My new car

We made it to the auction today. I got a Mazda3. I think it's adorable.


The car auction is such a crazy place. We woke up early and looked around at the cars before the auction started. They started running cars through at 9:00. They start slow with one lane open and one car at a time...but it slowly gets more and more chaotic. Eventually, there are 6 lanes for cars to go in and 12 auctions going on at a time. The picture below is of some cars lined up ready to go in. It's a good time. You have to be on your game though because there is a lot going on. I think we made it out successfully. Thanks mom & dad for taking us!!

Car Auction....

I am headed to the car auction tomorrow morning with my dad, Caleb & little sister Ashley. I'm excited to see what we come home with. Stay tuned.

Hot or Not?

This might quite possibly be the worst photo that has ever been taken of me. I don't really know what's going on in the photo, but I hope I don't normally look like this. Thanks to Alison for taking such a great photo in Chicago.

New Couch

So for our anniversary this year, Caleb and I decided we needed a new couch. When we decided to get a new couch, I quickly listed our old couch on craigslist. We wanted get it out of the house and make room for the new one. It was gone within a couple hours of the posting. So, we were couchless. We went shopping for a couch and didn't realize it would be so hard to find one. The more we looked at couches, the uglier they got. Finally we found the perfect couch (at least we thought)....after much looking and being couchless. So we got it delivered to us, got it in our living room and hated everything about it when it was in the room. It was too big, too brown, too wide...everything wrong. But, we thought we would give it a chance and lived with it for about a week...it didn't get better. So we went looking again and traded it for a different couch. The only problem was, this couch was on backorder. We couldn't get it for a couple weeks. Well, those couple weeks have finally passed and we have our real new couch. It fits in our space perfectly and is very comfortable. Who would have thought it would take over a month to get a couch?
Here is our couch transition:
old couch

in between...sorry no picture of the brown couch :(

and new couch! Hooray. I hate having unfinished projects, so it feels good to have this one complete.

CHA

I keep getting behind on my posting. Last week/weekend I was in Chicago for work at CHA (Craft & Hobby Association). Making Memories has a large booth there. We got there a couple days before the show to set up the booth and get things ready for the show. Then we are there during the show working at the booth. I worked at the Demo and Make'n'Take booth most of the time. We have a new tool coming out called the Slice. It's a really cool digital die-cutting machine. Everyone at the show wanted to see how it worked. So, I spent 3 days demoing that machine basically. It is a lot of work to go to a show, but a lot of fun. It's nice to be out of the office and to work with people you don't normally work with. On the last day, Tara and I went to Jersey Boys in Chicago. It was an amazing show. I was 100% impressed. I loved every minute of it.

Koala bears

This picture is on Caleb's desktop of his computer. This is our friend C.W. sneaking up on a Koala Bear. I am totally jealous. I would give anything to sneak up on a Koala bear. Totally Adorable. Just thought I would share.

As promised....

Here is a recap of our FMOM camping trip to Pine View Reservoir. We stayed in site #6, which is the same site we have stayed in two years in a row....interesting. I guess it's our lucky spot. Myself, Caleb, Mindy, Ryan & Bev all came camping.
Saturday night we made tin foil dinners, and they were 100% delicious. I could eat tin foil dinners every day of the week.


Then for dessert, I made peach cobbler in the dutch oven....delicious as well!!!






That night Caleb & Ryan decided to climb the tree in our camp site. Ryan got up pretty far & Caleb gave it a valiant effort.



The next morning we had boiled omelettes. These were really good. You just put everything that you want in your omelette in a freezer bag and put in the boiling water.



Then we went boating with Mindy's brother Bubba. We had a great time swimming & relaxing on the boat. Thanks Mindy & Bubba for the great time. All in all it was a great FMOM camping trip. We did miss Maria though. (Maria, no ditching out next month. Lagoon! I can't wait.)

FMOM

I haven't done a post about FMOM yet, I think it's time. This is a monthly activity that myself, Bev, Mindy & Maria do. FMOM stands for "First Monday Of the Month". We decided since we don't get to hang out as often as we would like, we would set aside one day a month where we would for sure get together. We have been doing this since April, and it's a lot of fun.


In April we went to the Mayan...we had not so awesome seats (we were by the utility closet in the corner where you can't really see the divers) and the food was sort of terrible. I was sick the next day. But, it was so great to hang out with friends. We had a great time.



Here we are outside the Mayan. Bev, Me, Maria & Mindy

May FMOM was on Cinco de Mayo. We had pulled pork tacos, amazing pico de gallo from Bev and delicious Tres Leches cake from Minday...sorry no pictures. This was Caleb's first FMOM experience. We had it at our house and Caleb didn't realized it was FMOM until we started eating. I had told him before hand, but he wan't listening I guess. He was a little embarassed to be part of FMOM and claims that he doesn't want to be a part of it again...unless Ryan or another boy is there.


June was BBQ at Ruth's Diner. I had never been there before, but I have always heard great things about it. I will definitely go back. Great atmosphere...and of course, great company!



At Ruth's Diner. Mindy, Maria, me & Bev

July was our FMOM camping trip. We just got back from our trip today. I will post about it when I get pictures uploaded. (by uploaded I mean....when Mindy posts the pictures on her blog, I will take them from there and add them to my blog. Mindy is our unofficial photographer. Thanks Mindy!)

Island Park

We just got back from our vacation to Island Park with Caleb's family. The weather was perfect, and we had such a great time. We were just in time to see all of the beautiful wildflowers.




We went on a walk to the old Railroad tunnel by Warm River.









We went through Yellowstone park about 3 or 4 times throughout the week. I hadn't been to Yellowstone and years and forgot how beautiful and unique it is.










A crow eating someone's lunch.



Here are lots of pictures with Caleb in them.

Caleb & Brooke


Caleb & Trevor


Caleb's mom (Corine) & Caleb


Me & Caleb


Caleb & a river