The Guido Story

I am kinda on a blogging frenzy right now, but here is the long promised Guido story for Matt and Carla. This story was written by my little brother, Robert. When Matt and Carla went to Disney Land, we watched Guido for a week and brought him up to Star Valley with us. Robert was very excited for his visit. Pay attention to the creative spelling, translations are under each picture.

When Guido is coming over

On Friday, Gwedow (Guido) is coming over. Its going to be fun. He is staying until Sunday.

He is a puppy! He is a pug. He is fun. He is white, he is black on his face. (notice the picture)

When he gets here Im going to play with him.

He eats everything. And he eats his dog food fast! If it is 9:30 pm he eats
quick and its still 9:30.

Then sometimes he eats our carpet. My Mom and Dad don't like that. (he has never been to our house so I think he had just heard stories of the carpet eating Guido. haha)

When he leaves Ill take a picture.

About the author: My name is Robert Walker. I like hunting and fishing. I have 3 dogs and 4 sisters and 2 (1) brother (2 boys). I like reading. It is fun.

Justin Douglas Walker

is going on a mission to San Fernando, CA. He spoke on Sun and sang with two of my sisters! They did such a great job! with everything! The song brought us all to tears. We are so proud of our Justin! He is going to be such a great missionary! And a handsome one at that!

Kaitlynn received her YW in Excellence award the same day! Congratulations
and way to work hard!

We had a little lunch after church, and got to see lots of cousins and friends. This is one of Dean's boys, Gavin. He liked the flash of the camera.

2 roommates and friends, 2 beautiful brides, 2 amazing weddings

This week we went to two beautiful weddings. Both of them were roommates from my first year at Utah State.

Dana and Jesse got married at Wadley Farms in Lindon on Wed May 19. It was a gorgeous day and the farm was astounding. Jesse's bishop conducted the ceremony and his advice was so good. I loved how he told them that there is a lot of turmoil and instability in the world, but it does not have to exist in your marriage and your home. We loved that. We always want to keep our home as a place of comfort and peace. Congratulations to this happy couple!!










Not to mention a gorgeous dress.




































Angella and Ben married on Sat May 22 at Thanksgiving Point. She has spent so much time planning this wedding and wow it paid off! So beautiful! Angella was my roommate the first year as well. Ben is one of Mark's engineering buddies and he also lived on the same floor as me, Mark, Angella, and Dana. So fun! Ben's brother was the ring bearer and he dropped the rings twice as he came running in. It was adorable. :) The pastor that married them told them that you do not marry one person, you marry three: the person you think they are, the person they really are, and the person they will become through being married to you. We thought that was cute.

I loved her dress as well and her jewelry was incredible. Her sister MADE her necklace and earrings! Incredible. Congratulations to Ben and Angella!














These are my old roommates. (Jesse in the corner, haha) then Rhiannon, Shanae, Dana. Fun that weddings bring us together again.

Updates

This last semester was a VERY successful for the both of us. We both finished with above a 3.5! It's nice to win one :)

We have spent the last two weeks hanging with this little guy. He has been so freakin adorable. My favorite is when we come out of a room to see him patiently sitting and waiting for us, or how he farts in Mark's face, or his Bad A cage fitting with Jasper (Walker dog), or how his name fits perfectly in everything, in every song, saying, etc. We love the little guy and have had fun with him. Matt and Carla get home from Spain on Sat.


Sunday is Justin's farewell talk! He is serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. WOW I can't believe this time has come. I am so stinkin proud of him and SO excited for him! It will be fun to write a missionary in a few weeks. He enters the MTC on June 9th and is going to San Franando CA! Congrats and good luck to him! We will be in Star Valley that day.

We are just roaming free this summer, sorta. Mark has had the opportunity to do a couple jobs here in Salt Lake and I am doing some work for my Logan job from home. Things are going well. We have started a blog for Mark "portfolio," (click here to see it!) hopefully this will help keep him busy with jobs this summer. The blog is still a work in progress. He has already got 3 or 4 other jobs lined up, so we will be jumping from SV to Salt Lake, to Logan quite a bit this summer. So far its been great.

Ya for friends! I have seen Kyli and Hannah a few times while being down here. We have had so much fun! Chase and Brooklyn are growing fast and man they are adorable! I stole this pic from Hannah's blog because I love it! Chase is "a bit" bigger than Brooklyn. I love it! They are both so cute! Thanks Hannah and Kyli!

Aggie Locks

A couple of weeks ago I donated my hair along with many other aggies on campus. It was so fun to see so many girls walk up and just give away their hair, many of them just on the spot. I was planning this for several months so I was prepared. Here are some pics. They just cut it off blunt, so they could get people through faster, I went back later and had it styled all cute like.

These are some other service center peeps that donated as well, after this pic

Lots to blog about

This is how we celebrate the last day of classes. SLEEP! Super excited to finally get caught up on sleep. Finals week is next week and then we are done!

Final PALS activity. This is about half the group I am over in the service center. We had a blast. We will send the nicer smiling picture to United Way of Cache Valley as a thanks for funding this program. Thanks to my amazing husband for helping me this whole year with this!

A backpack says a thousand words. We often joke that you can tell a persons major on campus just by looking at them. Its true though, its really easy actually. Mark is OBVIOUSLY an engineer by the size of his backpack. More often than not, it is more full than this.

We LOVE to see family! This is little Allstar (blog name). He is Melina and Spencer's boy and he is so full of smiles. So adorable.

Starting to get a little ansty

School is almost over! We can now count our assignments and tests on one hand. Sure feels nice, but its hard to keep going, and finish those few things when you can see the end.... so close! So far it looks like we are going to have a fun summer with few responsibilities and places to be... meaning jobs. Good jobs paying more than $8 an hour are not in sight, but hopefully they will show up, or Mark will have lots of handyman work. That would also be nice. Either way, another semester is almost out the door and we are that much closer to fulfilling our hopes and dreams. :)

Congratulations to the 2010-11 ASME secretary for Utah State

Mark has been chosen to be the new secretary for Utah State's ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) for the 2010-11 school year! I am so proud of him! He is excited. Yay Mark!

This picture is actually from our trip, when we were on a ferry. Pretty much the same level of excitement though.... almost. Yay!

"A photograph just can't capture it"

We saw such a beautiful part of the world this spring break and we almost gave up trying to take pictures because there was so much to take in, and a picture is just not the same. We still managed to take hundreds though. For blog sake, these are some of our favorites!

After dodging tumbleweeds the size of our car through Idaho on day 1, the subaru broke down. Ray here just happened to be pulling his car dolly, headed to help someone else, and stopped to help us. He towed us to his shop and helped us get on our way. We love him

View from space needle in seattle! So pretty!

Pike's Market. Flying fish, music on every corner, pigeons flying everywhere, yummy yummy fruit, fishy fishy smells, millions of chilies hanging everywhere, huge $10 bouquets of flowers, and awesome jewelry. In Seattle, we also saw the music museum and the science fiction museum. Those were also so cool! Seattle is definitely worth seeing.

The temple grounds at the Bellevue, WA temple were gorgeous.

The enchanted Hoh rain forest of Washington. So much green!

We even saw a unicorn.

Astoria, OR was incredible. This is the Astoria column on the highest point in Astoria, gorgeous view from the top but there was a tiny spiral staircase hike and it was very windy. It was a little scary. Our legs were shaking by the time we got back down. Yet.... worth it!

Mark did not to get to see much from the top of the column.... I was lucky to get this picture before he ran back down the stairs. :) He did not like the height. Couldn't blame him.

Lots of lighthouses, all were just as amazing.

The gang. This picture was taken while stuck for a half hour on the 2.5 mile bridge to Astoria. We liked it

Our favorite sign

View from the beach right in front our most amazing bed and breakfast! If you ever go east, we recommend this place! The Pana-Sea-Ah Bed and Breakfast. "Pana-Sea-Ah" meaning cures all. It lives up to its name!

The whole Washington and Oregon coast was incredible. This is one of my favorite pictures of the coast. We saw lots of tidepools! At one point we stopped on a dock to look for sea lions, and ended finding boulders littered with sea stars!

"Big Tree" literally. In the 1890's the people who lived in the redwoods planned to cut this tree and use the stump as a dance floor. We are glad they did not!

We were hungry and decided to stop and eat on the side of the highway. We thought we were so funny, then a cop pulled up. He asked what we were doing. When we told him we were just eating lunch, he looked so confused. Wish we could have gotten a picture of his face.


Needless to say, we loved our trip!!

We're home

We loved our trip and miss the beautiful west coast! We are already planning to visit again.

What we thought was a big tree....before we met big tree

More pictures in the future

Leaving Tomorrow!

We are leaving tomorrow! The only things that are really planned are some places to stay. Other than that we are winging it, going wherever looks interesting. Here is our outline

March 12: Leaving around 5 and driving to Hailey, ID and stay with Kelsie's family
March 13: Driving to Bellevue, WA to stay with more of Kelsie's family
March 14: A day in Seattle, WA
March 15: Taking a ferry a from Edmonds to Kingston, find some tide pools, visit Forks Washington and drive and camp? in Pacific Beach
March 16: Drive down to Portland area and then back up to Ilwaco to stay in a cabin
March 17: Light house tours maybe? Take our time to get Depoe Bay Oregon where there is a cute bed and breakfast right on the coast.
March 18: Take our merry little time getting up and head down to Crescent City California and camp?
March 19: Visit Redwood National Forest and drive to Gridley, CA and stay with Kelsie's grandma
March 20: Drive back to Logan, 12 hours..... wow

Its supposed to rain on us the whole time! We are packing lots of waterproof stuff.
Wow are we excited and so not packed, its going to be a late night tonight

Engineering Nerds

Mark has a group project in one of his classes and they were told to come up with a group name... these are the ones his peers came up with. We thought they were pretty hilarious

Naked Mole Rats
Fraggle Rock
Unicorn Warrior
Warrior Princess
Oscillation Fascination
Tiny Dancers
Manheim Steam Bowlers
The Giga-Watts
The Giggle-Watts
Bridget
Its a Trap
Noted
The Cancer Bats
American Caterpillar
Omnomigon
The PRO-Tractors

Our favorites are in bold.

Spoiled

So LOTS of stuff going on in our lives right now! Super exciting stuff! All our opportunities came all at once. Within two weeks we have sold both our vehicles, bought a different, more reliable truck, moved to a new nicer apartment, and got ourselves a used washer and dryer. We are totally living the high life! I feel so spoiled! More pictures and details to come, including highlights from our most interesting old place, which we do not miss in the least bit. Yay for everything!

P.S. Our trip is in a week and a half. Awesomeness! This blog is going to explode soon....

My Wonderful Husband

I am so blessed to have found such a amazing person as my eternal companion! Anyone that knows him knows what a talented and smart man he is. I am continually amazed at what he can do and rarely find something that he is only mediocre at!
This Monday he had a test in his Instruments class (not musical instruments, but instruments that one may have to learn for mechanical engineering.... leave it to the wife to explain) and he got an 89! Which is absolutely incredible for an engineer! And better yet, he was the class high! Out of almost a hundred other super smart mechanical engineers, he got the highest. I am so proud of him and am amazed at his hard work and dedication to his school work.

Plus, he is extremely handsome. How did I get so lucky?!

Valentines Highlights

Adorable New Nephew
Little Maughan

Matt and Carla's hospitality and that dang cute meatball

Clark Planetarium
Our Valentine's Date

This is the coolest marble maze thing. Way cool. Mark now thinks he is going to build one throughout the whole house that we are going to build one day. I love the idea

We also watched a lot of Olympics and got to see DaNell, up from Arizona to help with the baby! Also this weekend, Mark got Salmonella poisoning. That was not so much a highlight, but it happened. He is doing much better now but that is definitely not something anyone should have to deal with. Thanks Matt and Carla for letting us stay! Thank Melina and Spencer for letting us come see that precious new addition to the family.