Lake Powell

We went to Lake Powell (in Utah) in the beginning of July and I am finally getting all the pictures put in one centralized place. Lake Powell is my favorite place in the whole world. I've gone every year of my life - sometimes more than once. This year we had 17 people on our 72' houseboat. The houseboat is like a house - it has 3 TV's, an ice maker (that could be a washer and drier), a trash compacter, stove, oven, mircowave, 2 fridges, 2 bathrooms, 3 bedrooms etc, etc, etc. Its nice, to say the least. Of the 17 people that went, 11 were "kids" ranging from 9 to 22 years old. We went with both my aunts, my dad's sister and my mom's sister and both their families. Each person has their own favorite thing to do - But my favorite thing to do is fish! I love to catch striped bass - striper fishing is the best fishing I've ever done and I look forward to it each time we're there. The two boys on the left are my counsins, Chris and Greg. They've come to Lake Powell with us most every time we go and I love when they come. It's so much fun since we're all around the same age. (Ps. Go Redsox! - you can't really see it, but Nick and I are wearing B-town hats)

Kayla, in the middle of Nick and I, is my little twin. We look relatively identical - especially when we were young. Compare her 18 month picture to mine and you can't tell who is who. What makes it even "weirder" is that her and her sister are adopted into our family.

Chris, Jess, me and Greg enjoying the time at Lake Powell - I may not have many friends, but I have a family that would do anything for me, and for that, I'm grateful.

Haha - We were playing around one night taking pictures and my sister took this one of me.

Long story short, Nick fought this fish for, I kid you not, 35 minutes. It would not come to the surface and he was only using 6lb test and didn't want it to break his line so he took his time. When it got to the surface, Nick was less than impressed that it was just like the others we were catching. I felt really bad for him because he had such high hopes for a lunker.

I'm so glad Nick comes with us. I can't imagine being away from him for a week. He didn't go the first year we were together because we'd only been together a few months but he's gone every year since and its so much fun when he comes - he tends to lighten even the lightest of moods.

This is on the top of our houseboat - we got a terrible rain storm the day we came back into the dock. We pulled in and not 5 minutes later, it started to down pour. If we were caught out in the lake in this, it would have been pretty scary but the Man Upstairs was watching us this day. So we decided to test fate and slide on our feet and tummy across the SLIPPERY top deck. Of course Nick was the one who thought of it, and the one who got hurt - messed up his already bad knee really bad but it was tons of fun. Oh - and when the rain let up, we grabbed the hose and squirted it down again!

This is one of my favorite pictures of Nick - his smile is so genuine. Everyone else went out in the little boats to play out in the open water and Nick and I stayed back on the houseboat. We fished for small mouth bass and Nick caught 7 in 30 minutes. I loved seeing his excitement each time he caught a fish and it was just a super day for us.

This is a somber moment - we were getting ready to take up the anchors and head back to the dock. It was a great trip but I wish we could have stayed longer. (L to R: Nick, Me, Jess (sister) mom, dad)

Group picture before we headed out. All 17 of us.

This was the best trip, thus far. I can't wait for next year!!

Thanking God

Even though some aspects of my life are a little grey right now, I do have so much to be thankful for. (I feel like I'm starting off my speech for Thanksgiving :])

Even though school is starting, I could be one of the many out there that is not taking that step to further their education and even though we will have some $40,000 to pay back for Nick's school, I'm thankful that my parents have made a college fund that will pay for most, if not all of my tuition.

Besides my amazing parents, I have an amazing future husband, that I'd do anything for. He is everything I could want in a person and I am so thankful to God that He brought him into my life at just the right time. I was already down "that" path and it was short lived once Nick arrived. He is so precious to me and everything that he does is for US. I can't wait to marry him and have his babies - that's a big joke with us because when one of his friends showed me to him (over myspace) the first comment that came out of his mouth was "I want her to have my babies." I smile just thinking about that.

We do everything together and we've become each other's shadow. He often comes with me when I nanny and he is so great with the babies. The only thing he does not do is changes the diapers and I am fine with that - I have no doubt that it'll change when we have our own.

I am often amazed at how similar we are - besides looking like we're from the same womb, we enjoy all the same activities and foods. We have the same dreams and aspire to be the same things. We are currently looking at a hunting lease in Greeley that we'd get into with some family/friends and that is just one more spot that we can make memories at.

I just love him, and am so thankful that he's apart of my life. He listens to me whine and complain daily and never does he not want to hear it. He gives me the best advise, even if it is just to not say anything to a certain person or a simple comment such as "you're better than them" is enough. He's my partner in crime and my shadow for life. I love him, love him, love him.

Post #2: Took Long Enough

Its been a good 2 weeks since I last posted anything and for that, I am sorry. I have been running one place to the other and am sleeping very little, which, for those around me, is not their favorite part. So much has been going on that I just can't seem to gather my thoughts. I start school one week from today and am dreding it to its full extent. I mean, I love school, but I've had 3 weeks of summer - the first 2 months were spent in summer school and I'm just starting to enjoy my "free" time.

Note to self: Next summer, don't take 12 credits!

In other news, I've been down a bit. My sister is back to dating her skum-bag boyfriend. They were together for about a year before they broke up a few months ago. He cheated on her (several times) and so she called it quits. But this little persistant prick (pardon my french) won't leave her alone and convinced her that after a year of being unfaithful, he'll finally change. (HA!)

So she's been back with him for a few weeks. I'll interject here with some useful facts about this guy, whom I've grown to hate, yes, hate!

As I said before, they've been together a little over a year and in that time, he's had a girl on the side. He has told my sister that she can't tell him that he can't be friends with her because that's all they are. He has come around the house 3 times in the year they were together and he won't look my dad in the eye.
Besides never coming over, he comes from a lying family. His mom lied to my sister, saying that Christy (the girl on the side) was out of his life and he knew all along that she was still very much involved.
However, now its not ONLY Christy. It's Christy, my sister, and some other girl named Megan - who called my sister to inform her that they skateboard together and "stuff".

So, they've been back together for 3 weeks-ish and she is with him all the time and of course it is never at our house so she's gone all the time.
It really kills me because she is still so immature - she is 18 and acts as if she's 14-16. As selfish as this sounds, I feel like I'm being jipped of my best (girl) friend and my sister because this is the time in life when we're supposed to be really close and it is actually a time that we don't see each other and when we do, we're fighting because she isn't all that nice to be around.

I've been meaning to write when things happen because its such a problem in my life right now but I haven't had the time. I will make the time because I think if I write, it will help more.

I love you Jess - but you sure know how to hurt me.