Back from the farm...

Okay, I'm back from the farm. I have to begin with some very discouraging news to all, I'm sure. Since there is no real way to prepare one for such news, I will have to simply say it. I did not get to feed a baby anything a bottle. *gasp, mixed with an expression of absolute shock* Yes, I know. Life has lost it's purpose, right? The trip was actually really fun, despite constantly sweating (humidity has that effect) and having a constant fear of a tick finding it's way to my innards. We hiked a lot, canoed 15 miles down a river, and just basked in the awesomeness that is the wilderness.

I couldn't help but notice, however, the difference in the day's activities, depending on whether or not the certain person was a parent. There was the kidless group and the kidful group (I say 'kidful' because every person that had kids had a minimum of 3; that's pretty full of kids, if you ask me). There were really advantages and disadvantages to both sides, and I can't decide which group it is better to be in while trecking through the wilds and sleeping in the roughness (I am by no means an 'outdoorsy' type, so any kind of sleeping done outside of a fluffy four-posted bed is technically 'roughing it'). Sometimes it was advantageous to be in the kidful group, because Josh's mom would get them better treats. Sometimes it was advantageous to be in the kidless group because you could spontaneously decide to go on a 2 hour hike through incredibly dense forest without having to pack for an 87 day adventure. Seriously though. We would be going to take one of the kids 14 feet away and the mom of the said child would be stuffing diapers, changes of clothes, bottles, tools, toys, pictures, food, cameras and every other imaginable and unimaginable object alike, into a very small and very black bag of sorts. It was astounding, if not heavy.

I also realized while adventuring in the midwest (we hit Illinois, Indiana, and Missouri) that there were times I was too busy sweating to actually do anything else. Seriously. Sweating became more of an activity than a bi-product or result of another activity. People would ask what we were going to do later that night and we would shrug, look around at each other, and say that we were probably just going to sweat tonight. They would nod and say that they were initially planning on sweating Friday night, but that they had to go to their son's Little League game instead. Little did they know that they would likely be doing both.

Here are some pictures and stuff. We spent the first day in St. Louis and went to a Cardinals game. Here is Josh and I...

While still in St. Louis, we went to the arch, the Gateway to the West. Here is a picture of us gangmembers doing the sign for 8, being that we were riding in pod 8 to the top of the arch. Don't ask. We think we're pretty cool.
After St. Louis, we went to grandma's farm for a couple of days. Here are some pictures of the barns and the dilapidated house that houses the corpses of many dead animals. Its pretty on the outside, but very creepy on the inside.


After battling it out with nature, I stole over to Utah for a little time with two of my sisters, or 'sistas' as they are apparently called (props to Meg). It was awesome being back (I'm pretty pathetic since I've only been gone for about 3 months), and I had a blast that weekend. Something unusual for me, but not so unusual for my white-trash sister, Meg, is the roller blading we did. We are pretty awesome.
And here are me, Meg, and Britt on the Sunday that I left, right before we went to church (damn, we're righteous). The night before all 3 of us went to dinner and a movie (my absolute favorite date ever...), with my two best friends, Annie and Haylee. It was rad.