Rexburg

These next few posts will be a little out of order while we try to play catch up. We just got back from Yellowstone and stayed in West Yellowstone for a couple of days before coming to Rexburg.

Can I say that it is so weird to be in Rexburg!? I graduated April 2010 and came back to visit in 2011 and it has changed so much! There are approximately 1000 new huge apartment complexes that are new or in the process of being built. My old apartment is surrounded by high risers and the house I lived in my last year here has been torn down.

Before heading in to Rexburg I took Jordan to Monkey Rock. I spent one summer here and I went to Monkey Rock a lot with my friends. There is a bridge you can jump off of into the water and a bit down the road is a pond and some water falls you can go under.

Jordan left super early yesterday morning to go to Texas for work. I've been staying with my cousins Bubba and Claire while I've been here. Last night we had a big dinner together with a bunch more cousins and tonight I'm heading to Twin Falls to go to my uncle's house and see my mom!

Soda Springs

North again! Saturday has been our most eventful day so far. While we were in Preston, my cousins Shalise and Spencer said that they lived close - just north in Soda Springs. I had forgotten that I had family up there. We left Preston and headed to see Shalise and her babies. She fed us some lunch and then Jordan and I scooted around town to see the local geyser and to Hooper Springs Park. Hooper Springs is a natural spring that has drinkable carbonated water.

Drinking from the soda spring! Not my favorite :)

After scooting around town we went to Shalise's parents house in Grace, Utah. She took us out four wheeling and we had a fire in the backyard and roasted hot dogs for dinner.

Jordan and I followed behind Shalise the whole way. I think I got a little dusty :)

After dinner, Jordan and I drove to Pocatello to go to Lava Hot Springs. When I went to BYU-Idaho I used to go there with my friends. It was kind of weird being back there after so long.

Napoleon Dynamite

Eastern Idaho is absolutely beautiful this time of year. We left Logan and headed just past the border to Preston, Idaho. It was our first night away without the comfort of staying with someone we knew. The drive up was green and a little drizzly. Its been cloudy and raining off and on since we left Utah. I've really been enjoying it though because I know the heat will come soon and I'll wish it was cold again. It does make scooting around town really chilly.

We parked in a lot by a church and a park when we got there and made dinner. After dinner we scooted around town, but pretty much everything was closed. We did end up going to the grocery store three or four times while we were there to pick up groceries and fill up on ice. And Jordan stands out pretty well so I wondered if the workers noticed how many times we went in.

Jordan really liked it in Preston. It's a small town and the streets are wide. We slept outside of a different church under some trees. We both felt really safe and no one bothered us.

We ended up parking outside of Napoleon Dynamite's school. Jordan was pretty excited about that. 

Cheese and Cookies

We left Ogden Thursday morning and headed up to Logan. We got the exhaust fixed on the generator and stopped at the grocery store while we waited. We have friends, Kelly and Rich, who live just outside of Logan in Hyrum, so we stopped there for the night. Their house over looks a valley and has such a beautiful view.

On the way out of Logan we stopped at a couple of food factories. First we stopped at Gossner for milk and cheese. They have milk you can store on the shelf so that will be really nice to have. And they have such cheap cheese! We didn't get much because we won't be using our refrigerator to keep things cool - just a cooler, but we are almost out already and I wish we had gotten more. 

  

We also stopped at Pepperidge farm. They sell huge bags of Milano cookies for a good deal but they were all out. Boo. We did get some discount goldfish crackers though.

Heading North...

Jake and Laura

We left our little Provo home to our good friends' house in Ogden. It was nice to start off this adventure with a visit to someone we know. Jake and Laura have a cute little house with a massive garden. They spoiled us with dinner and ice cream at Farr's when we got there and breakfast and lunch the next day. They also sent us off with a bucket of strawberries and homemade bread.

We picked strawberries from their strawberry patch.

We also stopped at Jordan's favorite store, Smith and Edwards, on the way up to Logan. They have everything from army surplus to hardware, camping to kitchen goods, saddles and western-ware to old tanks and gardening supplies. And they have a great candy section. 

So Long Provo

We said goodbye to our little Provo home on Wednesday. Everything is in the storage unit and the house is empty. The hospital down the road bought out our neighborhood so they'll be tearing down all the houses in the next few weeks. I'm sad because our house was so great! We had a ton of fruit trees and beautiful flowers. And soon it will just be a parking lot.

Our two chickens, Ethel and Annie, and our little hamster, Poppy, are staying with some friends. I really wanted to bring Poppy with us but she can't handle the heat and I was afraid she would cook in the RV. The chickies are staying with someone who has a huge open field so I think they'll be happy. They probably won't want to come home when we are back in Utah.  I was sad to say goodbye to Provo, even if it is just for a little while. My twin sister, Vivian has a four-month-old and he'll be so big when we get back!

We're Moving!

In a few weeks Suz and I will be selling or putting our belongings into storage, jumping into our RV, and living in it as we travel around the country… indefinitely. We hope to make enough money on the road to break even and make it sustainable so that we can do this as long as we want. 

I have been thinking a lot over the last few years about how people, especially me, have dreams about this or that or how they want their lives to be, or what have you, but they never seem do anything about it. Maybe it’s because we are too scared or because the status quo is just easier. So, we carry on with our secure jobs and with what is normal, safe and easy. This is how most people do things and there isn't anything wrong with it. However, I've decided when we take risks to follow dreams we rarely regret it, even when it doesn't turn out as planned, but when we don’t take those risks we usually do regret it. The last thing I want is to look back on my life when I’m old and wish I had lived more and taken more risks or that I had done that thing I always wanted to do but for some stupid reason I didn't.

So, to put our money where our mouths are, we are hitting the road to choose life and experiences over playing it safe, building a perfect career or what may be easiest. Maybe I have been reading too much Thoreau and this is actually a terrible idea, in which case we won't be gone for long. Either way, at least we will have given it a shot and won’t wonder the rest of our lives “what if?” Here goes nothing…