I've got an electric guitar...

I know everyone really only cares about two things on this blog. Number one: the little girl that will be hanging out with us shortly, and two: seeing pictures of the the house, which are a couple of months over due. Really. I know. So rather than make excuses on why we've yet to throw up some pics, how about you check these out, and enjoy our home...one room at a time. Today's special: the garage.

Since everything is new, we've worked to make sure we get everything the way we want it from the start. So we started with the floor...

...and a water softener...

...and finished with a garage door opener.

Now before y'all tell me what a great job I did, Krissey actually helped out quite a bit, including painting the majority of the floor. She just happened to be behind the camera for most of it. Anyway, one room down...just a few more to go.

Teaser: Coming soon in 3D!

This baby's gonna be cute. Darn cute.

Fiesta!

Today we got to experience our first Balloon Fiesta! What is a Balloon Fiesta you ask? One word: Awesome! Ever since we made the big move down here, that's all anyone talks to you about. It's not just talk, they're pretty serious about ballooning. It might have to do with this crazy thing called the Albuquerque Box. Josh has watched the balloons all summer during his morning commute, there's normally four or five balloons somewhere over the valley.

We even get a wake up call most weekends by the sound of the propane burner by some balloon flying over our house. Last Sunday we caught this guy lurking around:

They even have a museum dedicated to ballooning, we went last Saturday for "Smithsonian Museum Day" (it was free). They have everything from the origins of ballooning, to the big gas balloons they fly over oceans and round the world trips. Pretty crazy. They also have a balloon simulator. It's pretty cool, and Josh did pretty well for being a newbie.

Luckily the other guy in the picture knew a thing or two about ballooning and was an excellent coach. It's a lot harder than it looks (at least that's what Josh kept telling me) for only having two controls. You get points for a good take off, navigating, and how close you can land to the target you are aiming for. Josh ended up getting about an 82/100, which was pretty good because a professional pilot flew before him and got an 88.7/100.

Anyway, back to the fiesta, we had some hookups for a sweet parking pass (thank you so much Tyler!) and made it to the park around 6:30ish A.M., slightly before the "mass ascension" (sounds like a Catholic term) where all the balloons take off. Despite the huge size of the park, they have to stagger the balloon start times so everyone can take off safely. You get to walk directly on the field where the balloons are launching. You can walk right over to the pilots and crew and talk with them and ask them questions, while they are blowing up their balloon. Anyway like someone has mentioned in the comments, a picture is worth the rest of this post so here goes:

That's just a handful of the fun. Josh went through an entire camera battery this morning. This was one of those experiences that is indescribable, the pictures do not do it justice, and you just have to experience it within your life. So, add this onto your list of things you just have to see. Tonight is the evening glow, so perhaps they'll be some more ballooning in store for the blog. In the meantime, the fiesta goes through next weekend, so if you're hankering for a quick get away come on down, we love visitors!

Bikes.

Krissey and I got the internet hooked up this weekend. Those long awaited house pictures should be up pretty soon. But in the meantime, here's something for my fellow bikers to think about:

It's hard to go even a month without hearing about a cyclist injured in a motor vehicle accident. Sure you can blame the public for not paying attention, not following the rules. The drivers aren't the only ones following the rules, just check out the comments on any news website about these accidents. (especially the Salt Lake Trib) you get an onslaught of complaints about cyclists not following the rules. If we expect to be treated with respect on the road, we've got to play by the rules too.

All Moved In...well mostly!!!

Last weekend was a busy one. We moved into our new house! Wahoo!!!! We are so excited to finally be in our new house. The first couple of nights I had to keep telling myself this really is my house. It is so fun to be able to have all my stuff out and organized (well mostly, we are still working on that) but not to have my stuff stored away. We are able to put all of my dishes in cupboards and we opened up wedding presents that we had never used because we never had space for them. It felt like Christmas. I had a few boxes of nice pyrex ware and a 24 set of nice glasses. We would like to give a HUGE thank you to Josh's siblings for coming down and helping with such a big project. We are extremely grateful and don't know how to thank you enough. It probably wasn't the funnest trip you have ever taken and I know we were very busy, but we hope you had a good time. We sure enjoyed having you come and visit us! It was hard being pregnant and not being able to lift anything. I had to watch everyone else move all of my stuff. The third night in our house we had a very full house. Josh's cousin came down from Pecos NM with her 4 kids and husband and spent the night with the 5 of us. It was so fun to have everyone come stay with us and that we actually had room for everyone, even though our house was a disaster. We also appreciate the help from other family and friends from the ward, we couldn't have done it without any of you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!