Our Time in Tucson

It was so nice of Dan and Amanda to let us stay with them in Tucson! They planned some really fun activities for us to do with them.

The first day, we went on a tram ride up a mountain and enjoyed seeing and learning about some desert wildlife. I was amazed by all of the cacti!

 

See all of the green lines on the mountains in this picture? Those are all suaro cacti (spelling?). It took me a while to learn that they are not saguaro cacti...Sam kept letting me say it that way because he thought it was funny.

 

Dan and Amanda on the tram!

 

Sam and I

 

We stopped at a fun little pond with a little waterfall. We played in the water, and these little fish were so funny! They would come up and nibble on your feet, which felt extremely ticklish!

I found out about one of Sam's hidden talents...skipping rocks!

I'm looking rather pregnant in this one.

Dan decided to go swimming.

The prickly pear cacti were so neat! Apparently you can actually buy prickly pear jelly and candies and things like that.

That night we went on another little hike. While we were hiking, an oncoming hiker warned us that there was a rattlesnake on the trail ahead! The others were pretty nonchalant about it, but I was frantically scanning the trail ahead. Somehow, I knew that if there was a rattlesnake, I would have an encounter with it. Thankfully it moved before I caught sight of it.

A shadow picture!

Amanda (Sam's sister), Sam, and I

Sam and Dan posing like the cactus

The next day, we drove up to the top of a mountain to see the different in climate and surroundings! This looked much more like the mountains we are used to seeing in Utah, and the weather was significantly cooler up here. We enjoyed a picnic and walked around a little bit.

The two colored specks near the top of the picture are Dan and Sam. They climbed up to the top of a big rock gathering!

Close-up...sorry to cover your face, Dan!

Remnants of fires were quite common, as you can see in the background of this picture.

On the way down, Dan caught a horny toad!

It was so nice to be able to stay with them and take a fun vacation in the midst of our move. Thanks, Dan and Amanda!

The Big Move!

We woke up early on the morning of Tuesday, August 18, and headed out! Sam was amazing and drove us the entire way, since I wasn't too keen on driving the huge U-Haul with our car being towed behind. 

Here we are setting off!

 

We drove and drove and got to Tucson, Arizona, around 12:30 am. We stayed with Sam's sister, Amanda, and her husband, Dan, for 2 days. Then, it was back into the cramped cab of the U-Haul and off to Texas!

The drive through New Mexico went pretty quickly. We didn't experience much of it, other than seeing old, abandoned cars and trucks turned upside down in fields, garbage lining the roads, and other interesting sights. We stopped at a gas station, and I got out to use the bathroom, only to find a huge swarm of hundreds of bees all around the door! I am not a big fan of bees. In fact, I don't like them much at all. Especially after reading about the killer bee attacks. And due to the fact that I tend to attract quite a bit of trouble, I stayed far away. Somehow, a bee still landed on my foot and crawled around until Sam got it away. I decided to lock myself in the cab of the truck and watch as the natives walked through the bees as if they did not exist. Finally, the store manager came out with something to swat the bees with, but they all started flying inside the store, so he gave it up. Somehow the whole situation was rather comical!

Here is a picture taken from my perch inside the cab while I waited for Sam. You can't see the bees very well, but I promise, they were everywhere!

 

We finally entered Texas, and what a joy that was! We felt that we were nearing the end of our journey, but in reality, we had another 15+ hours in front of us. After our drive through El Paso with Mexico on one side and Texas on the other (I'm so glad we live in America! It was devastating to see the contrast between the areas on either side of the freeway.), a pretty huge rainstorm hit. Not wanting to take any chances with our big truck towing the car, we pulled off and waited until it subsided a little bit.

Rainclouds in the distance

 

We crashed into a motel in Seguin, Texas (just outside of San Antonio) at about 2:00 in the morning, and then stumbled back onto the road at 5:30. Just 3 hours or so later, though, we made it to Houston! Just in time to see this beautiful sunrise!

 

We are having a great time here. We are really settling in, and Sam is enjoying his research and classes a lot. We're getting used to milk lids you pop on instead of screw on, horizontal stoplights instead of vertical, absolutely insane amounts of traffic, cheap gas prices :), lots of heat and humidity, big bugs, cloudy skies, rainy weeks, and friendly Texans!

A Zipline and Some Pregnant Women

Our last days in Utah were a crazy whirlwind of events. After packing all week with the help of my mom and sister (thanks!), we graduated (see below). Immediately after convocation, we came back to our apartment where family was waiting to help us load everything up. We filled a big trailer, which my parents took up to Kaysville, and then finished cleaning and checking out of the apartment. Late that night, we got to Kaysville where we crashed and spent the next couple of days in hurried, last minute preparations for our big move!

On Sunday, we returned to Provo for Church and to say final good-byes. We then returned to Kaysville, and early Monday morning, we picked up our U-Haul. We loaded it up, transferring our things from the house and trailer, and that afternoon headed up to Heber Valley Camp to be part of the White Family Reunion for a couple of hours.

They had a zipline (I sat out, considering the pregnancy...). Here is Sam getting ready to climb up and cross the log to the zipline!

Just leaving the platform...

...and ending the thrilling ride!

My 10-year-old sister, Avalon, after her turn.

Losaunne, 17

Bronson, 9, "ran" like crazy through the air throughout his entire ride!

3 pregnant girls! Laura (sister-in-law), who is due right around Thanksgiving, Jocilyn (sister), who just had her baby on September 25, and me, who should deliver sometime this week! And, we are all having boys!

Even though we could only be there for a little while, it was fun to be there while we could.

We Graduated!

What a great feeling to finish up at BYU and head off to start new adventures! Sam graduated, and I was able to walk, although my I won't get my diploma until I finish up my online class. Sam got to say the prayer for the ceremony, so he was up on the stand, and they were nice enough to arrange for me to sit up there with him!

We're the ones in the center of the picture. Sorry it's kind of blurry.

 

 

This is us with Sam's mentor, Dr. O'Neill.

 

Here we are with my parents.

 

Here we are with Sam's mom, brother (Don), and sister (Kellie).

And with his dad...

Showing off our baby!

In front of the Brigham Young statue and my workplace, the Abraham O. Smoot Building.

And a few weeks later, Sam's diploma arrived! He is officially a BYU graduate.