I never thought I would say this, but...

I LOVE UTAH!

(at least in the summer time).

What other state do you know where you can go from the best skiing in the world, to stunning red rock, to desolate deserts, to breath taking canyon-lands, etc.? Jonathan and I had an amazing weekend as we decided to be adventurous and travel around Southern Utah.

DAY 1: Arriving at Goblin Valley

We arrived at Goblin Valley at about 7:30PM. Upon arrival we learned that the Goblin Valley campsite was full, but we were more than welcome to camp on any of the surrounding BLM property. At first, as I looked out into the desert, I was a bit terrified to be on our own and in the middle of no where. However, we ended up having a lot of fun camping in the desert. In fact, it wasn't until the next day when we were camping at an "official campground" that we learned how annoying it is to have both tons of people around, as well as psychotic chirping birds early in the morning. The desert was actually a desirable camp location - no one to bug you, no squirrels rustling around your tent, and most importantly, NO BIRDS chirping at 3:00AM.

DAY 2: Hiking Goblin Valley/Calf Creek

GOBLIN VALLEY -

I had no idea this place even existed before Jonathan mentioned that we should go to Goblin Valley. Having been raised in the suburbs of Chicago I was never exposed to such amazing landscape (a road-trip in Illinois entailed speeding through never ending cornfields :)

I think the strangest part about Goblin Valley for me, was the fact that all of those goblin (however, it is obvious that they look more like penis's) looking formations are made of dirt.

Taking a little break to enjoy the sun...

ROAD TRIP to Cattle Creek:

So after Goblin Valley, Jonathan and I both decided that as awesome as the desert was, we wanted to make a change of plans and do something else. So we pulled out our old school map of Utah (GPS doesn't work in the middle of the desert) and we went on our way to Escalante, UT.

On our little road trip through Capital Reef National Park, we came across this awesome waterfall. Jonathan immediately pulled over, threw on his swimsuit, and jumped in. I waded in the pool below and took pictures while he had his fun.

We also came across some Petroglyphs, which was cool.

As we got close to our destination, we came across this TERRIFYING road. If any of you know me well enough, you may know I had a recurring dream as a child that my family was driving along a road JUST LIKE THIS ONE, and we lost control of the Smith Family Van - not cool. I had a mini anxiety attack as I saw the drop off on both sides of the road. The picture doesn't quite do it justice...

Lower Calf Creek Falls:

So we arrived at our campsite, and started on our next hike to Calf Creek Falls. It was a long 6mile hike through blazing dry heat, but well worth the trek.

Honestly, you can not tell me this isn't one of the more beautiful waterfalls you have ever seen! I just wish we would have gotten there an hour earlier when the sun was still shining because the damp breeze from this waterfall was CHILLY!

But of course, Jonathan being the brave person he is, jumped in the ice cold water. I could barely put my feet in it was so cold!

DAY 3: Upper Calf Creek Falls/Slot Canyons

After we hiked the lower calf creek falls, we learned that there was another waterfall with warmer pools above it. So the next morning, we packed up our campsite and took off for another breath taking waterfall. (I know it is kind of hard to see but the water fall is directly behind us in the picture below).

Notice the top of the waterfall...

And notice us standing on top of the waterfall - This was probably the coolest infinity pool I have ever been to ;)

And behind that massive waterfall was another smaller waterfall.

This time I had absolutely no excuse not to get in the water.

Little holes for us to sit in - how nice of nature to create the perfect hot-summer day cold-tub!

After hiking to the waterfall, we decided to go to some nearby slot canyons. Again, we only had an old map of Utah and a few locals who told us how to get to the slot canyons, so these little rock towers were our only guide to let us know we were on the right trail and without them we would have been completely lost.

The first canyon we went through was very wide so we took a picture and moved onto the next canyon.

PEEK-A-BOO slot canyon:

This is how you had to climb into the slot canyon...

And once you were in the canyon, there was a ton of hiking, climbing, and shuffling between extremely narrow places.

I had a ton of fun climbing through these canyons. However, if you are really claustrophobic, I would NOT recommend this little adventure.

One of the nerve racking things about being in these slot canyons, is the fact that if there is a flash flood, you need to do your best to get out as fast as you can, or else you are going to be flushed away in the flood.

SPOOKY Slot Canyon:

As the name portrays, the "spooky" slot canyon was a little more 'intense' than Peek-A-Boo. In fact, after the above picture was taken, I had a pretty bad anxiety attack...

I would consider myself slightly claustrophobic, so as soon as we could no longer see the light above us, and we were in these incredibly narrow places, I asked Jonathan to quit taking pictures and move quickly. Luckily we survived just fine with no sign of a flash flood :)

And to complete our trip, we drove past Bryce Canyon on the way home. We spent more time in the slot canyons than we originally had planned so we didn't have time to stop at Bryce, but we definitely want to go there on our next adventure.

And if you made it all the way through this post, (GOOD JOB!) I am sure you are as exhausted as I am.

June 2nd 2007

As you might have already guessed, today is our 3 year anniversary and I couldn't be happier to be married to the love of my life. This past year has been a bit of a struggle but I am so grateful for Jonathan's courage and strength to know that everything will eventually work itself out.

Our engagement photos were taken by Jonathan's sister Katie, and even though I think I used a different photo, this one is my favorite now.

The night before our wedding we barbecued in Midway with our entire family, which was nice since we didn't get to spend much quality one-on-one time with family and friends on the actual day of the wedding. Who knew we would be living in Midway three years later.

It is kind of fun to think about what I was doing on the day of my wedding right now. At 8:30am I was getting ready at a Holiday Inn with my friends and my mom. I remember putting on my eyeliner and thinking how grateful I was to be marrying the love of my life (and I as pretty grateful I didn't wake up with a huge zit :)

Jonathan surprised me with the horse drawn carriage. After a long amazing day, I was sad it was all coming to an end, but it was wonderful to sit on the carriage with Jonathan and ride throughout the city.

For our honeymoon we went to Puerto Vallarta. Being the forgetful person that I am, on the morning after our wedding I realized that I didn't have my passport. Luckily we were able to call up Katie's husband Spencer to bring the passport to the hotel before we left. I remember it being really strange at first to be alone on a vacation with Jonathan. I hope someday to renew our vows and redo it all over again

And here we are now, happy as can be! This picture was taken in Montana when Jonathan was sworn into the Bar.

Call me Master ;)

Graduation was last weekend, and my parents flew out to support me. Friday night was a graduation celebration that the division of Public Health put together just for the Public Health students, which was really nice. Saturday was the official graduation ceremony with the entire School of Medicine. As you can probably imagine, the ceremony was completely tailored to the Doctors. Luckily the Public Health Students were hooded first, so as soon as I walked across the stage, I continued walking out of the auditorium and out the door. It seems like just a month ago we were living in Vermont and attending Jonathan's graduation.

It was raining outside on Friday night...maybe I'll take the time to photoshop Jonathan's suit before printing this one.

My lovely nieces came to support me. Aren't they adorable!

This summer I have to work on an internship with the Salt Lake Valley Health Department and then I'll "officially" be done and hopefully employed :)

I passed!

After the longest weekend of my life, it is good to know that it all payed off because I passed the comprehensive MPH project! I am basically done with the program but I have to take one elective this summer and I also need to complete an internship/practicum this summer.

I know I have so many other things to work on right now but sometimes it just feels good to do nothing.

Word Purge

Do you ever find that when you are writing papers, after papers, after boring tedious papers - your mind starts to wonder and think of the strangest things? Well that is how I am feeling today after my 4th paper.... and don't worry that I have 3 more to go and school is going to be over in a week! AH! Forget the stress and back to my random thoughts...

Tuna - Why do we eat food that has so many horrible connotations? Tuna smells rancid, yet somehow when it is smothered in enough mayo, mustard and pickles it tastes yummy. Odd

Cottage Cheese - Why did someone out there in the world have to relate this delicious food to cellulite - it just ruins my experience eating it.

The Blind Side - Excellent movie! I finally saw it and I think it is one of those very rare movies that I actually think is worth purchasing. I know I am way behind on this one but I am a huge Redbox fan so I waited for it to be a dollar.

Speaking of Redbox - Does anyone know if Redbox started in Oakbrook, IL? My bills for Redbox always show up as Redbox - Oakbrook IL: $1.07. Stupid Oakbrook and all of there wealthy smart business people. Didn't Ty beanie babies start in Oakbrook too? One last thing about Oakbrook - On the Fortune 500 List, under the state of Illinois, McDonald's in Oakbrook was listed. Does McDonald's have headquarters in Oakbrook?

(when I googled images of Oakbrook, of course it came up with pictures of FABULOUS homes. The picture below was my personal fav.)

*BEWARE THE NEXT PICTURE IF YOU DON'T LIKE BLOOD* Grizzly Bear head butted me in the forehead the other day and literally caused the skin to split and bruise - like you see in boxing when the dude's get punched in the face. My head still hurts today! I am really proud of myself for not getting mad at him though. I remained calm until I put my hand to my forehead only to find blood. To add to my headache, I did 10 pull-ups (GO ME!) on the pull-up bar thing that I bought Jonathan and I seriously injured my back. I haven't been able to turn my neck to look behind me in 2 days now. I've kept a heating pad on it all day today so hopefully that helps.