NEW WEBSITE!

Hi Everyone!

I know it's been a long time since we have added anything new to this webpage but I've been working on a new one that is finally up and ready! :-) I hope you guys like it! Please check it out

www.mywedding.com/joshuaandalaina

thanks!

Summer Break (Josh)

Over my very short summer break (two weeks), I went with my brother Dan to the Rocky Mountains to climb Mt.Bierstadt. We drove out on Sunday and camped in the Arapaho National Forest. Our camp site was beside a high mountain stream which was amazing.
The next morning we tried to drive to the trail head but found the road closed with snow, so we set out on foot. Going was very slow, the snow was too hard to walk on and too deep to walk through. We just had to "post hole" for most of the way, which was both exhausting and time consuming.

There was amazing high alpine scenery all around us, mountains and snow fields in every direction. As we climbed higher the view only got better. We stopped to cook and eat lunch at around 12:00, before continuing toward the summit.

As we got higher the air got colder and colder, it also go thinner. We would hike a short distance and then have to stop to catch our breath, which was not a surprising. Considering that at that just 24 hours earlier we were in Omaha, NE, elevation 1200ft, and we were now nearing 14,000ft. We were ascending via the east gully rout, which is much steeper than the normal South ridge rout. We pushed on and reached the summit around 3:00 in the afternoon.

After a short stay on the top, we had to get moving because of the cold, we started the descent.

We made camp for the night in the valley, exhausted, we cooked supper and went to bed. This was when we realized that we were both sunburned beyond all reason, which made sleeping miserable. But there was nothing that we could do so we tried to sleep the best we could. I was awakened during the night by wolves around our tent, I think they smelled our supper. I thought that we wouldn't have to worry about them seeing as we were above the tree line, wrong!

The next morning we trekked back to the car. Our faces were so sunburned and painful that we headed for home instead of climbing another smaller mountain like we had planned. Over all it was a great trip except for the sunburn, next time we'll use sun screen with higher than 30 spf. This trip was Dan's first time in the mountains, I was a little worried about him but he did a great job on a grueling climb. He said it was the hardest thing that he's ever done, I agree with him, even harder then the 6 hour cross country mountain bike race, which is really the only other thing close. If pictures are worth a thousand words than this has been a long post, I'm not sure when I'll post again as I'm now back at the grindstone of work and school.

New Layout!

The blog needed a face lift! :-D I hope you like it! Yes, Jacob helped with most of it! lol!

THE DRESS!!

The dress has arrived!!! YAY! And it fits PERFECTLY! I can't begin to describe what a relief it is since I never actually tried the dress on and had to order it based on the pictures. :-) It's absolutely beautiful! I can't put pictures on the blog b/c I can't have Josh seeing them but I think I'd like it to be a bit of a surprise to everyone anyway! ;-)

Tomorrow we are going to stop by the cake decorator and put in our official order for the cake! :-D Also, we will probably be ordering invitations as well. I can't wait for those to get here! :-D

In other news, today I went in search of a sun dress for a wedding that Josh and I are attending on the 7th. After much digging I FINALLY found one I liked, that fit, that wasn't risque and it was 50% off!!! YAY! Go JcPenny! The only problem ( in the eyes of my man) were the colors.....pinks, lavenders, purples, black and white. Josh, knowing me, was a little afraid b/c he knew that I would want to match. Well, on his break at work today we stopped in at Pennys to see what they had that might match. And what do you know????? We found a tie that had all the EXACT same colors in it!! Really, it looks like it was made to do with the dress! lol! Poor Josh! There was a guy that was also shopping for a tie, and he kept giving Josh sympathetic glances and words of encouragement (no doubt from experience of his own! lol). In the end, Josh agreed to get it and wear it when I wear my matching dress. Such a trooper!! I have such a great man!! :-)

A's + J's

On Sunday we found out that two other we know couples have gotten engaged! :-) Alicia and Justin, & Abi and Josiah. We realized that three "A" girls are going to marry three "J" guys!! Plus we are all getting married this fall!

Fortunately, we managed to get all six schedules to line up so we could go out to lunch yesterday! We met at Heartland park and walked down town to Famous Dave's.

From left to right, Josiah and Abi, Justin and Alicia, Alaina and Josh

So adorable! They are matching!

So cute!!

We were thinking that if we all carpooled and eloped at the same time that we could save on gas money! Can you imagine? ;-)

Josh's 21st b-day!

Since Josh was turning the big "21" this year I really wanted to throw him a surprise party--especially since he boasted that he'd never been surprised on his b-day b4. ;-D Originally I had a plan in place but there were some complications that came up. So Mrs. Beasley and I worked on an alternative plan to surprise him! :-) Mrs B. graciously offered to have the party at the Beasley's house on May 14th (his b-day) and ask people to park in the pasture behind the house so he wouldn't see the cars. I created a "secret" event on facebook to invite ppl with out him finding out. The stage was set.

On the 14th I picked up the wonderful cake (great job Crista!!!) on my way out to school for my last final. When I was done I took the cake over to the Beasley's house so it wouldn't sit in the car. Luckily Mrs. Beasley and Anna were out running errands and offered to pick up a toy bike to go on the cake, since I hadn't found the time (WONDERFUL JOB GUYS!!!!). Esther helped find a place to put the cake in the refrigerator. Then I raced back to campus to meet Josh after his class so he wouldn't be suspicious. Josh kinda threw a curve ball at me when he said that we should drop my car off at his house and just take one vehicle to run on our errands (he had ridden his motorcycle). I couldn't talk him out of it so on the drive back to his house I called Esther and asked her to move the cake to her room so Josh wouldn't see it when he wanted chocolate milk. Yay for Esther b/c Josh went straight for the chocolate milk! lol! After he had his fill we left to go shopping for a hand gun! :-) We got done right at 5:15 which put us getting home right on time! When we got back to the house everyone was walking around like usual. we headed down to the kitchen and Mrs. Beasley asked Josh to take the steak out to grill. After a couple of fake outs, due to chocolate milk, Josh finally walked through the addition to take the steak out. When Josh walked in everyone jumped out and yelled "SURPRISE!" We accomplished our goal! Josh was truly surprised! A Thank You goes to the Grady clan as well for helping with the food! :-)Thanks to everyone who came out! :-)

I talked to Crista, the cake decorator at work, and asked her if she could design a cake with a mountain biking theme. She used cupcakes to help make the mountains! It looked great! Thanks to Mrs. Beasley who found the bikes! :-)

The guys playing b-ball...

Roasting marshmallows over some ashes from the big bonfire.

A big Thank You to everyone who helped get ready for this day! It worked out perfectly!

Catchin' Up :-)

Wow time flies! Let's see...the highlights.
Here are some pictures of Josh's mountain biking trip to Utah on spring break.

Josh had an "epic" time out on the trail. From what I've heard the pictures don't do it justice but it does look beautiful!

Josh's mountain bike racing season started on April 5 at the Maskenthine XC Classic in Norfolk, NE. This year Josh decided to race in the single speed division. This year I'm josh's official pit boss! ;-) It was a cold race to start the season but it was also very rewarding. Josh took FIRST!

On May 3rd we had the second mountain bike race of the season at Swanson state park in bellevue. Previously in the week we both rode on the trail and it was a ton of fun. Josh said it was about 5 miles per lap. Singlespeed races are three laps. It took Josh about 1hr and 10mins taking FIRST! :-D



Finally our matching bike master's jerseys came in the day before the swanson race. yay! :-) Here are some pictures of us riding on the tandem.