is this thing on?

so, last night we got to an all-time high of 31 degrees. it was the first time in 32 days that i didn't have to dig my car out of snow or scrape the windows... and the roads? well, you could actually see pavement. it was a beautiful thing. i felt so free...

having a history of zamboni's falling through the ice, into the lake, merely to try and defeat spring and milk more money out of the little ice skaters who want to experience what it's like to skate on " The largest Zamboni-maintained outdoor skating rink (5 full acres) in North America ." Common, who wouldn't?

playing scrabble with brian when i have a whopping 93 points TOTAL and he gets 107 points from the word 'bunnies'. whatever. i quit.

"how long have you lived in summit county?" normal response: "5 years" summit county response: "this is my 5th season"

what i don't appreciate about living here.... so, last weekend it started snowing and it didn't appear to be anything out of the ordinary. i wasn't worried because, hey, it was the weekend and i didn't have anywhere to be. then it didn't seem to be stopping and i had to be at work monday morning so i started to work up an ulcer because, i won't lie, i HATE driving in snow. brian looked up the weather forecast and it said only a quarter of an inch was expected so i chillaxed for a bit....that is, until i looked outside an hour later and we were already at 2 inches (quarter of an inch? ha). by the time we went to bed, my car had a good 8 inches on it. i decided to take the bus to work the next morning because A). digging my car out didn't sound that appealing and B). the tires on my car seem to forget how to be tires when they are in the snow- they just don't work. so, i trudged my way to the bus stop and patiently waited for the bus to arrive. i...

so, brian and i have been getting a taste of this new world we live in. the world where people put off school to come bum around, where skiing and snowboarding are just about more important than food, water, and sleep, and where you see more people trying to hitch a ride with a snowboard in their hand than ones who are holding a sign stating homelessness. it's also a world where you can go to the opening night of a huge ski and snowboard sale and be greeted with a complimentary beer to enjoy while you shop. and where, if you stand on the counter and sing 'hey jude', you get an additional 10% off. that, my friends, is the world i live in and i happen to think it's pretty cool.

so i heard about this thing going around the blog world where you go to 'google' and type in your name followed by the word 'needs', example: "Jaime Needs" and see what comes up...i decided i wanted to join the bandwagon because, well, it made me chuckle...plus, it's nice to know what all the other Jaime's of the world need; or at least what their friends writing about them think they need. now, without further adieu, here is my list (i especially like #6): 1. Jaime needs the swim of her life 2. Jaime needs to grow up and stop making those horrible faces 3. Jaime needs someone to talk to 4. Jaime needs a witness who saw the large UFO over Mexico City 5. Jaime needs some ice cream 6. Jaime needs your help growing all season long 7. Jaime needs a safe play area 8. Jaime needs to uncover the truth about Helena's death 9. Jaime needs a break 10. Jaime needs a blog 11. Jaime needs both her father and her grandfather

When you have me, using a Panera Bread recipe?? For those who were wondering, the only alteration to this loaf of bread since coming out of the oven is that one piece that's been sliced off. I just feel blessed that it doesn't double as a cement block...at least you can get a knife through it eh? oh, and is anyone else kind of freaked out by yeast? i mean, we try and keep this thing alive so it can eat and reproduce and then we bake it to death? Who on earth figured all this out?

amy came up this weekend and the weather was beautiful so we took full advantage. we went to keystone and rented a canoe for an hour. keystone lake has these ginormous trout/salmon that you can feed. we bought a bag of fish food and paddled out there. i've never fed fish not in an aquarium before, especially fat ones as long as my arm. i dropped some fish food in the water and almost had a heart attack when these things jumped at me to eat it. once i got over my initial shock though, it was thoroughly entertaining. plus, there were geese and ducks all competing with these fish for the food. afterwards we headed to a frisbee golf course and played 18 holes. i was pretty close to beating brian until he forgot his score so i say i won. needless to say, my arms are sore today from all the rowing and the frisbee throwing.

we met my parents in denver, at coors field, to watch the rockies last home game against the san francisco giants. yep, they lost. it's all about the atmosphere and experience of going to the game anyway right? here's to the colorado rockies.

amy, brian, and i took the bus (the FREE bus, might i add) to breckenridge to participate in their oktoberfest. pretty much every town up here has one but breckenridge's is the biggest. i've never been to one before and i enjoyed it a lot. though, if you think about it, all you do is stand around in the street drinking beer all day. we bought a commemorative stein and ate brats. here's to germany.

this is one of my favorite pictures, i hope you enjoy it, too. from left to right starting with me: jaime, brian, kara, george, sarah, aaron, kate, ben, josh, janson, elissa, & amy prayer...it's a good, good thing. there's Joel, our officiant... he's got earrings and a wife and a sweet goatee. our videographer's eyes got wide as he said, "whoa, what a cool priest!" here's the big picture... just pretend the videographer isn't there, trying to hog the reading of the Word.

go to this link! http://ipods.freepay.com/?r=23048509

whelp, brian's 23 now. my parents and bff amy came up to visit for the weekend. we ate at the backcountry brewery and then visited the outlet mall. i played hostess for the first time. i made lemon-soy burgers which turned out pretty good if i do say so myself. mom and dad brought him a cake from the place that made our wedding cake because they make pretty much the best cakes i've ever tasted and then he opened his presents. it was very nice to have people we know around since we really haven't met too many people up here yet. happy birthday brian!

our view from our balcony our dining room our kitchen our living room

so, brian got the call that he got the job at keystone resorts in the accounts receivable department. our next step was to find a place to live a.s.a.p. so we got online and looked at the ads in the summit daily news and then headed up the next day determined not to leave until we'd found something. there really aren't places to live in keystone because it's pretty much all just condo's for all the tourists. so, our first two places were in dillon valley. we walked in the first one and felt like we were on an episode of 'that 70's show'. it came furnished and it hadn't been re-decorated since the apartments had first been built. orange, shag carpet, brown pleather swivel seats, orange curtains, and a fireplace that had been painted mustard yellow. we said we'd keep it in mind...right. our next stop was up the street a little ways and it didn't look hopeful from the outside but we kept an open mind. we walked in only to have our nostrils bombarde...

so, it's been a long time and while i feel like i should apologize (though who i'm apologizing to has the potential to allude me) i think i should just leave it at this: dial-up internet stinks and i don't have the patience to work on a blog when it takes an hour for every link i click on to load. now that that's been said... this summer has been a whirlwind with so much change, so many events, and so much goodness. i moved home to colorado springs at the end of may and as i was driving down division street in spokane for the last time as a resident i almost burst out of my skin i was so happy to finally be leaving. for those of you who've never ventured to spokane, it's really not a horrible town so go, visit, boost their economy... i just did not want to live there anymore. coming home was great because it meant that i got a break from being a grown-up for a while and if you think that's not an excellent thing, i think you're lying. my only task was to...

said good-bye to my good friend jude today. she and her husband joel (the officiant for our wedding) are moving back to seattle. though i'm not looking forward to the long-distance thing, i'm very excited for them and to see how God uses them there.

saw 'monster-in-law' yesterday and really enjoyed it. it made me appreciate my soon-to-be mother-in-law a lot. that's what movies are good for. they let you live in someone else's world for a couple hours and then you can walk away having been more educated about your own life. of course jane fonda was over the top in the movie but hello! she has one hot body for someone her age! i was just in awe at how great she looks. here's to hoping it's not all plastic surgery so there's a chance for the rest of us out there. i also saw 'kicking and screaming' and i almost found myself looking forward to being a soccer mom. if you ask me, though a somewhat predictable underdog family movie, will ferrell did not disappoint. go see it, take your kids and be entertained. and yes, i did see two movies in one day with two different people and it was wonderful.

the peak pike wished to claim

in my boredom at work today i secretly started reading a magazine and found this quote from theodore roosevelt: "to describe the beauty of Colorado Springs and the Pikes Peak region bankrupts the English language". well said man. i always knew i liked that guy.

brian, being the business minded man that he is, has me reading this book called, 'smart couples finish rich'. brian's hope is that we'll have a couple million dollars stored up by the time we retire. uh, sounds great but just how much sacrificing will i have to do in order to help us accomplish that?! i'm not a particularly grounded person when it comes to money. granted, i pay all my bills on time and have no debt (aside from my student loans) but i do like to indulge every now and again. plus, i don't understand money talk. the first chapter kept talking about 'net worth' and 'overhead' and 'IRA' and i just looked at brian and told him i apparently needed an independant study course in finances before i can help him achieve this goal. my thing is, i hate money. i hate that it runs my life and that i often have to think the thought, "do i have enough money to buy groceries this month?" my goal in life is to just have peace of ...

me and brian at graduation 

i've been very resistent to this whole blog movement as i've been satisfied with my 6-year-old geocities web page. plus, i'm not one to 'advertise' myself so as of now i'm not too sure anyone will ever read this. however, i'm extremely bad at keeping in touch with old friends so i think maybe i'll give this a try...no guarantees though and you'll have to be ok with this not-so-fancy format because i refuse to pay for something like this. don't judge a book by its cover right? so...here i am, in my final week of living in spokane. my last day of work is thursday. thank. you. Jesus. for those of you who don't know, i've been a slave at Gart Sports for almost 2 years now. you often hear the label "bitter retail clerk" and now i know precisely where that comes from. customers are mean! and they slowly chip away at your soul until 'customer service' becomes a bad word. it's hard to be the head of customer service when you...