Oakland, CA

I just wanted to put this picture here because I like it. It's from our Farmington Canyon wheeling trip.

So Dustin is in Oakland until Thursday, which is Pioneer Day. Dustin gets Friday off instead of Thursday, because he is "working" on Thursday. He's actually flying back on Thursday and he'll be here around 3pm. hahahaha. I like it. He got there yesterday, and he said he will never think of West Valley as ghetto ever again. Those are my words, not his, but that is the gist of it. hahahaha.

I guess the distribution center there in Oakland got robbed a couple of weeks ago, and that is the only one in the whole world that has ever been robbed. Insane. Also, Dustin and Grayson, the other guy who went with him, figured they would ask the locals where to go and the what to see and where to eat, because they know best. Well, they all said to go to San Fransisco. hahahaha. They didn't say anywhere in Oakland. They said to go across the bay. How sad. But good to know too. Dustin has the camera, so I will post pics later when he gets back. They went to Fisherman's Wharf and had some good seafood. :D And they said they were going to try to find the windy road. I don't know what its called, but I hope they find it. hahaha. Maybe Dustin won't dislike California so much after this trip. hahahhaaha. It's cold there. Like 55 degrees this morning. So nutty.

Our camera wasn't working last week, so we figured it was broken. We thought that it would be harmless to take it apart, because things could only get better. By we, I mean Dustin. hahaha. So he took it all apart, and this is what it looks like naked. But he was able to get it all put back together after a few tries and a midnight run to Wal-Mart to get small enough screw drivers. All so he could take it with him to Oakland. Works for me, because it is fixed now. :) Dustin is a handy dandy.

Miaya and I went to the park today. This park is pretty cool, it has these water jet things that shoot out of the ground, and it's hot outside, so it was lovely. There is also this yucky little green stream, full of algae, so of course, Miaya preferred it to the clean water jets. hahaha. It was fun though. She got to see these itty bitty fish, or tadpoles. I think they were fish. It was fun, and sunny. Interestingly enough, I saw some huge gray clouds floating in our direction, so we went home, and about 30 mins after we got home, it started pouring rain, and thundering, and lightning a bit. It was awesome. It rained for a good half an hour, at least. Solid rain. It was great. I love the summer thunderstorms here. Beautiful.

Miaya playing

July 5, 2008

Miaya likes to play. She saw the bigger folks playing, so she wanted to join the fun. hahahha. She decided to use the big ball instead of the little birdie thinger. She's a nut, but a fun nut.

July 4th

Independence day was last week. We spent the weekend celebrating in various ways. On Friday we went wheeling up Farmington Canyon. It was dusty, muddy, windy, hot, and fun. Always fun. :)

Our Little Prodigy

This girl has a sense of rhythm and beat that is unstoppable.

Fishing

We went fishing at Rainbow reservoir on Tuesday. It was fun. I caught 1 fish and dustin caught 3. Miaya is reeling in the fish I caught with Dustin. hahaha. She loves the fish and always wants to squish the silly things. Gross. But she loves it. She has her own fishing pole, but we were busy enough just keeping an eye on our poles and her, so we opted to just use ours. Miaya loves the water and the plants and the birds too. She kept trying to get really close to the water. It freaks me out! She's so carefree, she doesn't mind getting wet or muddy or having algae in her toes. The messier she is, the more fun she's having. haha. Good times.

Miaya also loves trying to help Dustin hold the fish while he gets the hook out. She even wants to get the hook out herself. She's an adventurous one for sure. I love fishing. It's soothing, even when you have to run around after a one year old who is hell bent on getting into the water, whatever it takes. hahahaha.

Epiphany

So I have had an epiphany. Dustin and I were talking last night, just having a conversation in the car on the way home. As we were speaking, I told him, I'm getting to be in a better place than I have been lately. We we kept talking, I realized something. Something that was so profound and eyeopening to me: not everyone has to fight off depression. I thought, because I am so susceptible to it, that everyone was. One of those, oh I thought it was normal, kind of things. It isn't normal for everyone. Just me. It was very "a ha!" for me. I had no idea.

I also found something interesting out about myself, and how to watch out for how I'm doing in the depression stuff: when my house is messy, so is my life ie: depression. Funny? Yeah, I think so. And it's not that a messy house makes me depressed. It's that I get depressed and therefore don't clean. I don't have the desire to do much of anything. So I am excited to have made this connection. I can look around me and see when I need to make some changes and stuff. I really am thrilled to be able to change the way I do things, to better our lives.

Our Friend Danny

We have a friend named Danny. He and Dustin have been best friends since they were like 4. Danny also has a jeep and we go wheeling with him quite a bit. Yesterday we went wheeling for the first time since Decemeber, and it started off as just a nice dirt road easy wheeling trip. Then, when we had gotten as far as the snow would allow, Danny wanted to see if he could winch up and over this huge snowbank.

It turned out that he could. Sort of. Well, not really at all. He actually ended up rolling his jeep.

He didn't have his seatbelt on or anything, and he came out completely unscathed. We were even able to pull his jeep right side up. It was insane to see. Unreal. Everyones fine though, in case you were wondering.

Someone is watching out for us because we were able to get his jeep down the canyon, and to a gas station without any power to his jeep. We towed him down. Anyone who has seen 400 N. in Bountiful would remember how steep it is. It was fine, though. He was able to get it running at the gas station, drove it to a friends house to park it for the night, and we were able to get home. But on the way home, our alternator went out. We made it from Bountiful to West Valley on battery power only at midnight. We got to our house, and the jeep died on the lawn. We are watched over for sure. haha.

Oh yeah, I forgot we also broke a front axle shaft while we were pulling Danny out. Just your average wheeling trip. Something always breaks. :)