October Shenanigans...Cozy/Adorable/Fall Vibes Edition

October, WHAT??

• Got videos shot for the rest of year, which isn't like all that long or anything, but now Nils is locking in on the basement software so we can be more aggressive with marketing. We've sold a couple dozen basement courses/software with only softball/organic basement channel video mentions, so that's building confidence in its viability. 

• Addie, Ava, and me (and Maddy, Ava's friend) had went to Trader Joe's to get some fall goodies, and then watched "Over the Garden Wall". We maybe scared Maddy, I don't know, but it's a fall tradition for Addie in particular to watch it and feel reverence for it.

• Addie, Ava and me went to see "Sense and Sensibility", the new version. I'd like to retitle it to "Someone Please Brush Marianne's Hair". Holy, what the?? Her hair was a stringy, scraggly mess for the ENTIRE movie. Ava and I pretended to brush her hair anytime she was on screen. Other than that it was fine. A little dark and broody, and nothing will ever beat the 1995 edition.

• The above 2 activities were for fall break, since we didn't go anywhere, but we tried to do something fun each day. We went to Cornbelly's on the last night of fall break with all of the youth in the ward. It was a madhouse. Probably cuz it was fall break. 

• Anders went to Yosemite with a few friends, and they hiked Half Dome and survived! They also went to a scary clown motel in Nevada. I can't think of too many things that would be scarier than a clown motel. 

• Addie has been working away at school, working at the library, and getting neighborhood gigs like dog-sitting and house sitting. Much of October was taking care of other people's dogs and houses. Makin' them dollas. 

• Ava's been going to school and working every week day. She's the swim team manager, too and keeping busy with all the things. Her driving score is 95.

• Aani was transferred from Junction City and is now in Park City, KS. It's a slower area as far as the work goes and the demographic is much different. Her companion is Sister Wacaster, and she's a real hoot. Aani likes the area because there's a Swig, Maverick, and Salon Centric. :) She's 7 months in! It's going slow and fast at the same time. Like I can't believe she still has almost a year to go, but 7 months is more than I thought I would survive. We miss her!

Addie wrote me this text and found an emoji for every word. She knows me well since I have a history of using as many emojis as possible in a text message, just to prove how cool I am. 

Addie asked me what I would want in a spouse, for a class assignment. The last 4 are Nils specific. I could have written more but wanted to keep it classy. 

Look at this beautiful portrait of one of the most beautiful scenes you'll ever have the privilege of beholding. Baja Blast Zero, you are a gift. 

The Color Me Mine Spoils and the artists.

Miss this jit. She's always quacked me up. 

Baby Ava and her papa.

Goob and Goob. 

Half Dome! 

Scaywee!!

Addie was a pin cushion, not a strawberry. This costume was a true labor of love.

Sometimes when only 3 girls come to an activity, they get happy meals. I don't make the rules. 

We were Costco sample workers for Halloween. #onbrand

Cute

True art by Anders

My friend Ruth had to have a double mastectomy, so the friends took her to dinner to bid farewell to the ladies. I made peanut butter bars and holy moly they were yum. 

Gabe the Babe's farewell.

Ava was Charlie Brown and found Snoopy at school. 

Aani's porch frog, Stewart. 

Zone Conference with Elder Teixeira

Turns out Kansas really does have pretty sunsets

Aani and Belly were Dorothy and Toto. So darn cute. 

Aani is in Loo's zone now! 

Have the best November ever! 

September Shenanigans...IceLAND edition

Hey guys. We went to Iceland. More on that later. This picture is from our last night there and it's pretty cute if I do say so myself. We only had to try like 4 times- I kept looking at my feet instead of the camera. What a rookie. 

We went with Ava up to Cascade Springs on a Sunday afternoon. Umm, we had literally never been to the actual Cascade Springs. Huh? Super cute. The Alpine Loop was still pretty green but we wanted to go before we left for our trip. 

Nils officiated a wedding and did an amazing job. I love him so. 

Nils and I went to visit Addie at work at the library and she didn't love our picture taking. We're just so proud of her. 

I put together a dot themed activity for our combined YW activity and it was pretty fun. We played a game where we got dot stickers stuck all over us, watched "You Are Special" on video, and made dot cakes. It turned out fun. We kept it a mystery so the other girls didn't know what it meant that we were having a dot activity.

Anders and I are were casting spells on our soda cans. 

 

Anders' photo submissions: 
p.s. we love Cameron

Anders, Cameron, Addie and Ava went to Color Me Mine while Nils and I were in Iceland.

Anders dropped us off at the airport, and that was just the beginning of Kevin's shenanigans. 

Oh what can I say about Iceland? We were there for 10 days and barely scratched the surface. Literally every place we went was out of this world gorgeous. Non-stop beauty and wonder. You're always expecting a troll or elf or Gandalf to appear because the landscape is like an epic fairy tale. 

3 nights in Reykjavik, 3 nights in Hvöllsvollur, 4 nights in Höfn. We went along the south coast up into a bit of the southeast coast. We drove a Toyota Hilux and it was just great for traversing whatever terrain we encountered, and housing our food supplies and backpacks in the bed. 

We stayed in a capsule hotel in downtown Reykjavik, which was an interesting experience. Very squishy but just fine. A cute little cottage in Hvöllsvollr, and a 6 bedroom house in the actual middle of nowhere in Höfn. All were great. All were in beautiful places. All had super thick comforters with duvets and a singular pillow. 

We did the Sky Lagoon in Reykjavik, and loved it so much that we decided to go to the Blue Lagoon the next day. The Blue Lagoon is much more visually stunning in pictures online, but much grosser IRL. Silica in the water irritated my skin so so much, but besides that it was just a much different vibe. Like a bandaid floated past us and we realized that someone could drown in the water and you would never know unless you bumped into them. You can't see nuffin' in that water. The Sky Lagoon was clear clear clear and no bandaids, no sir. Those two activities were really the only things we spent money on, other than little parking fees, groceries and food, gas, and of course our Icelandic sweaters. 

We hiked, we drove and drove, we saw thousands of waterfalls, steaming mountains, volcanic landscapes, sheep everywhere, wild horses, black sand beaches, the angry ocean with mad crashing waves, insane rock formations, ate pylsa the Icelandic hot dog, yummy European chocolate, fake McDonald's (Metro), which has a GF burgers, hello! We cooked most of our dinners and breakfasts and packed sandwiches and snacks for the long days out. 

We played cards nearly every night, sometimes to 2 am. It rained non-stop about 85% of the time we were there, with crazy 60 mph winds. You dress for warmth and being waterproof in Iceland, so looking cute is not really a thing. 

We went to church in Reykjavik and it was tiny and about what you would expect from a branch in Iceland. 

Spent an entire day driving around Landmannalaugar, one of the national parks. Lots of stunning (duh) landscapes, hiking around, oohing and ahhing. 

Spent a day in Vik at the Black Sand Beach and Reynisfjara, battling the torrential downpour and the 60 mph winds, but it was so very epic and maybe my favorite thing. 

Vestrahorn Mountain with another stunning black sand beach and amazing photo opps. On our last day, the sun came out, and we found a golf course in Höfn. We played 9 holes in our authentic Icelandic sweaters that we got in town, with 4 ginormous glaciers, the ocean and mountains in the background. HUH?? Is this real life? Also we all suck at golf but that's not even relevant. 

It was exhausting and amazing and all of the superlatives. And we are SOOO happy to be home. 

Pictures: 

Our capsule. So cozy. 

What the capsules look like from the outside. 

Bra fence- we kept our on our bodies this time. 

Oh just another waterfall

Nils eating horse. Tastes like beef but chewier. Yum. 

Oh you know I'm gonna eat a GF cheeseburger at Metro (fake McDonald's)

Just me being an Instagram beach model

Pylsa

I love this cuz it looks like Nils is doing a jig, but he's skipping rocks in the angry ocean. 

Dead sheep=less cute than alive sheep

This truck was such a trooper

Golf card came every night- this was my lucky zero score. 

The trusty Hilux. What a sexy beast. Looking pretty photogenic 'eh? 

The whole crazy crew

Vestrahorn Mountain, are you kidding me right now? Like really? 

Hello, golden hour. Aren't you just so dang beautiful? Good golly.

I took off my sweater because I was getting hot- a first and only for the trip. Maybe the most scenic golf course anywhere ever? I don't know because this was my first and probably only time golfing. 

Glacier Lagoon in a torrential downpour. Classic Iceland. 

Now for our li'l Aanster in Kansas! She's been in Junction City for 6 months and will be transferred this next week most likely, but she still doesn't know where. She's ready. We miss the crap out of her, but she's doing great and we love talking with her every week. I can't believe she still has a year left. Ugh. 

Couch got taken, sad day.

She broke the recliner so they could keep it. 

Last day at church with Sister Young, or as Aani calls her, Kamy. Cuz that's her name, but it's funny because she's not supposed to call her Kamy. Missions are weird. 

Umm this might be my longest blog post ever, in 1,056 years of blogging. Insanity! Go to Iceland if you ever can. It's nuts.