Road Trip!

Over the river,

And through the windmills,

I almost got lost

On my way to Grandma's house...There it is!

Since I rarely make it back to Iowa to begin with, and I have been rather delinquent in keeping in touch with my Grandma I was long over due to pay her a visit. So I planned a day trip to Alta to see her. I made the trip across the state solo for the first time. I have GPS and been back and forth probably a hundred times, surely it would be a piece of cake, right? Well Hwy 20 goes farther now, oh yeah and I haven't updated the GPS maps in a year and a half...oops. So once I was driving through what my GPS Jack thought was a field I turned him off and pulled out the map from the glove box, also not accurate but at least I could find my own route. On every other trip home I usually fall asleep for at least half of it and when I do drive a parent usually points out the turns I need to make. Growing up in the area they seem to have this innate understanding of every highway in the area and what little towns are strung along them. I know my way around sort of but I've never actually driven the roads. Anyways I made it to Grandma's and we had a nice afternoon together.

Grandma and I

Now I know where my desire to collect mason jars comes from :)

On the way out of town I decided to drive along the lake. I made a pit stop at my favorite neighborhood park growing up.

And my favorite playground lady bug is still there! Although the paint job is worn and now it looks a little creepy...

I don't like that, I don't want that, no, Nooo!

The title of this post comes from a little girl I used to babysit named Laine (who is a senior in high school this year, yikes!) Anyways when you attempted to put something she didn't like on her plate she would squeal these words. Well being a picky eater myself I could relate. Recently I have come to the conclusion I am not a picky eater however, I was just raised to think I was. Either that or my taste buds have changed (probably a combination of the two). I have heard somewhere that a person's taste buds change every 7 years, so something you didn't like before you may love now and vice versa. I did a little un-scientific google search and it appears that taste buds do change every 5-7 years.

So now I try to try foods that I previously would have said "no way" to eating. I figure it is unfair to say I don't like something if I don't remember ever trying it in the first place. I don't like to cook but Ben does so when he comes to visit he makes meals for us, and so far I've liked everything! I did think he was a little crazy when we went to a grill out with some friends and all we brought along were vegetables (NO MEAT?) but it was good, and we had some left overs for a pick nick the next day!

Farmers market loot: squash, zucchini, eggplant and cherry tomatoes

All grilled up

Pick nick with left over veggies and grown up PB&J sandwiches (nutella and raspberry preserves)

Roasted red pepper hummus and our pick nick decor

Grilled chicken with pesto penne pasta and cherry tomatoes and squash

Birthdays!

This has been a summer full of birthdays. In June we celebrated Allison's birthday. July was Erin's birthday and mine was in August.

A group of us gathered and got drinks to help Al celebrate getting old (24)

We had dinner and played games to celebrate Erin turning her ideal age (27)

And Al threw me a party for my birthday complete with tissue paper pom poms and rainbow raspberry lemonade cake. Unfortunately the only picture I have of the night is of Ben (I was too busy being the birthday girl I guess)... every time I looked at him he had another garnish on his margarita glass!

For my birthday dinner Ben made sushi for us. To be honest I was a bit nervous to be eating raw fish out side of a sushi restaurant. Where we bought the fish from did not have any sushi grade fish so we ended up cooking it anyways. It turned out sooo good!

Externships

In the middle of July we had to apply for our externship sites. Our fourth year is spent seeing patients at three different locations. One is done at the clinic at school, one is at a private practice and the third is at an institutional site (hospital, surgery center, VA, etc.) I had been dreading picking my top 8 sites for the two off campus locations. So one afternoon I sat down with the list of choices, my computer and the application and researched and read about other students experiences and googled how far each was from home, Memphis and the nearest relative.

It turned out I got my top choices at the time I wanted them! So I will be in...

Kansas City, MO for the summer semester (May-August)

Back at school for fall semester (September- December)

And my last semester of school ever will be in Des Moines, IA

The 4th of July

This year Paul came down for the Fourth of July weekend. We went down to the river to see fireworks and Paul and Penny had a relaxing weekend :)

For the actual 4th Jenny and her husband had some friends over for a grill out/ pot luck dinner with homemade ice cream.

Jenny, Jessie and Kaila

Yummy vanilla ice cream!

My Best Friend's Wedding

The start of June brought Jodee's wedding. It was a whirl-wind weekend. Ben and I flew out Friday morning and flew back Sunday night. We had a blast helping Jo and Blake celebrate! I enjoyed being able to catch up with Jodee's family along with my own too!

At the rehearsal dinner:

Getting her hair done:

Getting ready (this angle seems to accentuate our height difference even more!)

My favorite picture of the night:

Ev and I:

Paul and I:

Second favorite picture of the night...

After the reception Jeff kindly shared his taco bell with Ben...

Jo and I at the end of the night:

Congrats to Jodee and Blake!

sorry none of my pictures of just the two of them together turned out :(

Memorial Day Weekend

At the end of May some of Ben's family from Michigan came to visit Tennessee. I was invited to the weekend festivities to meet everyone. I got into town pretty late since Ben lives about 4 and a half hours away. So I met everyone on Saturday morning. The weekend was filled with good food, site-seeing, bonfires and family time. I really enjoyed getting to meet everyone. On Sunday we went to a nearby town where there was a giant tree house. I hear there was an architect who was inspired (by God?) to build this big tree house. There are church services held in the tree house, but I'm not really sure of the schedule, the rest of the time it is open for people to explore and experience. It was really amazing!

View of the tree house from the ground

Architecture just wraps around the tree and it's branches

Pew in the Sanctuary area

View of the tree house from the third-ish story

On the side of the tree house at one of the "decks"

View of the grounds from the same "deck"

After exploring the tree house we went to a park area to see a waterfall. First we were at the stream at the top, then we hiked down to the pool at the bottom. The water was so cold, but refreshing since it was a hot day!

Looking up stream

Cooling our feet off

Waterfall!

On the hike to the bottom

Ben and I

Looking back up

Ben's family playing in the water

Ben exploring the other end of the pool

It was a wonderful way to start the summer!