THANK YOU CALEB, EMILY AND SAM!!!

Soooo, Matt & I came home from a hard days work and guess what we found!?!? Friends of ours in Michigan sent us a Halloween themed care package...including awesome cookies and candy pumpkins!!! That's not even the best part...an original piece of artwork by Sam Davis (their 2 year old son entitled "Pun-kin Cheetah Big White" Here's what we looked like when we opened it:

Thank you Caleb, Emily and Sam...you guys are the best!

Tram Pics!!! (part deux) (that's French) (I hope) (yup, I was right)

I left you guys with quite the cliff-hanger the other day. I know you were probably anxious to see if we all made it down safe and sound. Well you're going to have to wait a little longer (unless you skip to the end, which is cheating). On to the pictures!

Audrey and Dana hiking the ridge. (I told you there would be ridge hiking)


Frank decided not to wait for everyone else and began running up. This is a lot more impressive when you account for the fact that we were at 11,000 feet (running made my lungs burn).


Here I am about halfway up. Lost in the picture is the fact that my right foot is about 3 inches from a 100+ foot wall of shear rock, notice the look of concentration on my face as I attempt to remain with the living.


After much coaxing I got Audrey to join me on the ledge. Can you make out the look of terror in her eyes? (If you fall, you're going to have a bad time)


This is (one of) my lame attempts at "artsy" photography. My Dad always says, "put something in the foreground." You're welcome Dad.


Audrey got new shoes!!! Look how pretty they are. Quick story: We'd been trying to find hiking shoes for her over the course of a couple days. We went to a bunch of different stores around Salt Lake, but just couldn't locate a pair that didn't look like "boy shoes". Finally we found two candidates at REI. When the salesman came to help us he offered to show Audrey a couple other pairs, to which I replied, "she wants cute ones." Well this particular salesman obviously has a girlfriend because without missing a beat he said, "then these are the only option." True story.


This looks like it could be a jeans ad in a Patagonia catalog. (am I right?)


Jeans ad #2.


We really wanted to get a group shot, but considering we had just hiked far far away from any other people it was up to me to figure it out (notice I am not in this picture).


Luckily our new camera is equiped with a timer, so after a couple misses I finally got one with everybody in it.


The tram closed at 5 pm, and seeing how we did not want to get stuck walking down from the top of Snowbird we hustled back from our adventure.


Audrey is pumped to get back on.


Riding the tram back down to the base. (and looking good doing it!)


I don't shave on the weekends.


Back to the car. It's about 25 degrees warmer at the base.


I'll leave you with one more artsy shot. P.S. There are a ton of little creeks at the base that I've never seen before (they are buried in the winter).

Guess Who Saw The Temple?!?!?!

We did!!!! (but just the outside...more on that later). So after weeks of waiting to see downtown Salt Lake City, we finally got there :) Okay, so the Temple Square entrance looks like this:

Temple Square has a bunch of cool stuff in it (the Temple, Assembly Hall and the Tabernacle) and is walled/fenced off with female greeters at every gate. So, if you're not LDS (Latter Day Saints) you are allowed to walk around inside of Temple Square but you can't go into the Temple. Anyway, here's what we looked like when we got into the Square:

See how excited we are? That's because SLC is well known for this square and we were pumped to see it. Here's what the temple looks like in all of it's glory:

Pretty sweet isn't it? Anyway, the Tabernacle was the next thing we found in the square and it looks like this:
This is where the Mormon Tabernacle Choir rehearses on Thursdays...and we're totally going! The Tabernacle Choir is well known for their 360 members (all Mormon of course, but also all volunteers). Anyway, every year they put on an awesome Christmas show that is free to the public and so popular that you have to put your name into a lottery to get tickets. (And yes, we will be putting our name in for next year!) The show isn't in the Tabernacle though, it's hosted across the street (outside of the Temple Square) in the Conference Center (also made by the Church). It can seat 20,000 people, is GIGANTIC, and looks like this:
So also in Temple Square is Assembly Hall which was built from left over materials from the Temple. Here's what we looked like in front of it:
That's a lovely picture of us (have you seen a pose like that before?) but not such a great one of the Assembly Hall. Here is a better one:
Anyway, we were allowed to go into this building...so we did. Matt thought it might not be okay to take crazy pictures like I like...so you'll have to use your imagination :)

Tram at Snowbird!!! (part 1)

I realize we've been pretty bad about posting, but there hasn't been much "picture worthy" stuff going on lately. We spend most of our time at work, but this weekend we got out. Today we went up to Snowbird because they lowered the usual rate to ride the tram, $12, to one canned good, which is something a two poor medical students (and some new friends) can afford. Probably going to make this into a two-parter, we took 150+ pics.

Arriving at Snowbird.

Here I am turning in our two Chef Boyardee (am I spelling that right?) canned goods for a couple lift tickets.

CHEESE!!! Taking the stairs to the tram (we're still at the base of Snowbird at this point).

You can't tell from the background, but this is us waiting in the tram lift line. There were a ton of people at Snowbird taking advantage of the deal.

Here are our new friends. Frank (on the right, with the beard) is one of the first year residents at St. Marks, his girlfriend Dana (who teaches up at Deer Valley), and Frank's brother Steve. We actually spent most of the weekend with them, because they are all from Michigan too (we watched the Michigan and Michigan State carnage together Saturday).

AUDREY IS RIDING THE TRAM!!!!! (I just wish she could act like she's excited)

Frank and Dana riding the tram.

Not many people riding with us (good views all around).

Audrey at the top. Is she having a good time?

She is!
Look at all the snow (it was cold).

View into the valley (you're looking at Salt Lake City) from the top of Snowbird.

We did not make this snowman.

But we loved it just the same.

Ok, here's our last snowman picture. Did you notice the real carrot nose?

This is the last picture for today. Check back soon to see the ridge we climbed!!!

St. Marks Hospital = Where We Work

As of today, Matt & I have been in SLC for 1 week! What have you been doing with your time, you may ask...well, the first weekend we actually went up to Alta one day and then Snowbird another. Aaaaand because I had never seen mountains up close...I took a TON of pictures...which then ended up breaking our camera :( So, all of the gorgeous pictures I took are stuck on the memory card (does anyone know how to get them off?) Meanwhile, we sprung for new camera and now that we have it you get to see more pictures! As proof...here's where we work:

It's called St. Mark's Hospital (seriously, you can read it for yourself). It's a private community hospital located in the south part of the city (I had no idea where it was...Matt just told me).



So, as you can see, it's in a really ugly part of town...I mean, really, nothing in the background to look at...so sad.

As Matty has mastered the manual transmission, this is what I look at while he drives us home each day (pretty freakin' sweet, isn't it?)


These were taken a little closer to where we are staying in Cottenwood Heights. On pretty much every street there is a side for bikes/runners...so it's really easy to be able to go for runs...which kick my butt (as the altitude is a little higher and the hills a little steaper).


We found this restaurant on our first night...and it is our new favorite. It's called Zupas and its fast food that serves these elaborate salads, sandwhiches and soups. The BBQ chicken salad and cauliflower soup are the best and they always give you a chocolate covered strawberry at the end...it's awesome.