Monday, August 30, 2010

Applications

So, this summer has been a summer of applications for Eli. He has worked so so so hard and I'm really proud of him.
Eli applied to a lot of schools, and each school sent him their own secondary application. Each application had their own essays and other things they wanted to know about him. He had to spend hours researching each school and painstakingly writing out each essay, trying to convey the right message about him. On good days he could get 2 applications done in one day, but usually it took longer. It was very stressful, because he knew that how he answered could be the difference between an interview or a no.

But, I am so proud of him because he is done! He has finished all of his applications, and he has started to hear back. So far, he has 4 interviews! I'm so proud of him! Of course soon, we'll start hearing more no's, but it's so exciting he has 4 already! The interviews are at University of Nebraska in Omaha, George Washington University in DC, a D.O school in Des Moines, and at the University of Louisville in Kentucky! The great thing about all of these places is we either have family or really close friends in each area. My sister lives in Omaha, and my parents are 3 hours away from both Omaha and Des Moines. Our good friends Emily and Kyle just moved to Louisville where Kyle is working on his PhD, and our good friends Jake and Heidi live in DC and Jake is going to law school at George Washington. We're really excited. I'm really proud of Eli and how hard he's worked. I just wish we could fast forward to January and February when we can find out where we'll actually end up.

Be sure to tell Eli good job, and we'll accept any prayers you might want to include us in. We just need to get in somewhere!

Disney Land

Okay, a disclaimer first of all. I don't have pictures. I still need to ask Brooke for them, we decided to just carry one camera around rather than two, and their camera took better pictures, so, sorry, no pictures today.

How do I even describe Disney Land? Magical doesn't even cover it. Maybe it's a defense mechanism of mine, when people say that something is amazing I always think it can't be that great. Maybe it's because I always wanted to go to Disney Land but never went. Anyway, I went into it thinking it would be a fun trip and that Disney Land is probably cool, but it's not going to be magical unless you're a kid. Boy was I wrong. It exceeded every expectation. Every detail of it was seen to, I just can't even describe how much fun it was! But I will try.

If you're not interested in a day by day breakdown of our trip, then don't feel obligated to read.

So, we left on Thursday morning at 5! Steve and Brooke picked us up. We got all loaded and hit the road. Brooke's parents were kind enough to let us borrow their hybrid car, so we gas was so cheap. We had fun driving. Brooke and I decided that Steve and Eli were more excited about going on a trip with each other than they were about going with us. When we got close to California, they sat in the back and watched Step-Brothers (edited) together and laughed and laughed. Then we were all listening to an episode of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, and we could hear them laughing in the back seat, then all of the sudden it was only Brooke and I laughing, we looked back and the little boys had fallen asleep at the same time. It was so funny. They were like two little kids. So, we got to our hotel, which was not the nicest, but it was cheap! We got unpacked, then went to swim for a little bit. Then we got dressed and went to Downtown Disney. It was so cool! The whole place was so cool. We ate dinner at the ESPN Zone. That was a really cool restaurant. While we were there, we got to see LeBron's decision on a bunch of tv's, specifically, a the biggest screen tv I have ever seen! That restaurant has tvs in the bathroom stalls. Eli loved seeing wall to wall sports of all kinds.
That night we went back to our hotel. We had been given a handicapped room on the first floor, which is fine. The shower, however, had a backed up drain, and leaked all over the floor. So, the hotel generously upgraded us to a bigger room on the third floor.

The next morning, we got up bright and early and headed to the park. We had our park hoppers, so we started in Disney Land, went to California Adventure, and back and forth! The favorite rides were Haunted Mansion, Space Mountain, California Screamin', Toy Story (The coolest ride), and Soarin' Over California. The food was so good. We had the most delicious corn dogs ever for lunch! We had pineapple ice cream, delicious wraps, pretzels, and other really good food.
The shows were so amazing! We saw the Muppets 3-D Experiment. The best show was the new Colors, in California Adventure. I don't even know how to describe how awesome it was. They had a whole light show on water shooting up, but it was more amazing than anything I had ever seen. Then we ran back to Disney for fireworks and Phantasmic, and then we went home. It was great!

The next day, Saturday, we slept in a bit, then went to the beach. It was great! It was kind of a cloudy day, but still warm. We played soccer, saw some dolphins, and did some body-boarding (Or boogie boarding, I can't remember what it's really called). That was so much fun! We had a blast! Then we went home, cleaned up, and went back to Downtown Disney for dinner. We ate at the rain forest cafe. It was delicious. Then we got packed, slept and left the next morning after we went to church. The drive back was good. Once we got past Cedar City we drove through this pretty valley where it had just rained and saw the brightest most beautiful rainbows. There must have been about 5 or 6 of them!

It was a wonderful trip. We had so much fun with Steve and Brooke. It was better than I could have imagined!

A Good Summer

Well, I had the best of intentions about blogging EVERY day, but I didn't do it. What can I say, I'm just not a very dedicated blogger. Sorry. Well, let me fill you in on the summer. I believe I'll do this in a series of posts, a trick I picked up from my sisters. So, this first one will be about our diet.

I'm sure you're all dying to know about our diet and how it is going. Well, our trip to Disney Land was the end of the diet. I mean really, who can stick to that in the happiest place on earth? Not us. And, since we've been back, it's been hard to be as strict as we were. But, I am happy to report that we have seriously cut back on our sugar and refined flour intake. We eat way more fruits and vegetables now. Neither of us have gained any weight back either, so that's good. Now we are more aware of what we eat. We've even tried to cut back on our meat intake. The next thing I'd like to do is cut back on our dairy. I don't know if I'll ever be able to give up cheese and sour cream (my favorites), but I'd like to cut it down to couple times a week. So, that's the deal. I think in a while we might go back to cutting out the sugar. My new favorite thing to eat is quesadillas. I use whole wheat tortillas, refried beans, a little cheese, green peppers, and fresh guacamole. I love it. In fact I'm having it for lunch again today. So, to sum up, we've changed our habits. My goals this week are to try making my own whole wheat bread, including grinding the wheat, and try to make my own fruit leather. I just need to see if I can borrow the dehydrator from Eli's grandma. I'll let you know about those things!