I too am grateful

Everyone's gratitude posts really inspired me and made me reflect on what I hold most dear. The older I get the more I realize it's my relationships that have the most profound affect on my happiness and give me satisfaction. Specifically my relationship with The Lord, my family and my friends. But I would like to go into specifics of a few things and people that I am particularly grateful for at this time in my life.

• My family. I am really blessed that although I have lived thousands of miles away for the last 15 months I have been able to see my family quite a bit. I have been able to go home to Utah four times and then my parents have come to DC, New York and my entire family went to Italy in this time. Just spending time with those that you are most comfortable with is refreshing and it was a special treat to have my entire family reunited over Thanksgiving when Brian came home from his mission in Jackson, Mississippi. And our neighbors took the liberty in decorating our house, part of the decoration includes 200 helium balloons that we gathered because we wanted to try to see if we could put our cat in a pillow case to see if it would float. Unfortunately/fortunately the cat must have caught wind of our plan and by the time we gathered all the balloons it had disappeared. But we still decided to use the balloons for a great family photo.
• Wonderful friends. Of course nothing can replace family, but I've found a pretty good substitute while I live on the other side of the country. I have been blessed to live with a lot of amazing girls since I moved to DC. The last two houses that I lived in have really felt like home. The girls of Joyce and Uhle Street have made me feel loved and taken care and have helped my transition to the east be a surprisingly easy one. They all came together, along with Ogreid (Odie, Grayden and Reed), to treat me to a birthday dinner last month and helped take the sting out of turning 26. 26 was a surprisingly hard age, it marks the transition to the late twenties and for once I really do feel old. But this is not the only time in my life that I have been surrounded by great friends. All of you from my childhood to high school, Utah State, The Mission, BYU and now DC have been with me through a lot of adventures and good times as well as difficult times and I really appreciate it.
  

The girls of Joyce and Uhle - (Back to front, left to right) Courtney Mecham, Jenny Corry, Leanna Kowallis, Sarah Stancliff, Erika Borgquist, Jeanette Lyman, Stephanie Sonksen, Jocelyn Sparks, Staci Wheeler, Alison Aikele, and Hollie Pollan.
Ogreid and the Dice at Halloween: Odie, Jenny, Grayden, Courtney and Reed

• Fall, it has become my favorite season. In DC fall lasts two or three months. The leaves change in phases and stay on the trees much longer than in Utah. The humidity decreases and there is so much to see and do. I love that from my desk, I can walk down the hall and overlook the white house and monuments and seeing them surrounded in color is really a treat. Perfect for Saturday hikes and bike rides and road trips to West Virginia, New England, and Boston.
  

• My Job. I still don't know exactly how I ended up where I am, and I know it's not where I want to be forever. But my job has taught me a lot, exposed me to new ideas and given me freedom and flexibility. I have to take flack, I think mostly in jest, for the fact that I am working for the unions. And the Jimmy Hoffa jokes do get a little old, but overall it's been a really good place for me. I'm grateful that my work will help pay for my school and that I work with people that are supportive of me, truly care about me, and appreciate my contributions even if they are small. I also just got finished working at a conference that was the brainchild of my departments director and we did most of the work on. Even though I am the peon in the office, I did have some input and contributed to this conference and it turned out great. We had over 200 union leaders from 83 countries, and got some good press coverage in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and the Chicago Sun. It was fun and rewarding to see a huge event like this come together. If you are interested here is the article from the post.
• My testimony. This is the last point I will expound on, but certainly not the least important. I read a lot of the articles on Romney's candidacy and I find it really interesting. Of course I, like most fellow Mormons, am somewhat sensitive to what is being said. My religion is what identifies me more than any other characteristic that I have. I identify with my religion even more than I identify with my nationality. And when taken out of context a lot of the criticisms that are made do make mormons sound a little crazy. But all I have to do is open the scriptures, pour my heart out in prayer, or visit the temple to again feel peace and comfort and know that indeed my Savior is Jesus Christ. When Brian gave his welcome home talk in Sacrament meeting he reviewed the "first discussion" and I cannot hear the account of the first vision without being touched by the spirit, which reminds me that he is a true prophet. I am grateful for my testimony and for the direction and purpose it gives my life.
  

mmmmmmmmmmmm

Yesterday I was feeling a little sick at work. I really did have a little cold and the all-you-can-eat pizza buffet had done a number on my stomach the night before. So I dogged out a little early and went home to make one of my favorite treats. Pumpkin bread. I recently found a recipe that is really good and is copying Great Harvest Pumpkin Bread. Which is my absolute favorite thing. In High School Natalie worked at Great Harvest and she would occasionally bring the day old bread to my house, I became addicted. There is a Great Harvest in Arlington Virginia. I was surprised thinking it was only a Utah thing, but I have never made it there on the day when they sell the pumpkin bread. So thanks to the world wide web I was able to duplicate the recipe. And creating this divine bread yourself makes it even more satisfying (which I never thought was possible).
So I want to share this recipe with all of you. It was the perfect food for a rainy November afternoon in.

GREAT HARVEST PUMPKIN CHOCOLATE CHIP BREAD

2 1/2 cups white flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
3 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
16 oz cooked or canned pumpkin puree (not pie filling)
1 cup oil
4 eggs, beaten lightly
2/3 cup water
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease two (9x5 inch) loaf pans or three (8x4 inch) loaf pans.

Mix flours, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt together in a large bowl; set aside.

Mix pumpkin, oil, eggs, and 2/3 cup water together and stir into dry ingredients. Stir in chocolate chips. Place batter in prepared pans.

Bake 60 or 70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

A New England and Amish Autumn

After a hot dry summer the last two weekends have actually felt like fall. The leaves are changing, the weather is perfect (light jacket weather), and it's been raining on and off. Last weekend a group of us left DC for Boston to visit our good friend Suzy. She lived in DC, but moved to Boston in the spring to work on the Mitt Romney campaign. We only had two days, but we really packed it in.

Highlights:

• We went on a duck tour where you ride on an authentic amphibious WWII landing vehicle. And let me tell, I was that cheesy tourist that I get so annoyed by in DC, and I loved every minute of it. Our guide called himself "Sergeant Meatball" and made us yell "quack quack!" whenever we saw people walking on the street, he probably weighed 300 pounds and was wearing a hula skirt and a hawaiian shirt.
  
• Canoli in Little Italy
• Street Performers downtown. I especially loved the breakdancers.
• Our VIP tour of Mitt's headquarters.
• Cuddling with all the roommates + Odie in Suzy's bed.
• We went to the Head of the Charles. A crew rowing race where colleges come from all over the country to compete. It's really close to Harvard campus and we wandered over to watch a little bit of a Princeton vs. Harvard football game. And let me tell you the Princeton band's outfits were something else.
• 
• We watched part of the Red Sox semifinals verses the Cleveland Indians in a sports bar in Harvard Square.

I spent this weekend in Amish Country, Lancaster Pennsylvania. A group of us went to ride what has become a tradition here in DC. Dutch Bike Dutch. We did a forty mile ride and it was beautiful. It had rained for three days straight. And stopped right as we began our ride Saturday morning. We were fully prepared with rain gear, but didn't end up needing it. We crossed wooden bridges, saw amish children and buggies, llamas, and pumpkin patches.
Pictures from this will have to be forthcoming, I didn't do the best job of documenting this trip.

Oh mother nature

You may think that this moose is just a sweet and innocent animal wandering through the mountains looking for food and family. That may be your impression now, but when he is staring you down from ten feet away he will make you want to wet your pants. On my trip to Utah last weekend Des and I went biking in American Fork canyon. We had been going for no longer than five minutes when I slammed on my brakes because directly in front of me on the path was this moose. I know, the picture isn't as impressive from fifty feet away. But it's the best I could do because I was so scared and didn't want to do anything that would startle it when it was close. Des and I really aren't up to par on our wilderness survival skills and so when we both realized we had no idea what to do, retreat, play dead, climb a tree....we decided to do the only thing we did know how to do. After our friend Bullwinkle took a few more steps towards us we decided to pray. And of course no sooner had we started praying that the moose turned away from us and got off our bike path and walked around us. My testimony grew, the crisis was averted, and the bike ride was spectacular.

I've been home a month, and really feel like I need to write about my trip Europe, but what I want to write about isn't the beauty of Michaelangelo's David, the deliciousness of the gelato, the enchantment of Venice and the grandeur of the Alps. I want to talk about spending ten days with your family in a nine passenger van traveling through three countries where you have no hotels booked, speak none of the languages, have no itinerary, and have lost the debit card. That my beloved readers, may seem like a recipe for disaster, but to the contrary it was delightful, stressful of course at times, but all in all a really great trip.

Spending time with those who love me most taught me a lot about myself and how at 25 I've matured more than I thought despite my childish tendencies. I remember in junior high I was a completely different person around my family and friends. I was trying so hard to be cool and impress my friends that at times I would end up treating my family horribly as I struggled to find an identity. We have all been through this awkward time and can relate to each other. Now after serving a mission and having lived with over twenty different girls I realize that I can't hide and that my true self begins to emerge as a person that is neither the person I was when I was fourteen and changing personalities as I switched between Jenny who was trying to impress (friends) and the Jenny who knew she was loved unconditionally and could act however she wanted with her family.

My point is that on this Europe trip all of this came together for me in my head. I realized that I am myself around my family, but it's that same myself that I am around my friends. My self-confidence has grown enough to stand up for myself when I'm with my friends, and my feelings of charity and love for my family have grown so much that I want to show that when I am with them and not just take advantage of their unconditional love which forces them to put up with my cranky moods. They still see my crankiness, but hopefully in smaller doses.

I'm not writing this to say I'm not hypocrite, I definitely still do many things that are fake to my friends and inconsiderate to my family. But spending a concentrated time alone with my family was great for me to see this evenness that is a part of my emergence to adulthood, expounding more on my theme of adulthood from my last post. And I'm interested to hear if you had similar experiences or if I'm just a little slow with my epiphanies.

And now a few pictures:

Here we are in front of the Ponte Vecchio in Florence. We had an awesome bike tour by our friendly tour guide Marco. One of my favorite facts I learned from Marco is that all the industries in Florence are being taken over by the Chinese because the Italians just like to take naps.

Steph and I in Venice. Love her, a great travel companion and she is so non confrontational. She would be absolutely mortified by my dad when he would haggle about prices and demand tap water from the Italian waiters who tried to convince us that Italian tap water just wasn't fit to drink.

Cute, yes they are. The family in the Austrian Alps.Our beloved van. This was at church in Salzburg, I think it took about twenty minutes and an 83 point turn to get out of this predicament.

Today it finally happened. I was walking back to my office from lunch looking so professional in my black pin-striped dress pants and heels. And then, as I elegantly strode to the front door, thinking in my head how beautiful the sound of clicking heels is, I lifted my foot and my shoe didn't want to come with it. I fell forward and just smiled as I looked back at my shoe stuck in the crack between the two pieces of tile and the people around me who seemed to look more embarrassed than I felt. For some reason it just reminded me that I am now an independent adult in our nation's capitol, wearing heels, giving directions to people on the street who ask me how to get to the holocaust museum, paying into a 401K retirement plan, buying things like band-aids and neosporin instead of just stealing them from my parents house, and having a desire for the first time to buy things like furniture.

Don't get me wrong the silly part of me tends to come out more than the super serious, but it is refreshing once and awhile to be reminded of my continual emergence into adulthood.

*Disclaimer*

Sorry I just realized that the post below this is the longest post known to man.....I don't think even my mom will have the patience to read that, but have fun scanning through the pictures.

Snapshots and soundbites

So as I've started blogging, I've started reading a lot more blogs, and I am impressed with their wittiness and depth. And then I look at mine and they tend to be just a photo journal of what I did and where I went. I've always been the kind of girl that prefers to reads the op-eds first and then will skim the headlines for stories that interest me. So I'm a little ashamed that I haven't produced more posts of substance. And now, after stating my good intentions, this post is just going to be a debrief of my last few weeks accompanied by some choice pictures. Substance will come soon....I'm just might take me a few weeks to think of something clever enough that I won't be afraid to post it.

Our trip to Palmyra was quick, 36 hours to be exact, but that doesn't mean it was uneventful. However, I was appalled at some of the commercialization that went on to suck all the money out of the mormon tourists, that just reminds me of one of my biggest pet peeves. When church becomes more a cultural part of your life than a spiritual (and I'll admit I've been guilty of this from time to time myself). However, the gift shops sold shirts that said things like "Mormon girls, worth the wait" and "99% Nephi 1% Laman, I will go and do, but I'll complain the whole time" those things just make me sick. So being surrounded by that I was becoming very cynical right before we went to the sacred grove. I told my friends I did not want to go into the sacred grove with this kindof attitude because it would ruin previous experiences I'd had there. So Jeanette, Grayden, me and Staci sat on this bench with the sacred grove behind us and the Palmyra temple in front of us and talked about how we gained our testimonies of the prophet Joseph Smith. It was a great conversation and made my trip to the sacred grove much more meaningful.

I love this man. He parked next to our car at "Pageant" (we were politely informed that you do not refer to Hill Cumorah as "the pageant" it is simply pageant) and told me that even though he's not Mormon, these Mormons sure know how to put on a good show. And every year he rides his bike out to watch it, and this may or may not be what it looks like, the beginnings of a torrid cross country romance.

Here we are meeting the cast. They really had a tent set up so you could go and meet the stars prior to pageant. Really awesome. It's actually pretty intense. I didn't realize you had to apply to be in pageant and a lot of people are rejected, not only that but you apply and goes through this selective process only to live three weeks in tents rehearsing in upstate New York. Wow, What a perfect family vacation.....
On Sunday after church we stopped at Glen Watkins state park to do some "hiking". It was East Coast style hiking with paved trails, guard rails, thousands of people. Regardless of that it was beautiful and I just feel like this picture needs to be a family Christmas card or something. Pictured is Lincoln, Matt, Holli, Staci, Jeanette, Joe and then me and Grayden in the front.
Hollie is quite the aspiring photographer. This is one of the bridges and 17 waterfalls at Glen Watkins.

Sarah is an amusement park girl. She absolutely loves them. The really ironic part is that she hates rollercoasters, obviously my feelings are a little different. I think this picture says it all.

At the end of Sarah's birthday party we had a countdown until her real birthday (which was actually Sunday) when we threw confetti, lit sparklers, and blew noisemakers. The picture was beautiful, the neighbors however were not so appreciative.

Scotty (as in Des's husband) was in town last weekend. It was fun to see him and he requested that we eat at Marrakesh, it's a Morroccan restaurant that feeds you seven courses, requires that you eat with your hands, has a belly dancer as entertainment, and best of all here is our waiter such an adorable man and pouring us delicious mint tea.

This is me at work. Sortof. I know you can't see me, but I was there. One of my favorite day's at work recently, they put most of our bus on a building and drove us next to the capital where we had a celebration for the new minimum wage law that went into effect on July 23. The day wasn't too hot and muggy, but they had ice cream and Popsicles and I sat on the grass and stretched while I listened to Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Ted Kennedy speak along with our President and other union leaders. Really hilarious, quite a day.

And even us type A uptight east coasters get crazy from time to time. It has been a dream of mine for a long time to create a jell-o slip and slide. So with the birthday of my friend Matt Fischer I knew it was the perfect opportunity. If there is anyone in DC who would appreciate this kind of crazy behavior it's him. The party was a hit and here we are slipping and sliding down our jello runway.

Earlier this week I had the chance to go to an amazing concert. It was Guster and Pete Yorn at Wolf Trap. Wolf Trap is an outdoor concert venue that is actually a national park. It's beautiful and only twenty minutes from home. We had seats at the front of the lawn and laid our our blankets, had a picnic and listened to Pete's soothing voice and the bongo drums and happy music that Guster makes that I so love. This was an usher and this is what I'm going to do when I'm old. Volunteer for these types of events. He told us he's been waiting all year to hear Guster because "all the other bands, like Earth, Wind and Fire just make noise and all sound the same" he was totally tapping his toes and shaking a little to the music.

Virginia is ca-razy!

Sometimes I feel like I don't live in the real world. This is what I'm constantly telling myself and others. I live surrounded by highly educated young single adults ages 24-32 who are from middle class Mormon families mostly from the west. One of my roommates just got a job as a Presidential Speechwriter, another travels to Singapore, Germany, and other exotic locations around the globe working for trade shows, I'm no longer shocked when I meet people who attended prestigious Ivy League schools. It's pretty ridiculous. I don't know why I'm saying this to introduce this post, it's just something I've been thinking about a lot. What I really want to show you I guess is while I do live in this world that isn't very representative of the population as a whole. Once in awhile I am brough back to reality and realize that I live in good old Virginia. For example in our quiet neighborhood here in Arlington there was a recent rabies outbreak. 23 people were treated for rabies here in our quiet neighborhood. And the culprit was a rabid kitten of all things. Shocker. http://www.arlingtonva.us/Departments/Communications/11998.aspx
And then today I received an email from my friend Ryan, informing me that MacBeth is playing in a nearby theater. Please look at this poster and you will realize this is not just any regular production of MacBeth.Yes, in case you can't read at the bottom it says Warning: Fully Nude. And yes the star does look like a werewolf. Nothing like a hairy naked man to bring in the masses.

Okay so as of late I just feel like we've been hosting a lot of parties. And I feel obligated to put up more pictures than just naked wolf man. So here are a few random pics for you.
Notice my face if you can make it out in the back. Sheer joy at the dance party for my dear roommate Sarah. And party hats make everything more enjoyable and easily make you look at least five years younger, right?
Well this is the least scandalous of my (I have removed the word sd because I found that people who were searching for sites with that word were finding my blog on google, ew) in the Potomac pictures. Yes, we did it, the night before my old roommate Jenny Miller moved back to Utah. Regrets and disease caught are at a strong zero. Even though a friend was kind enough to forward me an article in the Washington Post after that said "The Potomac is a river with levels of fecal bacteria that frequently exceed federal standards." Ew. What's done is done though.

HC is for hard core. You better believe it. Ok, not that hardcore, but this is me paddling a duckie on the Cheat River in West Virginia. Yes, I survived those crazy class II and III rapids.

big city life

It's funny living in the city. Some things are so convenient. We've got great public transportation, a number of great cultural events, ethnic restaurants, and more. But what did I really need this week? A dollar store and a fireworks stand. Let me tell you DC really dropped the ball on this one. The capitol of The United States of America, independence day is less than a week away and there is not a fireworks stand to be found, take me back to the west please.

And my dollar store debacle...I decided to search online for a dollar store, I found one that was in walking distance of my work to go to on my lunch break. So I walk about seven blocks onto streets I've never been. Suddenly the streets smell like urine, everything is a bit more dingy, and everybody is looking at me like I don't belong, even though I'm only seven blocks away from downtown and it's the middle of the day. I unconsciously take off my headphones and put my ipod away as my senses are put on alert. I find the hole in the wall dollar store, and the only thing they had there was cleaning supplies and those brown paper rolls that banks have to keep change in. Ok, that's an exaggeration, they had more than that, but this was no Utah dollar store where you can find pretty much anything you need. And nothing there was actually a dollar.

All in all a hilarious/maddening situation. I'm still searching for sparklers and little containers of bubbles....anyone? anyone?

Why I love summer

Summer, we all love it. It's a great season, and I was recently discussing with my roommates that even though we all have full-time jobs, no more summers off, there is still a general feeling in most offices that summers are a bit more chill. Well aside from a reduced workload here are a few of the many reasons that I love summer.
*snowcones - Snowie is a personal favorite and yes I did work at a snowie at the warped tour and a snoop dog concert
*random road trips - most recently last weekend we took a trip to Assateague island in Maryland. It's an island where there are wild horses roaming and the beach of course is always incredible. I sure do miss my mountains, but it's great to be close enough to a good beach that it's doable as a day trip.
* watermelon - Not the perfect fruit (that would be a grape) but there's something about eating a watermelon, with the juice dribbling down your face and hands that is so distinctly summeresque
* BBQ's - I've already been to a few this summer, and I'll go to another tonight. It doesn't matter if the food is mediocre for some reason when you cook and eat it outside it's so much better. And I love to just see boys come to life around a grill, it's hilarious.
* Fireworks - So many good memories of laying on a blanket with friends watching explosions above us
* Firebugs - Another east coast find that reminds me of my childhood in Iowa
* Long Days - It's amazing how much more I seem to squeeze into a day with those extra hours. This week I've been taking sculling classes on the Potomac and it surprised me that at 5:30 when my alarm went off the sun is already rising.
* Swimming Pools and Water Parks - Even though this does bring some painful summer memories of hours in the pool screaming at kids as I taught swimming lessons, it's more good than bad. There's nothing like jumping into a pool on an hot muggy east coast day. And I've been craving a trip to seven peaks, I need to find a local water park ASAP.

Well there are a lot more reasons to love summer, but that's a start. And here are a few random photos from our trip to Assateague.

Octopus Odie, Staci, Ryan and I had a lot of fun burying him and alive and creating this sand masterpiece

Yep, Wild Horses, that's what brings the masses

What's in a name???

So sometimes I have a little bit of free time at work, oh wait a lot of time I have free time at work. Or at least I create my own free time. Something that I have found way too much fun doing is name generating sites. Even though I know it's completely random, it's a guilty pleasure akin to reading horoscopes. So here are a few that I have appreciated, what's your air guitar and mormon name??
I'm Jennilyn Celestial Glory and Jenny "airoholic" Corry. Fitting, no?

The Mormon Name Generator

What's your air guitar name?

Welcome to Duck Beach: Greased Watermelons, Crab Hunts, and hundreds of single mormons looking for love

There is a serious tradition that exists on the east coast that I was never aware of until I moved here. Every Memorial Day weekend Mormons flock from areas as far flung as California, Florida, Boston, and Canada (we even had a few Finnish guys to mix things up). Some come seeking love, some want to escape the city life, and some 'girls just wanna have fun.'

Basically you get a group of of your friends, twenty to thirty people, and you rent these massive beach houses for the weekend. Then the fun begins, there are parties every night, a volleyball tournament (which was extremely well organized thanks to my roommate Leanna), skin boarding, wiffleball, impromptu dance parties, kayaking, and just an excuse for everyone to hang out without the stress of work or school. Camille came to visit from Utah, and it was so great to have her here, so she can finally put faces with names and we could spend some much needed quality time. And as many of you know, I am on a quest to get everyone I know in Utah (and other far flung places) to move to DC, and Duck Beach is a major selling point.
See how we grimace in pain as Spence, Jeff, Reed, Todd, Odie and I fight over the greased watermelon.

Me, Dan, Sarah, Courtney, Reed, Odie, and Grayden enjoying the final of the volleyball tournament. Funny note to add to this picture. This is immediately after a few of these guys had decided to bury me in the sand. While I was laying there with my head propped up on a sand pillow perfectly content watching the game this guy trips over me and ruins everything even though my friends had warned him I was there. Well when I sit up I realized it was the ex-BYU volleyball player who had spiked the ball in my face earlier that day. Needless to say our relationship progressed no further.This is the house we stayed in, and the parking lot which was the result of having thirty people stay in your house that was only supposed to sleep eighteen.

Hopefully, when I get some more pictures from other people of the crab hunt and other highlights of the trip I will post them for your viewing pleasure.

Vamos a Ecuador

Meet Team Mojado: Reed, Grayden, and Jenny

Since now I am an adult and have a full-time job I sit at a desk all day and I am always signed into my gmail account. This ends up forcing you to become an instant messager addict because the people you email that have gmail automatically appear in an instant messaging window. Anyways, this is relevant to my post because in a way gchat is responsible for getting me to Ecuador. You can personalize your status on gchat and I had written "I need a vacation" and my friend Grayden saw this and invited me to go to Ecuador with him and our friend Reed. I don't think he thought that I would take it seriously since I do have a full-time job and they were leaving in two weeks. But I took it very seriously and by the end of the day I had talked to my boss and decided that I was going to go. It was just what I needed, even though it was too short (I was only there for five days) it satiated my need to flee that I tend to feel every six months and allowed me to spend time doing things that I love with fun friends in Latin America where I really wish I could spend more time.
Our first day in Banos we rented bikes, and when you pay five dollars for an all day mountain bike rental you should probably know that you shouldn't expect too high of quality. We attempted to finish a sixty kilometer ride from Banos to Puyo. Which may have been possible, but we were too easily distracted by cable cars that you ride on like a zip line from one side of the river to the other, waterfalls, rainstorms, and riverside cafes. Not to mention our bike equipment that was definetly subpar, half the time somebody was either unable to shift gears, our chain had fallen off, or the gear pad was almost completely worn down (which is definitely sketchy on a mostly downhill road shared with blind corners that your sharing with buses and trucks driving Latin America style). But the ride was beautiful as we started in Banos, which is a village nestled below a volcano in the Andes, and as we descend thousands of feet towards Puyo you can literally see the change in the vegetation as we moved from the tropical high lands to the Amazon rain forst basin.

The next day we had planned to go river rafting, but it had been raining for thirty straight hours and the roads were a mess. There were landslides and rockslides covering all the roads out of the city and the water was so high, so they canceled our river trip. So I spent the morning getting a massage while the boys worked on getting a fire started in our fireplace. In the afternoon we visited the local Catholic church which is covered in murals depicting miracles that happened to people in Banos from saving men who were walking across bridges that collapsed to saving villages from volcano eruptions thanks to the Virgin Mary.
Our last day the rain stopped and we were able to do our rafting trip. This picture doesn't really do the river justice (the rapids were pretty large with consistent class 3 and 4 rapids) but you can see that it looks like the chocolate river in Willy Wonka. The water is silty from all the volcanic sediment in the water. And as we were rafting we could hear landslides all around us. We were lucky/unlucky enough to be on a trip with a bunch of drunk Russians which provided us with plenty of entertainment as we watched them struggle to paddle our boat. When our boat capsized and Grayden and I were pulled downstream the Russian boat rescued us and pulled us in. And as they chanted in Russian we can smell the alcohol with every stroke. And the kicked was that our rafting tour started at 8:30 in the morning.

NYC Baby

So this weekend I spent exactly 24 hours in New York City, and I had a great time. It's funny comparing road trips in DC to Utah. Instead driving four hours to end up in the red rock heaven of Moab or charming quaint Jackson Hole we have Philly that's two hours away, New York is four hours and Boston is eight. It's a different kind of escape and the adventure always brings the unexpected. For instance on this New York trip we were in China town looking at knock off purses. My roommate Staci (in the middle in the above picture) wanted a particular bag that you had to go a hidden room in a warehouse to see. So we followed this women three blocks away into an alley and through a huge metal door. We climbed four flights of stairs and when she opened the door I was shocked to see about thirty Asian men and women at sewing machines with fabric everywhere working at creating these designer knockoffs for the tourists. I felt like I had stepped back in time about fifty years, or at least crossed the border to a different country.

On our whirlwind tour of New York we visited Central Park, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Manhatten Temple, and Times Square. We also helped my roommate Staci prepare for the annual "Wheeler Party" that her and her brothers host. There were probably around 200 Young Single Adults from the area who came to their Hawaiian themed party, however I was exhausted and really not in the mood to make small talk with a bunch of people that I probably would never see again so I went and took a nap for about an hour and a half, then woke up in time to dance for about a half hour before the party died down. New York is an amazing city, but I was just reminded of how I really don't ever want to live there, when we came back to DC it seemed so small, clean, and familiar. Home.

My latest obsessions....

Okay, so I'm at a loss for what to write, but feel like I should write something here at least weekly. So here are a few books I'm reading, songs I'm listening to, websites I'm digging, hobbies I'm cultivating etc.
So yesterday my roommate Leanna was so excited to show me this website she has found www.bfro.net look it up and you'll understand. It's a website run by the scientific research organization dedicated to exploring the bigfoot/sasquatch mystery. Folks this is no joke. It's actually a girl in our ward who's brother runs the site. Anyways they have bigfoot expeditions all around the country where you spend the weekend in a place that has had numerous bigfoot sightings. Conveniently there is an expedition in South Carolina on November 8...I'm really pushing to head there for my birthday next year, can you think of a better way to spend 26? Me neither.

So here is a playlist of some songs that I'm listening to, anyone who knows me knows that I love finding new bands and sharing my discoveries so here goes:
Concrete Seconds - Pinback
Shiver - Chris Velan
In the morning - Junior Boys
Concerning the UFO sighting near Highland, Illinois - Sufjan Stevens
Decatur, Or round of applause for your stepmother! - Sufjan Stevens
Come and find me - Josh Ritter
Big Sur - The Thrills
El Salvador - Athlete
Wake up - The Arcade Fire
Baby Boy - Beyonce
Its Too Late - Evermore
Saint Simon - The Shins
Skeleton Jar - Youth Group
Nothings Gonna Change Your Mind - Badly Drawn Boy
A House Is Not A Home - Field Music
Be Without You - Mary J. Blige
July, July! - The Decembrists
Ruby - Kaiser Chiefs

I have self diagnosed ADD when it comes to finishing books...I am currently in the middle of two (but that's only counting those I've picked up in the last two weeks) They are "A Long Way Home" which is a really sad, graphic, but interesting autobiography of a boy soldier in Sierra Leone. I'm only half way through, but it has totally changed my perspective on war and what it does to people. Especially seeing it through the eyes of a child and how you can become so totally hardened. There are constant reminders of the evil that exists in the world as was evidenced this week by the shooting this week at Virginia Tech. The other book is not as fast of reading, but is very interesting. "The Omnivore's Dilemma" which talks about the evolution of the human diet and how far we have come from eating actualy "food" I can't give too much commentary though because I'm only about twenty pages in.

A very happy Easter

Nothing says a perfect Easter weekend like an egg hunt with a group of people in their mid twenties to early thirties, a trip to West Virginia to watch horse races and eat at a buffet, a rocking birthday party for my roommate Leanna, and a job that gives me holidays that I don't even really know how to celebrate (Good Friday) off from work.

Since I am a self-proclaimed novice in the world of blogging I don't know how to put captions on pictures....so starting top to bottom we have our favorite horse "splendid frolic" brining home the money, my beautiful roommates at rock & roll bowl, Leanna showing off her precious golden egg to Courtney, and Sarah and I enjoying watching all the "kids" hunt after playing Easter bunny.
p.s. can someone please help me figure out to layout a page....s.o.s. I'm self-conscious enough at times about having a blog...

Apparently the national cherry blossom festival is a big deal. I’ll be honest, I’d never heard of it until I moved here, and even then I didn’t fully comprehend. Well this weekend I understood. The Japanese donated 3,020 cherry trees to our nation in 1912. They have been planted around our national monuments in Washington D.C. and it is truly spectacular. The trees surround a reflecting pool that lies between the Jefferson and Washington monuments. Yesterday my roommate Sarah and a few other choice souls (a 6 a.m. departure time for a bike ride is a great weeder to find the truly hard core) packed a crepe breakfast and headed to the monuments for a pre work picnic at the cherry blossoms. It was incredible, I think our friend Cristy put it best when she said we were privileged to see “dawn’s rosy fingers trail across the blooming sky.”

I finally caved.....

Welcome self to the world of blogging and welcome to all you who care enough about me to actually read this. After a bit of prodding, but mostly because I really enjoy reading others blogs and keeping in touch with those who I really wish I could actually talk to more frequently, I decided to join the world of the bloggers. It’s less intrusive to all of you than sending out mass emails and not as overwhelming as getting a myspace account. So blogs away.