Well, I guess it has been awhile since the last time I decided to grace you all with a post... so consider yourselves graced for another month or two until I put up the next one. And I don't want to hear any whining, 'Jeeeeeen, you only do one every few moooonths, and I get so sad with out your awesomely formed wordings.' 'Jeeeeeen, I can't even live with out the new posts on your blog! I read them a million times, and I just neeeeed something new!!!!' Well, none of that! This is the best I can do! Give me more of a life, and sure, I'll throw one up every week,
heck twice a week even, but currently I'm averaging 5 hours of school, 1 hour of working out, 9 hours of sleep, and 9 hours of reading a day (yes that's 24 hours, my math class' pay off greatly). There's just not a lot to put on here! BESIDE THE POINT!
Summer:
Scratch that, THE LAST PART OF SUMMER:
After getting home from Europe I knew that I had to get into gear and earn some money so I could actually live, come school in the fall. So, what did I do? I moved up to West Yellowstone, Montana and began that grueling task of trying to evenly distribute time between tanning, napping, and searching for a job. ENTER JANE, my wonderful cousin (2nd to get specific, but I feel we're more like 1st, love her), who worked at a wonderful shop called, drum roll here, The Rustic Candy Shop/Christmas in Montana (is 'in' capitalized there? I can never get all those straight) and who happened to have been asked the question, 'Jane, do you have any cousins looking for a job right now?' just a few days prior. So, I was hired. Yesssss.
ENTER THE CANDY SHOP, AND WEIGHT GAIN
So, I got a job. And I worked a hefty 24 hours a week. Work was fun, sometimes a little bit annoying, having to be there while it seemed like everyone else was out enjoying summer. But I loved it, in the end, and was sad to leave. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Amazingly enough, in the month and a half that I worked there many employees came and went. There's Shaylee, the cutest gal in all the world, he time was up well before ours, and she returned to Utah and to her sweet boyfriend (now fiance). There's Whitney, Candy, and Tracy, all roommates, and all seemed to switch around their hours on a regular basis. Miss Jane departed for school. Creepy Jon left us to go hold down the fort across the street at the t-shirt shop. Tyler, well you just have to know him, and how he was in love with Anne. Jason, I only worked with once, but he seemed like a nice guy, the kind of nice guy who owned his own taffy puller and cutter and sells his taffy at various fairs.The missionaries did service there, and are still there to this day,
so they outlasted the rest of us it seems. Then there were the top few, Anne, Dylan, and Jake. I only got to work with Anne a little bit, and I worked with Dylan a little bit too much, and Jake came into the picture just for the last few weeks. But the few of us together had an awesomely good time. It made it really sad to head back to Utah. And then there were Dee and Diann, the best boss' in all of Montana. So amazing kind, and funny. I love all the randomly hilarious things we talked about. Mostly we sold fudge, icecream, candy, chocolates, and Christmas ornaments. But we also laughed, teased Jen, mopped the floors, threw stuff at each other, you know the typical crazy kids type of things. I actually do miss it now. Oh and we answered a few questions people had about taffy, namely, "how long does it have to pull for?"
When I wasn't at work I was living the life of leisure. I got the second most tan I've been in my life. Played a lot of football in the lake with the cousins. Read at least 10 books. Took at least 100 naps. And mostly just hung out.
For two weeks we had our family reunion. We have one every year in our cabin near Hebgen
Lake. It's the best time in my life, I love it. It always gets a little dicey, people get tired, fights break out, but since we're family that sort of thing is bound to happen. SO here are a few highlights from our reunion this year:
1. Hebgen ball.
I wish I had a photo of this amazing sport, rather I wish I had video. We'd get the oldest cousins out in the lake for a rousing round of football. Full tackle. No feet out of the water. The end zones were the volleyball net on one side, and Michelle (who I wouldn't let play since she's
carrying my nephew) would dutifully sit on the other side to be the other end zone. We aquired nick names as we displayed our footballing tallents. Rachel- the mocker. Brady- the beast. Maddie- the animal. Jen- the kraken. etc etc. I had the most fun this year at Hebgen playing ball. Sure we all encounter various injuries. I scarred most of my opponents with my nails, rocks in knees and elbows here common, kneed in the head, held under water, trampled, flattened, etc. I also lost an earring, which meant pulling an eraser out of the end of a pencil and wearing that in my ear for two weeks, blech. we played at least a half a dozen times. And I for one am counting down until next year when the games are on once again.
2. Boating
Although a lot of boating didn't happen this year, we did go on a few fun rides. I also went on a canoe ride with Covey and Matt, that was super fun, and I plan on making two other people take me out again next year so I can sit in the bottom of the canoe and do nothing but sing various songs and take photos.
3. The Beach
Guess who got the best tan outta all the Taylor cousins this year?? Oh, that would be me! Cancer here I come!! But dang, I'm gonna look good on my way there. The beach is also good for sleeping, reading, chatting, and getting sand everywhere.
4. Ernies
Eating at Ernies is one of my most favorite things ever. Even though I worked there two years ago the food is still just as amazing to me. I love their sandwiches. I wish I could eat there every day.
5. The movie theater
The Movie Theater, The Bear Den, in West is the best theater there ever will be, just one screen, and the A/C is cranked all the way up. You freeze to death, but it's worth every minute.
6. Sasquatch house/the haunted tractor
Every year we drive out to the haunted tractor at night. It's so fun. We go out there, tell a few scary stories, take a few photos, scream a few screams and come home. This year we decided to walk out to the magical house which resides in the back of a field near the woods. Said house is only visible at certain times of the day, and legend (our legend) has it that it belongs to Sasquatch. So, we headed out in the rain and lightning, and let me tell you, amazing.
7. The Jeep
Driving my grandfather's jeep (from the 60's) is awesome. It's the most fun car on the world to drive. We take it up contour road and hit the bumps at high speeds (sorry Rachel's head, you gotta watch the roll bar). This year I taught Rachel and John how to drive stick in it. I thought I had pictures... but I can't seem to find them...
8. Taylor's Peak
Here we go bumpty bump, here we go beepty beep. Taylor's peak is also tradition. We go up the side of the mountain to the peak where we roast weenies, or in my case eat a lot of chips. This year Maddie got two flat tires while up at the top, so there was more tension than usual.
9. The Park
We only went into the park a few times this summer, but it's still just as great as usual. We went to Old Faithful a few times. They're doing major construction, so it was hard to get pretty much anywhere else.
10. Shopping in town
Mostly, we do this while shopping:
I also finished a quilt this summer, for my friend Kate who had a cute little baby boy:
Well, I'm sure there are a million other things I LOVE about Hebgen and West Yellowstone, but frankly I'm bored of this, and I want to go accomplish something else. I feel I was much wittier yesterday when I started writing this than I am today.
I took a nap which went horrible awry and left me with a groggy headache. Hate that. So maybe when I'm more chipper I'll roll back through and throw in a few jokes. But here's on just in case you need a bit of cheering up.
What did the farmer say when he couldn't find his tractor??
GIVE UP???
Answer: Where's my tractor?!
