Vacation, Part 2

So, horseback riding. I hadn't ridden in FOREVER, and lately it has been all I can think about. (Our ride in Vernal has cured me of that obsession, at least for a few days!) My mom's former co-worker has horses, so she called and asked if we could ride. He was pretty worried about it, because apparently one of his horses, Bailey, is quite gentle and easy to ride and the other...well, suffice it to say his name is Turbo. So my mom's friend was afraid one of us might get hurt. But Amy and I both used to teach horseback riding lessons, so my mom was confident we could handle it, and told him so. He wasn't so convinced, but he agreed to let us ride them anyway. We had a blast, going on a little trail ride and literally running and running and running the horses up and down hills and up and down the road, etc. It was GREAT!! I love to ride, because there's nothing quite like the feeling of the wind blowing through your hair, when the only things that matter in the world are you, the horse, and keeping your butt in the saddle. :) Hard to think about all the drama and craziness life throws at you when you're just trying not to fall off a huge animal hurdling down the road at breakneck speeds, eh?!

So I think my mom's friend figured out we really do know how to ride about the time we galloped up the road and stopped right in front of him. :) It was a great time.

Anyway, the rest of the time we just hung out with friends and fam, played my parents' Wii (which, by the way, if you haven't played with a Wii--soooooo fun!), and hung out. I highly recommend Wii Olympics. It's a blast. And watching Brookie box was pretty awesome, too! (Can I just mention how fun it is that my sister married the brother of a good high school friend, so now I actually see Brooke (Merrell) Alexander all the time!! Love it!)

Amy and I drove back the ol' Vail Pass way to Denver (also gorgeous!), picked Ster up, who'd been working in Grand Junction all week and missing out on all the fun, and headed out to dinner, then to visit Janna and Ryan and their kiddies.

Joe and Ben are AWESOME!! I've spent some time with Joseph before, and man is that kid adorable!! I've never seen a kid that age obsessed with Star Wars before, but he can't get enough. And Ben--what a great baby!! I don't think he cried the whole time we were there. They are sooooo cute. It was great to see Jan and Ryan again--twice a year is totally not enough. Jan and I have been friends since we were ten, and I introduced her to Ryan when we were freshman in college (Ryan and I worked together), so it's especially fun for me to see how they're doing and watch their family grow. :)

Anyway, Jan invited us over for brunch on my way to the airport, so she made us an awesome breakfast/brunch and we had a little photo op...that went on and on and on...that Joseph likes to be the center of attention! :) It was great to see them. Then my awesome sister and brother-in-law dropped me off at DIA, and it was the end of vacation for me.

The flight back was amazing, flying RIGHT next to the top of Mt. Hood as we came into Portland. It got even more amazing when my fabulous boyfriend brought me flowers at the airport and insisted on buying me tea at Starbucks! :) He's great. Then we went out for dinner and went to see "Kung Fu Panda" (which I HIGHLY recommend, by the way--it's hilarious!! And not just for kiddos, either).

So there you have it. That was my vacation. :) I feel like I just wrote a high school essay or something. :)

Utah + Colorado = VACATION!!!!

Despite the craziness of my last week (I promise this is the FIRST time I've actually had a minute to myself to sit down and write--and yes, largely that's my own fault, but that's neither here nor there), I'm actually writing this blog within a week of returning from vacation! I think that's pretty darn good! :) WARNING: This will probably be LONG, so read at your own risk!

So, here goes:

This is the first time EVER I will work a job year-round for 12 consecutive months. Usually I have summers "off"--at least off from whatever my typical gig is. This has literally been the case SINCE I WAS BORN. Maybe that's why I feel like I am NOT cut out for this 12 month job business. I NEED A BREAK!!! Geez.

Anyway, I was originally hired to work a 10-month contract, August 1-May 31, which followed in my typical pattern of having the summers to go on trips and have a summer job and play. However, toward the end of May, my job decided they wanted to change my contract and make it be a 12-month, year-round deal. (You can probably tell I have mixed feelings about this change of events.) It's nice for my wallet, not quite as nice for my sanity and vacationing needs. So at the end of May, my boss and I had a chat that went something like this:

Boss: So, Jen, starting July 1, you're now a full-time, 12-month employee. That means you'll be running Vacation Bible School.

Jen: So, you're saying you want me to run this giant program with about four days to plan it.

Boss: (clearly confused) Uhhhhhh.....What do you mean 4 days?

Jen: Well, VBS is scheduled for the second week of July, and I don't work here in June.

Boss: You don't work here in June?

Jen: Nope. My contract is up at the end of May.

Boss: Are you sure?

Jen: Yep. August through May. 10 months. So you're not paying me to work here in June.

Boss: Ummm....huh. Well....let me work on that.

After a crazy series of conversations, it was decided that I WOULD work there in June, but for some reason they "can't justify" hiring me to work full-time this month (but they can next year? Huh.), so I'm working 30 hours per week. BUT the good part about this change is that they told me I could stack those hours however I wanted, so I could take some time off. So basically I worked like crazy for two weeks, then took a week off, and have been just taking it easy ever since. (Does all this seem crazy to anyone else?) So the moral of the story: VACATION!!

My mom just had her first knee replacement surgery (second knee coming in August--and she's doing FABULOUSLY, by the way--only a week and a half later and she's already walking around the house WITHOUT crutches! CRAZY!), and she really wanted me to come home. Since I didn't think I'd be working at my job in June, I had told her it might be a possibility, but then it got a little trickier when the job sitch changed. I was also a little wary because we hadn't quite figured out when Erik would be moving, and I didn't really want to spend his last week here with me a plane-ride away. It all worked out, though, and I'm SO glad, because it was FUN!!

My sister is in Physical Therapy school in Denver, and she just happened to have a few days off, so logistically and financially speaking, it was actually a lot better for everyone for me to fly into Denver, then drive to Utah, so that's what we did. It was 95 degrees in Denver!!!!!! When I lived in Utah, 95 degrees was nothing to sing about--that's HOT!! But when you come from Portland where the sun is a rare occurance and we never saw spring, let alone summer, the sunshine is GLORIOUS!!! So I was basking in it's glow all week. Anyway...

You guys, my dad got this new job a couple years ago, working for a private company instead of for the BLM, and boy does he have connections!!! Thanks to my baseball-loving boyfriend and his extreme patience in explaining the game to me, I have become quite a fan of baseball, so my sister and I made plans to go see a Rockies game. Unbeknownst to us, my dad called his boss (who happens to live in Denver), and next thing we knew we had FREE tickets in the TENTH ROW!!!! It was AMAZING!!! If you ever have a chance to see a baseball game at Coors Field, DO IT!!! It's like a giant party--sooooooo much fun!

The next day we fiddled around in Denver for awhile, then hit the road. My sister and brother-in-law (Sterling) drive to Vernal quite a bit, but they've never followed Highway 40 all the way from Denver on home. Amy casually mentioned that sometime she'd like to take that route, so I said, "Let's do it!" And it was BEAUTIFUL!!! And really, it didn't take us any longer than the other way, which is supposedly sooooo much faster. It was totally worth it to go that way. There is NOTHING quite like driving through the middle of the Rocky Mountains.

We got to Vernal just a few minutes after my folks rolled in from SLC, chatted with them for a little bit (by the way...people on major narcotics are HILARIOUS!), and headed to bed. Thursday was mostly a "take care of mom" day (which largely fell to Amy, since my mom decided Amy's physical therapy student status meant she was clearly the most qualified to help her out--okay. Sorry you had to do all that, Meem!). But, when my dad got home, Amy and I went horseback riding!!!

To be continued in the next post....

A little John Denver, anyone?

, "Sunshine....on my shoulders....makes me happy!"

So, I'm not home yet, but here's a tiny little preview of my vacation for my blog. Suffice it to say, I have been BASKING in the Utah/Colorado sunshine, and it's making me have a hard time figuring out why in the heck I would ever choose to live in gray, rainy Oregon!! (Okay, okay, Oregon's not that bad, but I'm not looking forward to leaving the constant sunshine of the past five days.)


"Rocky Mountain high, Colorado...!"

Seriously, how beautiful are the Rocky Mountains? Sometimes I can't believe how awesome they are, and I can't believe I grew up practically right next to them! No wonder I can't get enough of the mountains!! The sky is big and gorgeous (hello, I AM a Montana girl at heart!), the weather's beautiful, and the landscape can't be beat. Glorious!! :)


And how adorable is my sister? We went horseback riding on Thursday, and it was GLORIOUS!!! We had such a great time, racing up and down the dirt road on horseback--so fun! And as much as I was ready to leave Vernal when high school ended, look in the background--isn't it pretty??