So here is the latest around my new townhome during this January: so beautiful, but very scary to drive in. Going to work today was pretty dicey. I won't admit to being close to hysterical driving in it, but I was.

View of my backyard. Check out the height of the snow on top of my air conditioning unit.

 

 

 

Now, check out the snow pile you hit right after skating across the ice rink that is my front porch. It's at least 3 feet high. I get some good exercise shoveling my driveway to make that pile. It would be perfect for a snow fort or igloo.

 

 

 

Then there are the mondo icicles hanging from my roof right outside my bedroom patio. They do look pretty cool. One of them is probably four feet long.

 

 

 

I had some wonderful visitors this weekend. Here are a few pictures of the cute kids and fantastic mother that stayed for a day this weekend.

Well, I got back from my wonderful vacation to Seattle about two weeks ago. Lisa and I visited the arboretum, the ocean, the rain forest, Deception Pass, and last, but not least, the Maltby Cafe for the huge and good cinnamon rolls, which were beyond fantastic when made into bread pudding. I'm a sucker for pudding.

Since then, I have gone back to work completing trainings for ebay and lego, caught up on grading, and started school. So far it has all been managable, but we are only in week 2. :)

Update on amaryllis, which is progressing far better than I am at the moment.

Nothing much to post these days. I am again behind in everything I need to do. How do some people do multiple jobs? I am not mentally able to keep up.

But the good news is the amaryllis I thought I had killed just needed a little warmer air. Now look at it. Yay.

The Relief Society activity yesterday was about how to plant a garden on your balcony. I decided to start with easy herbs instead of going for the difficult, fickle tomatoes, even though I have killed any herbs I tried to go in the past. Well here we go.

Okay, so it is May 24th and it is snowing. Crazy!

There was an elder in my MTC district that has since become a well-known photographer-here is his website. He has an amazing visual eye. My favorite portfolios are the editorial, landscape and the personal. He has also been accepted into the AFI program and been there a year. On facebook he updated that one of his videos made it into the top ten on vimoes list of videos for last year. It is simple but lush and gorgeous. I would also check out the sunrise run video.

powerlinerflyers from wes johnson on Vimeo.

I got my new computer power cord in the mail so I am back in business, baby.

I decided to post a few pictures from my trip to the Northwest.


Here I am in a beige jacket doing bumper cars with some nieces and nephews.

I went to a basketball game my eleven year old nephew was in.

Here was some of the beautiful Oregon scenery.

We played some black-light mini-golf.

Here is one of my nephews. I just had to post this one.

Since the job outlook isn't so great, I thought I would post a few pictures. With the snowfall that come down a week ago I wanted to take a picture of the tree outside our balcony. I think I am obsessed with close-up pictures of trees. I don't know why.

My three nephews and I made a pilgrimage to Ernest Hemingway's grave site and memorial in Ketchum, Idaho last Saturday. He is their favorite writer, well a favorite writer for two of them. It was a lot of driving but it was a really fun trip. We had some bread and cheese and sparkling grape juice to commemorate what most of his books were about:) My nephews penned some tributes to him and our journey on a typewriter (Brad's, not Bryan's). It was lovely country out there.

Here is the grave. People had left a wine bottle, vodka, shot gun shell, a flag, some notes, and some money.



This is my nephew composing some of his own writing on the spot.


Here is the movable feast we had.

Here's some pictures of my family reunion at Lagoon and Bear Lake. Most are of my (great) nieces and nephews, but the last is me with my sisters playing a game of family feud.

I thought I would post a few cute pictures from the time spent with my great niece. She really likes to make faces.





And the birth of another great niece-Katelyn at 6lbs 6 oz.



It is a little blurry-I know.

I am going to try and post a video and we'll see if it works. Here she is making a slam dunk. I had a really cute one of her walking on a little path through the yard that she makes at least fifty times a day, but I accidentally erased it.



I am excited for the season finale of Bones tonight and am, again, ashamed to admit it. As several people well know, I think a thesis does strange things to your brain.

I went to the zoo a little bit ago with my neice and her family. Here are some pics from that.

"When I was a young wart hog..."



My dad and my great nephew



My great neice

News flash:
Marie Horne attends the ward top ramen cook-off for FHE. She brings a stroganoff that looks like glorified cat food from a can and brings home the "Most Disgusting" award. I pretty much died laughing. At least now I won't be asked to become a food prostitute (as they are lovingly called at BYU) for the guys in the ward.:)

I have been doing this contact routine morning and night since the seventh grade. In fact my eyes are so used to my contacts that they get dried out if I don't put them in everyday.
I have also been wearing the pictured green claw in my hair nearly every day for about seven years-no matter what I'm wearing. Ridiculous, I know. There was a brief period in there where I straightened my hair like every other day, but then I started losing all of my hair and became quite lazy so I stopped.




I have been doing the "green shoes around the house" routine for about eight months now. They are so comfy; I like to wear them.