New Pics

We were playing with the fam over the weekend after church and a friend volunteered to snap some pictures of us. Wow was she talented! Here are some of the fruits of her labors

California here we come!

Our Trip to Cali

Last month we went on a trip to Cali to celebrate our one year mark. It's hard to believe that it's already been that long, but are excited to be able to say that we're no longer "honeymooners". Here are some lovely pictures of our california adventures:

As you can see, our trip began with emerging from a very large hollowed tree. It was a traumatizing experience.

This is what I looked like after our first water ride at Six Flags. .. which by the way is the best theme park ever. We spent two days at the park screaming our lungs out on some of the tallest and fastest roller coasters in the country. I highly recommend it.

Here we are at Muir woods. It was just like the Redwoods and was absolutely gorgeous!

This thing made us laugh until we almost peed. It's a little trick with mirrors and windows. These people pulled faces into mirrors, all the while having no clue that there was an audience of people at Ripley's Believe it or Not museum watching them and laughing hysterically. At one point a guy saw the red flash of our camera and began looking deep into the mirror trying to figure out where it had come from. The two of us ran and hid behind a corner like little kids at recess, afraid that he could see us.

This is at the exploratorium. I've always thought I looked better with a halo.

Again at the Exploratorium. This is a great look for Tyler.

Our deep sea fishing adventure. My fish was sure a beaute. Don't ask about Tyler's.... there's still some bitterness there :)

In case you've never seen this though, you catch a fish, you're all excited, and then they pound its brains with a wooden mallet. Eesh.

Here is a shark that one of us caught. We actually got to touch a shark!! Jake actually caught a bigger shark through his eye... as in, the hook went through his eye. If you ever come across a one eyed shark swimming through the ocean you can thank Jake. It was crazyness!

The inspiration behind this picture of and exhibit at Ripley's Believe it or Not museum lies behind the book that kept me sane during our long ride to California: the Twilight series. Along with several other thousand girls across the country, I am now a total vampire fan.

Again at Ripley's, Tyler and I strike a pose with this gentleman. Ty wins this contest for sure.

No words are really needed for this picture. Whales are beautiful!

Home Sweet Home

Breaking news!! Local homeowners be warned- we're moving in!! After numerous searches, this team of crazy bandits has at long last settled on an official theiving ground. Mwa haha!

Okay okay, I'll try not to be so loony. We were informed late last week that our offer on a home was accepted. Everything we looked at in our price range was.... well we'll just say that they were in need of a whole lot of lovin. Much to our surprise however, we did find one in our desperate attempts that caught our fancy. We made an offer on it the next day and the rest is history!
Speaking of desperate attempts, our lovely manager... lets call him he who must not be named for thematic purposes.
Ahem. Continuing on: he who must not be named knew that we were looking for a home and inadvertantly rented our apartment out to a poor unsuspecting couple and informed us that we had 3 weeks to be out. Wow! 3 weeks and no where to go. Not surprisingly, I was unsuccessful in my attempts to convince Tyler that the money we would save by living in a tent in the back yard would be worthwhile.
As you can see however, our story has a very happy ending (excepting of course the large supply of eggs that will be pelted at he who must not be named in the near future). We'll live with family for just a couple of weeks and then we'll set up shop. We feel so blessed and so thankful to be able to do this!
Here are some pictures of our cute little home to be:

Wedding Pictures

Breaking News! We finally got our wedding pictures! I have to apologize for the delay however because as you can see, I haven't put them up yet. They should be up within the next week or so once we get the CD back. So sit tight, they'll be here soon.
In the mean time, Tyler and I have been enjoying our summer break to its fullest. We were able to go camping, ride motorcycles, take a random hike that landed us in the middle of a golf course (we looked like lost tourists wandering around while dodging golf carts) and watch movies galore. It's been a lovely experience!
Tyler has started one of his summer classes and we each will start back full time at the beginning of June. Yay for summer classes! Stay tuned for pictures.

Our Spring Break

It's sad how school can so often take over your life isn't it? Both bandits have found that to be the case these past couple of weeks and sadly have little expectations of that changing for the next month or so. It seems like about this time every semester we stop and ask ourselves if it is physically possible to finish all of the academic demands at hand. So far we've proven that it is however, and continue in our hopefulness for the same evidence this semester.

That being said, we had a FABULOUS spring break last month! We were able to join the fam and some friends up in Island Park for some fun in the snow. Ty completely showed me up on the snowmobiles (don't worry, I can still take him on the bikes :)! We also did some midnight snow shoeing, which we absolutely had a blast with!

The cabin that we stayed in held 3 families, had no running water and no bedrooms, but it was so nice to get away and rough it out there in the beautiful outdoors!

I have included a very glamorous picture of the two of us on snowmobiles. .. I'm the one with no face.

Hope you all enjoyed your break as much as we did. Keep us in touch!

Love,

The Cookie Dough Bandits

Our Desert Adventure

It was recently suggested that we tell the infamous story of our desert adventure.
(This picture was taken on the morning following our lovely mishap.)

Case in point: Tyler and I have run into a problem. We are unable to sit peacefully at the family dinner table without various snickers and "Better keep an eye on these two, they might get LOST" comments ringing out from all directions in the room.
Why you ask? Well there is a very simple explanation.
Don't get me wrong, the facts of this case point clearly to a scandal: newly dating couple, driving alone to meet the parents at the campsite and arriving 4 hours late.
Before you jump to any rash conclusions however, please allow us to tell our side of the story:
After the two of us had been dating a whole 2 months, I decided to put him to the test. It was time to take him to the desert! After all, any boy that I was going to be with needed to be able to rough it and handle a bike. So we planned a little get away and left straight after work to meet up with the fam at the dirt hills.
Things got off to a rocky start right off the bat. First of all, in my effort to keep the house safe I managed to lock the two of us out of the house which is where all my luggage, maps, and directions to the campsite were. After climbing up the roof and trying our best to bust out our robbery skills, we failed at all attempts to open the windows. In desparation we called our neighbor who managed to pry open the kitchen window and hoist yours truly up to crawl through it.
I'll spare you the details and skip to our next major road block. Just so you know, dirt roads and pitch black do not mix well. First of all, it makes cute little innocent bunny rabits hard to see. yep. I hit a cute little bunny rabit and went into complete hysterics. My entire family is huge into hunting and shooting anything that moves but I could not deal with the fact that a little fluffy bunny could be hopping along happily if not for my neglegence. I nearly burst into tears as I realized what happened, then pulled over, and my date (pictured above) tried his best to convince me that rabbits were "like rats in this part of town" and that I had no need to feel bad.
Secondly, pitch black darkness and tiny road signs also create an unfavorable mixture. Two hours after we expected to arrive at our campsite we came to the conclusion that we were terribly terribly lost. What's more? Our gas tank was officially on empty, it was the dead of night, and the only gas station in town was closed. With the car running on fumes and the two of us completely at a loss for further directions, we did the only thing we could; we pulled over to sleep on the side of the road for the night. After a few minutes however, we spotted a large truck headed our way, flagged it down and asked if we could follow them to the camping area.
The drivers of the truck evidently had no idea that speed limits were actually enforceable and rased down the road reaching speeds that our gas lacking car struggled to reach. Well we finally caught up with the truck and were told that this was the starting point of the camping area. Little did we know that our map actually began two turns behind this point. In a nutshell, our map lead us to a deserted dirt trail hardly suitable for large vehicles in the dead of night and once again with the feeling that we were completely and hopelessly lost.
At this point, we were serious. If we continued driving, we'd likely run out of gas so that by the time morning came we would be completely helpless and unable to look for the family with the advantage of sunlight. Throughout this entire process, I'd been on the phone with the parental units trying very hard to have a conversation with them as we roamed in and out of service areas; it was nearly impossible.
Seeing no other options, we pulled down the back seats and made a bed with the one sleeping bag and blanket we had (he was kind enough to give me the sleeping bag). Next, I sent him on a walk as I changed into my pajamas in the car. We got totally ready for bed- brushed our teeth and spit in the sage brush together, cleared out the car, said our prayers, everything. This was excellent. We'd known each other for two months and there we were: stranded in the desert together and lying next to each other trying to fall asleep. This was a new experience that quite frankly, would've been frowned upon by a large majority of the people we knew. Just as we were falling asleep, we heard the sound of a motorcylce coming closer and closer to our little makeshift shelter. Dad was there to save the day and guide us to the campsite. Needless to say, his determination to find us was pretty high that night.
The moral of the story is that getting lost in a desert together can be an extremely effective dating experience. I loved this because it gave me the opportunity to see how we work together when things do not go as planned. Everything from the burglary to the killing of an innocent rabbit and being stranded in the desert together went completely wrong, but I enjoyed it and am still thankful that we were able to see sides of eachother that would not have normally come out in a typical dating situation.
In conclusion, we hope that you will see that the two of us are completely innocent and free of any "foul play". Not surprisingly however, I'm sure we'll never hear the end of it from our beloved friends and family. Furthermore, Dad has informed us that next time we get lost, he will not come looking.

The posting of pictures

Hello all! We have recently received suggestions of making our pictures bigger for your viewing pleasures. In light of those comments I am making an attempt. If it works, hooray! If not, don't say I didn't warn you of my handicap. Love you all!

P.S. more to come :)