Thanksgiving in West Virginia

First of all, here is the finished "OHIO" with all the letters put together. You saw the "O" in an earlier post. That is the letter I am in. Sorry that it has been a while since we posted anything. We both have been very busy.

We went to Jacob and Jennifer's house in West Virginia a couple weeks ago for Thanksgiving. We were also there to see baby Victoria, our brand new niece, come home from the hospital. Shawn's birthday happened to fall on the day of Thanksgiving, and we also celebrated Jennifer's birthday on Saturday, November 28th before we left to come back to Columbus. So we had a lot of things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving!

William was helping me fix my scrubs that my mom made for me so that they would fit me.
Here are some pictures of me with the newly altered scrubs on. I think my mom and I made some pretty sweet scrubs!









William became my little buddy during the whole Thanksgiving break. He always wanted to be right there with me whenever I did anything. It was so much fun to play with him, and I'm so glad that we live close enough to Jacob and Jennifer now that we can see them more.

I'm not really sure how to get this formatted right, but these are some of the pictures we took while we were at Jacob and Jennifer's house.












Here are some more pictures of Shawn and me playing with our cute nephew!

MOLARS!

This is the video that Dr. Weiss (our awesome Oral Anatomy teacher) used today to start off our discussion about molars!

White Coat Ceremony

Laura's White Coat ceremony was Monday the 21st of September and it was a nice night. For all of you who insist on pictures and blog updates, here you go.

Top 10 Things We Love About Our Apartment in Ohio!

We love Ohio. Here are some of the reasons why: (these are in no particular order)

10: The weather here is not too much different from Utah, except for the humidity. So far, we don't think the humidity is too bad: we put on chapstick less and don't use nearly as much lotion! (Although we look really sweaty when we go outside, but I guess it could be worse!)

9: We love our apartment! The front room is one of the favorites. We haven't put anything on the walls yet, so they will look better when we do so :) We saw the couches while we were running one morning out on the sidewalk in front of a house. The guy who lived there said they were moving and we could have them, only problem was that they were soaked because it had rained the night before. We borrowed someone's SUV to go pick them up, let them dry out most of the way outside, then completely dry under the air conditioning inside. Once we bought covers and pillows for them, they turned out pretty nice, says us!


8: We have grass in the front yard and grass in the backyard. The backyard also has a playground where kids from around the complex play. There is also a pool! This is a picture of the front of the apartment. Ours is the green door on the left. That brings us to number 7...
7: The apartment number is clearly visible from the front of the apartment (although I don't think you can see it in this picture) Haha


6: We found somewhere to put every kitchen item in the kitchen, although the kitchen is very small! Here is a picture of the kitchen in Cedar City (left) compared with the kitchen here (right):
I really don't know how we fit everything in it!













This kitchen table was at JC Penney Furniture Outlet. We got it for a really good price!!

5: We love having the extra bathroom,


the extra bedroom (the office for me to study in and Shawn to work in until he finds an office in Columbus),















and the extra balcony to store our bikes between rides:

4: Our neighbors are wonderful! Actually, we have not met anyone yet who has been less than loving. Our apartment complex is full of LDS dental students, so we fit in great. Our ward is wonderful...everyone we have met has been more than willing to help us out in any way possible! The moving committee in the Elders Quorum had our moving truck unloaded in ten minutes flat. It was wonderful to have so much help!









3: The temple is really close! It is one of the smaller ones, but very beautiful. We drove to it and around it on Sunday after dinner, so now we know where it is!



2: Having a dishwasher, air conditioning, washer and dryer has been so nice! We feel so spoiled!




























1: Our bedroom is a lot bigger in this apartment than it was in either of our other apartments! We actually have two sides of the bed, which allows the bed to be made much easier! Check out the comparison:


















We have a balcony that can be entered from our bedroom. We have been throwing all our empty boxes out there as we unpack.








We love the fact that our bedroom is a true master bedroom with a bathroom and walk-in closet. The shower head in our shower is actually high enough! I hate it when they are so low, I have to bend over just to get my hair wet!

It's been a month! sorry about that, but we saw pretty much everyone up at Wolf Creek, so that can count as a blog. I thought I would update everyone on our move, so here we go. We are less than two months away from going to Ohio and have started to worry a little more about things we need to get rid of, sell, and take with us. We have a truck reserved, which is a huge worry off of our shoulders, now we have to pack and all that stuff. So when August 10th gets here we can be completely ready to get the truck loaded and begin our drive to Ohio, which will take a few days.

Apart from the move Laura and I have less than two weeks of class left for the summer, which is just awesome because I'm tired of school and ready to concentrate on other things.

So far the summer has been really nice, I don't think we have reached 90 degrees yet, the clouds keep us cool, and it rained the other day :-) I am looking forward to some nice thunderstorms before we go because I love lightning and can just sit outside and watch it, hopefully on a metal chair to bring it in closer! Just kidding.

Well this has been pretty random, no pictures or anything, I just wanted to update the blog because it has been so long. Sorry for all of you who sit on the edge of your seat hoping and waiting for a blog to show up so you can read about the fantastical lives of Laura and I, I will try and do better next time. See ya!!

As most of you know, I spent a few days this week up in Logan to do some training and learn from a friend of mine, Cris Guymon. It was a very good couple of days, but talking about insurance training and meetings is not the most fascinating thing to put into a blog. so for all of you who decide to read this thing, I tried to make my trip home on Thursday a little bit more interesting.

I left in the morning, and the first thing that I decided to do was go to the Logan temple and take a couple of pictures because I had never seen the place in person. I didn't go in or spend much time there because I needed to be on the road heading home. Anyway, I got there and took some pictures from the parking lot, and here is one of them that turned out pretty nice.

After leaving the Logan temple I drove for about an hour, with my music and a nice cloudy sky to a small place in Roy. Laura and I were watching a show on Food Network one day that showcased a place called "The Burger Bar." So when I got there it was about 10:30 in the morning and I was not even close to hungry enough to eat a big old burger. So I got some onion rings and a snickers shake. The show said that the onion rings were great and awesome, I've had better. The shake was ok, but I could have gotten the same thing pretty much anywhere else. Here is a picture of the sign, the place has been around since like 1956, and it was cool to eat there, just not as exciting as I thought it would be.

After leaving the Burger Bar I headed south and was going to stop by my friend's house, but I couldn't find it, despite my directions and google maps, so that was a little bit of a waste of gas and time. I had also expected to stop at Danny J's apartment to play some guitar hero, but he had to be in class, so I just kept on driving. Something that I did see, which was awesome, was the National Guard tribute bike built by Orange County Choppers. There is a show called American Chopper and it shows a business that builds extravagant thematic motorcycles and I finally got to see one in person, at 75 miles per hour. I did manage to get a shot of it, because it was awesome!

After passing this by, I decided to take a couple of pictures of big signs, for cities that mean absolutely nothing and that nobody cares about. I took two pictures, one of a sign for Scipio, and the other the sign for Beaver.

If all that excitement weren't enough I saw a pretty big dirt devil and took some pictures of that, one of which I will put in here.

That is last of my pictures, I also counted 9 dead animals on the side of the road. I know that is a little gruesome but oh well, it kept me busy while driving forever through nothing. to tell the truth, I saw 11 dead animals, but 2 of them were so rotted and gutted that I decided not to count them because they looked like smudges, not animals. Well I hope you all enjoyed the ride home from Logan with me, it was so exciting that I just can't wait to do it again someday!

Graduation

Last week was the last week of spring semester, which meant finals and then finally graduation on saturday. It was a pretty crazy week on its own, but then having everyone come out to celebrate graduation just made it that much more insane. Not only were Laura and I graduating, but also my cousin Leslie, so her family came out as well.

Friday was fun, the rugby team got some guys together and played a little bit of two hand touch rugby on a muddy field, which was fun because people were slipping and sliding all over the place. That night we had 20 people in our group that went to Sizzler for dinner. Having my family (Grandparents + parents + Scott), Laura's family (parents + Emily and Matthew), and Leslie's family (parents + Ben + Jody and Zach), there to celebrate with us was just awesome.

Saturday was graduation day and Friday night both Scott and Matt stayed at our apartment, so we had to drop Scott off at the hotel, because he wasn't going to the graduation, then we dropped off Matt at the Centrum so that he could go in with everyone else to watch. Laura and I went up by the scence building and got in line...well, we got in a mass, then into a line later. Walking down was pretty cool, there were a ton of people graduating and the only bummer was having to pass the gay pride parents... Anyway the commencement was great, a girl had a seizure and found out that it was a 3 inch tumor in her head. President Monson gave a good speech, we moved our tassles and that was it. Once it was over, Laura and I bolted for the door and waited for everyone to come out so we could take a couple pictures then run off to AppleBee's for lunch, which was again with 20 people. That afternoon was the convocation and that lasted an hour or so, maybe an hour and a half, i don't remember.

Saturday afternoon was pretty relaxed. After the convocation Laura and I went home to the apartment to change and when Mom and Dad Harmon came we opened some presents, including an awesome clock which we promptly put up in the office. That evening a bunch of us hung out at our apartment watching the NBA playoffs and eating a little bit of pizza. Laura, Mom, and I went to Artic Circle and then went to the hotel to hang out a little more with family, make fun of people on TV, and say our goodbyes because Laura and I weren't going to be getting up very early to see everyone off.

It was great to see my grandpa and talk with him a little bit because I haven't seen him in a while. He's 82 now and hopefully he has 20 years left in him. anyway that was our weekend, it was exciting, it was fun, and it was crazy all at once. Such is life.

Amplifying DNA - posted by Laura

     I just watched Jacob's video (about the parts of the brain) that he has on his blog, and thought I would post one of the videos that goes along with a method that I use to amplify DNA! This song is about the Polymerase Chain Reaction, and if you know what it's talking about, it should be really funny. Shawn calls me a nerd when I watch videos like this, but I'm okay with that! :-) Enjoy The Polymerase Chain Reaction Song!  

(disregard the advertisement at the end)

Random Ramblings

I am not going to whine, I'm not going to gripe, I just want to say that I am so close to being done with school that I can taste it! I can't wait to be done, but at the same time, there is so much work i have to do in the last week of school that I don't even want to think about it. Here is what I have done to relieve some of the stresses of school:

1. Running

Almost every morning Laura has class at 8:00 in the morning, and I don't have class until nine. That means I have 1 hour to kill before I even have to think about anything. So what I do is get my tired and barely awake butt up to the track and run a little bit. It really isn't the most amazingly fun thing to do, and it actually hurts, but I figure it is better than sitting in an empty classroom playing games on addictinggames.com. So what I did, once my foot was better, was develop a routine that I can continue to expand as I get stronger. First, I walk a lap, which equals about 1/10 of a mile, then I stretch so I don't pull any muscles. I started out running only 5 laps, but starting Monday I will be running 8. After running those laps I walk another lap, then run another 5, or in Monday's case, 8. Finally I walk one more cool down lap, stretch a little bit, then go to the locker room to shower and get ready for class. This helps me to wake up in the morning, it keeps me from eating a junky breakfast because if I do eat a junky breakfast, I might die during the run.

2. Rugby

I have grown to really enjoy this sport. I heard on a commercial for rugby that I watched on YouTube that: "Rugby, a villain's sport, played by gentlemen." I thought that was awesome. What rugby does is give me a chance just to get out and play a game that has nothing to do with school. Even when we only play two-hand touch, it is nice to be out there running and yelling at people, which is surprisingly nice. Also, when playing rugby, I get to kick the ball off a tee, like a kickoff in football, and that gives me a chance to show off how far I can kick the ball. (I made a field goal from the middle of the field once).

3. Age of Empires

My mind is a magical thingy. hehe. Age of Empires is a game on the computer that requires strategy, quickness and a lot of attention. Lately I have been playing as the Dutch Civilization, and what I have to do is develop a city, develop an army, and conquer the map given to me. I sometimes play against 2 opponents, sometimes 5, and up to 7 opponents. Each game can take an hour or more and I can just get into a different world and not think about anything else going on, I don't play very much, but when I do play, I dominate!

4. Chill with Laura

Another way I handle stress is just to chill with my wifey. Yeah she studies and I sit there, but it helps me to relax knowing that she isn't freaking out about all the things that she has to do, cause she has a lot on her plate. I know she is tired of school too, so we are kind of in the same boat. When we just sit around, watch food network, and cheer on some Iron Chef or critique the contestants on Chopped, I like it. We watched "The Office" yesterday, and Laura was sitting there and it was fun, we talk about who is doing what, its awesome. Then she falls asleep, and that's fine with me, I can watch Discovery Channel or SportsCenter until it is time for us to go to bed. Laura's awesome, we are almost at the 9 month mark of being married, when I was on my mission I took a picture looking like I was pregnant and about to pop, I won't do that this time.

That's all I got, this is a pretty random blog, have fun. Peace!

Easter Holiday Happenings!

So here are some of the things we've been up to since the last post;

1. Spring break!
2. Rugby
3. More school
4. Running and the Ab Lab!
5. Puzzle
6. Cookies
7. Cake
8. Maggie Moo's
9. Basketball
10. Elder's Quorum Pinewood Derby (No real rules)

1: Spring break, kind of a crazy break. We went to California for a few days, then up to Bountiful, then down to St. George for a wedding and that was about it. it wore us out and made us want an actual break

2: Rugby, besides missing a couple of games because of injuries and going to a wedding I have been at practice and been playing for the St. George men's team. The season is over for now, but some friendlies and other exhibition games will be played later on during the summer. Plus, I found a team out in Columbus that I can go play with once we are there, it keeps me active and its a great stress reliever, at least for me :-)

3: More school, boring, tiring, and I'm frankly sick of going to school. Most of my classes seem worthless at this point and all I do is sit there. Only a few more weeks and we will finally be done, for a month, then summer school starts. I can't wait to be done!

4: I have been running at the indoor track in the SUU PE Building in the morning. Since I come to campus with Laura and have an hour before I actually have class, it is nice to go for a little run, a little over a mile, and then shower and go to class. It wakes me up and hopefully I can lose some weight before graduation!

5: Laura and I completed a 1500 piece puzzle that we got at the SUU bookstore with the gift certificate she earned by being on the women's week panel a little while ago. It was pretty hard because there were so many pieces, and, because there wasn't a lot of color differences.
6: Cookies, several times over the last few weeks we have made cookies. Chocolate chip cookies from scratch and from a Betty Crocker bag, also, I made my first Peanut Butter cookies ever. They turned out to be a little flat, but they tasted good and our Pyrex bowls with nifty lids that fit perfectly are great cookie jars!

7: Cake! Laura made a yellow cake and frosted it with rainbow frosting stuff. it was really good and it stayed moist for days after she made it. I was so proud that I almost cried.

8: Maggie Moo's. This is the new ice cream place a few blocks from our apartment. It is like Cold Stone Creamery, and it is awesome! We've been there a few times and we like it a lot because the ice cream is really good and the mix ins are great too. We went there last night for our eight month anniversary. I got a cup of cheesecake ice cream with brownies, teddy grams, and caramel mixed in. I was very happy. (By the way, do you say care-a-mel or carmel?)

9: Basketball. Ward basketball continues with the beginning of a double-elimination tournament that we began with a bye week. Since our regular season record was the best, we are the number 1 seed and didn't have to play last week. we did play last night and won by 8. Next week we play at 7:15 and hopefully, we win.

10: Elder's Quorum Pinewood Derby. This is what I really wanted to get to. Last night, before basketball. the elder's quorum of my ward had a pinewood derby with limited rules. the cars had to be under 8 ounces. rules done. One guy come in with a small airplane turbine on the top of his car, and he won the whole thing. I made a very BYU car and didn't do so well, I won worst design because of how BYU my car was. I thought it was fun. I am putting a bunch of videos that I took especially for this because it was just funny to me how much time some of these guys spent on their cars. the track was really nice, made out of metal and had an electronic timing system and bracket generator. Enjoy the videos!

Foot Update

Guess what?!? The Doc at the emergency room made the wrong diagnosis. When I went to the podiatrist on Monday he took some x-rays and showed me that I had a subluxated cuboid. For you medical students, you might know what that is. For the rest of us, let me explain. The cuboid is a 6 sided bone in the foot right in front of the heal bone that is pretty big and thick. It is towards the back of your arch and toward the outside of your foot. This bone in my foot, because I didn't have proper arch support during the triathlon, moved down about 1/4 inch from where it was supposed to be, sort of like this x-ray I found on Google:

You can see how the heal bone goes up and then the next bone to the right is down pretty far from being level. That is the Cuboid, and it should be just about even to the heal bone. So the doctor, to try and remedy this, found maybe the most painful spot on the bottom of my foot, put his thumbs on it, and pushed up hard to try and get it back into place. That hurt by the way, I had to put some of my shirt in my mouth to bite down on and grippe the arms on the chair to brace myself. I slept last night because I was prescribed percocet and SOMA to kill the pain and relax the muscles, respectively. So that is the update on my foot, I still ice it down and walk around with a big boot and crutches.

I am Falling Apart

Well, I am writing this blog to let everyone know that my body hates me. After hearing Clara's sad story of sickness and stuff, I guess it is my turn to let everyone know what has been happening with my body. Don't worry, it's not gross.


First, let us travel back in time to Thursday February 26th. I was playing church ball for the ward and sprinting back on defense my hamstring went "twang!" inside my leg. I ended up hopping around the rest of the game because we didn't have any subs for me to get out of there. That night and Friday night I had ice on the back of my leg trying to help it heal and to ease the pain. I went to rugby that weekend and played at most ten minutes because running really was not an option.


Moving on to this week I had to try and prepare for Saturday morning's triathlon. So Monday through Wednesday i tried to work up some endurance in my leg so that I wouldn't die in the middle of the run. Thursday and Friday I rested and didn't do any workouts so I could be rested and fresh for the three mile run, ten mile bike, and 1/4 mile swim on Saturday morning. I was planning on buying some decent running shoes, but we never got around to it because of our busy schedules. So I ran in my basketball shoes and finished the marathon in 1:24.58. I was just happy to finish and perfectly satisfied to have done as well as I did. Anyway, for the rest of the day i was pretty tired and sore because, well, I had done a triathlon. there was a rugby game that afternoon that I didn't go to because I was so tired. that night we went to the Polynesian Club Luau and and enjoyed dinner and an awesome show.


That night, well I guess early Sunday morning, as in 5:00 am, I woke up because my left foot was killing me. I tried to ignore it but couldn't, so I got up and practically hopped over to the kitchen and took 3 Ibuprofen, then went back to bed. At about 8:15 I woke up again because of pain and couldn't go back to sleep or do anything to make it better so I got up and took 4 more pills. In case you didn't know, I really don't take many pills or go to the doctor.


This afternoon, after icing my foot all day long, the pain still hadn't gone away or even subsided. Putting any pressure on my foot, especially the heal brought searing pain up my entire leg. So Laura drove me over to the hospital, again a rare thing for me, and had my foot looked at. The doc said that I have Plantar Fasciitis, basically tendinitis in my foot.


So now to add to my array of injuries and stuff I can add a pulled hamstring and Plantar Fasciitis. Basically, my body is falling apart and now I am on the couch with ice tied to my foot with a belt.

So in conclusion, my body is falling apart piece by piece.

Top 10

Top 10 ways to spend your Tax Return

10. Buy enough paper plates to never have to wash plates ever again.

9. Buy a custom printed shirt that says "I 'heart' Obama" for you and 20 of your friends.

8. Make up for that crappy Valentine's Day gift you got.

7. AppleBee's, AppleBee's, AppleBee's, AppleBee's, AppleBee's, AppleBee's.

6. New shoes, new shoes, new shoes, new socks.

5. Go see Confessions of a Shopaholic in theaters at least 4 times.

4. Buy clothes that fit your after-Christmas body.

3. NASCAR Tickets??

2. Subscribe to ESPN the Magazine, just for the free stuf they give you.

and the Number 1 way to spend your tax return...

Go on a weekend cruise! unless you live in California where all you get is an I.O.U.