Oregon

On January 9th of this year, my friend Chris and I took off on an early morning flight from Omaha to Portland, Oregon. Our flight left Omaha at 6:00 am and we had a quick layover in Denver, Colorado. The flight from Omaha to Denver was very rough and the turbulence was terrible, but we got there safe and the flight from Denver to Portland went by very quickly. I sat between two guys from Portland who had never met, but you wouldn't have known that after the flight. The flight was very good and we arrived in Oregon about 10:15 am. My mom, who flew to Oregon a few days earlier, met us at the airport with my sister. The whole reason for the trip was to help my sister load up all of her stuff as she has now moved to New York City. Our time in Oregon was very short, but we managed to get a lot done in that time. We started loading the semi trailer with my sisters stuff at 1, and by 4, we had the semi trailer loaded and her apartment was cleaned by 6. After cleaning everything, we managed to go back to the hotel for a little bit of shut eye, before going to an awesome wing place. The wings were very good, minus the raspberry habanero ones, which were way to hot. After eating, we went to a going away party for my sister, where about 15 to 20 of her friends were waiting at an upscale Chinese restaurant that had karaoke. Chris and I stayed until about 12, then I took Chris back to the hotel and went back to my sisters apartment to load up everything that we were going to bring back in her car. The next morning, we left Portland at 4:30 and we were into Idaho well before noon. After managing to not stop through Idaho, we made it through Utah and into Wyoming without any troubles. After about 50 miles into Wyoming we had car troubles and had to wait 8 hours for my dad to come and pick us up with a trailer. He arrived at about 3 am. Luckily one of my sisters friends lived about an hour away and she and her husband came and picked us up and let us stay at their house until my dad arrived. We arrived back in my home town to drop off the car at 11:00 am the next day. My girlfriend was home that weekend, so we were able to get a ride back to Omaha with her. I was very thankful that she was home!!! I don't think we would have made it back to Omaha if she hadn't given us a ride! The trip was very quick, but very eventful and one that neither Chris nor I will ever forget. The pictures are ones from a lookout just a few blocks from where my sister had lived in Oregon.

While I was at home, I thought I would go out to my grandpas farm and take some pictures. This is a picture of the barn and as my grandpa would say the "chick house." My grandpa and grandma used to have chickens, but the "chick house" is now used as a cat house. My grandpa loves his cats. He goes to the farm every day just to feed them and during the winter, he makes sure to take hot water so he can fix them warm milk. No wonder there were always so many mice at the farm. When my grandpa and grandma moved to the farm in 1968 and the chick house was already there. They moved the barn from south of Madrid shortly after they moved out there.
When my family moved out to the farm in 1996, I got a dog and she lived in the barn for the first couple of weeks so that she would not run off. When my dog had her first puppies, they stayed in the chick house, and my cousin Brooke thought she would hold one of them. She held it until the puppy pooped on her and then she cried for about 20 minutes! As time has went by, these two buildings have started to deteriorate. When we used to have family gatherings at the farm, we would go into the chick house and try to catch baby kittens. It always seemed like we had the wildest cats ever! I would always help my grandpa and grandma put plastic over the windows so that during the winter, the cats would stay warm. I sure do miss those days.

Another year has come and gone.

Another year has come and gone. This was a year where my life changed as I graduated college, moved to Omaha, and started a new path in my life. Where will this path lead me, who knows, but its a good place to be right now. I have decided to start blogging more than I have. I usually just read blogs, but I want to do something different this year. Instead of wasting my time being online, I thought I would waste my time constructing a blog to see if I can compete with the awesome blog that my sister has. She is awesome and has awesome things for sell on her website marmadesigns.blogspot.com. Anyways, lets see how this goes and hopefully I will keep ontop of keeping this thing updated.