June Catch-Up

June was a pretty fun month for us!  We had Dad & Mom Hansen's birthdays, June 2nd and 13th.  It was great to get together have dinner and ice cream cake yumm!!


Then we went for a drive up around Palisades Reservoir.  It was a beautiful trip!  We stopped for tinfoil dinners, s'mores, and some campfire songs.  It was great to have Becca and Craig with us although I think we truly opened his eyes to the Hansen family when we started singing, "Once an Austrian went yodeling..."

   Doug & I by the reservoir


                              Enjoying S'mores!!

             

It was a great trip and we enjoyed the outdoors, even if we didn't camp over night!  The one disappointment was that I didn't get to try the famous Square Ice Cream.  We will have to go back for sure since I am assured that it tastes way different that regular scooped ice cream.

Oh where as the time gone....

Ok so I realize I haven't blogged in like 6 months! A lot has been going on! Things have been just plain busy, but I figured when is it not busy? So I will try my best to keep up on blogging.

I will start with playing catch-up for the next few posts. I need to get a cable for my camera so that I can post some pictures with what has been going on. Then most definitely I will be posting! Ok until then...: )

Schools out!!......Or so I thought.

I'm finally done, with the exception of one online class, with my Associates in Piano Pedagogy!!!  Yay!  This past week was so wonderful with no school.  I only had piano teaching to worry about and helping Becca plan her wedding.  But by the end of the week I must admit, I got a little bored.  I think its because I've been so busy since I started college, so when I get some freedom it seems like I have so much time with so little to do.

So this brings me to my big announcement.......*drum roll*.......

I'm going back to school : ).  Tomorrow actually : ).  What am I thinking???  Well you see.....I had to take this one class this summer so I can graduate.  Its a 3 credit class and so it was going to cost me about $400.  Thats quite a bit for one silly class but I had to do it so I got online and registered for it.  A couple days later(last friday actually) I received an e-mail telling me that my scholarship information was updated.  "What scholarship info?" I asked myself, "I'm off track this semester.  hmmmmm."  So I got into my account and found that I had been awarded full tuition scholarship this summer if I took a full load of classes!  

My first thought was, "Too bad I only need one class.  I'll have to pay for it anyways."  Then the little thought that had been in the back of my head for the past two semesters crept up.  "We'll I did want to try to get an Associates in Professional Preschool Education.  Although last time I talked to the academic office they pretty much acted like that wouldn't be possible." And with that little thought I became very determined.  I decided that I would have to really find out.  So I jumped back online, registered for the classes I needed to get started (its amazing they weren't all full), and headed up to the college to see if it was possible.

After about an hour of talking to "someone else"  I finally nailed it down.  As long as I fill out a paper graduation form and then petition to change my major it should all work out.  Now the catch is that I have to petition, which means that they can tell me no, but they acted like it wouldn't be a problem to switch my major.  And the beautiful thing about it is I can be done by the end of next summer!! I could have just continued in music and gotten a bachelors in piano performance but I don't really like to perform, and I've already got the teaching degree. Now I get to gain new skills and do another degree that is similar to what I was leaning towards when I first started college (early childhood special ed)!  

Needless to say I'm excited and no longer bored : )...........  Just don't ask me in a month if I'm glad I'm in school.

Yay! Our computer has returned to us!

Finally our computer is home and working!  No more slow laptop that never shuts down when you want it to, is so slow it's not worth using, and can't handle running more than one program at a time.  Yes our wonderful Mac is back!  Just thought I'd let you all know how happy we are about it :).

My sister is moving far, far, away

I couldn't believe my ears as my dad told me where my brother-in-law, Gary, was thinking about going to medical school. I had only called to talk to him about my brother getting married and our travel plans to attend the wedding. the conversation went something like this... Me: "Well we want to fly but will probably end up driving because it is less expensive. Oh and I'm going to stay about a week. Its right after school gets out and I haven't been home in a while." Dad: "Ok that will be fun. Logan will be the only one around besides me and mom. So that will be great for you to spend time with him before he goes on his mission. With Britt and Gary moving, and Tyler working you won't get to see much of them." Me: "Moving? What? Where?" Dad: "Oh you haven't talked to them. He got accepted to Ross University in the Carribbean somewhere." Me: "What!! The Carribbean! You're just joking....no your serious?!" Yep, school starts at the in May and they are probably leaving right after the wedding on April 25th. I can't believe my sister will be living in tropical paradise for 16 months. Thats a long time to be gone! She said that the island is not really developed its considered more of a country, so there aren't tons of tourists or anything. She posted a picture of the island and its absolutely beautiful so I've decided we need to plan a family vacation to Dominica, thats the island they are goint to. Perrfect I've always wanted to go to the Carribbean! But.....seriously......I will miss them so much. I still can't believe they are going.

Our poor computer.

A couple of weeks ago our computer died. We woke up one morning to a computer that had turned off by itself in the middle of the night (it never does that!). Alarmed we tried to turn it back on. Nothing happened. We thought maybe the outlet was having a problem we moved it across the room. Nothing happened. Oh its just got to be the power cord we thought. So we got a new power cord. Nothing happened.....We finally came to the conclusion that it was just dead. Its an IMac(which means its intel-based and everything is built into the monitor) and the closest apple store is in Salt Lake, and the people at the computer repair shop in town.....well lets just say we aren't so confident they always know what they are doing. Doug dropped it off to them on Saturday and talked to them about how much it would cost. It went something like this. Doug: So what do you think the problem is? Guy1: Well we'd have to get in there to really see but its probably something with the internal power supply. Doug: Ok, so how much would it cost just for you to diagnose what is really wrong with it? Guy1: Theres a $59 testing and diagnosis fee. But if thats what's wrong with it the part is about $200 and all together the labor would be around $200. Doug: Well....lets just have to do the test and diagnose right now because if thats not what is wrong with it I don't want you to order anything yet. Guy1 (as he begins unscrewing the back of the computer).: Ok. No problem. Now let me tell you about a conversation I had yesterday with these people after Doug called down there to find out when his computer would be done. The people down there said, "Oh, this is your computer? We were trying to figure out what its doing here. Theres no note or anything with it and its just been sitting here on our counter for a couple days." Doug proceeded (in calm tones that may not have been coming out of my mouth had I answered) to explain what the problem was and then asked him to work on it. The phone rang a couple minutes later and I picked it up. Me: Hello? Guy2: Hi. We have some more information on your computer. Me: Oh ok, what is it. Guy2: Well, we haven't done anything to it yet but we are pretty sure its an internal power supply problem. So the cost of it will be $250 for labor and $200 for the part. Me: Well have you done the testing and diagnosis yet? We kind of just wanted you to do that. Guy2: Oh ok, that will be $150. Me: $150?! Wait a minute. When we came in on Saturday we were told that the fee was $59 how can it go from that to a 150? Guy2: Well I don't have anything written down about what your order was. That must have been Jason and he doesn't understand what exactly our prices were. Me (beginning to be very frustrated).: Well its not our fault you don't have anything written down and that was the price quoted to us. We don't want to pay you a $150 just to tell us whats wrong with it.... And on the conversation went with the guy telling me that it would take a lot of labor just to get into the computer and that it doesn't matter what we were told but it would cost us $150 to just open the darn thing up. So I finally told him I'd talk to my husband and call back. Needless to say we decided that if the person we dropped the computer off to doesn't seem to know the prices and obviously didn't touch the computer after we dropped it off a few days ago(even though he appeared to unscrew the back and start working on it right away) and can't even write our order down....well maybe we didn't want them working on our computer anyway. So we are going to take it to Salt Lake to the Apple Care Center and people who work on them everyday. Sorry that took so long to explain : ).....I just vented some very built up frustrations about the whole situation....So yeah......Thanks.

Ummm....Yeah its been a while....

Ok so I would say I'm sorry for not blogging for whats been 4 months but I'm not really. I have been so busy I don't know how I've had time to get enough sleep! I am in my last semester before I can graduate, teaching piano to 11 sometimes wonderful (when they practice) kids, serving as assistant to the secretary in Primary (where we have 5 soon to be 6 nurserys), and all the while trying to be a good wife who makes dinner and cleans the house (yeah I could do better). We have both been cruzin through this school year and it I can't believe midterms are next week. I am taking only music classes this semester and it is so nice not to have to worry about that 5 page english paper or math exam when I sit down to practice. I am working on some fun music this semester! I love learning new songs I just wish they didn't have to be performed and then given a grade. I'll be so excited when I can learn them without that pressure. Doug has been having fun teaching his middle school kids. He is trying to plan a trip down to Lagoon in the near future that should be really fun. We just have to wait and hear whether it gets approved. We have done some fun things since the new year has started. I'll list a few of the recent ones: - I started a quilt for someone (I won't say cause its a surprise). It's my first real piece quilt and I'm super excited about it! Its so cool. I'll post a picture and explain how it works later. - Doug got asked to play with the Rexburg Tabernacle Orchestra in a year or two? (cant remember when). So he's started to learn Saint Seans 3rd(?) Violin Concerto. - We went and rented a little cabin up in Island Park for Valentines day and it was so much fun. We went cross country skiing and saw tons of beautiful swans on the river. It was perfect because it snowed the night before and the sky was clear and sunny. (we had to do this a weekent before valentines because of whats coming next). - We went to Arizona last weekend to hear Doug's brother play his last recital for his doctorate program. He did awesome and we enjoyed the warmer weather, sun, and their two great kids. We had to drive to Salt Lake then get on a plane so it was a lot of travelling but it sure was fun. I got pretty sick on monday when we were supposed to travel back and thank goodness I have wonderful priesthood holders in my family who could give me a blessing. I started feeling better on the airplane and was able to travel. Well thats it. I'll get on more often now that this semester is winding down. I'm sure I'll have plenty of time in the near future! Yay for graduation!