Sleeping Hazard

When Jen was feeling extra sick during the first trimester, I slept on the air mattress for a few nights. Something changed from night two to night three; for some reason my air mattress felt distinctly different.

I think something is wrong.

3D Catan Box

So as most of you know, Jennifer and I like Catan a little bit. We (Jen might say Wes) decided to make a 3D catan board. It is a work in progress and lots of people have helped get it up and running. Especially the Munns with their late night/early morning contributions. Surprisingly this post is more about the box in which it resides. Due to a very large catan board that I had preciously constructed. Jen and I (reluctantly) agreed to only make the game if it could fit in the box below.

It was just an empty box on sale from Michaels. Well this clearly wouldn't suit my needs. So I decided to make some modifications as follows.

I cut the front off and started to add shelves.

I hinged the shelves to provide easy access to the hexes.

Fortunately everything fit.

Then I had to create a way to put the front back on and still make it removable. Pegs on the top and bottom did the trick nicely.

I grooved out the front to allow the hexes to fit more comfortable. Actually this was the original reason I wanted to modify the box.

Now, from the outside it looks the same, but you know what's inside.


Mike, Jeralynn, and Talon are playing the game with Jen and myself. There you have it.

The Bigger News...

Wes told all of you about our exciting new job starting July of 2010 at ExxonMobil in Houston, but we both agree that the bigger news is...that we're having a BABY!!!  We were holding off to make the announcement until after my first trimester, but there have been leaks via Facebook and other people's blogs (I still love you Shelby, Dad, Sabrina, Aunt Belinda).  So, who wants to hold off on such exciting news anyway!  I am due March 27, which will be 4 days before our 4 year anniversary.  We are ecstatic to finally be expanding our family!

Here are our baby pics...I wonder which one the baby will resemble more?  Either way, it's going to be a cute baby!

The Houston-Internship Summer Snapshot

I realized two things tonight--yes, two things in one night. First, I haven't posted anything for a while and second I haven't posted any pictures from my internship with ExxonMobil's Gas and Power Marketing group in Houston. So here are a few random pictures from the experience.

Jennifer drove down with me (1600 miles) and dropped me off, only to fly back to Utah to finish teaching school. The long distance was helped by playing Peggle (a great game) with Jennifer over Xbox live--made possible by Spencer Wilde (thanks for the Xbox loan) and frequent phone conversations.

Here I am about to enter the Exxon building. I worked on the 35th floor.

After I was made official, I headed up to my office.

Yay for my office...which lasted three weeks and then I was moved out to a general work area with about 50 other people. I got to talk to more people there and I got a window, actually there were windows on all three sides of the open floor.

So I wasn't right by the window but I was fairly close. Houston is home to some great restaurants (Barbecue, Cajun, Vietnamese, Mexican, Crepes, et cetera).



I had never eaten a spring roll before but it was good. One restaurant I went to several times called Bourays served Vietnamese food and Mexican food. 'Yes, I'd like the Egg Roll Vermicelli and the quesadilla please...no wait, let's just go with the pork burrito and a fortune cookie.'

This was one of my tougher days at work. Nothing like a grueling day at a charity golf tournament.

I did Meals on Wheels (bringing food to people) during work hours as well with fellow interns, Jenny from BYU and Alex from Missouri.

Finally Jennifer came down (Yay!!!) and we had a lot of fun. I won us free Astros tickets from an Exxon drawing that put us five seats behind the dugout. The Astros won and they did fireworks. After the game I saw a baseball player carry a three foot snake in from the field and scare one of the officials.

And we worked over the Museum of Natural Science...lots of butterflies, dinosaurs, diamonds, and Terra Cotta warriors. This is an Allosaurus from Wyoming.

Anyways, another 1600 miles later and we are back in Utah. Jennifer is already teaching school and I am spending every waking second working on my graduate thesis...or, well...I'm about to. My final year of MBA classes starts on August 31st, yay! Oh yeah, Exxon offered me a job (double yay)!!!

Awkward Family Photos

I have discovered the most fabulous website.  It is called AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com.  It is hil-ar-i-ous!  I have clocked many hours scrolling through the pictures and the comments.  The readers of AFP.com are some pretty witty people.  To accompany this post I would love to post some of my own awkward family photos, but I am still in Texas, so those will have to come later.  Take a moment to stroll over to the site and see a few funny pics.  They'll make you laugh.

Below, is an example picture from the site.  This one is kind of bitter-sweet...poor girl.  Although, I love that the frog legs are straight up in the air.  They get even better.