unto mount Nebo

On Friday, I hiked Mount Nebo (near Nephi, Utah) with John Bradley, Sara Skidmore, and Matt Johnson. I was definitely not in the best of shape to be hiking the tallest peak on the Wasatch Front, but I made it to the top! This was largely made possible by numerous speedmo’s from John Bradley.

(‘speedmo’: a term used in the Hoyt family indicating the action of someone momentarily placing one hand on the back of the person in front of them to support and/or gently push the person along—thus aiding in forward motion; can be employed while hiking, biking, walking, running, etc).

In looking back at the hike, I’m happy to say that I made it to the top and back and had lots (and I mean LOTS…like 9.5 hours) of fun chatting time. Also, I took lots of fun pictures and slept wonderfully the night following the hike. On the other hand, I was extremely tired and grumpy on the hike down and the only apparent lasting result of the hike is that I’m sore and sunburned.

Not too bad, eh?

It’s funny how quickly can be forgotten the pain of going steeply downhill for four hours (I’m pretty sure I got a taste of what arthritic knees must feel like), or what five and a half hours of heart-pumping uphill feels like. There’s something amazing about reaching the top of a mountain and something compelling about getting there. At first, I move forward along the trail to see what is next...what new view will I meet? What will appear if I just make it to the next curve in the trail? Then at some point the scenery isn’t as motivating as it used to be, and I’m looking down, hoping that focusing on my feet will somehow propel them forward. It becomes all about placing one foot in front of the other.

Kind of going off on a tangent a little bit…hiking in the mountains reminds me of my dad and my childhood, how much he likes the outdoors and all the backpacking, hiking, and camping trips we went on when I was younger. I remember once we were backpacking in the mountains in eastern Oregon and after a few days, I told my dad it felt like we had been there two weeks. He seemed surprised and replied “I feel like we just got here.” Something else my dad has mentioned before (and which I think is really cool), is that there’s a lot about mountains in the scriptures, and accounts of prophets that went into the mountains to talk to God:

“And it came to pass that after I, Nephi, had been in the land of Bountiful for the space of many days, the voice of the Lord came unto me, saying: Arise, and get thee into the mountain. And it came to pass that I rose and went up into the mountain, and cried unto the Lord” (1 Nephi 17:7).

“And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount…And afterward all the children of Israel came nigh: and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him in mount Sinai” (Exodus 24:12, 32).

Intramural Champ :)

I came to one of Pete's first games this Spring and spent the majority of my time sneezing and inwardly screaming at my immune system to "chill out! It's just grass!" I hate allergies. Suffice it to say I was not seen at the rest of those games there in the middle of the season. When it got to his last couple games--for the championship, I really wanted to go watch, so me and my over-reactive immune system prepared with Claritin, heavy-duty nasal spray, and even eye drops.

I'm glad I came because it was a really fun two games to watch (and this is coming from a girl who usually thinks baseball is pretty boring). They lost in a really close first game to the team "Pink Destruction" (now doesn't that sound intimidating?) and then had to play another one against them again for the win. The second time they really played well, securing the championship with a final score of 10-3. Peter has been playing with this softball team for 2 or 3 seasons--the team is mostly made up of friends from the ward he was in when we were dating. He had tons of fun playing with these guys and it looks like the summer season of softball intramurals are just around the corner (I guess I'll be stocking up on allergy meds).

Done with Spring classes!

Yesterday, I woke up and studied.
And studied.
And completed part 1 of a test
and studied more.
Then I completed part 2 of a test
and studied more.
Then I completed part 1 of another test
and studied more.
And with minimal breaks, I studied until 11:30.
Then I woke up at 6:30 and studied more.
Then I went to campus to take the last part of my last test.
At 10 am I completed said test.

When I walked out of my classroom and started walking home, I swear the air smelled different.
Summer. Finally.

I texted Peter with a big "Wooooooooooooooooooooo! I'm done! It's summer!"
And then I smiled the whole way home.

The remainder of the summer will be devoted to family and my herbs.
End of Story.

By the way...

I think I fixed the problem of not being able to post comments to the blog. So could at least one of my like 3 readers kindly try to post a comment and see if works?
Thanks.

Life of Peter

I'm sitting here writing my last paper of the term and thinking about how I am home alone waaay too much these days. Here's some pictures of Pete working at Cardiac Rehab (which is 1/3 of the reason I am home alone a lot). A cardiac rehab patient wanted to document her recovery, so she took pictures and then made copies of them for the workers (gotta love those scrapbookers). Although I'm not sure how she bypassed the whole HIPAA thing, apparently there was some oral consent involved. Nevertheless, I did my best to protect patient privacy in these pictures. So here's Peter doing his thing as a "Cardiac Fitness Assistant." His other two jobs (and the last 2/3 of the reason I'm home alone a lot) are at a physical therapy clinic and a school for troubled youth. Add some GRE study and softball intramurals to the mix of 3 part-time jobs and you come out with a very busy husband :)

First Hike of the Summer

We have some pretty "lofty" hiking goals this summer and to start out, we conquered "Y" mountain (like to the top of the mountain...not jut to the "Y")this past Memorial Day. Although the trip up and down took a bit longer than originally planned, I choose to blame it on the picture breaks (and probably the one time I sat down in the middle of the trail and refused to move). Although it was a little snowy and there was not much in the way of pretty flowers, there were plenty of lizards and rumors of a rattlesnake to keep our attention. Small green shoots throughout the snow-flattened dead grass gave me hope of summer and (almost) sufficient motivation to want to do the hike again later on.