I was tagged to tell you 7 things about ME.

My friend Kalleen tagged me...Basically, I have to tell 7 things about me within 7 days in order to avoid 7 curses. Um...I didn't complete this task within 7 days, so I hope no curses befall me. These 7 things are totally random and I wrote them as quickly as they came into my mind. Enjoy.

YEP...THAT IS ME SPEAKING SPANISH.

-I really want to learn Spanish. Brad speaks fluent Spanish so I want to speak fluent Spanish. I used to commute from Ogden to Logan and I actually checked out a "learn-Spanish-in-1-month" tape and told myself I could actually learn spanish this way. I think I learned a about 20 words, 2 of which actually stuck. The word for left and right. I'm pretty good with immitating what a hear, so until I am around more Spanish people, then my goal will have to wait a bit. Chloe just recieved a little Spanish book from her grandma and maybe I can learn some more words this way!!

ANYONE UP FOR A GAME??

I love to play games. Whenever a group of people come over I would totally prefer to play a game. Often, I love to invite people over so that we can have an excuse to play games. I have such happy memories of growing up playing Nertz with the family in SunValley and helping pass out money while I watched games of Aquire being played. Brad and I have tournaments of Yahtzee, Mancala, Sequence, and phace 10 dice. We actually manipulated a phase 10 dice game to see what you would have to roll to achieve the highest score possible. It was pretty awesome.

TRUE STORY

When I was in about 4th grade, we were at my cabin snow mobiling. We were leaving and had to haul a bunch of the stuff we used at the cabin to the cars. So, in order to do this, we would attach two tubes behind the snowmobiles from rope. Two people would ride on the snowmobiles, and two people would ride in the tubes to the bottom. I loved to be one of the tube riders. The bags and supplies used at the cabin would be placed on top of the rider on the tube. Now you have the scene. Just as we approached the final bridge, disaster happened. Somehow, our tubes were slingshot off of this pole that marked the edge of the bridge. We were shot off the bridge right into the frozen river below about 20 or so feet. My brother ended up in the middle of the icy water and I was closer to the bank. The bags slowly drifted down the river. I struggled my way up the bank with heavy, water soaked boots, snowpants, and coat. When I got to the top, my mom was saying something about the bags and such. I just stood there soaked and crying. I turned to see my brother stumbling up the bank with wet hair and goggles hanging off his head. Still, my mom was telling us to go get the bags. She had just been to Japan and put all her priceless photos in a scrapbook and the scrapbook was floating down the icy waters. We had a japanese girl living with us and all of a sudden she just jumped right off the bridge into the water. She got the bag and trudged back up to the 3 of us standing there. None of the pictures were even touched by water, and you can be sure everything else was soaked. Isn't that an amazing story. We dried and now laugh at the story and I'm glad those pictures survived.

I LOVE CREATIVITY

-I love pretty much anything art related. When I was in France we went to the most amazing museum right on the water and it was absolutly breath taking. I bought a modern art poster there and hauled it all over Europe with me. I love the memory everytime I look at the framed print in my room. In college I came across the art of Andy Goldsworthy and was totally inspired. Nature is art, I've always thought so. I love to paint with bright colors and sketch portraits with simple black and white. I like to look at creative things in magazines and try and recreate what I see, or atleast tell myself "I could do that". Most of the things I have hanging in our house has some memory attached to it. Either I made it, painted it, drew it, or discovered it on some wall of some unique store or museum. Someday our walls could be covered, but it wouldn't matter to me because they would just be walls covered with happiness.

I MARRIED THE GUY IN THE MILITARY WITH A DIMPLE IN HIS CHIN.

-I met cute Brad right before I went on my mission and he left for basic training. He kind of wrote me back and forth, but I was sort of "wierded" out by the whole idea of this guy I barely knew writing me. So, in short, the time I could've spent getting to know Brad via letters on my mission was spent not getting to know Brad via letters on my mission. It all worked out okay because I came home and we fell right in love and got married. But...in one of the letters he wrote me he did send a picture of himself in his military uniform. I kept the picture and would look at it and show my various companions. Today, the picture resides somewhere in Mongolia (I gave it to my Mongolian companion) Anyway, before I left my mission the sisters made a sort of prediction/ goodbye tape for me and someone predicted that I would marry the guy in the military with a dimple in his chin and what do you know...it came true!! And I can definitly say I agree with the phrase: I AM ALREADY LIVING HAPPILY EVER AFTER.

MARATHON TIME

My sister and I ran a marathon a couple of years ago. Training for the marathon was just long and long and full of prayers for good health and strong bones and a resiliant body. It was a long 4 months hoping my body could withstand the pressure being put on it. When we did our 20 miler we all did fine, but when I went out to do my short run a couple of days later, that's when the pain set in. I had this excruciating pain in my knee. Turns out I had bursitis and I was told to ice it and such. Well, i wasn't about to not run the marathon, so I iced it and iced it and just hoped that the ice would somehow "cure" my knee in a week. So, time came for us to do another long run and I think this time we ran 21 or something. My knee felt okay, but hurt. So, I iced it right when I got home. I think I thought that if you applied ice directly to the skin it would somehow work better. I lost track of time (which is wierd because I had a freezing piece of ice on my skin) because when I took the cloth and the ice off, what I saw on my skin was frightening. A two inch band above my knee bone was bright bright white and hard. It wouldn't go away. I showered and still the white remained. I tried to rub it but the hard lump remained. I started to freak out and called Brad but he was in some crazy mcat prep course or physics class so I couldn't get ahold of him. So...I went to insta care. I seriously thought I was going to have my leg amputated. Sound dramatic?? Probably. But, I had never seen anything like that before. To end this long story, now. You can imagine what the doctor said when he looked at me. I think he had to control his laughter as he said, "you have a small case of frostbite and it will go away within the day. And miss, don't put ice directly on your skin again." Needless to say, we never saw a charge for that instacare visit. Pretty sure he felt sorry for me in more ways than one.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

I love to cook! I love to read recipe books and create meals in my head. I am a sucker for recipes with red onion, feta cheese, blue cheese, strawberries, and sauteed mushrooms or onion.