Mugs, Thugs, and Bugs

Mugs:

A couple weeks ago one of the guys in Nate's sales group was mugged while he was waiting to be picked at the end of the night. He was held at knife point while the muggers stole his wallet and phone. Don't worry though, during the ordeal they justified their actions by explaining, "You just don't get it man, this is what we have to do to survive."

Oh please. Scariest part of this story, at least for me, is this all took place just a couple streets over from where Nate was waiting...

Thugs:

So the other morning my friend Traci knocked on our door and hesitantly asked if we'd see our car; which is really my Dad's Tahoe that he so kindly let us borrow so we had more room to bring stuff out here. "Oh great." I thought. "We must have gotten a ticket for parking under the carport even though we're not supposed to." IF ONLY.

We went down stairs to find the car with the driver's side window shattered and smashed in. Glass was ALL OVER and of course our GPS, Nate's video iPod, and our iPod docking station thing that transfers the music from the iPod to the radio were all stolen. Lovely.

Let's just say we were more than slightly annoyed. Annoyed that we didn't hide our GPS better. Usually we take it off the window and store in the center compartment. The last few days we had just gotten a bit lazy I guess. It's one of those things you know you probably should do, but in the back of you're mind you're thinking, oh it'll be fine.
We were also annoyed because the apartment complex has two gated entrances that you need a keyless remote to open. But of course, one of them has been broken for the last week. Not to say it's the apartment manager's fault, but we couldn't help but think if the gate would have been working it might not have happened.
We were annoyed at the thug(s) who did it because he had obviously scoped out our car and knew what he was going for. This creeped me out big time. How long had he been "watching"? However, in his hasty filching, he left my iPod, both of our sunglasses which aren't worth hundreds, but they're nice(!) and also some cash that was blatantly sitting out in the middle of the center console. Weird!
It was even more annoying that we had to waste a whole day going to get the window fixed. A day Nate could have spent selling.

In the end, as bad as it was, I guess it could have been worse. No other damage was done to the car and really we only are out about 200 bucks; seeing as how Nate had won the iPod in a company competition. Well ok, and the money it cost to repair the window, but not too bad.
The most annoying part is the stupid thug did the exact same thing to one of the Apx technician's car too. It's like they knew that anyone with Utah liscense plates would have a GPS. Who the heck knows why they need so many GPSes because obviously they know where to GO to take advantage of all the poor Utahns.

We had some pictures, but they were on my phone before I got a new one, and I forgot to switch them over. It's probably a good thing though. Otherwise I would probably get angry again everytime I looked at them.

Bugs:

Or should I say cute as a bug! Here are some recent pictures of Navi baby.



After church on Sunday


She finally enjoys bath time.

She's always liked things by/touching her face and often falls asleep with her hands over her face, but this was a new one.

Some tummy time

And this is just a random photo from a day we went to Ft. Worth.

Gotta love cowboys. Just in case you're having a slow day....ConGRADulations. (conGRATulations)

God Bless Texas

HOWDY YA'LL !!

My friend Dani asked if everything really is bigger in Texas...
So far I've only made it to Walmart, and wasn't too impressed, but I'll keep looking.

Anyways, we're finally here in the great state of Texas! What a whirlwind the last week has been. Here's a quick recap:

May 2 - Nate Graduated (!!)


May 3 -We blessed Navi

Nate gave a very special blessing and so many of our family and friends were there to support us. The day was definitely a good one.


May 4 - We left for TEXAS

The GPS told us the quickest route was through Wyoming, down to Colorado, half way through Kansas, and then cut down through Oklahoma.
But seeing as how the first year we left, we had a flat tire in Wyoming and last year the freeway was closed off due to a massive blizzard...we decided avoiding the boring place all together wouldn't be such a bad idea. SO, we opted to drive an extra couple hours down to Moab and over through Grand Junction, CO, then down through New Mexico. I was a little excited because I'd never been to New Mexico. (It would be something new) However, I was greatly disapointed and will just say there is a reason they call it New MEXICO.

I wasn't able to snap as many road trip photos as I would have liked (all the "welcome to" state signs) but that was partly due to my back seat location with Navi and mounds of baby stuff. Also because when I asked Nate to warn me when we were getting close to the Texas line, he replied with, "Uh, I'm pretty sure we already passed it." Gee thanks.

Navi was a super traveler. (No blow-outs and only 1 throwing up dilemma) She slept the majority of the trip; just waking to eat, change diaper, etc. Although, by the last 3 or 4 hours she really let us know she had had ENOUGH of her car seat. Who could blame her? I can't complain, this was my view the whole ride:


And lastly - I just wanted to throw in this stinking cute picture with cousin Brex. He wanted to hold Navi one last time before we left. I can't believe how big he getting! His 6th birthday is next week!! When I first started dating Nate, Brex was only 2 years old but carried on full conversations. (He was born a week after Nate had left for his mission so they didn't "meet" until Nate got home)


My favorite memory of Brexton is the very first time I went to his house with Nate. I don't think I had even officially met Nate's sister or brother-in-law, and much to my surprise Brex swings open the door to say, "What's up Nate? Where's Kristen?"
FYI - Kristen was Nate's girlfriend before and during the mission. I think Brex's mom was a little embarassed but I laughed so hard!

Too bad I'm a slacker and didn't get more pictures with all the other cousins and family members. Navi will have changed so much when we get back.

Nate's back in the selling mode and already has one so far. He had to use our car the past couple days so Navi and I have just been hanging out in the nice air conditioned apartment. (our car thermometer thing read 90 degrees the other day) Grandma Marianne is coming to visit in a week and we've already got the mall scoped out...

At the moment I can't think of a cheesy Texan salutation, but
ya'll come back real soon, ya hear?
HA. This might be a long summer...

Ode to Virginia

Dear Virginia,

I'm leaving soon, for Utah calls...
I'll miss you dearly - and all your malls.

When I'm gone, Nate just might relax,
who knew shopping sprees caused heart attacks?

I found solace in the slower days,
if not in malls, then catching rays.

The apartment pool - the Eastern shore
you know tanning is what summer's for!

You've been a great host, oh sweet V-A,
if given the chance, I'd come back to stay.

But in the end, U-T has you beat,
with mountains, deserts, and normal streets.

Although, the one thing you can truly boast -
Your license plates! I will miss them most.

So in honor of you, oh state of states -
my personal plethora of crazy plates.

Colonial Williamsburg

It's taken me a bit to get these up, but here are a few pictures of our day in Williamsburg. We drove up with Rem, Traci, and Sawyer and had lots of fun even though the weather was peaking into the 100's. The city is all historically preserved and the people are dressed up in colonial attire. We didn't want to pay to go in some of the homes...but we still had lots of fun just walking down the streets and peeking in where we could.
On the way home we had a Jelly Belly competition to see who could eat the grossest flavors. Someone would eat a bean without looking what it was, and then we'd laugh as they were forced to swallow or spit out jelly beans that tasted like vomit, rotten egg, moldy cheese, booger, pencil shavings, and skunk spray! If you've seen Traci's blog, these pictures will look very familiar!

Back Home, Barfing, and Batman

Now that I've had a few days to recover from my travels, (and more importantly-I found a spot where my computer will finally connect to the internet) I thought I'd record my experiences getting back home.
A couple weeks ago I had the chance to fly home for a week of visiting my family. My dad's side of the family has a camp out reunion every summer and since I missed it last year, I really wanted to be there. The fact that Cade is leaving us in less than a month also played a big part in the return.
The actual trip home was a story within itself but I don't really want to say much more than I now have a strong dislike for Dallas, Texas. (In particular, one American Airlines worker in Dallas)
When the Wallentine family gets together there's no lack of good food, laughs, and story telling. My dad has 7 siblings and they all have large families of their own, so dinner time with 40 relatives is normal. I love it! Here just a few of my favorite camp traditions:

Wallentines NEVER cheat at games ;) Some more action shots. Yes, that is my Dad.
And here is the close up. Watch out Cade!Uncle Chris reading the famous "left/right" story.
My Nana, with help from lots of others, gets enough gifts for EVERYONE to pass around the circle while listening for all the "left" and "rights".
And of course, sitting around the fire. I love listening to all the hilarious stories!
While I was home I caught a 48 hour flu bug...or something...so I had to leave the first night of camp to go home due to a upset stomach. (I won't mention any names of who I contracted this sickness from...ahem, Ashley :) ) However, I didn't have to miss too much of the reunion so it all worked out.
I had lots of fun at home and I'm glad I went, but it also made it hard to leave my family again. I was excited to come back to Virginia to of course be with Nate, and it won't be long until we head back for Cade's farewell.
Soon after I got back, Nate's sales office made their goal for the day and his manager paid for all of us to go to the midnight premiere of Batman. I haven't seen any of the other Batmans, but I loved the new one! It also helped that Christian Bale is VERY good looking. :) Heath Ledger was freakishly awesome as well.

July 4th - East Coast Style

Nate worked until 5 on the 4th of July. I think that is the only day they get a slight break...(?) because they usually go until 9. As part of the festivities, his company is awesome and pays for a huge BBQ dinner. It's a BYODC event (bring your own Diet Coke) , which to me, is basically any event.After dinner we went down to the beach with 95% of the population of Virginia (the other 5% was packed into a park a few blocks from our apartment). Then parked 10 blocks away from the action, walked behind slow people for 10 minutes just in time to catch the firework show, and walked the 10 blocks back with the same slow people who were ironically then in a hurry, all after a max 20 minutes of fireworks. I'm used to Romney Stadium's 45 minute celebration duration, so I was completely NOT ready to leave after the so-called grand finale.

I know I probably sound a bit pessimistic/sarcastic, but Virginia Beach really did put on a good show and it was a fun night. The fireworks were set off on boats out in the ocean and therefore reflected in the water when they exploded, so it was like a double dose.
(If you're like my sister, you notice my shirt changed colors. Just think clumsy, BBQ, ketchup, and white shirt...but Nate is very festive)
(This doesn't do the water reflection justice, but I tried)

We missed our families and their parties (and Nate's dad's birthday, Happy Birthday Darrell!), but we also realize this is such a great opportunity for us. It's a time of our lives that we'll never be able to duplicate. The 4th of July is one of my favorite holidays because it's not focused around spending money or other such things, but just a time for everyone to celebrate our country. Happy 4th!

Why Nate is Great: Part Deux-

*For the original "Why Nate is Great" post click here:* http://lacibuttars.blogspot.com/2008_03_01_archive.html

During the summer my day begins after a good amount of sleeping in. I daresay if there were a competition of staying up far too late, and sleeping in way too long, I would take the prize. A sad confession, I realize. (my only justification is that it's summer and I'm more productive during the school year) After a long snooze I rouse to make Nate's sack lunch before he heads off to his daily work meeting and then continues to a 7-8 hour day of knocking doors. All the while, I try and keep myself busy by either shopping with friends or straightening the house.
Last week I spent more days then I'd feel comfortable admitting wandering around the mall, so today I knew I needed to do some serious cleaning. As I sat here at our rented, black, wooden table and scowled at the tower of dirty dishes in the sink; I was a bit discouraged to consider the long process that lay ahead of me. Scrubbing slimy plates that have sat slightly ignored for too many days, and attempting not to dry-heave (sorry to be so graphic) as gooey globs of garden salad slide down the garbage disposal, is not my idea of a good time. Long story short - I DESPISE doing dishes. Why don't we just rinse our bowls after slurping down cereal? Good question. But for reasons unknown, Nate and I just can't seem to keep on top of this specific household chore.
I was almost completely fed up with being the one who always succumbs to the soapy job. "Why can't Nate give me a break at least once?" I silently whined as I hot water seeped up the stainless steel sink. Just as I began to slide into self-pity, I snapped out just as quickly as I realized the contrast in my daily activities compared to Nate's.

Therefore the actual reason of this post - in good old fashioned David Letterman style,

THE TOP TEN REASONS
Why Nate is Great: Part Deux-

10. As mentioned above, he spends the vast majority of his day knocking doors.

9. He doesn't complain about the continually unoriginal sack lunches I make him everyday.
(a PB&J or turkey and cheese sandwich, yogurt, small bag of chips, Oreos 100 calorie pack, and a Gatorade)

8. He has 6 shirts to choose from throughout the whole summer. (There are only 5 in the pic because he's wearing one. I DO know how to count)7. He has even fewer pairs of shorts to choose between.6. To him, accessorizing with a hat is best part of getting dressed. (He had all these specially made just to stand out a bit)5. He does all this work in extreme heat. Yesterday the temp hit a high of 101 degrees, not to mention humidity. WOW.

4. He cut his own hair in attempt to stay cool from the heat. 3. Instead of sexy smelling cologne, he gets to smell like a mixture of these:2. He RARELY complains. I honestly think I complain for him more often than not.

1. He does all of this so we will have more money and won't have to work as much during the school year.

So go ahead Nate, kick back with your Dr. Pepper and NBA Live '08 on the Playstation. I'll scrub the dishes anytime.

Memorial Day Weekend

It's true! There really is a beach here! We finally made it last Sunday afternoon with no weather complications. Since it was Memorial Day weekend, there were as my dad would say "throngs" of tourists, but all in all it was pretty fun. Live bands were playing up and down the boardwalk and they even broke out some kinda weak fireworks.
Here is Nate (I was the photographer) with some other couples from our office. We were quite the group. Rem and Traci took turns long boarding and almost running into people, Nate and I pretended we were parents to Sawyer, Dani and Trevor stopped all the Grandmas and children with their little puppy Lucy, and Sam and Bekah told the funny stories.

Traci and Laci. And in case you were wondering there is another wife named Stacie. It's so cute. Haha.

King Neptune. We all named him King Triton though. He was enormous as you can see and we all took turns getting our pictures with him. Nate and I were lucky enough to get that random man in ours as well. P.s. Thanks Rem for centering it.
As they say, "Virginia is for lovers". I guess that's what we are. It is fun to spend our Sunday afternoons exploring our surroundings since that is basically the only time Nate isn't working.
My sister Bekka was nice enough to send me some family updates of their weekend back home. It's funny, when I was younger, Memorial Day meant school was almost out and we had one last long weekend to play. My mom would always take us to Clarkston to put flowers on my grandpa's and great-grandparent's graves. I didn't hate it, but for some reason I always thought I had better things to do. Since we've been gone these last two Memorial Days I've really missed the day spent in Clarkston continuing the tradition my mom taught me to appreciate.

I will always love my mom's headstone. My dad did such an awesome job "designing" it so to speak. All the flowers look so pretty as well.

My family usually makes a trip to Bear Lake also. This is my aunt Lauri Ann's grave in that cemetery. She died when my dad was just a kid.
I hope everyone had a good weekend however you spent it!

You're Not in Utah Anymore...

So this post is more to "journal" our time in Virginia but also to share as well.
Last Sunday after church we decided to try and find the beach. It was a bit cloudy and a little breezy but we weren't planning on doing much more than looking. SO... we met up with Rem, Traci, Sawyer boy, and with lots of help from the GPS, made our way to the beach.
Just as we parked the car and set foot on the boardwalk the "rains came pouring down." (As in the Wise Man and the Foolish Man) Sand pelted my ankles as the wind picked it up and threw it every which way. Dark spots grew into dark blotches on our clothes as we ran for cover back to the parking garage. Needless to say, our beach tour lasted a good 10 minutes. We decided a drive by viewing would suffice for now.
As we made our way home, the radio hummed in the background until I heard the long and annoying BEEEEEP that is usually followed by information that you'd probably rather not hear. Well, that something turned out to be a tornado warning. Correct. A real tornado as in those big swirly things that pick up Holstein cows in the movie "Twister". The announcement proceeded to warn people to find immediate shelter, at ground level, and if caught in a tornado, to find an interior wall closet or room and to cover yourself in pillows and blankets - and to stay away from windows.
So being the sheltered "valley girl" that I am - make that Cache Valley girl I guess - I obviously experienced a few moments of shear panic.After we made it home, we looked on the internet to find that Virginia Beach was on the borderline of the warning area. This calmed our worries a "skosh" (as Mrs. Olson would say) and the storm raged on for a couple more hours. Luckily I never saw a witch fly by on a bike or anything. Long story short, we're perfectly safe, and have now experienced tornado ensuing weather.

Lesson learned: I'm grateful for mountains.

We're Heerrre!

Virginia is pretty sweet! (and very warm) Just thought I'd document our very long road trip:
When we were still sane - before thirty plus hours in the car.
After we had to take a very long detour because the Wyoming freeway was closed. Not cool.
Just a few of the hundreds we saw.
Yes, the rumors are true. Kansas is flat.
Eating lunch in Kansas with the Allens, our travel buddies.
Yes. I got pulled over. Stupid Kansas. Who drives 60 on the freeway?? Luckily the guy was pretty nice and just gave me a warning.
I tried and tried to take a cool picture of all the cows and barns for my Dad, but I was always to slow.
A sunset pic with the Allens in tow.
Saying goodbye to our ghetto motel.
Apparently Santa lives in Missouri, not the North Pole.
I love Kentucky! That is where we lived last summer. This is right before my camera died, so from there to Virginia got left out.