The Rivalry Begins

On November 8th student tickets went on sale for the BYU vs Utah game that approaches this upcoming weekend. As a result, we were in line November 7th! A special thanks goes out to Robbie and Rachel as they started standing in line at 11:30 am (that's right, over twenty hours before tickets went on sale), Derek (who arrived soon after), and John. I arrived around 5 pm, right after I got off work with sleeping bags, a tent, and some lanterns. It was a great experience as we camped out on the sidewalk near the stadium with over 2,000 students anxiously awaiting tickets for the big game. Kyle Whittingham and some of the players even came around and shook the hands of their many loyal fans and even donated some pizzas to the cause. Becky came over around 7:30 pm and hung out until about midnight...it was a cold evening! The pictures will paint a better picture...

The line wrapped around the entire stadium. You can see 2% of the people behind us.

Becky just hangin out in the tent preparing herself mentally for an intense game of phase 10! Her preparation did not help her too much...Sorry, Becky.

Thanks to Kate we were able to survive the night. That was the best hot chocolate ever!

Robbie, Rachel, and myself just securing our position. If people came late or tried to cut others, fights broke out. We were not part of that, but many Ute fans are not affraid to speak their minds through their fists...

After a long night in the tent we woke up to find a line already forming. We got up around 6 am and jumped in line. People were not happy as many that were close to the front got pushed much further back. This is where we ended up starting our morning wait...there were about 600 people infront of us.

100 more feet to go...

There were over 2,000 people still waiting for tickets as we neared the front of the line. Many Ute fans left unhappy as tickets sold out soon after we became proud ticket owners...it only took us 22 hours!

Was waiting in line and camping out worth it? YES! Is this game going to be great? YES. Is Utah going to win? They better as they are the better team and EVERYONE knows it. GO UTES!

October-Fest 2008

Well, Becky has left the next couple posts to me so you are all in for a treat. Last October many of you may recall that Becky and I had just been married and were able to venture to the beautiful land of Cabo -- Twice! This October we were not as fortunate to do that, but we had a blast. I will let the pictures tell the story...

Earlier in the month we were able to make a trip up to Park City to hang out with my Mom, step-dad Brent, and step-brother Ian. We do not make it up to Park City too often so this was a treat. While we were there we went and walked the path of scare-crows by the white barn and took some pictures. Here are a couple visuals:

Halloween at Del Sol! If there is one company that goes all out on Halloween it is Del Sol. I am telling you, there are people at Del Sol right now that are already planning out their costumes for next year! Becky and her little crew dressed up as Moose hunters this year. Tell me their costumes aren't awesome...Nice work with the moose Ben:)

I knew my wife was a true hunter deep down inside. I mean she grew up in Morgan right?

Halloween night was a treat. We hung out with some of the greats...Johnson's and Crowther's. Sorry we embarrassed you both. Not because we were in costumes, but because you guys were not in costumes. We really showed you up this year and you will forever remember that. Becky and I just love Halloween so much that we wanted to stay in our costumes ALL DAY! Thanks for making me a true Cowboy Todd...

I just love this picture of us and little Nana! I think she just might sock Becky right in her BEARD!

If it weren't for the orange vest Becky would basically be invisible. I think she is trying to shoot that bird in the bottom right hand corner of the picture...look out!

This is actually November 1st! Thats right, we are still in costumes, but Becky decided to be an Indian this time. As branch missionaries we hosted a little activity and dressed up again. It was a lot of fun and we were finally able to meet some fun people in our branch.You do not want to mess with Becky the Indian when it comes to a Donut on a string contest. She will rip you apart...look at that bite!

Our little getaway to California

Well I am still struggling to keep up with my blogging! I have a lot to catch up on but I wanted to start off by posting about our trip last month out to California to visit our good friends Shunae and Travis. They were so kind to let us crash in their front room for a few days and we had so much fun hanging out with them. We took advantage of their closeness to Disneyland and spent two of our days exploring that magical place. And magical it is... we transformed into little kids as we ran around and went on all the rides. We pretty much covered all of Disneyland and California Adventure in the two days we were there. Has anyone seen the parade they put on in Disneyland??....I believe I enjoyed the parade just as much as all the 5 year olds around me. I actually made Brandon watch it both days we were there because I was sure we missed some of it the first day.... turns out we saw the whole show both times. :) But I enjoyed it just as much the second time as I did the first. I think I secretly wanted to be one of the princesses in the parade. When I was younger my cousins and I would always play "Princesses" when we would get together. Pretty much it consisted of picking a princess and then we would run around and pretend to be that person. I actually have no idea what the point was.... but it was something I always wanted to play. I guess I still have that instinct in me :)

Our adventure in pictures begins......

We had just gotten to Disneyland and couldn't be happier.

Us and our favorite Disney character below.... no not really. There was a really short line for a picture so Brandon and I thought we would take advantage of that. We both froze and didn't know what face to pull for the picture. I feel that we did not make the best choice....we only had one chance and we both blew it.

Heading over to California Adventure....

Screamin' roller coaster! So fun.
You would think we were the only ones in the park with this picture.... I can assure you we were not.
One of the many highlights.... Turkey Legs :) Warning: if you are a vegetarian you may throw up looking at the next few pictures. I got some pretty weird looks as I was walking around with this bone but it tasted so good!

Brandon is loving the turkey leg....
The best part of our day was when we were getting in a 2 hour line for Indiana Jones a man came up to Brandon and handed him 2 fast passes that he decided he wasn't going to use! We quickly jumped in the other line and ran straight to the front. It was just grand.

Brandon enjoyed Tarzan's Tree house more then anyone there....
He secretly wants to be Tarzan... he is trying to show me he has muscles just like him

Firework Show!!! The fireworks were awesome. Getting out was not as cool... I tried to take a picture of Main Street and the amount of people that covered the street trying to get out. It was crazy.

Our second day back.... here I am enjoying my Bugs Life 3D glasses. Everyone needs to go on the Tea Cups...
Our adventure in Toone-Town...
Very sad about having to leave....
Brandon was so sad he had tears.....

We also spent a day at Universal Studios with Shunae and Travis and had so much fun!
Brandon and Travis were so scared to go in here.... :)
After we went through we were all a little creeped out... Who can blame us? Chucky is right there with a knife.
Jaws almost ate Brandon's head. Luckily I was there to save him.
Here we are on our Tram Tour. It was a little more intense than we thought! With Shunae being pregnant we were a little worried about baby Shelton...but if baby Shelton is as tuff as her mom I'm pretty sure she could take it:)
Shunae and I are enjoying the tour and admiring the distroyed airplane behind us... Got to love the Simpsons...
We were lucky enough to get a picture with all the Apollo 13 guys. I felt a closeness with the one on the end....

Dinner with the Sheltons! It felt much like a Wedding reception with the white tent we were under. They were renovating the restaurant so they had this tent set up in the back. The food was awesome and the company was even better :)
Saddly our trip came to an end and we spent our last few hours in California at Huntington Beach... Great looking guy that I found on the Pier....
Enjoying the Pier and admiring the coast guard joggers.... I love the beach and the ocean water. I was wishing it was a little warmer so we could have layed there all day!! He is looking good out there! If only he had his shirt off.... :) So happy... The Long Beach Airport... we were able to capture the whole airport in one shot. It is that big.
Shunae and Travis were so good to us while we were there!! We had so much fun hanging out with them and making some fun memories! Thank you both so much!

September 28, 2008- Marks One Year!

It is hard to believe that it has already been one year since Brandon and I got married. This last year has gone by so fast! Brandon and I had so much fun reminiscing on the last year of events and thinking of all the things that we have been able to do together and the things that we have learned. We have both learned a lot about each other :) And I was surprised to remember how much we had done in a year! It has been such a fun year and we look forward to many more of those to come...... In celebration of our one year, Brandon planned a fun little getaway. It is best told in pictures.

He first surprised me by taking me to dinner. We went to Bonsai, which is a Japanese Steakhouse. So good! Here we are enjoying our dinner...

And then of course we had to get a picture with the cook! How about this pic? It is possible the cook is putting up his hands in defense because he is afraid I may pounce on him. I am obviously twice the size of him and could hurt him greatly. Brandon took Karate in his youth and therefore felt a bondness with the cook... After dinner, Brandon made me put on this blind fold as he drove to our destination. I was pretty upset about having to sit in the car for 25 minutes not knowing were we were going. Since I was complaining, Brandon was paranoid the whole time that I was peeking. Knowing that I would most likely blog about this, I decided to take a pic of myself....

Brandon finally pulled over and opened my door and took off my blindfold. There we were, up in the mountains and he was standing there with a rose and a candle. He then read me a poem that he wrote about us. I honestly had no idea that he was a poet! It was very cute and very well done! I quickly forgave him for blindfolding me :) We then enjoyed a nights stay at the Cliff Lodge up at Snowbird. The next day we took the tram up to the top of the mountain... tram is shown behind me

It was beautiful on top of the mountain! Brandon and I enjoyed walking around and he told me all about his snowboarding stories... Then we wondered into the cave connecting the Peruvian Lift to Mineral Basin.... we enjoyed taking many pictures of ourselves in here

I believe this pose was inspired by our cook at Bonsai...
Then we took some modeling shots against the wall, cause we thought it looked cool...

Wow. He is really handsome... And then of course, these pictures were inspired by Brandon. Sunglasses and all. Look at this skill! He couldn't be happier....

I, on the other hand, am not as graceful but just as happy. This took more effort then anyone will know. Jumping is not my skill. But I did what i could...

Instead of taking the tram back down the mountain, we decided to enjoy the outside air and rode the peruvian ski lift back down. We entertained ourselves by taking more pointless pictures of which I was unable to post... I was pretty scared at first and was afraid of letting go of the bar...

Brandon has no fear and is very strong. As you can tell...

One more of the many pointless pictures on the lift...

When we got down to the bottom, we found that Octoberfest was beginning! We asked two different people, at different times, to take the picture of us below and we were surprised to find out that our chances of getting a good picture did not increase. Both seemed to cut our feet off.

We ended up finishing our celebration by walking around Octoberfest for a while before heading home. I really did have such a good time and can't thank Brandon enough for planning everything and for keeping it a surprise. He is such a good husband and I am so lucky to have him. I love you Brandon!

Anniversary Day....

We kept to the old tradition and ate the top of our wedding cake on our one year anniversary. My Mother was kind enough to freeze it and had it all ready for us to eat the day of our Anniversary. Here we are cutting it togther just like a year ago...

And enjoying...

So, maybe some of you are wondering...how did it taste? Well, I suggest freezing a cake for a year and trying it out yourself. :)