Monday, September 30, 2013

Not so Fun

Alisha says: To follow up Dave’s latest post about what we’ve been up to since returning from our great summer adventure I’ll add my own post. I’ve debated writing this but decided to because I don’t think anyone reads our blog anymore and because we just always blog about the fun things we do and let’s face it, sometimes you get to do some not very much fun stuff in life also. So shortly after returning from our trip we discovered that I was pregnant! Yay, we were both super excited and I began trying to learn everything I could. At 11 weeks I finally got to go to my first doctor’s appointment. While I entered the appointment filled with much anticipation on seeing the heartbeat, that excitement quickly turned to feelings of sadness as we learned that there was no heartbeat and development had stopped a few weeks earlier. The doctor had me wait a week to see if anything would happened and then come back. At the next visit I was presented with the choice of having a d&c or using medication. I decided on the medication and was very thankful that my mom was able to come and spend a few days with me as this was a very emotional and trying time.  


We took my mom up Mt. Lemmon for a nice walk while she was here.



Friday, September 27, 2013

Back to real life


Dave says: Since the big adventure, the blog has been neglected. The last two months have been a busy time as I am on the job market applying for faculty positions. Here's the brief highlights of the last few weeks.


Even though we didn't miss the heat while we were traveling for the summer, we did miss sitting out front in the evenings and enjoying some gorgeous sunsets and panoramas.


We drove up Mt. Lemmon with Sam in his sweet new Mustang and did a hike from the very top.


The hike had some great views. This one is from the fire lookout.


We also did the Wilderness of Rocks trail on the hike which has some cool rock formations.


We made it up to Phoenix for my grandparents' 60th anniversary. I built a mega-fort with Christine's kids. As a bonus, they could even watch TV in the fort.





We did a nice scramble up Soldier Canyon which is the first switchback of Mt. Lemmon. The route ultimately comes out at Prison Camp. As you can see, there were some great boulders to scramble around on.


Can you see the curled up rattlesnake? I was climbing up this wash and reached around this rock putting my hand only a few inches from it. When I looked up, I was pretty scared. Fortunately, he was just sunning himself and didn't hardly seem to notice.


This was the big boulder jam on the hike that we climbed around. After the hike, we went out for some tasty custard at Culvers which has been a recent favorite of ours.





I also taught seminary for the first three weeks of the school year. It was a fun time however since I didn't take any pictures of the class, the closest thing that I have is a delicious tray of cinnamon rolls that Alisha made for the class. Right now, things are very busy with my PhD program as I am going on the job market a year early and trying to do a 5 year program in only 4 years. It is an exciting time but it can definitely make things a bit crazy at times. More updates on this in the future...