Big Bomb

I took this picture at work this morning. It's a 15,000 lb. bomb we're going to drop on thursday out on the range (across the salt lake). If you look close, you can see writing all over it...when they send them over to be used in war, everyone who it passes through on the way writes messages to the people receiving them - they get pretty creative too! On this one, I was reading some of the stuff and then right in the middle of it said, "El Cid 01". I thought it was pretty neat to see another Citadel Grad had a part to play with this one somewhere down the line. I'll put up some pictures if I get any good ones from the test drop tomorrow.

Lazy Days!

Mel and Roxie are really stressed out these days! I am pretty sure this is what they do all the time since Mel doesn't go to work until about 1pm each day. The mornings and evenings have started to get pretty chilly lately, so I think Roxie will be our heater blanket from now and through winter.

Trail Race / Hiking

This has a been a busy weekend! Friday night I finished out the X-Terra Trail Series. I didn't finish this race as well as I wanted to, but did hold onto 1st place in my age group for Utah. It was a tough run, but had the same finish as the Ogden Marathon. They had a big Expo at the finish that was a lot of fun...awards, vendors, and all the other stuff that usually goes with it. On Saturday, I took Roxie on a hike with my friend Zach. We hiked to the summit of Mt. Nebo. It's the tallest peak in the Wasatch Range at about 11,968 ft. or something like that...I just know it was pretty much 12k feet. It was about 10 miles overall and a gain of over 2,000 ft of elevation. I bought a dog pack for Roxie - I figured she can carry her own food and water - which she did really well with. We didn't have to keep her on a leash or anything, so she did really good. She loves going on hikes and I think she probably could have made that trip a couple of times in a row - she never looked tired! She is slowly getting into her new schedule at our house and seems to like it so far.

New Addition

Meet Roxie! Her owners moved and couldn't keep her anymore...she is only about 17 months old and is a Chocolate Lab. She still has a lot of her puppy energy and lilkes to run and run and run - really fast. She is going to be a lot of fun for us since she loves to go hiking and also loves the water. Mel is getting used to her, since she never had a dog before, but she likes here a lot. She is pretty small for a lab though, she is only about 50 pounds, kind of built like a wimaraner. We think she is going to be a great dog and a lot of fun to take out and about around the area.

She had a sister, a yellow lab, who was also taken to a new home, so they miss eachother a little bit. Roxie was given to us for free too, they were going to try to sell her, but they just wanted to find her a good home. I think she will like her new home and family. Her first adventure will be this weekend - I am taking her hiking with a friend all day saturday, I think she'll do fine; she is very strong and likes to pull you when she's on a leash so I think we'll be investing in one of those trainer collars to keep her from doing that. We'll keep you updated on what other new things are going on in our family. We'll talk with you soon.

We Moved...

We're finally moved and all settled in! This is our new house on base. It's older than the townhouse we were in, but we both like this a lot more. It has 4 bedrooms and really nice covered porch and patio in the back yard and plenty of trees to keep us shaded in the summer. It doesn't have air conditioning, but we almost froze the first night we were in it...those swamp coolers really keep it cold. All of our neighbors seem really nice and most of them have younger kids, so I guess Mel can make lots of extra money babysitting:) We'll see what she thinks about it first though! I'll give you our new address, but we will be getting a new home phone too (I'll let you know when we get it). Our address is: 4060B Hancock Circle, Hill Air Force Base, UT 84056. We've plenty of rooms and beds now, so come on out whenever you want to...

Fishing and Camping at Echo

Lat weekend we went on a fishing/camping trip with our friends Zach, Dane and Laura. We all went out to echo resovior, which is about half-way between us and park city, on the East side of the mountains. Mel pretty much spent the entire time on her beach chair bundled up and asleep. We didn't know it then, but she had streap throat and was running a 103 temperature! But she is feeling much better now and says she had fun camping on the lake shore...I'm not so sure I believe her. But while Mel slept the night away; Laura, Dane, Zach and I fished and fished. We were mainly catching yellow perch but Zach ended up catching a rainbow trout and I caught this ugly carp in the picture. But otherwise, it was non-stop perch until about 1130 when we went to bed. It was a fun trip, and I think the next one is already in the planning stage - hopefully Mel can enjoy the next one a little more!

About 10 minutes after we cast our lines out, I caught this ugly thing! I just wish it had been something other than a carp...but I guess it's better then nothing.

Trail Race Update

I had my 3rd of 4 trail races last weekend down at the Sundance Ski Resort in Orem. Robert Redford owns the resort and has a pretty nice 'little' house right outside the resort. I was out the night before fishing until about mid-night, then I had to wake up at 4:30am to get down to Sundance for the 7:30 race start time. It was another 10k run; the first mile and a half or so were uphill then it was rolling hills for the most part and a 1 mile downhill finish! I ran this one about 13 minutes faster than I ran the previous race at Snowbird and placed 3rd in my age group. Overall, I am first in my age group for UT, so it looks like I have a pretty good shot at getting an invitation to the National Championship race at Lake Tahoe. We won't go to the chamionship b/c we're headed up to Vancouver about a week later for the Marathon - but it would still be cool to say you got invited! We'll let you know how the last race goes; it's on Friday, Aug 17 (same finish as the Ogden Marathon).

Mel's New Job!

I finally got a new job!! I am so excited about it and I get payed a lot more!! I am working at the Christmas Box House which is a shelter for victims of child abuse and neglect. I will be working in the crisis nursery with the children and give them lots of love! I am really excited but I am also sad to leave my other kids at school!

X-Terra/Snowbird Trail Race

Today, we went to Snowbird for my second of 4 X-terra Trail Races. This one was much harder than the first, we were about 4k feet higher in elevation that I'm used to, so that made it pretty interesting. We did a lot of climbing but it was pretty fun - once we finished anyway! I got first in my age group (16th overall) so I got an X-terra medal to add to my wall of fame at home. After the race we hung out at the resort with our friends (Eric, who ran with me) and his family for the afternoon. It was a beautiful day and not too hot up in the mountains. It was 85 degrees up there and 105 degrees down in the valley where we live...little bit of a change once you get into the Mtns. We have 2 more races to go, and depending on how I place in those I may get invited to go to Lake Tahoe for the X-terra National Trail Race Championship. We'll keep you posted on that.

Trip to Moab

After running the Ogden Marathon in May, we took Mom and Daddy down to Moab, UT to check out the scenery down there. It's like being on a different planet. This is in Arches Nat'l Park where we spent most of our time. There are over 2,000 natural arches similar to this one in the park, some have only been discovered in the past few years. We also went to Canyonlands Nat'l Park on the way back home. Canyonlands is the most unexplored region of the United States, so we didn't get too far off the beaten path. We had great weather (it was actually kind of cool), and I'm sure Mel was glad we didn't have to stay in the Best Western like we did on our first trip to Moab. It was a fun trip, hopefully we can take a few more of these in the next couple years!