Thriller...Thriller Night

Halloween is a great time of year where Adam gorges himself with candy and Camille gets all crazy with the decorations. As is tradition, we carved our pumpkins; however, this year we waited a little too long and ended up having to carve them at almost 10:00 at night. We were both tired, and Adam's face might be showing it a bit.Camille was still chipper despite her pumpkin having a little rot in it. The rot was right in the middle and once she cut it out there was just a big hole right in the middle of her pumpkin.So, with a giant hole in the middle of her pumpkin, she made a spider. It was the best she could do, she said. We even saved the seeds and cooked them in the oven.Adam's pumpkin turned out to be a little girly, so he added a soul patch beard in hopes of making it a bit more tough...but, the end result was a gay pirate looking dude. Ah well, it was fun. We even had a ton of trick or treaters this year. Apperently living in the middle of town does wonders for getting rid of candy. In years past we have had one or two, which made Adam happy because he ate more candy. This year, we almost ran out. It was a great year.Adam and a few of his coworkers dressed up for work. Adam claimed to be a defense attorney, but most of the prosecutors he worked with said he was too dressed up because of his tie. Sadly enough, these were the only four people dressed up at the courthouse on Friday. Leave it to Adam to always be the odd one. (Note: if you look closely you will see just how much Adam has been brushing his teeth).

Rock Creek Hollow

On October 24th it was a sunny day and we decided to visit some of the sites in our area. Camille has been reading a lot about the Mormon Pioneers and Rock Creek Hollow, which isn't far from where we live. We grabbed some sandwiches and headed up there for a nice warm picnic.
However, once we got there, the wind picked up and it turned out to be very cold. Camille didn't really feel any of the cold weather, as you can see by this picture. A couple of times Adam had to keep telling her to stop rolling her pants up like shorts. NOTE: It was so incredibly cold!! And ironically, October 24th 157 years previously was the actual day the Mormon Pioneers came to Rock Creek Hollow. They had endured an 18 mile trek up rocky terrain. That night over 13 individuals died (which is the monument that Camille is standing by). The next day, another 2 died, which were the men that had buried the others. It was a very beautiful, but sad area.

Adam had no reservations whining about how cold he was...but that is just the kind of guy he is. This was another monument showing where President Hinkley had dedicated the area.This is the actual spot where the Pioneers had camped. According to Camille's reading, most of the people in the Handcart Company only had rags wrapped around their feet for shoes. Adam quickly said he would have died a whiney death. We gained new found respect for the pioneers on our visit.Camille seemed a bit less cold here and that is because deeper into the Hollow the wind became less. There was a neat little bridge, and behind her, is the actual Hollow.Further away from the Hollow are a couple of almost ghost towns. One is called Atlantic City (sorry, no gambling here), and South Pass City. Atlantic City still boast a population of about 17, where South Pass City is burning up the charts at a population of about 7. Adam decided to model one of the more modern homes in the area of South Pass City.As we were getting ready to go home (Adam was getting antsy because the BYU debacle was about to begin against TCU), Adam noticed a light on in his truck. We got out to look at the truck and found one of the tires to be flat. Adam, being the manly man he is, went to work to change it. Once he got all the lugnuts off, he could not get the tire off. He tried and tried for about an hour (note: there were no monster fits pitched, wink wink). Finally, we went to a local house and knocked on the door, where an old man came and helped get it off. Adam did all the work and the old man just kind of looked around, but we finally got the tire off. At the end Camille gave all the credit to the old man. Adam was not happy, and was even more sad when he saw what TCU did to his poor Cougars.

It's beginning to look a lot like...

We realized after our last post that we did not include any pictures of the front of our little house on the prairie (Adam is modeling our little home). When we first moved in the front yard had a neglected garden and a couple of dead trees, so we ripped them out and tried to help the garden. Therefore, our little house looks a little bare. Hopefully, next spring we will have some flowers coming up.Here is another view from the front. We have some real nice big trees in the front.We had to trim the trees when we first moved in. Camille's dad came up and helped us out. However, these wonderful trees looked like this two weeks ago......And today!! It has been snowing for the past couple of weeks. The snow was so heavy and wet that it broke off more branches. We keep waiting for the early fall snow to melt away, but it has not. We got about 19 inches the first weekend, and this past weekend another 7 were added. What happened to our fall!! Adam is furious and says he was ripped off. He does not want to trick or treat in the snow!!
Our backyard has developed a large snow drift. Adam really wants to jump off the roof and land in the drift, but Camille has advised him that he is old now and is very easily injured.

Another picture of the snow we have. It almost has the feel of Christmas.Adam really wanted to BBQ for the start of the MLB Playoffs...however, the BBQ is a bit covered in snow. So we made fajitas instead. (Note: We have driven to Utah and all over Wyoming the last two weekends in these stupid snow storms. Last Sunday night the power went out about 8:00p.m. while we were cleaning up after our trip. We waited and waited for it to come back on, and finally just went to bed. Around 1:00 a.m. the power came on, along with all the lights that were previously on. Adam had to get up and turn off the TV and turn off all the lights...so much fun)

Merry Christma....We mean....Happy Autumn!!

Our house, in the middle of the street...

As many of you know we recently moved from our big log cabin. It was a nice home, but we had dirty water the last three months of living there. It was not fun to have the water always look yellow. Camille kept thinking Adam didn't flush the toilet after using...towards the end Adam kept saying, "If it's yellow, let it mellow, if it's brown, flush it down." Camille was not amused. At any rate, we moved to a nice, cozy house in down town. Before we moved in, we asked to paint the walls because they were a faded yellow (man, we can't escape yellows...yellow water, yellow walls...enough with the yellow!). Camille picked out a nice brown color and away we went.

Adam hated every second of painting. He whined and complained and said he will never paint again. However, after all was said and done, he loved the color and admitted that he would help paint. We only had two days to finish the painting before we had to be out of our old house, so we painted for four hours the first night and six the next. We were exhausted, but the house looks nice. Adam was so excited to almost be done he did a paint dance. Camille thought it made him look a little limp of wrist and told him never to do it again. Here is our living room with all our stuff in it, and the walls fully painted. Looks cozy, doesn't it? The room where we weren't able to do anything is the family room (we are only renting, and were told not to paint it). It is a large room, but the walls are a bit too brown. Adam has called it the Wonka room, the dirt room, the chocolate factory, dog poop room, the underground, and that ugly room that smells bad. Note: The previous owners had large dogs that shed a lot!! They also smelled bad. So, the carpets had a distinct odor. We have sprayed and cleaned a lot, so the smell isn't so bad...only a slight gag occurs upon entry.

This a view into the kitchen and dining room. This is where we were painting in the previous pictures. It is a nice place and we are very happy here. We really enjoy drinking water from the tap, showering, and doing laundry where our clothes don't have a yellow tint. Anyway, sorry there aren't more pics of the house, but once we get a bit more moved in, we will post some. Note: Camille's purse is very green!! Kind of like, where's Waldo for purses.

We're going to Jackson, So comb your hair..

Every August, we get a chance to celebrate a great and glorious day...our anniversary. This year Camille planned out a wonderful weekend in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Jackson is only about 2 hours from where we live and we took off right after work. Adam was so excited that he mounted his trusted steed, "Hopper", to make sure he could get there faster. Note: Hopper was a jackalope off the side of the road at a gas station. While Adam was climbing onto Hopper he almost fell off twice. The wind was blowing very hard, and he claims it was that. But we all know, Adam is a clutz.The mountains were stunning!! It was a cold and windy weekend, but the clouds made the mountains look great. As we drove in and saw the Tetons in the pic below, Adam began to sing church video songs...he was so inspired.
A special treat in Jackson is the Gun Barrel Restaurant. They serve wild game, and Adam being the adventurer he is ordered the mixed dish. It came with Buffalo, Elk, Deer, and garlic patatos. He loved every bit of it. If you look closely you can see the blood lust in his eyes.

Adam also tried to make some friends in the area by mimicking wild life. However, many passerbys thought he looked like he needed a bathroom.

While Adam was out making new friends, Camille had moved on to a new man. He is much taller and hairier than Adam. But he was all the man she could ask for. When Adam saw them together, he decided it was time to mess with sasquatch.

As mentioned earlier, the weather was cold and windy, mixed with rain and even a little snow. The weather broke long enough for us to take a little hike up the side of Grand Teton. It was very pretty.

We hiked up to a look out. In this pic we are both a little worn out from walking up the side of a mountain in the rain and wind. Note: Camille has on two shirts, a sweatshirt, and a rain parka draped over her with a backpack...she is not trying to be a hunchback.

When were about to walk back to our car, it started to rain again...then snow...then wind, snow, and rain. It was so miserable. Adam tried to stand up against the elements, but in the end, we decided to pay an outragious amount of money for a boat to take us across Jenny Lake.

The boat across Jenny Lake was so freaking COLD!! Adam's cheeks were so red, and he kept yelling "I can't feel my cheeks!!" He even had some tears rolling down his face, but claimed those were from the wind and cold...he was not crying!! He is a man, men don't cry. Camille then called him a whiney baby.

George and Joan celebrate 50

Adam's Uncle George and Aunt Joan recently celebrated their 50th Anniversary. We had a big party and ate some cake. They are wonderful people, and we love being with them. Happy 50!!Just for fun, we made them feed each other cake like when they were first married. It was very funny!! We love you George and Joan!!

Washington DC, Annapolis, and Baltimore

Many of you are probably wondering if we have given up on this thing called Blogging...but no! we have just been insanely busy this summer. First of all, our house has fallen apart. Since about April we have had dirty water (looks like mountain dew is coming out of our faucets). We have run out of propane, the septic tank exploded (totally awesome experience, didn't stink AT ALL!), and the final straw, we came home on Tuesday night and a water pipe broke, so the floor was covered in water. At any rate, we have found a nice new little house in the middle of town to move to. We have been frantically fighting with our landlord and getting ready to move. Hence, the blog has been neglected.

The other super fun thing we did was go to Washington DC at the end of July. Adam had some business back there, so Camille tagged along. We had a blast. We actually stayed in Annapolis, next to the Naval base. The big thing there is to eat blue crab...and because everyone there was so big into crabs, we to got a bad case of the crabs...on our heads. Adam is very lucky to have a couple of friends from when he was growing up and from law school that live in DC. They were kind enough to show us around. In this picture is Adam's friend Todd "the toad" Thorpe. They are both Law School graduates and were forced to get a picture in front of the Supreme Court Building. Adam said he was feeling very lawerly as he stood there. Note: please disregard the "crane of justice" in the background, they were doing some work.

What is a trip to DC without the cheezy pic in front of the White House. Adam was sure many passerbys would confuse him for Obama because of his good looks, so he tried to keep a low profile.

Quiz: Which one of these two structures is the real George Washington Monument? Adam also thought many passerbys would mistake him for the famous monument...he went to college?

There were so many amazing things we saw in DC, but we both absolutly loved every Smithsonian we went to. We guessed that we walked an average of 10 miles a day. We took lots of snacks and water to keep us going, but this last Smithosian we went to was a killer. It was a hot day, and the heat really sank its teeth into us. It practically swallowed us whole. Ok, those jokes were totally lame...wait...one more...Jaws of Justice...??

Nerd Alert!! Nerd Alert!! Camille's favorite highlight of the trip was a stop at the IRS. She was overwhelmed with happiness and was giddy. All she could talk about was taxes. If you look closely at the picture you will see her giant smile. As we were leaving she said, "Pinch me, I think I am in heaven!"

The perks of having friends in high places is that they hook you up. Adam's friend's wife is staffer for a congressman and she was able to get us a backdoor, all-access tour of the Capitol Building. And because we were VIP's we got to sit in Wyoming's Representative's office. She wasn't there, but hey, we made ourselves at home. She won't care...we are from Wyoming!!

Adam's good law school friend Geoff and his family, the Gunnersons also lived in DC and met us at the Nationals baseball game. It was free T-Shirt day, but we got stuck on the metro and didn't quite make it in time. It was a fun game, and Nationals even won, which they rarely do.

Back to our crab problem...Adam's conference went late one night and we didn't make it into DC. Instead we went to a little crab shack just off the Chesapeke Bay called Cantlers. They boast the best Blue Crab on the Bay, and they did not let us down. We didn't really know how to eat them, so we had to ask a waitress who quickly tore one apart. It was fun, but it sure took a long time to eat.

We also wanted to try the other local cuisine, so we order some clams and mussels. Camille did NOT like them one bit. Adam didn't mind them and said they were kind of like fish flavored gum (becuase they were so chewy).

One of the final days we visited Baltimore. It was pretty dirty and there were lots of people...which was annoying. However, not as annoying as listening to Adam say, "Apple core, Baltimore, who's your friend?" Anyway, that night we ate a seafood restaurant for one reason and one reason only...it was named after Adam. A.E. Phillips & Son. It was decent food that was a tad over priced. But, we thought it was cool because it was Adam's name. We tried to get some free stuff by using Adam's name...but we failed.

If you have watched the food network, you would recognize this building. It is the location of Ace of Cakes. We went out of the way while in Baltimore to see it. However, when we got there, they told us the windows are covered and no one can come in. So, we snapped a few pics from the street. Note: it was in the middle of the ghetto, and we thought we were going to be robbed at any moment.

On our final day we went to Mount Vernon: Home of George Washington. It was one of our favorite places of the trip. The only painful part of it was that we had to take a train, metro, and bus, lasting almost three hours, just to get there. It also didn't help that it was 95 degrees and super humid...Adam started melting. This is a picture in front of the visitor's center. The windows depict George's life...oh, and in case you were wondering his false teeth are made of lead, and he never cut down a cherry tree.

Our friends, the Gunnersons, came with us to visit George's house. We were super happy to see them and hang out once again becuase it had been almost two years since Adam and Geoff had graduated from law school. It was a great time, however, towards the end of the day the kids started to melt as well from the heat.

Adam and Kaylee decided to go back in time to the revolution. Kaylee's stick gun was a bit big for her, but she told Adam that she could kill him without any weapons...Adam decided to just let her be. Note: Adam's hat was not in his size.

Our last act in DC was to go to Rita's for some Gelato. The Gunnersons talked about this place all day long. They explained that the cup is filled slightly with frozen custard, then filled with Italian ice, then topped once again with frozen custard. It is filled with all things good!! Adam ignored his ice cream headaches and pounded every last drop of his Rita Gelato.