OKC Bombing Anniversary

Last Saturday, April 19th, was the 13th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. We've visited the memorial grounds several times, but this time the museum was free to the public. We spent our afternoon there and it was neat to see all the help and volunteerism that occurred the following weeks. There is a tree that survived the blast. It's called the Survivor Tree. Every year they give out saplings of the tree. We want to get one the year we leave and plant it wherever we move. It would be neat to know the story behind it. 

These pictures show the building next door. All the light brown windows are actually bricked up. They were never replaced. 

The other picture shows a gate. The water is a reflecting pool where the street in front of the Federal Building was. The street continues on either side of the memorial, but this section is closed off. The grass in the background is where the building was. There are 168 chairs representing those killed. You can kind of see them. The gate you see says 9:01 above the opening, the other gate (behind me) shows 9:03...before and after the blast. It's a really neat memorial.

Anniversary

Sorry this has taken so long to post.  We had planned to go out to a place called Red Rock Cafe. However, when I came home from school Tricia had decked the house out in tea candles (about 50)  and had cooked a beautiful meal of parmesan chicken.  Of course it was way to bright outside to light any of the candles but the food was amazing.  Our cake was still really really good.  We were pretty surprised b/c after all it was a year old and had traveled across country.  Thank goodness for thick insulating fondant.  I just wanted to publicly thank Tricia for all that she does and is.  She works so hard for us not just here at home but also bringing home the bacon while I am at school.  She it the best thing that has ever happened to me.  Everyday I get to spend with her makes even the bad days great.  Tricia you are my everything and my all.  

Love you always,

Tristan 

Happy 1st Anniversary!

I can't believe it's been a year already...and at the same time it's only been a year since Tristan and I got married. The time has flown but it seems I've known him forever. I can't imagine my life without Tristan.

The day was beautiful and both our families were all there, which made the day all the more perfect. There were only 3 sealings in the Salt Lake Temple that day, which made for a peaceful quite celebration, and a less crowded area more so we could focus on the special sacred part of a wedding day. The tulips were blooming (my favorite) and the trees on Temple Square were in bloom and when the breeze blew, all the blossoms would come down like a waterfall.

If you can tell behind the bouquet, this is when I accidentally flipped off everyone at the Temple. I was trying to demonstrate limp bunny ears. The guys got a kick out of it.

We had a dinner with our closest friends and family at Noah's in Pleasant Grove. The room was decorated amazingly by Angela, Tristan's mom, and the food was all prepared by my mom and aunt Sue and several others. Everyone made it so nice for us. Even though we didn't have dishes suddenly for the dinner, I was so pleased with everything else paper would have suited me. But thank goodness to make it nice Angela stepped in to save the day. :) These are the girls trying to catch the bouquet, and Tristan helping me get cake off my face. If you look closely you'll see that our cake top is two elephants with intertwined trunks.

I feel so blessed to have a wonderful family and be part of a new family.

Tristan, I love you so much! I am glad we can spend our lives together and all time after that. I am amazed by how well we go together. I am constantly surprised by what a great person you are and I keep thinking none of this can get any better, and it does...and we're only in the first year. You are the most amazing person in the world and I feel so lucky to be your wife.

Love me

Eischens

We went to this great restaurant the other night with our good friends, Lindsey and Brandt. It took us forever driving in the middle of nowhere to get there, but it was so worth it.  The menu was extensive, they serve half a fried chicken, or a whole one.  It's just the greatest chicken. If you want to feel like a redneck in OK this is it. No utensils, just a lot of napkins, no cups, just a can of whatever pop you order and for sides nachos and okra (fried of course!). No plates, just a piece of paper. Anyways, we got there early and it's a good thing too, because at lunch and dinner it gets PACKED!! There is no hostess of any kind. Those who want a table just stand around you until you are done. When you leave, they pull up a huge garbage can, chuck everything off the table and the next group sits down. It was great!Oh yeah, they only take cash so we had to use the atm next door and this was posted. Nothing like a small town in the middle of farming nowhere.

My Kite

For Easter I got a My Little Pony kite in my basket. OK is perfect for flying these because it's always windy. We tried it out the other day.

Our New Neighbors

So, our kitchen window looks into a window of the house next door. The lady who owns it lives across the street in another house and  uses the one next to us as a large storage unit. We thought it was empty, but last week some fun new neighbors moved in. I shouldn't spy but they left the window open. :)

Thunderstorms

We have been having some really big thunderstorms lately.  Most of the really damaging stuff has been to the east of us near Tulsa and the Arkansas border.  However,  I really don't know why but the thunder here is sooooo loud.  As an example of this a couple of days ago while Tristan was at school, a thunderstorm hit.  It kept getting closer and closer and louder and louder.  Until BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  A huge lightning bolt crashed outside and the thunder that followed was so loud it made our house vibrate and made my car alarm go off!  I know my brother Ben will be jealous because he LOVES thunderstorms. Anyways, we'll post pictures soon.

Tornadoes

At 1:30 this morning we awoke to the sound of the tornado sirens going off. They go off if there are circulations in the clouds that could possibly touch ground. I distinctly remember thinking it was my alarm clock and how I wanted to break it, and why in the world it was going off at that time. 

Once we got our minds cleared, we turned on the tv. I wanted to hide in the closet like I've been trained (No, not like that) but we realized it was north of us. It probably affected some of our friends and ward members. Well have to check on them. I think today I'll take a nap. 

OKLAHOMA!

The great thing about Oklahoma is that we have a state song. You guessed it, Oklahoma from OKLAHOMA! Not only is our spelling of the state better, but we are learning the words to the song because at large events, everyone will stand and sing it together. It's like being in a Broadway, with no dancers and I don't know my lines. It's fun, I love it! 

Rangers vs. White Sox

We have a friend who works for the Red Hawks (a minor league baseball team) out here in OKC and he offered us some tickets to watch an exhibition game for the Texas Rangers and the Chicago White Sox. We were close enough that all those t-shirts and foul balls that you see from a distance (and usually below your seat) fly into the crowd were actually over our heads. 

The best part was a house cat, black with white feet, mysteriously came onto the field near the White Sox dugout. Poor thing was scared to death with all the noise. He soon disappeared out a fence, possibly to train for the next big game and find the exit sooner. ;)

Puppy

Last week while we were planting grass seed, a dog wandered into our yard. All we had to feed her was wheat bread. We realized her collar was so tight, so I took it off and she suddenly perked up and in fact decided she wanted to visit all the neighbors. She jumped every fence, and when we called her, she'd jump back to us. She really took to us and would sit in the front yard if we drove away and she'd stay there until we came back. We found it in our hearts that maybe dogs shouldn't live off bread alone. After calling several friends, we finally took her to the shelter. Hopefully a family has found her. Oh yeah, we called her Puppy. Aren't we flowing with creativity?!

New Project for Joe

My brother Joe is very talented at making / carving furniture out of wood. We took these pictures at the arena at OKC fairgrounds to introduce him to his next project. :) Tristan did not want to be in the picture I realized later (you can tell by the look on his face). Sorry Sweetie, I was trying to show the size of the log. You're still cute!

Circus Fun

The other night we went to the India Shrine Circus here in OKC. Even though the arena smelled like animals and popcorn we had loads o' fun. There were tigers doing tricks (even a white tiger), trapeze artists, motorcycle riders in those hug metal globe cages, Frisbee catching dogs, and high diving house cats (one of my favorites), elephants that moved in ways that should break any pachyderm, and one of the most amazing...bears that would sit and walk more like people than animals and one who even knew how to pedal a bicycle and steer it around the ring. Here's a picture of a guy on a rotating ring thing. He would run around the small ring while the whole thing spun. It was awesome. You can see him at the top kind of laying back. We are determined to build one when we have room. :) Apologies for the fuzzy pictures. 

Stat Counter

This is something my friend friend Abby showed me on her blog. It's supposed to save time, but I only spend more time on the computer first looking at EVERYONE'S blog several times in one sitting (yes, I think you'll update them for my enjoyment every 10 minutes) and then I go to this website trying to figure out who looks at ours. No worries...I still have no idea, but I have guesses. You can download this stat counter that shows when a computer looks at your blog. We even had someone from Belgium. You can also see what city they are from and what page they were on before they got to you. Anyways, try it. It's fun to see that even if people don't make comments, they are looking at our little page...probably doing the same thing I am. :)

statcounter.com

Easter Eggs

This year we decided to keep going with my family tradition of painting wooden eggs.  Usually we try and paint something that has happened during the year.  We have been missing our pets lately so we decided to paint them.  I painted feral on top of a mouse and Tristan painted Thomas.

 

                               

  We also decided to dye eggs.  Neither of us like 

them hard boiled so we just did them raw and tried 

our best not to have them break.