Well since I only have time to update my blog in between semesters I have a lot of catching up to do. Sorry I’m going back so far but as this is the only journaling I do, it’s mostly for me to remember.
SUMMER
This summer Jeremy and I were able to go on a few really awesome vacations. In July we went to Depot Bay, Oregon with Jeremy’s family for a mini-family reunion. We stayed for a week in a beach house with our own private access to the beach…yep…AMAZING! Some highlights of the trip were:
1) Stoping by Multnomah Falls on our way to the coast.
2) Watching Jeremy and his brothers body board in the FREEZING water. Jeremy was the only one who didn’t have a wet suit, and even though he was freezing he loved it too much to stop.
(Hehehe-They both got taken out by waves at times)
3) Going out on a boat whale watching and having a whale come up multiple times right by the boat! The trip didn’t last very long though because despite taking a ton of Dramamine Jeremy’s family started getting sick
4) Touring a working lighthouse. Totally reminded me of Pete's Dragon.
5) Having a photo shoot with my sister-in-law Erin on the beach, which included handstands and all kinds of crazy jumps!
6) Hanging out in the hot tub.
(Didn't take any pics of us in the hot tub but this is the house we stayed in and you can see the tub in the corner)
7) Shopping at all the downtown shops and antique stores (and getting really awesome crocs!)
8) Watching the beautiful sunsets!
Overall it was an amazing trip and we had so much fun!
We also took a trip out to California for a Welge family reunion, but sadly this trip didn’t go as smoothly. Not realizing how many miles we had put on our car since it’s last oil change we set out for California in August. The plan was to meet my family at their campsite in Calaveras Big Tree forest, camp with them two nights and then head to Sacramento for a few days before driving back to Boise. Well we made it about 500 miles and were about 40 miles away from the campsite when our car broke down. This wouldn’t have been a big deal except for the fact that we broke down in the Stanislas National forest on a tiny one lane highway so far out in the middle of nowhere that there was no cell service and no houses or stores or anything. We assumed that when it started getting dark and we hadn’t showed up at my family’s campsite that they would come looking for us. We assumed wrong!
The note I wrote when I still thought my parents would come looking for us.
Some nice people stopped and tried to help us, someone even drove way out of the way and bought us oil to put in our car, but none of it helped. Luckily we had sleeping bags and food and water in the car and so we decided to camp overnight and hope my family came looking for us. We got in our sleeping bags and had the worst night of sleep ever in the car. It was SO COLD outside once the sun went down (turns out we were right near the summit of the mountain), and I got really sick in the middle of the night. In the morning we decided we were going to have to pack a backpack and just start hiking up the highway. We ended up hiking about 8 miles (3 miles of extremely steep switchbacks up to the summit) before we found a little overlook where our cell phones got service. Through a series of miracles we were able to get in contact with my cousins husband who was trying to reach us through skype (none of them had cell service either but they were starting to get worried about us). We told him where we were at on the side of the road and he came to rescue us. We were taken back to our car where we emptied it of everything and met up with the family at the campsite. At that point we were sunburned, had blisters from walking so far and were totally exhausted. We made the most of the last day of camping and got to take a really awesome hike to see the giant redwoods, which I loved! We had our car towed to Sacramento and we squeezed into my parents car. The rest of the vacation was fun, although a little stressful just trying to decide how the heck we were going to get home for the first week of school and what we were going to do with our car. We ended up renting a car and driving it back home and our car is still in Sacramento to this day. A family friend fixed it up and now my brother is driving it until we take it back next summer. Jeremy’s brother was nice enough to let us borrow one of his cars for the school year so that Jeremy and I could both get around, and it’s actually been really nice being able to drive a nicer car than what we had.
Here are some pictures from that trip:
FALL 2011 SEMESTER
Once the semester started Jeremy and I were both crazy busy. Jeremy applied for dental school this summer and throughout the semester got invited to 4 dental schools for interviews during the semester. First he flew out to Louisville, Kentucky where he interviewed with the University of Louisville, then he flew to Las Vegas, Nevada and interviewed at UNLV, then he flew to Loma Linda, California and interview at Loma Linda University. The last place he flew to was Mesa, Arizona where he interviewed at A.T. Still. He had a blast traveling even if they were really short trips. When he wasn’t traveling for dental school interviews he was busy working (he does developmental therapy with disabled children, and also works in a dental lab), and also studying for all his science classes. This semester was loaded up with really hard upper level sciences classes which included: The Molecular Biology of Cancer, Biochemistry, Pharmacology, Genetics, and Head and Neck Anatomy. He worked really hard and ended the semester with all A’s and B’s!
My semester was pretty busy as well. I took 15 credits of graduate social work courses. My social work internship this school year is with St. Alphonsus Medical Group, where I work at a medical clinic which services a majority of the refugees in the Boise area. It’s been a learning experience for sure, and while it’s not exactly what I wanted to do permanently it’s a pretty good internship. Between my 15 credits at school, a 20 hour a week internship and working at the gym about 20+ hours a week, I stay extremely busy. Jeremy and I both are getting super excited for graduation in May! I can’t wait to be done!
WINTER BREAK
December 1st was the first day that dental schools could start sending out acceptance letters and Jeremy stayed up all night the night before checking his emails to see if he got an acceptance. At about 5am he woke me up to tell me he got accepted to the University of Louisville. We are both so excited he got accepted somewhere and really excited for a change of scenery. We are still waiting to hear back from Arizona and UNLV who will send out second rounds of acceptances in January, as we would probably rather live there than in Kentucky. Either way we are just excited that in 4 years he will officially be a dentist!!!!
December 1st was the first day that dental schools could start sending out acceptance letters and Jeremy stayed up all night the night before checking his emails to see if he got an acceptance. At about 5am he woke me up to tell me he got accepted to the University of Louisville. We are both so excited he got accepted somewhere and really excited for a change of scenery. We are still waiting to hear back from Arizona and UNLV who will send out second rounds of acceptances in January, as we would probably rather live there than in Kentucky. Either way we are just excited that in 4 years he will officially be a dentist!!!!
Well that’s our last six months in a nutshell. Life has been very eventful and at times super stressful but we are so grateful for all the blessings in our life. . . And very grateful that our goals that we have been working towards for forever are starting to become a reality.
Jeremy had decorated our house and thrown me a surprise 
We had cake and ice cream and hung out chatting about our upcoming family vacation to the Oregon Coast. It was a great night! Halley and Kelsey had a blast blowing up balloons as big as they could. I kept waiting for them to explode in their face and for tears to flow, but they got lucky.
Love Halley's face in this pic:
As soon as it got dark the temperature dropped like 40 degrees (the grass was wet in the park and there is a river really close). It was FREEZING!
Doesn't Jeremy have the most INCREDIBLE blue eyes?!? I sure think so!
Picture of fireworks never do them justice, but we tried anyways. The Emmett fireworks show was interesting. Instead of playing all patriotic songs while the fireworks were going off they were playing country songs about being rednecks. But hey it is Emmett we're talking about. ;)Overall it was a wonderful/long day. I'm so grateful to live in the U.S of A!!!
