Guess who has dark hair?

Ewww...and an update

Not too long ago I took Bear for a walk and felt something wet on my sandal, and figured I just stepped in some water. Then I remembered I live in AZ and there usually aren't any puddles so I took my shoe off and found this little creature. Lovely. (I took this picture on my cell phone so if you can't see what it is it is a squished cricket!)

On to the update! Donavon finished his book study part of med school!!! He started his first rotation last Month here in Phoenix. He is home A LOT more now and even better when he is home he isn't studying!! We even watched a movie during the week together! I know, pure excitement! That has not happened in 2 years! He has been working in the VA hospital for the past two weeks and has some really funny stories when he comes home. Who knew being a Doctor could provide such entertainment! A big shout out to Tony M for showing D the ropes!

We also have heard where we will be during our 4th year! During his 4th year he visits 4 residency programs around the country for 1 month each and then has a 6 month core rotation at another residency program. So drum roll please, here is where we will be:

June: Denver

Nov - Jan: San Francisco!

The rest of the year we will be here in Phoenix for his core.

I can't believe we are already in his 3rd year! It has gone by so fast in no time at all we will be a Doctor! Crazy!

Halloween Adventures

Well, Happy Belated Halloween! This year Donavon went as a Podiatrist (easy costume), and I went as a foot. haha, we are so creative. This is a HORRIBLE picture of us (I think in the history of D&K), but it is the best one we have in our costume.

Our camera wasn't working so I was being the model for D while he figure it out. Hmmm...maybe model is the wrong word here. More like scary looking wife who looks like a deer in the headlights thanks to the flash. This year my Dad was a Chef, and my Mom was a witch. I love her socks

Tim and the Fam came up for the festivities and they had the cutest costumes! James was a dragon & Matthew was a knight.

AHH, A scary Dragon! Look out!
The Knight with his loot



These kids are so darling.

How cute is this? Knight Matthew in his converse.

We went to a Halloween party earlier in the week and made werewolf cupcakes. Donavon was my sous-chef and did a great job! He was in charge of everything but the frosting the cupcakes. When we mixed the coloring in the frosting I though it looked too dark so I started adding some other colors to it and they turned out dark purple! OH well, they are still dang cute!
Cupcakes in progress...marshmallows with fruit rollups

The finished product (minus the teeth, we ran out of frosting)

Beaarrrrrrrrrr

We stayed at my parent's house the other weekend to watch their dogs while they are were out of town.  When my parent's dogs and Bear get together they always get into trouble.  I got home from work one day and Bear had a big piece of tape stuck to him.  I searched all over for the role of tape and couldn't find it anywhere.  We call the 3 dogs the gang because that is exactly what they are!  We came home another night and they ate a bag of white chocolate chips with red and green swirls.  Later that day all 3 of them were throwing up and one of the piles had part of a lizard in it!  Gross!  Although they are kind of crazy we still love them!  

That is Suzie's face to the right of the picture.  She treats Bear like her child, it's really cute.  She'll bring him food and if Lola, my parent's other dog, is being mean to Bear she'll jump in.  That is why Suzie is in this picture.  She thinks I'm being mean to cute Bear.

I want to stay here

The Clayoquot Wilderness Resort in British Columbia, Canada. The rooms are actually tents in the middle of an amazing forest! Here is an example of the rooms. And the bathrooms

And the general beauty!
P.S. This is how you get to the resort...

"Simply get yourself to Vancouver, British Columbia and we'll take care of everything else.
Guests flying in from Vancouver enjoy VIP guest services from our preferred seaplane partner, Sea Air on specific resort-chartered flights."

What an ADVENTURE! I'm totally up for it. Anyone want to go with me? Go the their website http://www.wildretreat.com/ Too bad it's pretty expensive otherwise I'd be there right now! Maybe one day...in like 40 years!

What the Hail?

When we got back we were greeted with a HUGE monsoon storm. There was so much lightening that I felt like paparazzi were outside our window. We woke up after midnight because the thunder sounded like someone banging on a cookie sheet and then it started to hail. We turned on the TV because I was worried about tornadoes (there were warnings earlier in the day) and they said the worst of the storm was where the 101 and 51 hit...which is right by our house but there were no tornado warnings. So, I put a pillow over my head and was asleep in 2 minutes. I LOVE monsoon season. We don't get rain too often, but when we do we soak it up! Here is a picture of our backyard. Can you see the hail? It's pea size but I promise it's there.

Road Trippin it to OR

We took off a couple of weeks ago and went to visit D's family in Oregon. Not everyone could get together for Christmas this year but were able to at this time. So everyone was there (minus Keith who is on his Mission in France) It was so great to see everyone! We went rafting down the Rogue river on Saturday and saw a Bear and an bald eagle. It was so cool! And it was so beautiful! It was like a blanket of pine trees and it smelled so wonderful! I want to go back! On Monday we went on a Jet Boat trip down the river. http://www.hellgate.com/Splash/ If anyone is ever in Grants Pass you have to go on this. The boat only needs 8 inches of water to go so they take you over all of the rapids and through a canyon called Hellgate. It is beyond beautiful. Speaking of Beautiful...look at this cutie below! Hubba hubba, wooooo hooooo ho, grrrrr! Oh woops, did I just type that?We had D's sister Cherali and her little girl Averi with us. She is SO darling! Cherali is due the end of this month with #2 Dexter Cash. Cute! And yes, I'm walking bear with yarn. We couldn't find his leash, yarn works just as good. We went frisbee golfing when we were OR. Spencer & Jasmin came down to visit us! It was so fun to see you guys!

Oh, nice form Kristen.
WOOOO! D, you take the cake.

*Jaron, I don't have any pictures of the rafting trip, can you send me some?

**Tyler and Shelley, can you send me the pictures from the Jet boat trip?

Park Fun

On our way to Oregon to visit Donavon's family we made a pit stop in Sacrament to visit my sister and her cute family. We ate Chinese food, watched the Olympics and stayed up late eating ice cream. What could be better. The next morning we took the girls to the park.

Donavon taught Emily how to throw a frisbee. She got really good at a tomahawk throw. Molls loved playing



Heidi liked to play hide and seek with me. She's not so keen on smiling yet, but she sure is cute!!

This flower is in my sister's yard! Can you believe it? Just to let you know the squiggly part of the flower is not soft. That was my first question. I want these flowers in my yard!

Thanks for the fun visit Carruths!! We can't wait to see you again!

Cute nephew James

Here is James. He is so darling. We all met at my parent's house for sunday dinner and he saw the dogs going in and out of the dog door and had to try it out.

Now we know the real reason he wanted to go outside! Yum...a salad!

This is the e-mail that Donavon received today:

Congratulations to the students of the Arizona Podiatric Medicine Program Class of 2010 who took the Part 1 National Board Examination in July.  EVERYONE PASSED!  This continues our enviable string of 100% passage on the national boards.  I would like to thank the students for their hard work and the faculty for their commitment to excellence.

We were very excited!!!

Infestation

There has been a big bug infestation here in Arizona. Maybe that is just my opion, but man, they are everywhere! Here are some of our bug adventures that we've had in the last month.

Tim and Monica (brother and his cute wife) and their family bought a house down in Gilbert. We are so sad that they are moving but glad they aren't too far away. D and I went down the other weekend with Tim to go look at the house and do some cleaning. He brought some bug killer because he said there was a bee's nest outside their front window. When we got there there were so many bees it looked like this!! And not only were they ginormous bees, but they were Africanized (also known as KILLER BEES)! Scary!

I'm sorry this picture doesn't do it justice but there were THOUSANDS, ok maybe hundreds but still! I have never seen so many bees in my life. D took this picture on his camera phone so the quality isn't great, but you get the picture. Then the neighbor came over and told us that during the storm the previous evening they were swarming around the front yard and they were worried they would start attacking people so they called the exterminator but because the house didn't belong to anyone in the neighborhood they couldn't come out! We could tell right away that the little household spray wouldn't cut it, so Tim called the exterminator to come over and about 45 minutes later we were all outside sitting in our car watching the exterminator who was dressed from head to toe in bee gear spray all the bees. It was actually fun to watch and man did those bees hate him. The update now is there are no bees and the neighborhood is happy. Few!


I was laying in bed last Saturday when Donavon got back from a walk with Bear. He told me when they were walking bear starting digging at something and then jumped back really quick and started batting at his nose. D looked down to see what was wrong and there were ants all over his face. When he got home he put him up on the bed with me and told me he was going for a run. After he left I reached for Bear to scratch under his chin and I noticed that his whole face was swollen! This is another cell phone shot so it's not so great, but his face was huge! You can usually see his little under bite. Nope, not now he looked like he was playing chubby bunny. I didn't know what to do so I called my parents and they told me to give him a Benadryl. It worked and now he's back to normal. I felt so bad for him!

Infestation at work! And the culprit is...the Paloverde Root Borer...These giant, black beetles can be up to 3 1/2 inches (8.9 cm) long. I came downstairs one day at work and noticed a HUGE beetle that someone had sprayed bug killer on (and then left it there to slowly die...so sad!) I mean this sucker was big. The next day when I came in there were two more, just as big as the first one, again sprayed with bug killer to slowly die and then these little ones in the corner of the door also sprayed to slowly die. I went downstairs at the end of the day to take a picture of the big ones but someone already moved it. I resorted to a picture of these little lovelies.

But this is what they look like when they are big.

And this is what's left of one of the beetles at the bottom of the stairs. Yes, those are the part of the beetle that covers's it's wings...And they are still stuck on the ground...along with some of the bug killer spray. I just checked the picture info on my phone and the above picture was taken on July 8. The below bug was killed the day before (July 7)...I just took that picture today...Lovely.

I just got back from D.C. Had a great time. Chilled with 'Bama and McCain. (not really) Had a lot of meetings but was able to slip out and see some of the sights. These are a few of my favorite pics I snapped. Above the Washington Monument and below the Vietnam Memorial. D.C. is a very cool place to visit.