What Happens in Vegas... Again

Since we spent Mother's Day up in Oregon with my family, Ian and I decided to drive down to Vegas and spend some time with his family over Father's Day. The drive wasn't too bad, though gas was pretty durn expensive. Ian was sick the night before, so he slept (or tried to) while I drove most of the way. He was nice and drove into Vegas. For some reason I just really don't like driving into cities that I don't know well... then end. ANYWAY...

Friday night we went out to eat with some of the Oxborrow family friends. We went to Memphis BBQ and it was splendid... I had a blackberry lemonade with my delectable dinner and it was delish! We had some good conversation. Ian and I sat in the very back of the SUV... and it was funny. Ian is so tall he can't even sit in the back, he had to have his head sideways the entire time... poor man. The rest of the night was spent chatting! It was great.

On Saturday Ian helped his dad move one of the ward members and then we headed out to Pahrump, NV where Ian's grandparent's live. It was fun to see the old haunts of Ian's childhood where he and his siblings spent a bit of time each summer. We also happened to be there the same time as his aunt and uncle, so I was able to meet them too! It was a lot of fun.

We picked up food for dinner and whatnot, then we headed home and watched The Princess and the Frog and When in Rome. Ian and I saw The Princess and the Frog over Valentine's weekend (as I know I've mentioned before) and we NEVER get sick of it! It's one of our favorite Disney shows! So, if you haven't seen it, DO IT! Ian's mom and sister loved When in Rome and wanted us to share the bliss... and it was hilarious indeed! :)

Sunday we went to church. Ian's mom gave this amazing lesson on the Atonement. I know her words really touched many class members and made them really think and ask questions, which is exactly what a great teacher does! After church Ian's dad grilled up some steak (which was divine), Livvi made biscuits and helped me with the pressure cooker and the carrots, and with the potatoes it the perfect Father's Day meal!

We drove home after dinner and made a pit-stop out in the desert to look at the stars. It was perfect! Ian called to some of the desert critters and they called back! It was so cool!

Monday we went up to Ogden to celebrate Father's Day with my family. We gave my dad a ninja hamster. It's hilarious. We also went and saw Ashlee's play Footloose. She did a great job dancing and singing her heart out!

Now on to the wedding weekend. Congrats to my cousin Aaron and his awesome fiance (soon to be wife!).

Ore-Ida

So last weekend we went up to Hermiston, Oregon to visit my grandparents. It was a lot of fun (a lot of driving... but a lot of fun). We didn't take a whole lot of pictures, because the majority of the vacation was spent watching my cousins' baseball games, playing video games, eating, and just relaxing... not particularly picture-worthy occasions (although maybe a Mikami food-fest is.... hmmm....)

In the car for the 8 hours of bliss. Huzzah.

At a random rest stop. So funny note: we were walking around and all of the sudden this motorcycle shoot out of the parking lot blaring "Highway to the Dangerzone." And we laughed. A lot.

Superman? Yes. Absolutely! (We had to take advantage of the phone booth... there are so few these days...)

So we got to Oregon, hit up a few Little League baseball games. And Ian sprained his ankle. It was great. Really. We had a Japanese food fest that night (which was amazing).

Saturday we went shopping (and got Ian a one-size-fits-all-except-Ian ankle brace). We also went and saw Iron Man 2 which I thoroughly enjoyed! The plot was a bit all-inclusive, but I liked it. We also went to Jack-in-the-Box (which I don't think I've eaten at for like a million years... well, maybe not quite that long). That night we had pizza and watched some of the Jazz game, but the majority of the remainder of Saturday was spent playing Super Mario Bros., some Wii games, and a few PS3 games, but ultimately what took the cake was playing Halo on X-Box until like 2 am... yeah, we're sometimes really big nerds and something like video game losers... but it was awesome. We got to a point in Halo where we couldn't figure out how to get out and our brains weren't really functioning. At that point, we threw in the towel and quit for the night.

Sunday we went to church and celebrated Mother's Day. My Dad cooked us steak for dinner and we had fresh rolls and all kinds of goodness.

We left early Monday morning and made the long drive home. And the reason this post is called Ore-Ida... well, Ian saw the Ore-Ida plant as we were around the border of the two states... and he says, "AHHH! I get it! Oregon-Idaho." HAHA, I love him. He makes me laugh all the time. And thus we have Ian's first venture north of Ogden!

What Happens in Vegas...

...Is pretty much going in this post.

So last weekend (April 23-26) we went down to Las Vegas to hang with the Oxborrow fam. It was a blast! Ian had to work until about 1 on Friday, so when he finished, we pretty much just booked it out of here, picked up Seth, and drove down to Vegas.

When we got into town Ian's parents took us to Claim Jumper... talk about huge meals! It was awesome! We tried to take a bunch of pictures... here are some...

I think I have more pictures of Ian's tongue than anything else *wink*

"The back of your head is ridiculous!"

 My favorite picture of the trip I think... there might be one or two more...

The next day we went to Valley of Fire, the state park northeast of Vegas.

Being gangtsa' on the way there.

Boys will be boys... HAHAHA

Our first stop in the park.

The dead snake that Livvi found while we were exploring the canyon.

Wha' happened? We took a couple of pictures here. This was just the funny one. Oh, see the shoes? They're Ian's brother's shoes. He's on his mission... Thanks Caleb!

This doesn't look that high up... but it was.

Livvi posing. She's awesome!

Ian climbing the rocks... again.

A cool shot of the desert rocks and the moon.

Cactus flowers and the sun beams!

One of the many family pics. I must admit that I liked taking the one where Graham had to run to get in the picture :) Isn't the background awesome! Ian's Mom picked it on the way in... pretty sweet.

Huzzah! Day of conquering at Valley of Fire!

Sunday we went to church and spent the day relaxing and I learned how to play Mexican Train dominoes. Seth kept beating me, and Ian's dad had the worst luck ever. Really. It was funny, I'm not going to lie.

We headed back on Monday and stopped in St. George to see Jill and her kids. (I grew up with Jill in Vegas). That was a lot of fun. They have a really cute house! And the boys are simply adorable!

It was definitely too short, but it was a fantastic weekend.

You can probably see the rest of the pictures on Facebook when I get around to actually posting them....

Tokyo and Nikko

So we headed to Shinjuku, got on the subway and went to the Hiro-o station where we promptly got off, got lost, and had no idea where we were going. Ah yes, it's like a metaphor, because where were we trying to get to? The temple of course.

So we felt fairly lost, because we didn't really get stellar directions. And we started walking and there! There beside us was the Church HQ in Japan... but alas it was 5:15 and all was locked up. Still at square one. Eventually we figured out where the park was that was supposed to be near, and lo and behold, there was Moroni. Yes. It's true.

So we went to the temple that evening. We met a couple who was actually from Ogden serving there. Weird. The Ito family. They actually knew my math teacher from high school... the wife was actually her cousin... and my PE teacher. Yeah it was all really too weird.

But it was really cool to do baptisms in Japan and hear it all done in Japanese.

We met up with the Kuwaharas there, Doraina's mission comp Tomoko and her family. We stayed with them for the next few days. They were AWESOME! Love them so much!

So we ended up staying in Saitma which is a suburb of Tokyo.

The next day Doraina and I went into Tokyo and went to the Tokyo National Museum.

Oh look...one of the buildings at the Tokyo National Museum. Imagine that. It was really cool with a bunch of neat artifacts.


After that we had an adventure in Kabuki. So we waited at the theater for about two hours to get $10 tickets...


But it was worth it. It was SO awesome. Especially the end murder scene... grisly I know, but awesome nonetheless.


The big gate in Tokyo. We went there late, so everything was closed in Asakusa.


The entrance into Edo Wonderland... the theme park of ancient Tokyo in the city of Nikko.


More Edo...


This was the water show... this is mild... water was coming out of everything by the end.


This is the ninja show. Bad picture. Cool show.


Geisha show. It was a comedy, but had a lot of dialogue, so it was a little hard to follow.


Streets of an ancient village... just kidding. It's still the theme park. But it looks real, eh?


More streets. This is where The Last Samurai was filmed. Tom Cruise walked here. Wash your feet haha.


Me killing this dude. He asked for it. Really and literally.


Cool trees!

So the last couple days we spent with the Kuwahara family. We went to the ward there and it was great! They were so kind and the RS President was actually from Utah, so she translated the entire three hours. It was so nice of her!

We drove to Narita the next day and ate Japanese style Ramen (so good) and flew home. Woot!

The end. Finally. It was long. I know.

Hakone

So on our way from Hiroshima to Tokyo we stopped at a little resort/spa town called Hakone. This is where we stayed at a Japanese Ryokan (traditional inn) and ate a beautiful spread of amazing food... most of which I didn't like because I'm not the biggest fan of seafood. But Doraina liked it enough for both of us, so it was great.


Being Japanese in our yukatas. Quite comfortable!


Our shoes. Cute eh?


Me in the full garb in our room.


To preface this: we went to the Hakone Open Air Art Museum the next day as we headed to Tokyo. So the next group of pictures are some of the things we saw there. This was really cool, as you can see from the picture. But the thing you can't see is the stream of water that trickles from her lower eye into the pool. Really neat.


This was on a hill, and looked really cool.


Some statues.


The koi in the pond that thought we were going to feed them or something. Just like my fish flick...huh...it must be a goldfish thing.


This is the outside of the building. Kind of ugly, no?


This is the inside of that ugly building! So beautiful!


Japanese Maple tree.


Haha. So we ran across this statue in the grass kind of by mistake. I walked past it, and then I stopped, took a glance back and started laughing my head off. Yeah. It's that funny.


This was an homage to dance. It was pretty cool. The black are males, the red females.


There was this Chinese family in the ropeway car with us. The kid has on a Monsters Inc. hard hat. I thought it was the funniest, but cutest, thing ever!


The hot pots/sulfur springs we flew over on the ropeway.


The European-style Man of War ships that we rode across Lake Ashi. Yeah. All the pirate statues were European. It was funny. But the boats were really cool!


Me with the "Japanese" pirate captain.


This dude always looked like he was shooting people. We spent most of the time up here with him on the top deck.


Us!


The other ship. I thought this was a pretty neat shot.


A group of cute school kids. We saw a TON of these groups while we were there!


Beautiful Mt. Fuji! Too bad that dumb cloud wouldn't move EVER!

After that we headed back to Hakone and got on a train to Shinjuku station, Tokyo!