lives!

Turns out both teams ended together... Oh and we took 20th place!

Candid shot, all tuckered out after the race. Don't we look pretty?

P.s. while I was writing this blog post I found our team from last year "Team No Pants"  was featured on active.com.  See link and scroll down.  Pretty funny we're famous and we didn't even know it.

http://www.active.com/running/Articles/Run-Wild-at-the-Ragnar-Relay.htm?page=2

Crazy Interactions

Do you ever have a strange interaction, or conversation with someone, and its strangeness doesn't really dawn on you until after the interaction is over?  Well I had an experience like this last weekend.  I was walking at the Gateway when some guy motioned me over to him.  He was selling something, and I really did not want to go over there, but he looked desperate and I decided I'd at least humor him and let him talk to me.  Well he starts talking about water conservation, which wasn't that bad of a topic compared to what it could have been.  Well, he comments on my earrings and he had some ear art himself so I commented on that.  Well this just opened a whole new door.  He started pointing to all the places he'd had pierced and he proceeds to point to his nipples and said.  "Yeah I had these pierced once, but then it got ripped out."  I was just sort of nodding my head then he keeps going and says "It hurt worse than getting ran over by a car and yes I have had that happen too, so now I just stick to getting tattoos less can happen with those."  He then continued to tell me about the tattoo that took up his whole back it was a landscape of Ireland, turns out he'd never even been there. I'm just glad he didn't pull off his shirt to show me that REALLY would have taken it too far.  This guy just made my day, it's interactions like this that made me realize some people are really good at just being themselves even in front of a perfect stranger.

The Six Letter Wonder!

Many of you know one of my greatest friends of all times who I lovingly refer to as the six letter wonder, others refer to her as Ali Pew.  Well, pretty much every where we go together without fail someone always asks us "are you sisters?"  As many of you know, I'm a triplet and I can remember one time, ONE TIME only, when a stranger asked us,  "are you you triplets?" and it turns out that person was a triplet too, so they had some kind of triplet sensing super power. It's just funny to me when your real sisters don't even look like your sisters, and your best friend looks like your sister.  Maybe, people who look alike attract to each other.  You've heard those stories of couples that start looking alike, maybe when you've been friends with someone for so long you start to look alike.  Whatever it is I'm honored to be the "sister" of the six letter wonder. 

Pictures compliments of Jane M. and Jane B.'s Blogs.

Doctor Doctor

When I was in Japan I went to a Japanese bath house, you pretty much have to if you go there. While I'd love to talk about naked time with a lot of random Japanese ladies I'm here to tell you about something a little more interesting. At the bath house they have a big hot tub looking pool (but the water was cold) of mini fish. They look a lot like guppies. Well these are no ordinary fish, they're called Doctor Fish. You put your legs in this small pool and the fish come eat the dead skin off of your legs and feet. I was a little apprehensive and grossed out by the whole thing at first. I mean you have hundreds of little fish biting your dead skin off.  After you get over the initial put in of the feet, it became quite relaxing... well that is until I started to think about it again. Apparently, these fish feed off of dead skin alone, so the second your legs hit the tub they're going to town on them. Looks a lot like this.

I definitely wouldn't have put my head in there, but I don't think I really had the option, thank goodness. This is what I call a brave brave man, or a man with a lot of dry skin either one works.

Now ask yourself, what kind of person are you? Would you put your head in with those fish?

Do You Think Tim Burton and Johnny Depp Got Their Inspiration From This?

This is an old Tom Petty music video. I ran across it a week or so ago.  It's unbelievably funny, ridiculous, and amazing all at the same time.  I couldn't help but wonder... Did Tim Burton/Johnny Depp get their Alice and Wonderland inspiration from this?  I sure hope so. I personally love the part at the end when they're cutting the cake, priceless.