NC Happenings

I know, I know, I'm the worst blogger in the history of the world. Actually, I'm going to go ahead and give that title to my sister-in-law. She made a blog and then NEVER posted again... I hope she's still alive...

Anyway, we made it to North Carolina! My lovely east coast! We've been here for just over a month and I'm just getting around to write any sort of post about it. And it will likely be a very long time before I post again, so you're just going to have to re-read this post over and over again to fill your lives with joy (for now).

We're living in a small town outside of Ft. Bragg. Daniel is a medical service officer on post and if you have any more questions about that, you'll have to ask him. Or leave them in written form and I can ask him and then respond. All the other wives around here know about ten thousand more acronyms than I do (acronyms are the way you can determine how much someone knows about the army) and they want to know more about his work and I say, "paperwork... medics... he was a business major..." and then they stop talking to me because they think I'm an idiot. It's pretty great.

So here we are in our little starter home (that I'm not going to post pictures of because I'm still unpacking and cleaning from our camping trip) enjoying life as adults! Well, not REAL adults since we don't have kids. But Harley is like a kid, so we're pseudo-adults.

I mentioned a camping trip. That's because we went camping! For my birthday (and luckily it was Veteran's Day weekend) we headed to Carolina Beach and camped... on the beach! Harley had a good time smelling (and eating) everything and we enjoyed some time relaxing and being together. Daniel works 12-14 hour days, so any time he has off is great.

I'm helping out with the 2-3 year old kids at church and Daniel helps with the 12-13 year old boys, so we basically do the same thing on Sundays.

Here are some pictures from our camping trip!

Our sweet setup on the beach

Harley thinks she's a people... and we love her!

I'm so Texan right now...

Today was craft day on the Cox farm. I headed over and made these beauties with Jenna. We saw them a while ago online and thought they looked easy enough and our craft-impaired selves could actually pull them off. We weren't disappointed!

We started off with some 11x12ish boards from Hobby Lobby. Then, of course, we painted them. And who wants new things if they actually look new? So we took sand paper to them and rubbed some of the paint off. We're so vintage.

Then we made some cutouts of Texas with hearts over Austin. Not only is it where they're from, it's so conveniently located on the map to look all artsy for this project! So that's a win-win. And also something I never would have thought to consider while deciding where to live... so now I know!

Then came the nails. Thousands and thousands (maybe millions--who knows?) of nails. Death by nails. After driving so many into that tiny heart, it made me wonder if it was all worth it. But it was. Of course.

And then the string! Jenna beat me on the nails, but I had a much easier time with the string.

 And after tying off the ends, we were done! I didn't actually take a picture of Jenna's finished product, but I promise you it was beautiful. But here's mine, and I'm quite proud of it!

And I know what you're thinking... "Crafts?? I came here to see pictures of your gross leg!" Well don't worry; here they are:

Last Wednesday

Today.

So the swelling and bruising has gone down a lot, but it's still pretty bruised right on the spot where the boat hit me. Also, this injury explains why I'm stuck inside doing crafts.

Mid-Summer Update

Well it's been a while since I've updated, but a LOT has been going on! Let's see if I can remember everything...

In June we got the heck out of Provo! We thought we might miss it, but we really don't yet (oops?). We headed up to Idaho to stay with my family for a bit before Daniel's training started. And since he's now addicted to relay races, we ran the Bone and Back with my friend Jordyn (http://jordykates.blogspot.com/) and my uncle Scott (and the rest of our team). It was a fun day, but I was definitely not in shape for it and I was feeling it the next couple of days.

I only had this one picture... If you really want to see more, there might be some on Facebook.

The next week, we headed up to Priest Lake in northern Idaho and it was warm for once in my life! We had temperatures in the 90's and 100's and the lake felt so great! My dad also bought a couple of wave runners and the whole week was a blast, relaxing and playing whenever we felt like it. Unfortunately, I only took this one picture the whole time. If I get my hands on any more, I'll put them up.

Unfortunately, we missed out on this particular Anaconda opportunity...

Then I cut off my hair!!

13 inches!

Right after Priest Lake we picked up our u haul trailer and made the looooong drive down to Georgetown, TX (just north of Austin). We had a fun detour along the way through Dallas where we picked up this little beauty! She's a German Shepherd/Rottweiler mix and she's going to get a LOT bigger!

Her name is Harley

She's the cutest thing ever and the first grandchild on Daniel's side of the family! haha.

So now Daniel has started training in San Antonio, but I get to see him every weekend. Luckily his training is only two months long, so we get to head to North Carolina together at the end of September. But his family is nearby and we're doing lots of fun things together. Daniel's dad has a boat, so we get to go out on the lake quite a bit. I learned to wakeboard the other day! I'm not very good. Ok, I'm not good at all. I can barely stand up! But it's a lot of fun and a great way to get out of the Texas heat!

Daniel's brother and I were matchy matchy!

The beautiful lake at sunset

I got up eventually!

But most of my time was spent here...

I dare the entire internet to find a cuter picture than this. Not even staged!

I'm living in Daniel's grandparents' house for now. His grandpa has been up in Idaho helping with BYU-I's engineering program all summer, but they'll be back in a few days to keep me company. But for now, this little cutey is keeping me company:

She loves to play with the bigger dog

9 week picture!

And I felt like there weren't enough pictures of Daniel in this post, so here's one from last Christmas when he decided to torture the goat:

So that's what we've been up to! Hopefully I'll update at least one more time before the big move!

The Old North State

The news everyone has been waiting for (trust me, you've been waiting for it): We're going to North Carolina!!! Daniel will be stationed with the 82nd airborne as a Medical Service officer so he's really excited about that, but I'm pretty sure I'm a LOT more excited than he is. My grandma thinks I never liked it out here in Utah/Idaho because I'm SO excited to get back out to the lovely east coast. (Utah and Idaho are great, by the way. But the east coast is about a bazillion times better).

Anyway, how about an update? My cousin berated me for taking over two months to update my blog...

In April, Daniel commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant! I sang the national anthem for the ceremony and he was more nervous for me than I was. It was a great ceremony and both our families came. Daniel got the Kalunky (sp?) award, which is the top award the ROTC offers! I've always known he's the best, now he has an award to prove it!

That same weekend, Daniel's little sister got married! My favorite quote that sums up the experience was when Daniel said, "I don't know how you managed it, but you both married down!" Ok so maybe that's not how we really feel. But he really said it. Then wrote it in their cute little sign-in book. We're good siblings.

This past weekend we headed down to Moab where Daniel ran in his second Red Rock Relay. He had a team with a bunch of other army guys and they came in third place! We had a lot of fun "camping" (in a travel trailer) with my parents and visiting the national parks down there. And we saw a bear on the side of the road when we were cheering Daniel on during the race!

His team placed third of about 160 teams! They're kind of a big deal.

So for the next few months we'll be splitting time between my family and his (which means we get to drive between Texas and Idaho over and over and over again...) and then we'll head to Ft. Bragg in October! We're excited to see our family out there more often and I get to be back on the east coast!!!

So there's my update. I hope everyone is happy!

Jan & Feb

Since we don't really have anything exciting going on in our lives, I don't update much... hopefully the next couple months we'll have more updates.

So anyway, I'm going to sum up January and February with one word: MISERY.

There has been so much snow and it's been so cold. I made Daniel promise me that we will never, ever, EVER live in Utah again (or a state that's this miserable in the winter). So hopefully the army doesn't make him break that promise and send us to Alaska or New York or something... because I will probably die.

In other news, Daniel's life is being eaten by the army--he has had 2 weekends off this ENTIRE semester so far and I get to bond with his sister a lot when she comes to keep me company. One weekend was the ROTC dining out, and that was not completely awful. It was actually pretty great! At least I got to be with him! (And Tucano's catered... that was a definite plus.)

Doesn't he look so handsome???

And just yesterday he got to join a VERY elite club: he is now an intramural champion! I got my t-shirt a few years back with my basketball team and he just won the doubles racquetball tournament with a friend. So I guess I can't tease him about that for the rest of our lives any more...

Other than that, not much is going on now. Well, a lot is going on but it's all boring. Luckily my sister is getting married this month and his sister is getting married next month and in May we're going on a ton of vacations and moving to Texas, so hopefully I'll have more adventures to fill everyone in on.

Until then, please educate yourselves on the angler fish:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-BbpaNXbxg

One Year Together!

Daniel and I celebrated our first anniversary in beautiful, sunny Texas. We were getting kicked out of our room at his grandparents' house for a while anyway, so we decided to get a hotel in Austin and see the city.

We started at the Saltlick BBQ restaurant in Round Rock. They had some pretty good food, but we liked the pork ribs the best.

I meant to take before pictures, too, but... I forgot...

Outside the restaurant.

Next we headed into Austin and checked out the Capitol building. It's even bigger than the nation's capitol! So it's true when they say everything's bigger in Texas. It's also a very beautiful building! And inspiring to think of the dedication in building it before they had all the machines we have now. So much thought and work and care went into it and all the amazing buildings from that time period.

The central dome

It says "Texas" everywhere... the tour guide said "Just in case you forget where you are"

The senate room. 

These are the ORIGINAL desks and they are beautiful! They had some artists in there restoring them while we were there.

"Texas" in the lights, haha

The House was in session. There's something important about that tree, but I don't remember what it was, haha

The building from the outside. Does anyone know how to flip pictures?

Next we headed to "Mount" Bonnell. A whopping 106 STEPS to the top. Like literal stair steps.

But there was a nice view from the top. There was also a view of the city, but it was far away and didn't look that impressive in the picture.

The silly steps!

Then we checked into our hotel and checked out the Arboretum shops. We were still full from lunch, so we got some ice cream and rode the weird stone cows. I'm still not sure why they were there...

I'm firing guns. Because we're in Texas and that's what people do in Texas!

Daniel scolding the ashamed cow.

Then we headed to the Trail of Lights for some depressing Christmas cheer. We heard it used to be really good but the people who originally did it sold it and it got lame.

Our favorite was the tunnel of epilepsy:

So we tried to get out of there as fast as possible

All of the exhibits looked something like this. But at least this one has something to with Christmas! Not all of them did...

This was the one exhibit with Jesus. And he is creepily huge...

But there was a nice view of the city lights at the end!

After that we headed back to the hotel and relaxed in the hot tub for an hour before they closed it. The next day we saw The Hobbit in the morning. It was a really nice couple of days and we think we'll make a tradition of mini-vacations for our anniversary.

Can anybody guess where we are?

Hello from warm, sunny Texas! Anniversary update to come...