One Engagement Photo

Thought some people might like to see this. More to come.

Over a month of our life in...Michigan, Puerto Rico and Dominica

So I know I'm behind. I admit it. This past month has been crazy and this post is crazy long so...Moving on.

Ben is done with his first year of medical school. Yay!!! The day after the test we finally hung out with our friends Liz, Jason and Emmy. Liz is such a wonderful friend, because she is so relaxed and fun. Plus she is the most positive, energetic and inspiring person ever. I hope one day when I have a baby I will strap him/her on my back and conquer the world like she does (and still have a smile on my face- hahaha). We have been trying to hangout all semester and three days before we head to the states we finally do. Yay for following through.

We all decided to go on a hike to the river I mentioned a few posts back. This time we took the quick trail up and cut through a ton of lemongrass. You can see Jason, Liz with Emmy and Me. It was a funny time except for all the lemongrass paper cuts I got.

Me and Ben.

Getting a head message?? It was fun.

On our way to MICHIGAN!!! Oh wait, we have a ridiculous delay at the Puerto Rico airport. Short version of the story is we get stuck outside the airport for 7 hours!! All because some idiot put mercury in a bottle, in his suitcase, and it broke. This event is known as a "mercury spill" which causes the whole airport to shut down, as well as gazillion police and firetrucks, EMT and us army to come to the scene. It also produces chaotic-ness! Once they started letting people enter the airport it became crazy. Everyone was trying to get through a sliding glass door through a bottleneck sidewalk that they then didn't let people through. Opps! False alarm- we are being annoying. It became a fiasco of screaming, crying, fainting sardines. It was one of those moments in life that you pause and look at what you are in the middle of and laugh at yourself thinking, "am I really experiencing this?". Nevertheless we made it home to Michigan after another layover in Baltimore Maryland. We also had problems on the way back- you'll have to ask for those details.

Us about two hours into our experience. We just got water and didn't know what was coming so we still have our ok/happy faces on.

Part of the mess outside the airport.

Ben getting a little more antsy. It doesn't look too packed, because this is taken about 30 minutes before we enter the catastrophe!

So now we are suddenly in Michigan! Yay. We went to Michigan over the break to have our second wedding reception for my side of the family. It was so much fun. My mom did an amazing job on the yard- we had a simple open house at my parents house. A tent, trillions of sunflowers, yummy ice cream, pies, sandwiches and great family and friends. Unfortunately we didn't catch any photos on our camera- so hopefully friends and family who did can send us a link. I want to thank my Mom and Dad for everything. And thank you to everyone who helped out. It was perfect and so much fun. Thank you tons.

While we were there, Ben's parents were able to come. I was super excited because they could finally put a face with all my stories. It was so great to show them Cranbrook, my home, Ann arbor, the farmers market, community fair, elephant ear wagon and parade. Thank you for coming it meant a ton to us!

Bill (Ben's dad), Ben and I next to the Jonas fountain at Cranbrook. The weather in Michigan was surprising cool, an early fall temp. of 65 degrees. But we loved it! We could finally put on some pants and a sweater.

My name is up on the wall at Cranbrook!!! Here I am pointing to it! Yay class of 2005!

At the parade with cousin Isaac. He has a pretty fun Mohawk haircut. I don't know if he was super happy to sit next to me, because I pancaked him to the ground to get some candy at the parade. It was funny, but also a little over dramatic. Sorry Isaac. I'm all about getting the most candy and don't even eat hardly any of it.

Nathan (my brother), Chelsea (his girlfriend), Pete (his dog) and me at the parade.

And now we are back to Dominica. Ben and I decided to go on a hike behind campus and up a hill. It has confirmed how much I need to get in shape for Patagonia come Christmas.

Me and lemongrass.

Ben stopping for a picture.

Banana tree.

While we were on the hike we found a place called the barbwire. While we were looking over the fence one of the people renting out the place came and talked with us. They were from Australia visiting for a month and were nice enough to show us around the retreat. It consisted of a manicured garden, patio area, cottages, bathtub with mineral spring water, etc. It was pretty cool and would be fun to rent out for a visit- if your up for rustic and eclectic living. Beautiful.

Entrance to the property.
View from the second floor bedroom.

Two guys live on the property and cook you breakfast and dinner. One of them lives in this blue house.

Another cottage on the property.

So now this is when pictures get a little more random. The picture below is of the main street running along campus. I though people might be interested to see what we walk along everyday. Campus is on the left. The grocery store and restaurants on the right.
Earlier this week we had a baptism at church. The girl who was baptised is named Lena. She is super sweet and friendly. Very exciting.

Here she is in the ocean getting baptised.

After the baptism we had a bonfire down the beach for the Wilderness Medicine Club that Ben is president of. It was a lot of fun and a great turnout. We got a few of our friends from church to join. Which will make it even more fun.

Hot dogs and s'mores. Yum. S'mores here are made of cookies, marshmallows and nutella.

Ben and I cooking hot dogs. We were sweating. And I'm only wearing a dress because I walked over straight from the baptism. But don't be fooled....I have a suit on underneath.


Sunset at the bonfire. Here I am talking with Liz and her baby.

Beautiful Dominica.
I know this is making you all want to visit!!!!

So we are both having super fun and are enjoying life. Hopefully the posts will be a little more frequent now that we are back in the saddle.
Loving life! Hahahaha!

Caterpillar Attack!!

Slow yet again. I guess you are going to have to expect that from me (liz). Plan on a bi-weekly to weekly update on our lives. You would think I would have plenty of time to update the blog- which I do, but unfortunately I have become prone to island life and therefore have become lazy. Sad. Who knows if I will ever be able to adjust back. 10 hours of sleep has become a regular part of my routine- about 6 hours for Ben.

So this week we were attacked by caterpillars!! ARGH! Actually we weren't, but a tree down our road was. Earlier this week Ben and I were walking home from school when all the sudden Ben noticed a ton of leaves that fallen from the tree. Which was odd, because the caretaker had just cleaned the yard and there was no storm. It was when Ben looked up at the tree that we saw 60-80 caterpillars attacking the it!! It was crazy! Some of them were eating the stems and caused a ton of leaves to fall off. It was quite a site.

They were the big 5 inch long caterpillars that I had posted about earlier. Only some of these looked more like 6 or 7. They were huge, chubby, and fat. They have 8 stubby legs, some arms, and the red part is their head.

How many can you see? I think there are 9 in this picture.

This picture was taken at the end of the week. Notice how the tree doesn't have anymore leaves?! There's a few more still hanging out. I was hoping that they would make cocoons- but they all left.
Ben admiring the tree and caterpillars. I must have gotten bored.

Moving on.... Ben had his third exam last week and so after taking his test we were able to hangout for a bit. He still had to study because he has three more tests this week. Unfortunately, it seems like the days that Ben can play are the days when it rains. We decided to go outside anyways.

Indian Man.

We were waiting out the rain under a palm tree. Ben wasn't cooperating and letting me take his picture. But he did pose for this one. I like it. It looks like he could be on the cover of a book- like the Lord of the Flies or something.


Me in the rain. I don't know what to do in front of cameras- the peace signs seem to help. hahaha.

Now we are getting into some randoms. Above is a picture of the bay on our way to church. People were tearing down/burning a building on the way. While we were walking back it was completely gone. All in a days work.


Here are some of the girls in my nursery class at church. Fortunately one of us knows how to smile for the camera. And she's a cutie.

Me with some of the primary. I think about 5 more kids are missing. It turns out our branch is the second largest primary in our stake (which includes about 10 islands and some of Puerto Rico). We have about 20 kids.
And this is just a random pick I took today. I was walking along the beach and then walked up to campus. Ben and I sometimes take a secret route under the yoga deck and today I found this old fan. I wonder if it has been there every time I've used this path, and this was the first time I have noticed it. I thought it was pretty cool.

Randoms

Things have been a little slow down here. Ben was sick a while ago, and then we were both kind of sick, and then I got really sick. So things are looking a lot better and it seems like July flew by. I can't believe we are almost done with second semester- roughly 20 more days! Crazy. We are excited to head up to Michigan over the break and enjoy busy life for a week- at least I am excited for the busyness. In the meantime, I have taken a few pictures during July. They are kind of random, but I think people will enjoy them, it's more crabs, bugs, and animals, along with other things. Enjoy!

Before I begin, here I am at the beginning of "not feeling too well". Ben and I think it's a funny picture. Maybe that's just us.

This is the university's swimming pool. It is where I go to for occasional tanning, swim lessons, and a place to catch up and chat with people. I thought it might be neat to see what the pool looks like.
The weekend that I got really sick was the weekend that Dominica was having it's first International Cricket game in a long time. Supposedly it was a pretty big deal. The game was West Indies vs. Bangladesh. The game was Sunday and Tuesday in the capital. But before the game, they had practice at the field in Portsmouth. So on Saturday a friend and I went to go watch them practice for an hour. We got there an hour late and the team just got on the field to warm up. Typical island life. So we just hung out for a while people watched. It ended up being a lot of fun. It would have been neat to see a real game.
The team warming up. I think it's the West Indies team.
Some of the locals watching them practice. It was kind of a big deal.
My friend and I bought some Seamoss from the guy in dreadlocks. Supposedly it's crushed seaweed with "spices" and is an excellent source of protein. Spices = nutmeg, cinnamon, etc. The green bottle has milk and to it and the orange is original flavor. The green was actually really good, the orange was gross and the consistency of slug slime. Maybe that's why I got sick.

This is a picture of Purple Turtle Beach. It was where our church had the Branch Social and was a huge success. I wish I had taken more pictures. I made really good sloppy joes from scratch. The rope on the right is attached to the palm tree and a people could swing on it. If you climb the tree high enough you could jump into the ocean- like Ben- which was super silly because it was shallow and he could have hurt himself.

Ben and I were able to get some sun in between his classes. Here he is playing with a sick crab that died once he flung it into the ocean. We saw it floating on the bottom later.
One day I was walking home from campus and saw this huge katydid, or as I would categorize it as cricket, on our porch. It was huge!!! We took tons of pictures, because it was pretty cool.

As big as Ben's hand.
And here is a picture of our cow in the field next to our apartment. The building behind it is campus where the gym is. But the cow has a white heron on it- so we took a picture. Fun!

Graduation

So I realize that this is really late. But I have been wanting to put up my graduation photos. Being the fantastic person I am, I was able to graduate from the University of Utah in Economics and get married in the same week! So pretty much I am amazing.

My Dad, Me and Cousin Brandon. Outside of Cafe Trio- where we went for lunch after graduation with Ben's family.

Ben and me after the great event.

Me, Erin Anderson (Erin's sister in-law), Lauren and Erin (my sisters in-law). We all graduated at the same time, except Erin- who graduated the day before with a masters degree in social work. It made graduation more fun, especially since the three of us in black gowns graduated in the same school.