So I Guess it is Time....

I Broke down and did it, after 9 months of no car I finally got one. What made me do this you ask? Well, I fully enjoy my scooter, but with how much it rains here (especially during hurricane season) I get drenched!! There have been numerous times that I have had to buy new clothes when I got to work becuase it started raining without warning and I didn't have time to put my rainpants on. Well, that was reason Number one that I have been dealing with willingly all year. The thing that made me make a decision was on Monday, two cars got in a wreck and a bumper flew at me on my little scooter. I must say it was VERY scary! I was so scared that as soon as I got home I told Chris we were going to the Honda dealership and getting me an Element! (I already knew that is what I wanted, and because I had one before I knew what I was looking for). We came home monday night with this beauty. It is nicer than my last one, mostly because it is a few years newer. I was so excited to drive it to work Tuesday Morning when I got because it was POURING rain! Yay! I got to work dry!

I am not, however, willing to give up the scooter though, and will still probably drive it on nice days or when I am making a quick run somewhere. I love that scooter, we have had some good times!

We Made it Two Years!!

Yesterday was Chris and I's 2nd Anniversary. Boy does time fly! I can't believe that it has already been two years! I am thankful every day that I have him, even though we have gone through our rough spots....I admit that I was not the most pleasant person to be around our first year of marriage while I was always on bedrest, but we learned a lot from it and this second year has been a great one! We moved to a whole new place and have been figuring things out together on our own which has been great for us. I know there will be many great times to come!

*Our wedding pictures were taken by Casey Hyer who is a great photographer in SLC, so if you need pictures taken get a hold of him!!! Thanks Casey for taking them for us, and thank you Alisa for letting us borrow him those few days!!!!

Back to Normal.......Almost

As Promised I have some pictures from Hurricane Ike. I thought I didn't have too many because when I was walking around outside a cop stopped me and made me go home because he said it wasn't safe enough, but after uploading them I do have quite a few good ones. The hurricane itself was pretty amazing. I have never been in such a storm. We actually were able to stand on our balcony because we are enclosed in our cement building and the wind was blowing parallel to us. everything was blowing so hard that it was horizontal, and there was so much rain that it was just a rushing river below us instead of a road. Our power went out at about midnight, but the actual hurricane did not hit us until 5:00 in the morning. As good as we fared, we only lost power and water for 6 days, there are many many people that are going to have a hard time getting back to normal. Many gymnasts that go to our gym have trees in their houses, and many people that evacuated cannot go back to their homes for quite awhile. Many people losts their lives, many more than they are reporting because they have not been able to go through a lot of the wreckage. I hope that they don't find as many bodies as they think they will. We were very blessed that we fared as well as we did. Anyway, the pictures here were just taken around my house the morning after the storm.

The Storm rolling in Friday night.

Sky lighting up with electric transformers

Looks Alright at first glance, the trees are a bit bare

The calm of the city after it was ravaged. Downtown got the brunt of the storm. This is the view from our apartment

Chris on the roof of our building

Poor little street sign by my house

This is the front of a church next to our building. Lots of debris everywhere

Another poor street sign. This was basically the norm. Whole billboards were twisted in knots by the freeways so I guess these little signs were lucky.

There were/still are trees down everywhere. They still have to cut most of them up so cars can get down the street.

This was a brand new gas station that had just opened by our house. Poor thing didn't get much time here in Houston.

This is what most of the power lines around our apartment looked like. Gee, I wonder why we didn't have any power. That is our apartment building in the background. this is the side we live on, and it was fine. The other sides had a lot of damage from debris and wind.

This is a tree that is blocking the whole road. I was trying to get back to my house, but had to go around. Yep, that is still my apartment behind that tree.

This is the Chase Building downtown. I looked like a bomb went off in it. Those are all blown out windows.

This is some of the flooding that happened right after. Those are the TOPS of the trees

More flooding

More flooding right up to the overpass

This is a building by me that has its whole roof blown off to its side

More trees downtown blocking the roads

Another building by me. Trees snapped like twigs.....

That is all the pictures I have, but they show a pretty good picture. This is the 3rd most expensive hurricane after Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Now to get back to Normal.....

Getting Ready for Ike!

So, people have been trying to get ahold of me about hurricane Ike, so I thought I would do a quick post so that everyone knows. Yes, Hurricane Ike is supposedly coming this way, and no we have not evacuated. Chris and I are right in downtown Houston, and we have all been told to stay where we are to prepare for the storm instead of getting on the roads and clogging them up. I am a little nervous because I have never been in a storm like this, but Chris and I are prepared so we should be fine. We are in a concrete building on the 5th floor so we are not too worried about the actual storm. It is supposed to be a category 3 hurricane when it hits land, but that is when it hits Galveston, so hopefully it will be a Cat. 2 when it gets to us. They say we could be without power for a week or so, but we have a lot of dried food and batteries, etc. It will be like we are camping in our apartment :) So....I guess I will post again after the storm sometime and let you all know how it went!

Cool Weekend

This weekend some of my co workers and I were able to go to Austin to a Gymnastics Association Banquet. It was very cool, and we were able to hear the Mens Olympic Gymnastics Coach talk about how the Mens team won Bronze even though they were underdogs and were not supposed to even make it into the finals! It gave me goosebumps!! It was a very cool weekend. The picture is not that great because it is from my phone, sorry.

I also need to put a few pictures from my first football game! Chris got me and my friend Julie Titus Martin (she just moved here from Utah! YAY!!) tickets to the Houston Texans vs Tampa Bay Bucaneers. The tickets were very close, and so even though neither of us knew very much about football we had a lot of fun! Sorry, pics are from my phone again.

And of course the cheerleaders for all you men out there ;)