President's Day

Sore throat, fever, cough, headaches... Perfect health for snowshoeing! Just kidding. But that was what I was suffering from when I went snowshoeing with Colton, my sister Amria, dad, brother Aarim, and a bunch of Aarim's friends on President's Day. 

You see, we had already rented the snowshoes from the University of Utah, and I wasn't about to let my family have all the fun without me, so I sucked it up and went snowshoeing. It was perfect conditions for it. Up North Canyon was about four feet of snow.

Colton trying to climb up a snowbank.
The snow was so deep!

Colton dived into the snow, literally, to see how deep it was.
The weather was cool and sunny. We hiked up a few miles, then stopped for lunch on a log. The said log my family had visited a previous summer, and it was a log we had climbed on which stood above our heads. 

Now we used the log as a seat a few inches above the snow. Two of Aarim's friends broke their homemade snowshoes, and it was super funny watching them trying to hike in the drifts of snow. On our way down the trail, we did a lot more 'off-roading' with the snowshoes, which was much more exciting and difficult than walking on the packed down trail. 

Aarim and Colton also decided to climb up the entire face of the mountain, which took forever. 

A tired Colton coming back down the hill.

This is the same log we were sitting on in the summer. It's a good four to five feet high.

After snowshoeing, Colton and I headed over to Bree and Ben's house for an evening of conversation and dinner at the Pizza Factory. We also stopped at the Farmington Bay Bird refuge again and watched a beautiful sunset. It was a fun and memorable President's Day.

A solitary eagle sits on the water.

Pizza Factory in Bountiful. We stuffed ourselves
on salads and couldn't even finish our pizza.
And the breadsticks were delicious

Farmington Bay Bird Refuge

See the updated version of this post at: http://thymeandmint.com/farmington-bay-bird-refuge/

Gymnastics and Car Crash

Today Colton and I, along with my family, went to watch the gymnastics meet against the University of Utah and Michigan. The U is really good, and it was amazing to watch these talented girls throw themselves all over the floor and balance beams and somehow not hurt themselves. It makes me wish that I had never quit gymnastics when I was little.

There was so much traffic trying to drive through Salt Lake. We barely even got out of the parking lot before we were stopped completely at the intersections. Well, while we were waiting for the light to turn green, completely stopped, right next to Rice Eccles Stadium, all of a sudden there was a loud sound and our car jerked forward a bit. I turned to look at Colton right as the car who had hit us zoomed by and pulled away, barely missing the car in front of us. Colton was basically in shock because it hit his door which his leg was resting on and scared him, but I hurriedly took down the license plate number because it didn't look like the driver was going to stop. He did, however, and we pulled into the parking lot at Rice Eccles Stadium. The side-view mirror on Colton's side was completely hanging off, and there were scratch marks along the left side of the car where the other driver had scraped against our car. The other car looked worse, with a large dent in the right side and scratched plastic. The driver said, "Oh, that dent is from another accident. This car has been in so many accidents. It's only that small scratch there." So, our car was definitely more hurt than his car.

It took forever for the police to find us, one because we forgot to turn on our emergency lights, and two because the freaking Salt Lake City dispatcher told the officer the wrong place. If I was dying, I would have died before the ambulance found us. Colton's mom finally called the police again and told them where we were before he found us. The cop came finally, figured everything out, and we thought we were good to go. Come to find out the next week that the driver who hit us is trying to blame Colton for the crash! He's trying to say that it was our fault and trying to claim more damage than was done to the car. What a liar! He told us to our faces that the dents in the side of his car were from other accidents, AND we were COMPLETELY stopped! I wish we had asked other people to stop to be witnesses. But even without asking, you should always be a witness to a crash. If I ever get in another crash, hopefully not, I will now be ready for anything:

1. Take down the license plate in case the other car drives off

2. Ask other people who witnessed the crash to pull over as well

3. Turn on the emergency lights

4. Take pictures of the damage right after it occurs, and if you're inspecting the cars, record the conversation secretly on your phone.

It makes me so mad that there are actually people who lie about crashes (I know, I know, this world isn't as good as I believe it to be). Just know that there is a special place reserved with the Devil for people who lie...

Skate Skiing 2

We went skate skiing at Mountain Dell Golf Course a second time with Colton's entire family. It was much harder than last time. The snow was icier and our skis were different. It was still a lot of fun though, and definitely a great way to stay in shape during winter. I gave up before everyone else did because it was just too hard; I took pictures instead.

Stuff. Mostly mine I think

Colton's mom and dad

Ben and Debbie

Colton

Bree