Yardwork

The old pine tree in our backyard is gone! We had it taken down today. I'm wishing now that I had taken a picture of it before it got taken down. I don't have a "before" picture, but here's an "after" one:


The tree-looking pole in the background is a telephone pole. I plan on planting some lilac bushes in that area. I love lilacs!


I also thought it would be fun to post a picture of the red maple we planted last fall in the front yard. When it was planted, it was just a stick, but now our stick has leaves! Yeah :)



Someday, we'll look at that picture and (hopefully) have a hard time believing that the maple was once this small. Life is fun!

Arizona Trip: Saturday and Sunday

I'm finally getting around to posting about the rest of our Arizona trip! Life's been very busy :)

Ray and I got up pretty early on Saturday morning (we never did adjust to Arizona time). We randomly chose to do a hike up Schuerman Mountain. I picked out a geocache that was on the hike, so I was able to add Arizona to my geocaching map! The trail was nice and had excellent views of the red rocks.

After our hike, we stopped for milkshakes at a crazy little diner called The Red Planet Diner. I call it a crazy diner because it's all about aliens and alien sitings. I guess it goes with the area since there are supposed to be lots of "vortexes" in Sedona. (insert eye roll here!)

We made a quick stop by the Chapel of the Holy Cross. This church is so beautiful. You can see the cross from a really long way away. Just awesome! (Blogger's giving me problems with loading pictures right now, so I'm afraid you'll have to click on the link to see the chapel.)

The wedding was at 3pm. It was very nice and low-key... and even shorter than Ray's and my ceremony! After dinner and mingling, Ray and I almost walked into a couple of boars! They were on the sidewalk in the middle of town. Very strange! I have no idea if that is normal or not, but we kept our distance.

Sunday was another early morning and another long flight (this time delayed). We were glad to be home!

Arizona Trip: Day 1

The Arizona trip hasn't been quite as exciting as our DC trip, but we are having fun! The first thing I have to say is that getting up at 3:45 in the morning is NOT fun. Secondly, did you know that AirTran is a very prompt airline? Luckily, we were on time, so it was ok!

The flight to Phoenix was really long, but the plane wasn't full, so Ray and I got to stretch out. It was a pretty decent experience, all things considered. When we arrived in Phoenix, we ran into Aaron Schlicht! We've now run into three friends in airports during our last two trips. Craziness!

Arizona is probably the weirdest place I've visited as far as the landscape is concerned. There's no grass anywhere and really tall cacti all over the place. I would consider Arizona to be more different from Wisconsin than even Jamaica (landscape-wise)!

We did manage to go on a hike this afternoon. There was a nice breeze in Sedona that kept it from getting too hot. I'm a little worried I might have gotten a little sunburned, though. I'll eventually post a picture from our hike.

We hiked around Courthouse Butte and Bell Rock. To be honest, neither Ray nor I thought that Bell Rock looked like a bell. Kinda funny! We did lose the trail for awhile and I was getting nervous. We eventually found the trail again, though, so I'm alive and well at the hotel right now!

Soooo tired. Must sleep....

Orthodontic Update May 2008

Yesterday was my orthodontist appointment. As I said last month, Dr. Olsen was going to decide whether I needed to continue cranking the Hyrax. He said I was all done cranking! He put a wire in the Hyrax so it doesn't accidentally crank on it's own. The Hyrax will still stay in for another four months, though. :(

I was then informed that at my next appointment in June, I will be getting braces on my lower teeth! Wow! I had no idea that would be happening so soon. He will try to get my lower teeth to "tuck" under my upper teeth. Dr. Olsen said I'm still "on the fence" as far as surgery goes. There's still a chance I might be able to avoid it. It all depends on what my lower teeth do.

So, in a month I will have braces! On the one hand, I'm not looking forward to it at all, but on the other hand, this means things get done and over with that much sooner.

I'll let you know how the braces installation goes. :)