How...Romantic?

For our first anniversary, Brett surprised me with an overnight trip to Park City, Utah. The next morning we went shopping in the outlet mall, had a fabulous lunch, and then headed to Salt Lake to go to the aquarium. Brett had reservations for dinner that night, but we were pretty early for them. We decided to go to the Gateway and see a movie. The movie that we were willing to see that started at the right time was Pirates of the Caribbean 3. Romantic, no? Thus was born our anniversary tradition.

On our second anniversary, we went out to dinner and saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I was thrilled to get out of the house because Kennedy was born only 6 weeks earlier.

For our third anniversary, we went out to dinner and saw Terminator Salvation.

It seems that the first big blockbuster action movie of the summer always comes out in May, just in time for our anniversary at the beginning of June. So, next week, we will be continuing the tradition by going to dinner and then driving the 30 minutes to the movie theatre in Crescent City, CA to see Robin Hood. It may not be totally normal, but we enjoy it.

Exodus Part 3: Santaquin to Brookings

We left Santaquin (somewhat) early on Tuesday morning and drove to Reno where we stayed the night. After driving through Nevada, I've decided that there are only 3 things there: casinos, prisons, and long stretches of nothing. We literally only hit about 3 cities on our way through - one right on the border of Utah, one in the middle, and Reno. It was the most boring day of driving we had had. There was nothing to look at, except Beverly Hills (which consisted of a couple of small hills in the middle of flatness and a rundown house) and a voodoo witch doctor shack that was about 30 feet high and built out of antlers. Right before Reno it started getting hilly, but we were thrilled to be out of the car. The kids reprised their throwing up incidents at dinner that night, except Kennedy added a poop and Noah added two.

The next day was our last day of driving, and it was beautiful. We left from Reno and shortly entered California. It was weird, because that drive in California was nothing like I have ever known as California. This is what our drive looked like through most of it.

Tons and tons of tall snowy trees with interludes of beautiful lakes. In Oregon it was so green, mountainous, and just plain gorgeous. We stopped in Burney, CA for lunch and gas, and Brett ordered this bad boy.

That's a french fry on the top of that tall stick. It's got ham and turkey, bacon, and two types of cheese. It was huge. I don't know how he fit it in his mouth. My chili dog was not as impressive as it was more of a pork and beans dog. We kept driving and made a small stop in Medford, OR to shop at the Harry and David manufacturer's store, since it is headquartered there. Then, with only 2 hours to go, we drove to Brookings. The 199 in California and Oregon is absolutely gorgeous. Waterfalls, trees, rivers - you name it, it's there. Then, as we pulled into Brookings, we could see the ocean.

This beach is about 3 minutes from our apartment. Yes, you should be jealous. The whole place is beach on one side and hills and trees on the other. When I drive back to the 101 (which is the main street where pretty much all of the businesses are) I can see the ocean. When I drive home, I can see hills and trees. It's really beautiful.

It took me a little while to feel at home since I have never lived in such a small town. Between Harbor, Brookings, and the county residents who are outside the city limits there are 14,000 people. Previously I have lived in Orange County, CA, the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, Boston, and Provo (which might not seem that big, but BYU alone has more than double the amount of students than this place has residents). Obviously, it takes some adjusting. The local restaurants are pretty good and there's a great grocery store that has a home goods section too.

Everybody has been very nice, and we're finally feeling like we are at home. So far, so good with the Coast Guard. We hope it keeps up and they keep sending us to beautiful places like this.

Exodus Part 2: A Stay in Santaquin

The second part of our trip was a well deserved 4 day stay with Brett's parents in Santaquin. We were all sick of being in the car after 2.5 days of being stuck in our seats. We had a good sleep that night after a yummy meal. The next morning, Kennedy created a new delicacy by putting all of her grapes into her Cheerios.

She seemed to enjoy it. Kennedy had a great time playing with her cousins while she was there. Most of them are quite a bit older than her, but they love to play with her and Kennedy had a blast. The day after we got there we left the kids with Brett's parents and headed to Salt Lake with Jesse, Kaisa, Jamie and Trevor to watch the Jazz take on the Nuggets. The game was great and they pulled out a win for us. We had a great time, especially knowing that we probably won't be making it to any basketball games for a while.

We were able to shop, go to The Cocoa Bean for some awesome cupcakes, see some of my family, and see the Waddoups. Kennedy and Boston had a good reunion, although I don't think Boston was too fond of Noah. He got a little jealous when Kim picked him up.

We dropped off the trailer and loaded up the big trailer that would bring all of our stuff to Brookings. They packed masterfully! I took a picture with my camera, and not my phone, which I have yet to unload onto the computer. I will do that soon so you can all see their mad skills. We had a HUGE treat on Saturday night because Stefani offered to take Noah for the night. It was amazing. I slept for 8 hours without waking up once. It has been months since I've done that! We had a birthday party for all of us who have birthdays in April too, and Stefani found this cute cake at a garage sale!

We celebrated for me, Kasia (not to be confused with Kaisa above), Brett, Kennedy, and Brett's grandpa. We loved seeing family and, of course, eating a delicious meal and some cake! But all good things must come to an end, and on Tuesday morning we had to head out for the last leg of our trip to our new home!

Exodus Part 1: Plano to Santaquin

On the Monday after Brett returned from New Jersey, for the second time, we picked up the Uhaul trailer and began to prepare for our trip starting the next day. First stop, pick up my piano which had been stored at our piano tuner's house for the past few months. Norbert and his wife Paula helped us put the piano in the trailer. It took up slightly less than half of the trailer, and it took almost 3 hours because they are some serious talkers. Norbert even made Brett come inside the house and play a song for him. After this ordeal, we got back and found out that the Coast Guard did not have a 3 bedroom house available for us and that we would be given a 2 bedroom upstairs apartment. We then realized that there is no way we could take the piano with us and left it with my dad.

Because of all of that wasted time (and a not-so-quick stop at a Blockbuster going-out-of-business sale where we bought 7 movies for $8 each), we didn't finish all of our packing and didn't end up leaving until 1:00 pm the next day. We drove through Texas and Oklahoma, then decided to stop for the night in Wichita, Kansas. Kennedy was thrilled with the hotel room because she got to have her very own big bed.

The next morning we headed out to Salina and essentially turned left to head toward Colorado. Right outside Denver, a cop turned out in front of us and took up both lanes going about 40 mph. We had absolutely no idea what was going on, until about a mile up when we started getting pounded with hail out of nowhere. Traffic was completely stopped as we watched 3/4-inch hail build up about 3 inches on the road. This is how Kennedy felt about the hail.

Then, just as suddenly, the hail stopped and we were moving again. We stopped at Chili's for dinner, where Noah promptly threw up all over me. I went to the bathroom to get cleaned up. When I came back, we had our food. In the middle of the meal, Kennedy puked all over herself and the bench. I took her to the bathroom to get cleaned up, all the while listening to her almost crying saying, "Make a big mess a chocolate milk!" Needless to say, we stayed in Denver that night. We also discovered that like both her parents, Kennedy talks in her sleep. She talked about Utah.

Next morning we headed out of Colorado through the beautiful snowy mountains of Vail. Kennedy really loved going through the tunnels and being "in a mountain." We made it safely into Utah and into Santaquin where we stayed with Brett's parents.

We had a delicious dinner of Carol's potato soup and Kennedy got her own room again. We looked forward to spending a few days not in the car.

Hello, Old Friend

Ahhhh, it's good to be back after almost a month! I'm sorry about the delay in information. We are almost done unpacking here in Brookings and we are getting to know the town. It's not huge, but there's more here than we were expecting. The Fred Meyer grocery store is like a Target or Wal-Mart. There are probably 25-30 restaurants, at least 12 of which are Mexican. It's absolutely gorgeous, with ocean on one side and hills and redwoods on the other. I will be putting up some pictures shortly. Brett has been at his station for a little over a week and is enjoying it so far. He got off really early one day so we could move in, got to take a beautiful drive up to Coos Bay and back on another, and played flag football on another. Tell me that's not an awesome military job. :)

Kennedy had her 2nd birthday last month, and she's letting us know that the terrible twos are here. Granted, they aren't as bad as other kids I've seen, but for her, it's a change. Noah is 7 weeks old today and is starting to be a great sleeper. For the last week he's woken up between 1:30 and 2:30 and then again around 5:00 or 5:30. Twice a night is not bad at all. I will put up details and pictures over the next couple of days!