Catch Up

We have had a good couple of weeks. About two weeks ago, we attended BJ's work party up in Provo Canyon, went home, went straight to sleep (early in the evening) and got up at 4am to drive to Oregon to see my family. The drive went well; we read the last Harry Potter book and listened to books on CD to keep awake. It was actually pretty enjoyable. We got to Oregon with plenty of time to spare and enjoyed the weekend with my family. Monday morning we got up early and drove out to the Sisters Wilderness (The Sisters are a group of mountains in Oregon) and we put our backpacks on and hiked up to Moraine Lake on the South Sister. We stayed two nights. There were LOTS of mosquitoes and mosquito bites, despite the best efforts of repellents, badges, and other mosquito deterrents. We were all quite sore too. Part of our group hiked to the summit of the mountain (the 3rd highest in the state) on the second day, and on the third day we hiked down the mountain. What nice things showers are! We all couldn't wait to get home and get clean.
During our week in Oregon, we went to see the Body Worlds III exhibit at OMSI. Wow. It was really interesting and amazing. They exhibited bodies preserved in a new way (called plastination)- they won't decay or anything- they become fairly sturdy, while preserving very closely the way things actually look. It sounds a little morbid, but I felt that it was very tastefully and respectfully done. By walking through the exhibit (which took us several hours, much more than the 90 minutes they estimated) it was possible to see and learn about every system of the body. I don't know where it will be exhibited next, but it's worth seeing.
On Saturday night, we helped my siblings throw a country western party/ dance. We used fun decorations and props, set up a chuck wagon, hitchin' post, and dance floor. We set up hay bales in the grass, and had everyone dress up. BJ and I taught a partner circle dance and some line dances, we had a watermelon eating contest, and costume judging. There were some pretty good ones.

Country Dance Party

The next morning BJ and I drove home and finally got in pretty late. We miss everyone, but it is good to be home. Since being home, I have been trying to get things put away and back to normal, and I have also been trying to finish interviews for the research I am working on so that we can start analyzing data soon. (If any of you have aspirations toward being interviewed and having your ideas about public health benefit society, let me know! lol) I will mainly be working on that this week. The idea is that we will have all the data analyzed in a couple of months, and the professor I work for and I will be going to the American Public Health Association conference in Washington D.C. to present our research, and hopefully be published. We know we have been accepted to present at the public health conference, and I have my ticket already, but there is a lot of work to be done before that.
Other than that, there's not a ton going on, but we will sure keep you posted.