2011 Merry Christmas

This year we decided to actually do a Christmas letter.  I emailed the letter out so if you didn't get it that way and want a copy please email me at Nielsenb33@gmail.com.  We plan to do a letter each year so there will be more to come.  Also, I will be posting blog updates more than once a year, I hope:-)

Yellowstone

Tyler and I went camping in Yellowstone National Park on August 12th and 13th, 2010.  We went with our friends Jen, Richard, and (their cute baby Saydee).  Jen, my friend from college, planned the whole thing. 

She was so awesome to pick up all the food, find a car big enough for us all to fit in, and she picked out a campground for us to stay at (many, many thanks to Jen and Rickard).  Not to mention the two day, two night trip only cost us $94.00 dollars (which included gas, food, and camp).  We had awesome food too, pancakes and bacon for breakfast, tin foil dinners, and yummy snacks. We all stayed two nights at Norris campgound.  We arrived just in time to get the perfect camping spot on Thursday morning.

The first day we drove the Northern loop, which had many cool sites to see.  We even saw a grizzly bear and two cubs about a 1/2 mile away from us on our first day (thankfully the bears were no where near our camp).

The second day we drove the southern loop.  I thought the loops seemed really long at first, but we drove them fairly quick.  For those of you who haven't been, there is actually quite a bit of hiking, which I didn't expect.  It wasn't intense hiking or anything, but you definitely need to be prepared to do quite a bit of walking, which was great.

See what I mean about the hiking. 

My amazing husband Tyler.  What an eerie background.

US <3

Waterfalls are one of my favorite things, I could spend the day here.

Shhhhh, Tyler's pondering.

Mama bear and her two cubs.  You can see all three if you click on the picture.

Lot's of hiking, which was awesome!

So many random super blue water spots throughout the park.

There were a lot of tourists from Asia and Germany.  Looks like some of them don't know Buffalos are dangerous.  Get back in your car lady! 

The water is hot, but the steam felt good since it was a cool day.

Picutres never do justice.  The color here was so interesting.

Old Faithful, need I say more!

Precious.

Jen, Richard, and Saydee we had such a good time together!

Hello, hi, helloooo....look through the trees and you can see a herd of wild buffalo.

Yellowstone Falls, the prettiest site in the park.

Our campsite.  I didn't get a picture with our tents up, darn. ;-)

Overdue Vacation in Saint George

So the last vacation we had was almost four years ago, it was our honeymoon.  Our honeymoon was certainly a vacation but it was also a move to Utah. 

We stayed at a hotel here and there, but mostly camped for the 10 day move/honeymoon.  The camping trip idea came about because I never camped with my parents because summer was our busy season.

Devils Tower, 2006 (just one of many national parks we visited).
 

Tyler knew I was struggling a little bit with working so much as I hadn't had a day off since February.  He asked me where I would go if I could take a vacation so I described what I wanted to do and he planned it.  He did such a great job because we had an absolute blast.  We left Thursday May 13th and came back Sunday Afternoon the 16th.  We mainly hung out, laid by the pool, played games, went to Iron Man II, went out to eat at Pancho and Lefty's, walked around a few parks, and did a little shopping.  It was so nice to get out of the house and be together.  Well enough chatter, I posted some pictures below.

Saint George Laquinta

Palm Trees only 3.5 hours away by car!

Our Room

Tyler just happy as can be

Having a good time

I loved this rock park, it was fun.

Tyler, I adore you!  Thank you so much for being my best friend and knowing exactly what I need when I need it.  Love you, Brenda

Business Trip in LA & Lucky Layover in MN

I have been at my job for about six months and I absolutely love it. At this stage in my life I consider this my “dream job.” I feel I have freedom to be creative and take initiative with the various projects I work on, there are lot’s of perks (hello travel), and a great group of people to work with (I <3 my coworkers).

I traveled to Baton Rouge Louisiana in Feb 2010 and I had a layover flight both legs of my trip. On the way to LA I laid over in Atlanta, on my way home I was supposed to layover in Nashville.

So I made it to Louisiana at about 6:30pm. Time to pick up my rental car, drive to the hotel, and find some food. 

(Below is the sweet car I drove, very awesome and fun, but I do love the car I have right now, but only because it's paid for.  The picture of the palm trees is the view outside my hotel room, very pretty and nice, I still can't believe it actually snowed the day I took this picture, I guess snow likes to follow me).

The meeting is at 9:00am the next day – mind you I lost an hour with the time change.

You may need a little background as to why I am in LA in the first place. One of the main responsibilities I have is to research nationwide textbook adoptions. When we choose to participate in a textbook adoption there are usually a publisher meetings someone needs to attend (cue Brenda).

These meetings take place at various state capitols and involve publisher’s reps and the Instructional Materials Bureau of a perspective state. The meetings range from two hours to four hours. I attend the meeting to take notes and meet and greet with the IMB personnel during breaks so they know who I represent (I usually correspond with the IMB for the adoption process which can last up to a year).

A picture I took of Baton Rouge's Capitol Building

Once the meeting is over I usually have time to enjoy some sight seeing. Depending on what region I am in I will find some ethnic food to enjoy. Recently in LA I was able to eat some Popeye’s Chicken & Biscuits (Ok time was running short so I didn’t have time to find a good Cajun place, but still).

Time to fly home, I return my rental car, arrive at the airport well in advance only to find that my flight is cancelled. I wasn’t too upset since I figured I would make it home sooner or later. I was talking to the guy who was looking for flights. He wasn’t having much luck since every flight out of Baton Rouge was cancelled. I know there are a lot of flights between MSP and SLC so I asked if I could be routed through Minneapolis. He said, “man I didn’t even think of that” I am thinking “seriously, you are going to take my advice” and sure thing he did. I was able to fly out of New Orleans Airport.

I had to take a taxi to New Orleans to head up to Minnesota. I crammed in a taxi with a grouchy New Yorker and a nice Midwestern family man, luckily the New Yorker sat up front and didn’t say a word to anyone. It was about an hour drive to New Orleans but we made it. I had 50 minutes to check in for my flight and get though security but I made it.

I arrived in MN at about 8:30pm and was able to stop by my mother in-laws house to surprise her, and it definitely worked as my sister in-law opened the door with a look of shock on her face. I was so happy that I was able to surprise visit my parents and they were definitely happy to have me home for a couple days.

MN has snow! Check out these piles, and check out my DQ dip cone :-)

What a great trip I had and I now look forward to layovers and bad weather. Just kidding, but still I learned that just keeping my cool and not overreacting over a cancelled ticket enabled me to think clear and be respectful to the person trying to find me a trip home.

Back to Life Back to Reality

It's really back to reality after a two week vacation in Minnesota. We flew out December 18th and just got back New Year's Day. We had such a blast and are glad to come home in one piece. It was so good being with family. I especially enjoyed seeing my parents who I hadn’t seen in six months. Normally we talk to them on the webcam, but seeing them in person is so much better.

This picture is at my house with my parents

It was hard to come back after another visit home. We really hope and pray we don't have to visit MN much longer. The airlines haven't hired anyone in at least a year and a half, but that is changing as Tyler just discovered the airlines are starting to recall furloughed pilots and some airlines are actually interviewing and hiring!! This is definitely a shout for joy! He can’t apply yet as he only has about 800 hours of total flight time when he needs about 1000 to be competitive. The good news is that things are definitely looking up for next year (as long as nothing to major happens with the economy). We have been in Utah quite a bit longer than we'd like but we do enjoy the family, friends, and mountains here. 

I thought I would post a few pictures of Christmas 2009 in Minnesota!  Check them out below.

Tyler and I opening presents at his mom's house.

Tyler and Preston (bro) shoveling snow in their T-Shirts (Mind you it was 20 degrees out).

Tyler and I decorated some sugar cookies my mom made.

We played lot's of games - Life was way fun!

I will miss my parents, and hope to see them in March.

We're moving again!

We are on to our fourth move in Utah....weird...well this is how it all started.

We got hitched, decided we wanted to move to Utah so Tyler could go to UVU's flight school and I would high jump and triple jump for UVU for a couple years until we gratduated and then we would move back to Minnesota after a maximum stay of three years.

This is almost all true except for the part about staying only three years....

We moved to Orem in 2006 lived in a large apartment complex for about 9 months, said to heck with that and moved to Provo and lived in a basement apartment for almost two years, couldn't stay there any longer so we moved a block and a half to a half of a house, which was a great place for 9 months, but with getting better jobs and realizing that we were SICK of living in a old rickety apartment we wanted something nicer,  well that apartment is only a few more blocks away, so we are moving into a four-plex in December.  (I hope you enjoyed that run on sentence as much as I did).

So it may seem odd that we haven't moved back yet.  We decided since everyone likes to blame there problems on the economy that is EXACTLY what we are going to do, but we are for real...seriously, do you see any airlines hiring...I didn't think so.

Thanksgiving is almost here! I find it hard to believe I haven’t seen my parents for turkey day for almost three years. Unfortunately this is a side effect of moving 1000 miles away from home. Miss you mom and dad!

Since Christmas is about a month away I decided I am going to write a Christmas letter this year. I figure it would be nice to update friends and family about what Tyler and I have been up to….which isn’t much but school, work, graduate, work, and life. Hmmm, that could be my opening line. Bahh, just kidding I guess I could elaborate a little bit.