Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Updates on my life

I haven't posted anything in awhile until tonight because of several reasons that I should update everyone on.

#1: I've been out of town a lot and had family in from out of town a lot. Salt Lake City, Santa Cruz, etc. Sisters, cousins, Grandma, etc.

#2: My super genius amazing friend Rusty has been working on my computer and did a complete overhaul on it. I have the newest and best of everything! Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, Aperture, iLife, Microsoft Office 2008, etc.

#3: I haven't had photos to post because while camping in Santa Cruz my camera was stolen from my car during our last night. Not just the camera either, the whole bag that contained 3 lenses, 2 memory cards, and a photo idea notebook that I have been collecting ideas in for almost 10 years. I can never get those sketches and magazine clippings back. One of the memory cards was full of our camping photos. Pictures of my brother-in-law Kurt running into the ocean and playing in it like a little kid. The heart in the sand made out of seashells that took all of us a really long time to collect and then arrange. Walking down the empty Beach Boardwalk at sunset. Night hiking down the cliff to the beach by our campsite. Roasting Starbursts over the campfire. Kimberly's cute new swimsuit. Desirae trying to catch sand crabs and then squealing every time one touched her. Lori and Desirae burying Kurt in the sand. Kimberly talking on the phone to her roommates almost the entire time. Building sandcastles with walls and a moat to protect them from the waves and then being disappointed that the tide never came in far enough to destroy the castles. The raccoon that came into our campsite and hid in our tree. And all the group photos we took with the self timer at every place we went to. That is the thing that hurts the most. Losing all those pictures and memories. But hopefully insurance will help me replace most of the stuff, if not all of it.

Just because I don't have a camera at the moment doesn't mean that I won't be posting on the blog. It just means I have to be creative now. Stay tuned for more updates and exciting stuff!

I love David Cook!

I'm so happy to say that David Cook is still in the competition and still making sweet, sweet music! It's been several weeks and many performances since I last posted his videos so here are all of them up to date.

Little Sparrow


Innocent


Always Be My Baby


Music Of The Night


I'm Alive


All I Really Need Is You

Thursday, April 3, 2008

more David Cook performances

These are the performances that David Cook has done since I last posted about my obsession with him. And sorry to say the obsession is not getting any better! I have a lot of enablers though, friends and family who are more than willing to talk about him and American Idol with me, or listen to me talk!

Billie Jean


Day Tripper

Santa Cruz Camping

My awesome friend Danny invited Desirae and I to come along with him and his girlfriend and friends on their camping trip to Santa Cruz. We camped at Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park. It was an incredibly beautiful campground and we had a blast! We set up camp when we first got to the camp site and then headed into town to get some dinner. Who knew that they would have a Chubby's Diner too! I thought my town was the only one! Desirae and I were so excited! Chubby's is my favorite restaurant!


Brad, Ashley and Danny


Lucero, Aaron and Brad


Just doing a little advertising for Get Shifty in the parking lot. Get Shifty is Danny's extreme sports apparel and gear company.


Ashley, Lucero and Desirae around the fire pit at night getting ready to roast marshmallows.


These next 2 pictures are of Danny and Brad lighting the stove. I love the looks on their faces as the stove practically explodes in their faces and then as they try and blow out the flames!



Desirae, Ashley and I were super excited when we found out that all of us LOVED to play card games!! Des had brought some, and Danny played Skip-Bo with us as we drank hot chocolate and apple cider.


Ashley by the blazing fire!


Everyone gathered around the fire trying to stay warm in the cold morning.


For Danny's breakfast he toasted a roast beef sandwich over the fire with a couple of wire hangers we bought and used for marshmallows and Starbursts the night before. We were afraid that it would fall into the fire but it actually worked.


For the day we planned to go to the beach and hang out most of the day and then go to downtown Santa Cruz for dinner. A very unfortunate thing happened to my camera when we were getting out of the truck at the beach. I thought I had the camera strap around my arm but I was mistaken and the camera fell to the concrete lens first. My lens pretty much quit working after that and so there are not many pictures of what we did the rest of the day. But this is Des and I on our way to Manresa Beach. We hung out at the beach for several hours. Des was the really the only one that spent much time in the ocean. It was too cold for any of the rest of us to go any further than our knees. Everyone sunbathed, played catch, went for a walk down the shoreline, etc. I spent the whole time sleeping on a blanket with my sweater still on and a towel over my legs and feet, and a t-shirt over my face so I wouldn't get sunburnt as I tend to do at the beach. I hadn't got much sleep during the night because I was freaking freezing cold. Everyone joked about how I slept the whole time and I joked about how they were all sunburnt.

After the beach we went to downtown Santa Cruz to stroll the streets, do a little shopping and eat at Pizza My Heart. It was a beautiful spring weekend which encouraged everyone to come to downtown Santa Cruz. I love to people watch and this provided the perfect opportunity to do it. We watched the breakdancers, people playing instruments, adorable little puppies, people dressed inappropriately for the weather (either too much clothes or too little). We browsed a ton of incredible little shops until we were exhausted and decided to go back to camp.

This was how the boys liked to start the fire or get it going again:
Pour half a bottle of lighter fluid on the wood, sometimes already burning wood.

Then stick the lighter (and your hand) into the pit and try not to get burned by the flames.


Super sweet and great camping buddy Brad.


Aaron holding a bottle of Orange Cream that almost got us in trouble...more than once!


Danny acting crazy but he always has it together.


Lucero and Ashley...best friends, roommates, and super cool chicks.


Desirae and her amazing hair, even though we were camping.


Me rockin' the side pony tail.


Crazy group photos on our last night. The new girl is Noelle who came up and joined us that morning.