Nieces and Nephews

Well, I've noticed that I'm running out of things to blog about because I don't have kids to constantly entertain me and be my cute subjects for all my pictures. And really, isn't that why we have kids?

But, I do have the next best thing...nephews and nieces! And I realized it would be fun to post pictures of my nephew Nathan and my niece Tarin so that you can see what my future kids are going to look like...(because I can really see Marc in both of them). These are Marc's brother's kids...and Marc and his brother look a lot alike...so, if we do have red-headed kids...I have a feeling they will look like these two.

This last weekend Marc's parents came down from Utah to visit ...and so we spent Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday with his
parents, and two of Marc's brothers and their families. One thing we did was go to Nathan's baseball practice. Let me tell you, the kid is good...I was pitching the ball to him at his house and he hit a hard line drive and hit me square in between the eyes:) Yes, I realize that a 3 year old's strength hurt so bad it made my eyes water...let's make sure we don't let my personal trainer know about that one:) And also we got to celebrate Tarin's 2nd birthday over the weekend too. Isn't she a cutie?

Our Europe Trip

Ok, so nothing exciting has happened really lately...so I figured I'd just relive some excitement from last year:) (And Rachel told me she wanted me to post my Europe pics)...so here are some of them. We went last October for 2 weeks and got to go to Ireland, Scotland, England, and France. It definitely felt like I was on the Amazing Race...next time I would just pick 1 place to be for the whole 2 weeks. We were constantly on the move, but for it being my very first time to Europe, it was cool to cram a lot in the 2 weeks just to be able to see as much as we could.

Scotland had the most gorgeous scenery! We rented a car for 5 days in Scotland and got to see so much of its green landscape...

This is called Glamis Castle in Scotland...Shakespeare set 'Macbeth' in this castle.
These cows are called Highland Cattle...they are very hairy...Marc was jealous of their outfits...actually, I'm not kidding. He really wanted to find a kilt and buy one (which made me a little nervous)...but it turns out the whole kilt outfit is very expensive...what a shame:)
So after about a week of being mostly in Scotland...and a little bit of Ireland, we took a flight down to London and got to spend a few days there.

Big Ben

Remember the "Feed the Birds" lady from Mary Poppins? These are the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral where she sat and fed them...so in honor of that, I stood on the steps and sang my rendition of Feed the Birds...for some reason, I couldn't find Marc during that...j/k:) But seriously, this cathedral was GORGEOUS inside...it is where Prince Charles and Princess Di got married.
Buckingham Palace


This is called the Changing of the Guard...it is rated as the #1 thing to go see in London (in front of Buckingham Palace)...let me tell you, the first 30 seconds are exciting...and then the rest of the 45 min. are BORING...I guess if it just didn't go on so long it would have seemed better. But it was cool to see the guards dressed like that

We ended the trip for the last 3-4 days in Paris. So many people had prepared us to be ready for a bunch of rude encounters with the French...but honestly, I never saw it once. I mean, I guess they weren't overly friendly...but everyone we talked to was very helpful. And at all the restaurants we went to they always spoke English to us...so I think people shouldn't be so freaked out about the French being rude. I dunno...maybe we just lucked out.

In front of the Louvre

With Venus de Milo

Ok, this one is for Rach...remember the fun days of Art History class...I couldn't believe all those boring slides actually came in handy when I was at the Louvre...I actually recognized some things!!! This one is called Seated Scribe, remember? I actually remembered the name on my own too. I just never thought with our teacher's monotone voice, something would actually stick with me!

Here's Marc wishing we would see the show at Moulin Rouge...I don't think so buddy!

Eiffel Tower

Arc de Triomphe...we climbed to the top of it to watch the sunset...it was an amazingly cool one that night too.

Well, there's a little taste of the trip. It was pretty awesome...it just gave me the travel itch even more I think. So now the question is...where to next???

Personal Training

Okay, so I think we can all see here that we have a picture (from Ballys Gym brochure) of what working out with a personal trainer might be like. Doesn't it look fun? I mean, we see the girl working out with a smile on her face as she happily does the exercise the trainer is having her do. And by her slim physique we can see how the training must really be paying off for her.

I am here to attest that this picture is a complete and utter fraud! I signed up for personal training at Ballys Gym 5 weeks ago, and let me be the first to tell you those training sessions are not a pretty sight...rather than the happy model shown in the picture, I can tell you that during any one session I look either:

A) Scared, because I am sure that I will be dying sometime within the hour
B) Like I'm in pain, because...well, I am
C) Like I'm about to faint, because...well, I am
D) Like I'm having a panic attack, because I think I might faint and/or die (refer to
parts (A) & (C) above)
E) Like I'm crying, because I'm having an emotional breakdown
F) Grossed out, because sometimes I throw up a little bit in my mouth
G) Angry, because I can't understand why I'm paying this person to torture me
H) Hungry, because I am
I) All of the Above


I'd like to see Bally's give a more realistic portrait of what personal training is so that people know what they're getting into...show the model hobbling around like a handicapped person over the weekends...show the model driving through Krispy Kreme on her way home from the gym because she needs to do comfort eating from the array of emotions she experienced during the session...show her praying in her car as she drives to the gym, asking God to not let her die...

Now I'm not saying I've personally done any of the things described in the last paragraph...these are just things I've heard:)