Hawaii

Hawaii is beautiful. I don't want to write a lot right now, so here are some pictures and stuff n' stuff.

We spent our last night at the Hyatt.

This is where we stayed most of the time. This is the Marriott Waiohai Beach Club.





I am the only one that Kiley has told that she is "special".
This is when Gretchen told me to move because I was ruining her "game".

Asian Style

Gretchen is buying some Oakley sunglasses. I didn't think they fit quite right. She looked online for more glasses and found that Oakley makes frames in an "Asian style". Long story short, Gretchen has an Asian face.

Elden and the Chipmunks

On Friday Gretchen and I invited Christy, whom I work with, and her husband, Mel, and their daughter Lexi to eat pizza and go see Alvin and the Chipmunks with us and the Sheldons. We all ate pizza downstairs and had a really good time. Lexi kept on talking about how excited she was to see Elden and the Chipmunks. Then we went to see the movie. Todd and Mel were talking so long about getting drawn for elk in New Mexico or something so we got to the theater just in time. The movie was funny. The best thing about it was that Mel has a laugh like Randy Mudge and he thought the movie was hilarious. Since he was covering his face with his hat and laughing hysterically we were in turn laughing hysterically. About 20 minutes before the movie ended I heard one of the Sheldons spill a drink to the right of us, so I looked over to see who. But it was Carson throwing up all over Todd and the floor. The theater smelled nasty. I mean, it made the whole thing stank. They all went home and we finished the movie with the Davis'. All in all, a memorable night. I wish we would have started doing things with the Davis's before we decided to move back to The Springs. We had a lot of fun.

Once again...

Carson is watching one of his train movies in our room.

C: "Can I have some ginger ale? I'm thirsty."
TH: "You can have some water if you are thirsty!"
C: "My foot is really thirsty, but for ginger ale."
TH: "Your foot can have some water, too."
C: "Oh."

Fiction or Non-fiction?

It was the dead of night. I knew the trail between the frontier and the city was dangerous. you don't pass too many travelers during that time of night, but that was my plan. To get out of there before anyone even knew I was there. Then I heard it. Right behind me. There is a split second where a man doesn't know what he should do, and the sinking feeling he gets in his stomach when he realizes what he needs to do. So I pulled over and took my first ticket like a man.

Carson

Gretchen went down stairs to borrow her sisters boots while she was getting ready for church. As she passed through the kitchen with her curlers in her hair, 4 year old Carson stared at her and said, "I hate your hair."

Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving Gretchen and I went to L.A. to spend the holiday with her Sister Mary and her husband Corban and their son Baby Carson. (This distinguishes between the two Carson nephews.) It was a lot of fun. Mary is a mix between Gretchen and her father, meaning she is very kind and a lot of fun. Corban and I went to play in his Turkey Bowl on Thanksgiving morning. We played hard and paid for it for the next few days. I had to lift my legs up with my arms in order to put them on the ottoman I was so sore. Gretchen's family are Black Friday shoppers, something we never grew up with. I decided to go with Gretchen and Mary. We started at an outlet mall that was open at midnight. Traffic was horrible. We were stuck on the offramp for about an hour. We would have waited another hour to get into the parking lot but we ended up parking a 1/4 mile away and walking. As we were walking we heard someone yell, "Stop! Police!" We turned around and saw a man in basketball shorts and no shoes running from an undercover police officer. We stood aside as they ran past us and watched them cross the street and two other officers take the guy down. Lots of excitement. There were lines to get into the stores an hour after they opened, and lines around most of the stores to check out. We got out of there after 4 and they dropped me off at home and continued to shop until 9:00 AM!!!! That is one of those things that you only have to do once.
After L.A. we stopped in Gilroy picked up Ann Grover, went to see the Mellanders who were in town, and then went to Santa Cruz and Natural Bridges. It was a lot of fun.

The things boys like

Mary (Gretchen's sister) is visiting with her baby Carson. "Baby Carson" is a very cute kid who is one of those babies who lets anyone hold him and will smile at anyone. He was a little cranky while Gretchen and I were watching him before church and Gretchen said that Mary says that whenever he gets in front of a camera he smiles. We found out that it is true.



Sometimes the kids say pretty funny stuff. While we were eating breakfast on Saturday, Blake asked if he could see my armpit. I looked at him for a bit, wondering what I wanted to do, and then lifted my arms up. He said something like, "cool", but I don't remember exactly. When Mary and Gretchen started laughing at the singular occasion, Blake thought it necessary to explain himself. "What? Guys like things like bugs, blood, sports, armpits. They are cool!" So, I guess if you were wondering what gender you are, if you have a strange attraction to the axilla, you must be a boy.

Carson is a friend of mine

This is while we babysat the kids while Penny and Todd were in Greece.

The Apartment

These two pictures were taken standing in about the same place looking in opposite directions. It is the best apartment above Todd and Penny's garage. When you come visit, you can sleep where I was standing, or if you come for Thanksgiving we will have the rest of the house to ourselves. We just want someone to come because Penny won't be here to cook us Thanksgiving dinner.

Warners/Brimhalls UNITE!!!!

This just in:
Thanksgiving is at our place this year.

Saturday is a special day...

On Saturday I finally finished the dresser that I was stripping and painting. I like the new hardware a lot. I am glad Gretchen was there to pick it out. Now that she sees that one she says she wants to do the other one. Hopefully it won't take me 2 months this time.
Our ballast died in the florescent light in our kitchen last week, so we have been eating in a semi-lit kitchen, relying on the light from the "living room", or 6 feet of space between the kitchen and the bed. We got a new light at Lowes. It looks better than the other one, but it also cost money. Home Depot and Lowes really had slim pickins, but I think it is a nice light and it is brighter. The apartment looks a bit better now that all of our clothes are in the dressers and not in open suitcases. Everyone come visit now.

New paint job (and some dirty laundry)

Old paint job

New light

Old light

The longest day of the year

Everyone thinks it's the summer solstice. But it is really the day we tried to help out Penny. Kiley needed to get from a birthday party at Seaside to her youth temple trip a couple of weeks ago. Gretchen and I woke up around 4:30 a.m. to go get Kiley from Seaside (about 4 1/2 hours from Redmond) and take her to Portland. I was very excited because it would be the first time I had seen the beach since before my mission. Turns out, we got there just in time to pick up Kiley at the beach house and whisk her away to the temple. All that separated us from the beach was one measly dune. A DUNE!!!! Gretchen drove the entire way to Seaside and then from Seaside to Portland. She wanted to get Kiley there on time, she said. Thus, I was bestowed the honor of driving home from Portland because time was not relevant. It is not fun driving all day to do nothing, but Gretchen and my spirits were still high due to the fact we would still get home on time to do something fun. I was enjoying the scenery of the Cascades as the low fuel light came on. It was the first time that I had noticed the gas situation. I thought to myself, "No problem, there will be some gas up ahead." We had just passed through a small town called Detroit. Surely there was gas before we were to go over the mountain pass and into Sisters.
Not.
I ran out of gas halfway between Detroit and Sisters. I was barely getting a signal on my cell phone and was trying to call Penny to come bail us out. At that point we were only about 45 minutes away from home. Either my calls would not go through or the person who answered the phone wouldn't be able to hear me due to the low signal. I don't think the digital network could handle a conversation. Finally a good Samaritan in a red Ford Colt stopped. A Drunk Samaritan. The girl who was driving was very nice, but the passenger had alcohol on his breath and was ENTIRELY CRAZY!!! There was another passenger and a lot of stuff in the back seat. The crazy dude was rambling on about how he was going to get a pack of cigarettes and stay with the girls while I was taken to get some gas. He said he just couldn't leave us there. After going on with me for about 5 minutes, I told him I would try AAA as Gretchen gave me a look like, "Make him leave, please." Pretty creepy guy. So I pretended that I got through to AAA and that a tow truck would come. They left. To make a long story short, we were lucky to have left Gretchen's cell phone with Penny, because the Nextel radio was the only thing that would allow a conversation since it isn't on the digital network. Penny came and on fumes we made it to Sisters and filled up. Luckily Penny has a DVD player in the van. It made the wait not so bad. Thus ended my first and hopefully last experience of running out of gas.

New glasses

I got my glasses on Wednesday and have enjoyed seeing things a little more clearly. I only notice that reading close up as well as far away has gotten better with them. I only have half of my prescription right now though.

Portland

Portland is probably the coolest town in all the Portland area. Gretchen and I just went there with Todd and Penny to go to our stake temple day. I thought that the pictures that The Church has of the temple don't do it justice. It is so green and beautiful all around it. Man, I feel like Kip after writing that sentence. As we got out of the temple, Gretchen and I agreed that we needed to start bringing our camera with us wherever we go.
Living with Gretchen's family is a lot of fun, but also very funny sometimes. We just got our appliances for our apartment last week. We were pretty dang excited. In celebration, we went grocery shopping so that we could eat by ourselves sometimes instead of always relying on Penny. The next day Blake(6) knocked on our door. After coming in I asked what he wanted and he said, Nothing." He then proceeded to open our fridge and freezer in search of something good to eat. Then he left. At the time we only had sandwich stuff, but later we got ginger ale. While we were gone one day he came and snuck one. We have started locking the door. Now I can't blame the pee on the toilet seat on anyone else. Carson(4) Is the opposite of Blake. Blake is a very picky eater and is always in search of junk food. Carson will say, "I don't like meatloaf." After you tell him just to try it, he will, and then he says something funny, like, "This is the most awesome thing I ever tasted!!!" That boy can eat.
The other day I used our oven for the first time and baked a yellow cake with home made chocolate frosting. While it was in the oven, Carson knocked on our door and told me it smelled like I was making something delicious. I guess you could smell it though the whole house. So occasionally the boys come in and eat with us. Today, Gretchen wanted to make waffles, so she tried to sneak the waffle iron upstairs, but Carson caught her on the way. Now we have little boys knocking on our door wondering when the waffles will be ready. It wouldn't be so bad, except now I have to get some pants on.

Bragging

When I went bowling with Dale and Ty, I totally nailed a 4-7-10 split(which is depicted in this picture where I did not pick up the spare). It was pretty much the proudest moment in my bowling career. I also scored a 219 in that game, my personal best. I attribute all the good fortune to it being my bachelor party and so the bachelor gods were with me.

The world as I know it is FALSE!!!

2 things I need some help on.

1.If you wanted a cone that was chocolate AND vanilla, would you call it a twist cone, or a swirl cone? If you are used to saying swirl instead of twist or vice versa, would you understand what somebody else was asking for if they asked for the opposite?

I went to the DQ to treat my new nieces and nephews to some ice cream cones and I asked for a twisty cone and the guy had to ask me 5 times what the heck I was talking about. After that I explained the concept and he informed me I wanted a swirl cone. Thanks for the help. Here's the next one:

2.Charlie/Charley Horse
How did you guys use this growing up? I don't mean the spelling. How would everyone define this?

I grew up knowing that a charlie horse was a cramp/contusion, but it was not confined to the leg. While growing up we used, or at least I think we used, the term to also refer to someone inflicting such an injury on somebody else, i.e., "You just gave me a charlie!". Punched in the arm, kicked in the calf, kneed in the leg. It didn't matter. I think Gretchen thinks I am nuts for ever thinking that everyone used it that way. I am not trying to prove her wrong, I am just trying to figure out if I grew up one confused child, or if my whole family grew up confused.

Colloquial or Crazy?

I like being clyde

Gimme a break

Well, sorry everyone. I didn't figuratively "jump out of the birthing pool" to put stuff on my blog. That was figurative, remember. Just because something incredibly important happens people think that my blogging habits will improve? It is true, I now lift up the toilet seat before relieving my waters, but I can't become an internet sensation overnight. Baby steps.
I was sealed for time and all eternity on July 21st, 2007 at high noon to Gretchen Elizabeth Wahlgren. Not even Kaleb was packing even though the event was timed just right for a showdown.
Our photographer stunk, which is kind of sad, but I am not as broken up about it as Gretchen. She took a bunch of pictures under the trees and didn't have a fill flash so that the shade from the foliage made some people look like they had tattoos like a pacific islander. On top of that, we couldn't get a hold of her to let her know that we are going to have a hit man take her out for 2 WEEKS. After 2 weeks she calls and said that SHE TOLD us that she would be in Nauvoo for 2 weeks and SHE TOLD us that she would have a studio color correct the pictures and that there were spots on our faces because everyone elses' flashes were going off at the same time as hers and they messed up the pictures. Anyway, we both agreed that she needed to come up with a better excuse for taking bad pictures when talking to semi intelligent people who know a thing or two about photography and that one of us needed to be contacted about her vacation itinerary and about the color correction before we could be told about them. Like I said, I don't care too much, I figure it is something to laugh about later and luckily the family did take a couple of pictures so that we have some decent ones.
A week and a half after we were married we moved to Redmond, OR. We live above my sister in law's garage in a studio apartment. This weekend I have to strip the pink paint off the dressers and refinish or paint them. I am just happy to have a dresser after a couple of weeks of going without. I'll try to take some pictures of the apartment and the scenery this week. For now, here are some wedding pictures.

Bowling

I just remembered how to kick everyones trash in the sport of bowling. Gretchen and I are going to buy matching bowling shoes, mine are the pink ones. When things get "cosmic", the flames glow in the dark/blacklight. I don't think I will ever stay up that late, again, though.

Utah Conference Trip

If you are planning on going to General Conference, make sure the person who gets you tickets really, really likes you, or else they might Indian give your tickets. But if your tickets happen to find their way back into that Indian's hands, you can always eat pitas at a relatives house.

Liv entertained us with some wicked sweet dance moves

Miranda and what's his face entertained.... themselves. Note: This was totally pre-marriage. I wanted to take a picture of them and then Trevor said, "Wait, take a picture of us in our natural state, so you will remember us better!", and then started resuscitating Miranda, who must have stopped breathing.

People always ask me if I get upset that my Fiance is so vain just because she was a hand model for Vogue.

Gage and Sir Dylan after "The Accident" This picture was taken while Sir Dylan consoled his injured offspring after Trevor dropped Gage on his head. 5 minutes prior to this picture the conversation went like this:

(Scene 1) Sir Dylan, Leah, Miranda, Elden, Gretchen and Liv watch as Trevor holds Gage by his feet and then proceeds to flip him right-side-up and catch him by his armpits.

Trevor: Let's see if I can make him flip one full rotation!

Leah and Sir Dylan look at each other with a nervous smile, but say nothing as Trevor preps for the stunt. Trevor winds up and releases, catching Gage only by 3 toes! Amazing! After that they simmer down and just do some boring piggy back stuff and everyone loses interest. Then there is a thud and Gage starts crying. Very anticlimactic, but, hey, that's what happened!

I think this was post pita, pre banana bread. That baby doesn't look big enough to stop you from coming to my wedding, punk.

My sweet Fiance Gretchen and I. My sweet Fiance is so kind, she will not be mad at me because I put a picture of us up on the internet that she told me specifically not to put on the internet. If you look closely though, it is not a picture of us, we aren't even in focus. It is actually a picture of the wall and a calendar.

The pitas that we had were actually very good. The only bad part was that everyone wished that Liv, Gage, Trevor and Miranda would have asked for macaroni and cheese so we could have had more pitas.

Fleeting memories

The other day at dinner, Mikey informed us that he couldn't remember his childhood. I guess chillin' with the fellas can make you grow up a little too fast.