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.