Tubing at Soldier Hollow

*Check out the end of this post for two short videos of us going down the mountain!!*

Soldier Hollow hosted the 2002 Olympic Cross Country Skiing and the Biathlon events. Another interesting fact is that it has the longest tubing lanes in Utah and the entire west half of the US. The movie High School Musical opened with a scene from the lodge in the first movie (the New Years Eve Party and Karoke).

My Aunt and Uncle from Virginia came to Utah to visit their daughter Nicole and her husband Lance and their grandson Nicolas. We had a big dinner at my parents house with extended family that lived in Utah. While they were there, my Uncle suggested going tubing at Soldier Hollow before they went back to Virginia. I thought that would be really fun and on Tuesday, January 27th, my Uncle Duane, my Dad Richard, my Cousin Nicole, my Brother Randy and I headed out to Soldier Hollow. We met at Randy's place and headed east up the Provo Canyon. It was a great trip that only took about 40 minutes to get to from Orem.

The view looking down at the lodge and beyond. It was a beautiful day!

Our group L-R: Randy (my Brother), me (Julie), Nicole (my Cousin), Richard (Dad) and Duane(my Uncle).

The race is on- there are five lanes side by side and your group can race each other down.

Our group again

We're all smiles as we head back to the cable that tows you back up to the top of the runs. Talk about plush tubing! It was $20 for 2 hours. They also had music playing in the background. It was a great facility!

Randy trying to stop before heading into the fence.

Can his smile get any bigger?!!!

Nicole, looking beautiful even with the snowy, windblown look.

Uncle Duane was all smiles! He had a great time and we loved having him visit us in Utah.

My Dad as he was being towed up the mountain. What a great view and beautiful skies! The tubing was so safe! None of us fell off our tubes the entire time. Although some of us hit the fence at the end of the run. Luckily they are just flimsy plastic things that try to keep you from going further down the mountain into the parking lot. I went through the first fence into the second and tore out three stakes! All that I did differently was get a bigger tube and suddenly I was sliding all the way into the fence if I didn't try really hard to stop.

Look at these brothers go! My Dad is in his late fifties and Duane is older than that! They had a great time together with us "kids".

The view again as we get close to the top of the cable run.

I took this picture while in my tube going up the mountain. The runs were extreemly safe, even though you would fly down the hill at 30-40 mph. I even took our expensive camera and our cheap digital video camera down the slide. I will post the video of me going down the hill while the others were racing behind me.

Check out this video of me going down the run!

This video is of the others racing down the hill! What a great day. Thanks for inviting us Duane!

Together after 20 years! Angie and Julie

My childhood friend Angie Nelson and I decided to finally get together since we both live in Utah. I wrote about it on our joint blog One Tidbit at a Time. I decided to put our picture here as well since more of our childhood friends read this blog then our other one. You'll just have to skip on over to the other one to get the details! I will have to say that i'm not proud of this current picture of me especially since I'm so pale that you can hardly see where my chin is since it all is such a white blur!! Oh well, blame it on genetics!

I finally downloaded our newest pictures onto our computer and made sure our editing software is running. Be prepared to see a bunch of new posts soon complete with pictures! Take care everyone!

The Truth Be Told...

I'm a Twilight addict! I started to read the first book in December sometime (that month is such a blur) and read it in less than 48 hours. I decided that since I spent so much time reading it, I needed to devote more time to my family. So, last Saturday (a month later)I finally decided to pick up the second book "New Moon" that I had on hold at the library. I didn't start reading it until Sunday and by Wednesday I had finished that one! I don't care what others say about the sequels. Stephanie Meyers has a gift from God for writing fluidly. Her descriptions are full of imagination and I was hooked from the moment Bella met Edward.

Today I put a hold on the copies of "Eclipse" and "Breaking Dawn". I can't wait until I can get to the library to pick them up. Luckily our library has many copies of these books because many of them are already checked out or on hold.

I haven't seen the movie yet but I'm hoping to next week when Ryan goes to San Mateo, CA for work. I'm going to bring my Mom and maybe my sisters Kristi and Katie. (are you up for it guys?) Anyone else (friends, acquantances) in Utah that that is reading this post is welcome to join us. I know it is belated since the movie has been out since November, but I wasn't ready to see it then. I hadn't even read the first book back then!

Well, I'd better get back to Dallin since he is coughing up a storm. I put a more detailed post of my happenings of late on my other blog- One Tidbit at a Time. Hope your day goes well!

A New Job in this Economy!

If anyone is just dying to get a job, become a CNA! I was looking for a part-time job since the daycare business has been slowing considerably. Even at the main offices for Childcare Resource and Referral, they had been noticing a slow-down in people looking for childcare. In this economy, families are looking for ways to shave their budgets and childcare is one thing that gets axed. So, back to my topic of me looking for a job. I sent my resume out to three places and got one interview. Remember, I have no work experience as a CNA, just the certification and quite a bit of volunteer/real life experiences. At the interview on Tuesday, they said I was more than qualified and basically offered me a job on the spot!

I was so excited to take this opportunity as a way of getting my foot in the door in the health care industry! Usually the first job as a CNA is in a Nursing Facility and is quite the grunt work. The hours in a facility are typically eight a day and even if you get to work part-time, they make you work two-to-three eight-hour days a week and they require you work every-other weekend.

Not so with my new job! It is in the Home Health field and so I will go to clients homes and perform the needed services. I can accept as many clients as I want or just keep the two that I am starting with. So far my hours are Monday, Wednesday and Friday for about 4-5 hours a day! Just perfect for me and my family! The company I work for now is called Home Caregivers Home Health and their web site is very nice. Check it out by clicking on the name!

My parents have been a huge help by watching Dallin until I find a good daycare setting for him. Now that he is two, it will be almost like going to preschool. He misses his buddy that I used to watch. His little buddy used to come everyday for 4hours. We miss you Worsley family! So now he can play with other kids his age while I pursue a little work experience. I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up, but I have a feeling it is down this road of health care- somewhere!

Journaling

Tonight I wish I had Ryan around to help me figure out how to get our old pictures off the new exterior hard-drive. Between learning two new computers and an exterior hard drive- I am feeling stunted in my abilities to accomplish much blogging. Ryan was in L.A. with Tyler running a booth at a Reptile Expo this weekend. Of course, now is the time I feel I can get back to blogging, but he has the nice camera with him and I can't seem to dig up the pictures that I haven't edited yet. Oh, and yes I would like some cheese with this whine!!

I guess all I can do is type.... how boring! JK..... I can't believe how fast I've changed since I began blogging! I was using a very old digital camera, dial-up internet and a pretty slow computer. Just a year later and I have four blogs I contribute to and a good camera (thanks to Ryan's snake business- business expense), DSL and now two smoking computers. You might be wondering how in this economy we can even think of getting two. Well, one was a surprise gift from my parents and my brother Rob and his family. Rob was feeling pretty sad for us as we were trying to keep up with technology using an older computer. We would call him and ask him how to patch this and over-come that. He is big on computers (majored in something with computers:)and always has up-to-date tech things. My parents had also noticed our dilemma and got the idea of going in with Rob on a computer for us since Rob's family had our name for Christmas and since we housed them so much this past year while Dad looked for a job. Well, this was exciting for Rob and he immediately got to work finding a good but not so expensive computer. He also knew how my two oldest kids love playing in the virtual reality world of World of Warcraft. He made sure that this computer was up to high speed gaming.

Meanwhile, Ryan got his annual bonus and began looking for a good computer for us for Christmas. He found a great deal on a refurbished computer that also was good for gaming. He also found a nice 22 inch monitor that is sooo cool!!! Ryan gets to work on two of these types of screens at work. So even though I had just bought the 17 inch flat-screen in October after using the sales from selling toys at the SLC Reptile Expo, he bought the new one so that I could enjoy such frivolities (is that a word?)and so Tyler could have a cool gaming view.

To make a long story short, we kept both computers and the 17 inch monitor is connected to the computer we got from M&D and Rob's family. It has replaced a very old dinosaur in our front room. The other computer is set up in our main living area and so both kids can play each other at the same time or I can kick one kid off the computer and there is still one good computer to use. I think this will come in handy as these kids use them for homework more often! It was a great surprise when we learned about the second computer. Thank you Mom, Dad, Rob, Kendra and family. We love you!

The 2nd half of the Basement (part four)

This video shows the final part of the house my parents bought. Nothing super exciting. Enjoy!

The Basement (part three)

This video shows part of the basement and is a little shorter than the others due to me having to stop taping because Sydney hurt her elbow(edited out). Enjoy!

My Parents New House Upstairs (part two)

This video show the other half of the upstairs as well as quite a bit of my kids petting the horse and the pony that live behind the house in the neighbors yard. Once again, Sydney shows her wilder side. Dallin follows me around in true toddler fashion. Tyler's voice cracks a little as it deepens. Enjoy!

Move-in Day! My parents new house (part one)

This video shows quite a bit of the upstairs of my parents new home and of my daughters personality. She can be a wild one! Sorry that I have taken such a long time in posting new events. I have been so busy helping my parents unpack, keeping up with the holidays, getting over some bug that has turned into a mild bronchitis/pneumonia, and getting used to TWO new computers. It takes quite a bit of time to learn how to navigate Windows Vista and get all of our info switched from the old computer to the new ones. Also, just setting up my dashboard the way I like it and all of the settings for the Internet such as favorites, has taken quite a bit of time. I hope every ones Christmas and New Year was a good one! Enjoy part one of my parents new house!