snake swim

"Hey, it's a nice day today - you guys want to take the kids
for a walk and throw the frisbee around?"



in a heavy southern accent:


upon hearing the word dangerous and forgetting
their original reason of getting in the water (the frisbee)
they plan their entrance and exit strategy.






celebrating their non-snake-bitten-selves


never, ever a dull moment. thanks jake & rebekah
_____may your mouths be ever filled with rot and decay

Top 10 from weekend with JakenRebekah

So, here it is folks ....

And we'll start with #10 - Reunion


#9 Blow darts & Onion Rings

So, we went to Huey's again near Beale street in Memphis where they serve abnormally large onion rings and you can blow toothpicks through your straw to stick in the ceiling. Good stuff. The Joey picture is so funny (check out his magnified teeth!). Yeah, that is a carafe of water. Jake was making fun of him because he puts his whole mouth around a plastic bottle when he's drinking water or gatorade or what have you. So, Joey was proving that it's the cool way to drink - on any occasion.

# 8 Whose Baby is it Anyway

sometimes we think Luke looks more like Rebekah and Truman looks more like me. I think it's just the coloring though

#7 Daddy Launchers

Jake said all he wanted to do in Memphis was come and lay on our carpet and wrestle with the boys. We had so much fun just hanging out on the floor having the boys crawl all over us. And bonus - Jake taught us how to do "daddy launchers" (or in my case a mommy launcher)

#6 -m-i-s-s-i-s-s-i-p-p-i

#5 FAT LARRY'S

This is good old Southern Barbecue done right. And we had live music and since we pretty much had the place to ourselves - the musicians (susie and bob salley)were singing right to our babies with their sultry voices. Luke was mesmerized the whole time. Jake requested a few Johnny Cash songs for us and Fat Larry was there and kept sending over plates of his newest fried inventions. (I highly recommend this place for you local memphians)

#4 Chopper Control

In China, Joey bought a remote control helicopter and it's been his favorite toy since we got home. He walks through the door and his eyes light up - not to see his loving wife - no - but to see his bright shiny new helicopter. I'm pretty sure this was the highlight for Jake as well. Although - not for Truman. He got pretty upset every time they flew it.

#3 Bare Bums



Love these two. Truman was born about 3 1/2 months before Luke. They had a lot of fun together. (Truman is huge!)

# 2 Root Canal Madness

Jake was Joey's assistant and I think he enjoyed it WAY too much. Also, Jake has a pretty expressive face - so Rebekah said she finally had to close her eyes so she wouldn't see him reacting to her root canal procedure. She felt sooo good after it was done though. I guess this tooth had been bothering her for a long time - so she was a happy camper to get that nerve removed.

#1 The Snake Swim

can I get that drum roll now?



to be continued....

Brother Jake

My older brother Jake is super cool. He's the kind that makes every day a party. I've always really looked up to him and felt his approval was really important. He's a good brother. When I was a freshman at Utah State - he took me under his wing and even though I was a nerdy new freshman and didn't know anybody, I had instant friends who knew me as "Jake's cool little sister".
He's all about breaking rules to make life more exciting. When we were swimming once at the USU pool - he really wanted to go down to the observation window to see our dives off the diving board. Turns out - it was roped off and used for "officials only". So, we devised a plan. I was to distract the lifeguard while he jumped over the ropes and ran down to the underground window. Of course, I was in. I started walking around the pool and made a HUGE distraction by tripping over a water polo goal, and shouting in "pain" as I lay on my back holding my big toe. Both lifeguards immediately came to check out the problem and when they discovered no blood or wound of any sort - they looked at me funny and went back to their lookouts. Jake's mission was a success.
He's just a funny brother because a sign that says "keep out" or "official use only" just screams out to him "you gotta see what this is all about!" When we were on a family cruise ziplining through a jungle - he convinced some of us to zip ahead without waiting for the zipline guides - even though they specifically told us not to because it was dangerous. But if you don't want Jake to do something - you should never mention that it's dangerous.
He somehow even convinced me in college to ride on his SHOULDERS as he rode his bike down the steepest hill at USU to his house. That might be one of the scariest things I've ever done. My feet were on the handlebars and I was flying down this hill hanging on to his hair for dear life.
I've lived far away from him for 4 years now so we don't get to see each other much. But a few weeks ago he called to say he and his wife Rebekah were coming for a visit. Rebekah had to have a root canal - and since it's Jake - he of course figured out how to make this root canal a fun thing. Instead of paying for a root canal - they paid to fly out to see us and had Joey do it. I was so excited. They have a son, Truman, who is Luke's age and I love his wife Rebekah too - so this was great. Our first visitors!! Plus, I didn't have to do or have a root canal so I was just ready to party it up. The only bummer was they only had TWO days here - but let me just tell you - they were two very fun days. When you are with Jake - you don't have to do much or go far to find adventure. We mostly just hung out here and stayed up until the wee hours of the morning every night just laughing our little bums off.
So, do you want to hear about the weekend? Do ya? Huh? Ok, well stay tuned for the TOP TEN POST. That's right, I feel like it's ok to turn a single weekend into a top ten. Here's a sneak peek at what you can expect.

TOP 10

#10 reunion
#9 blow darts and onion rings
#8 whose baby is it anyway
#7 daddy launchers
#6 m-i-s-s-i-s-s-i-p-p-i
#5 FAT LARRY'S (and fat us)
#4 chopper control
#3 bare bums (that's right - bare NAKED bums)
#2 root canal madness
and number one... the one we've all been waiting for..... drum roll please...
#1 A snake swim (just be excited. be very excited.)

CHINA - days 8 - 9

Day 8 -

Ok, so day 8 might just be my favorite day of the whole trip. Maybe tied with day 1 (the Great Wall day). Anyway, this was a good'un.
Mike Hale dropped us off to do the "big 3 tour" which included a tour guide, tour bus, lunch and seeing the 3 biggest tourist attractions in Beijing. (We had a few "surprise" stops as well)

1.The Forbidden City




We learned a lot from our tour guide. From what I remember The Forbidden City was in use from about 1420 - 1911 and there were 24 emperors who used it. No one could come in or out. There was a door that all supplies (food etc.) were delivered to. Concubines for the emperor were selected at around age 14-15 and (I think she said) there were thousands of them. Some never even met the emperor their whole lives. It was like a prison with very nice living conditions.

2. Temple of Heaven





The Temple of Heaven is round and sits in a square base. The round shape represents heaven and the square represents earth. So, it's where heaven and earth meet. The architecture is so cool. It's all wood made without nails. (Yeah, I'm not really sure how that works)

3. Summer Palace



The Summer Palace was built as a "summer get-away" for the emperors. They only had a small garden in the Forbidden City and that's it - no trees because the emperor thought it took away his power by blocking his view. I think it was an emperor in the 12th century who originally built the Summer Palace for his mom's birthday. At some point it was burned by the British and French and the Empress Dowager Cixi (the dragon lady) neglected the Navy and dumped all the $ into rebuilding the summer palace. Which wasn't too smart because then they lost a war to Japan. But anyway, it's reallly gorgeous place. We took a dragon boat out on the lake and the sun was just setting. Ahhhh....
Oh and don't make fun of the dramatic pose. I was just trying to fit in. Chinese & Japanese always make really interesting poses that are so cute and Americans just stand there smiling. BOring right?

Chinese Medicine
One of our "surprise" stops was a Chinese Hospital. (We think it was a gimmick to get us to buy Chinese herbal remedies) Anyway, we listened to a shpeel about how Chinese medicine was better than western medicine and then Chinese doctors came in and took our pulse and looked at our tongues to let us know what was wrong with us so they could prescribe some remedy for us.


I'm looking very serious because I'm learning that I have cold air in my uterus. He prescribed a remedy whose main ingredient was cinnamon - for $72/mo. I decided to just make sure I'm eating a lot of cinnamon rolls. Warm cinnamony cinnamon rolls to warm up that uterus. Doctor's orders.

Relaxing Evening
So, a really, really fun thing about China were the massages. We got HOUR & A HALF MASSAGES for FIFTEEN DOLLARS!!! So, we had one our first night we got there. And with my jet lagged achin body - it felt soooo good. It was fun to all hang out and talk.




Good day right?

Day 9 - Our Last Day

This day was really chill. We did a little of this -



We ate some Peking Duck, ya know since we were there.


And got Shitos (head washes) Ok, this was AWESOME. ($4)


ACROBATS! This was absolutely incredible. The whole time I kept wincing thinking this would be the night something terrible happened. It is all so unbelievable and looks SO SCARY!


Thus our journey ends. We LOVED the company, the history, the massages, the shows, most of the food, and all the spectacular sites. We DIDN'T love the pollution, some of the food, the cigarette guy, the drivers and the "toilets". But like some guy said "Without new experiences, something inside of us sleeps and the sleeper must awaken."

So, Good-bye China. Thanks for waking us up a little.

CHINA - Days 5 - 7

Day 5 - Shanxi Province

We drove for 4 hours to get to our first stop: the grottos. First, we stopped at a hole in the wall restaurant but before eating, Mike, Victoria and I all had to use the bathroom. The waitress took us outside and we started walking down the dusty roads. and walking. and walking. We started wondering where she was taking us. Finally we stop at this makeshift bathroom that was actually just a few boards propped up. Needless to say - when you stepped to the other side of the board - it was not a pleasant experience. After we were done, we all quietly walked away, looking down at the ground as we walked. Then Victoria says "How do you come away from that and pretend everything is ok." Here is a candid picture of Mike and Victoria at lunch. They don't look too hungry.

But enough potty talk - on to the grottos.
These were super cool. They're called the Yungang Grottos and were carved by the Northern Wei tribes in the 5th century! So, they were man-made caves with hundreds of thousands Buddhas carved in them. Gigantic ones, medium big ones and tiny tiny ones. So these things are 1500 years old. Did I say it was super cool? Well, it was.

remember, if you fancy to - you may click on the picture to enlarge.

Next was the Hanging Monastery
This was built about the same time - so a 1500 year old structure. But the freaky thing was it is suspended on the side of a mountain with a few wooden stilts. It was scary to climb around up there. We even had an emergency diaper change up in this 1500 year old suspended Monastery - that's just so Luke can impress future dates. "Yeah, got my diaper changed on an ancient hanging monastery in China. It was pretty cool. No big."
p.s. it was cold.



Day 6 - The Ancient City of Pingyao (also in Shanxi Province)

Before driving to Pingyao, we woke up in a city call Jin Chou that wasn't used to tourists.
It was "real" China.

In fact, when we left our hotel, we had a crowd saying goodbye. The fact that we were foreigners AND had a baby with us scored us the status of "the talk of the town" - probably for weeks.



But our fame had only just begun. Actually, I should say Luke's fame. This is what we experienced in Pinyao.


this doesn't even show HOW MANY people there were. This was just the inner circle. Luke was really a hit with the Chinese.

Pingyao is a 5th century city that is basically frozen in time. We couldn't drive into the city, so when we WALKED in, it is just striking. The streets are cobblestone and are adored with red lanterns hanging against the muted grey stone buildings. We stayed in a hostel was a preserved residental house from the Ming Dynasty! How cool is that. We slept on a Kang - a built in bed with a stone hearth base where a fire can be made to keep you warm at night.

looking out of our room. check out those great thighs!


our 2 monkeys


we liked these signs...

night photo - Pingyao



Day 7 - Pingyao wall and Qaio Family Courtyard

We climbed up on the wall that overlooked the city.

For all you scholars who visited BYU's international cinema frequently - you might recognize the photo below. The Qaio Family Courtyard was where "Raise the Red Lantern" was filmed. (I haven't seen it yet, but of course all the Hales had - so I'd better rent it soon if I want fit in.)


It was actually here, while we were waiting for a few to visit the restroom - that a Chinese man came up and tried to put a CIGARETTE in Luke's mouth!!! (he was trying to be funny) I was so used to people stopping to coo at him, that I wasn't even paying attention (and he was on my back). Luckily, Mike & Mike both yelled at him and pushed him away at the same time. After that, I didn't think Luke's popularity was so cute anymore.

Here is a bonus photo of Mike being silly:

oh - we are so fond of the silliness. Yes, indeed.