Almost 3 months later

Jon and I are not too great at consistently writing on this blog thing so I'll try to think of any thing new or exciting that has happened in the past 3 months.

Insurance
At the beginning of July I finally got insurance from my work. The two days where I have felt the most grown up in my life were: the day I got my insurance card and the day I sent in my credible coverage letter from when I was on my parents insurance to waive the pre-existing condition waiting period. Working at a doctors office and having to deal with insurance and people having no idea what their insurance does inspired me to read the entire book that was sent to me by select med all about my coverage and benefits etc. I didn't want to be an insurance idiot.

July 4th 5k
After getting a pamphlet in the mail about Provo's freedom festival I decided that I wanted to run the 5K on the 4th of July. I convinced Jon that he should run it with me so we went running occasionally, but not even close to everyday (probably like 2-3 times a week on a good week). July 4th came and we ran ourselves a 5K. Considering our lack of training our goal was to finish in under 30 minutes and we both reached this goal. I finished in a little under 30 and Jon finished about a minute before me. Our times were nothing amazing but I was proud of the fact that we ran the race and tried to go running during the week.

Bear Lake family reunion

Over the weekend of the 24th of July my mom's family had a family reunion up in Paris Idaho. It was a lot of fun. Some of the highlights were tubing, trowing me and Jon off the wave runner with my crazy driving, the rope swing into the freezing pond, lots of good food, an amazing game of sardines with some of my cousins, and being able to hang out with Jon because neither of us had to work.

Ware Family Camp-Out
A few weekends after the Bear Lake reunion we had a camp-out with the Ware clan in Jon's parents back yard. It was pretty legitimate camping because we had a fire, made smores, we slept in tents, I got bit by bugs, and I peed outside because I got locked out of the house in the middle of the night. We had a lot of fun making bug themed crafts that were intended for the kids and hanging out with the fam.

When we got home we hung all of our crafts on the fridge, so now if anyone walks into our kitchen they will probably think we have children.

Dress Making
I got some really cool vintage patterns when we went to an estate sale with Jon's mom at the beginning of the summer, so one of my goals this summer was to make a dress. Of the 4 patterns I got I decided on the Butterick pattern number 6141 a mid 1950s halter top dress with a jacket.

I worked on the dress off an on in the evenings and on Saturdays when Jon was at work. I was pretty discouraged for a while because I couldn't get it to fit quite the way I wanted it to. Eventually after much unpicking, resewing, and searching for a brooch or a button for the jacket I finished the dress and was able to wear it. Here are some picture of the finished product.




Update on the Quest for Coupon Mastery
Most recently in my coupon endeavors I discovered some sweet rebates and sales that went along with these rebates. In the next few weeks I should be getting about $60.00 back in rebate checks from Kellogs and Kraft for buying their products. The best part was I scoped out the sales and with the help of my friend at work I was able to get a screamin' deal on a bunch of groceries. For the next few months, or until the 15 boxes we bought run out, we will be getting paid to eat cereal.

Rebates make me happy.

New Shift
Last Monday Jon started his new 11 am to 5 pm shift at work so he is no longer working the sucky 4 pm to 10 pm shift. It has been fun to actually have a husband again and to get to see him for more than about 2 hours a day. We had FHE for the first time in months and he helped me go shopping and set up for the enrichment activity we had on Wednesday. It has been so so nice to have him around in the evenings.

Pell Grant
We were really excited when we found out that we qualified for a pell grant to pay for Jon's tuition and books this semester. Like really really excited because over the summer we paid three different tuition payments because Jon took classes at BYU spring term and at BYU and UVU for summer term. It was a busy summer for Jon. I'm really liking the whole grant thing because our savings account isn't going to be drained this semester like it usually is when its time to pay tuition.

Ice cream maker
This month we got the ice cream maker attachment for our kitchen-aid from Bed Bath and Beyond with some of the gift card we had been given as wedding presents. It is amazing. You just put the bowl in the freezer for about 15 hours before you want to make your ice cream (or you can just store it in the freezer and not have to plan ahead as much) then you just hook the bowl to your kitchen aid, attach the dasher attachment, throw your ice cream batter in the bowl, and let your kitchen-aid go to town on that stuff. No ice. No salt. No salty-watery mess and no potential for getting rock salt in your ice cream. It is amazing. I made some peach sorbet with some peaches from my parents tree and it was super easy and way delicious.

Hiking Timp
Jon and I hiked Mount Timpanogos about a year ago when we were dating from the Timpanooke side and had a fun time, so when Jon Davis invited us to hike it with him yesterday we didn't hesitate in saying yes. At 7:30 am yesterday morning we got to the packed Aspen Grove parking lot because we decided to hike from the other trail this year. This was probably not the best idea because that trail is harder, I'm probably in worse shape than I was a year ago, and I'm married to Jon so I don't need to try to impress him with my hiking skills.

I did pretty well all the way up to Emerald Lake where we stopped for a break and sat and enjoyed some little snacks and listened to a few song on Jon's ipod. From the lake we could see the summit above us, but getting there was not that wonderful.

A little bit after leaving the lake we saw a bunch of mountain goats. They were super cute and very close to us. After seeing the goats we hiked across loose rocks and snow for a while to make it to the saddle where the Timpanooke and Alpine Grove trails come together. At the saddle we ate our lunches of peanut butter and jelly on english muffins (we didn't have any bread- they were pretty good but a bit dry), craisins, and anything else we managed to scrounge together that morning. We hiked to the summit, and I was dying. Jon Davis and my husband were very patient with my slow pace and repeated breaks to ensure I didn't throw up because I was feeling pretty queasy during this part of the hike. We made it to the top and there were so many people up there. It was crazy how many people were on the trail yesterday we passed so many people hiking up and back.
This is us on the top of Timp; of the three pictures we took I thought this one looked the best and ironically it is the one that Jon was trying to be super cheesy in. Anyway, we rested at the top for a while and then started hiking back down. The hike back down was a killer on the joints. We ran out of water on the way down so when we finally made it to the bottom we rejoiced at the sight of the drinking fountain and the fact that Jon Davis' car was still on the road where we parked it because the parking lot was full. I was probably a bit of a baby on this hike, but in the end I was glad that we hiked it and that we hiked all the way to the top. I don't know if I will want to hike Timp from that trail again any time too soon.

I tried to find some pictures to make this whole thing less boring. This hasn't been everything that has gone on in the last 3 months or so, but it is a start. Maybe I'll try to get Jon to write about what has gone on for the past little bit.