...and that's summer!

Summer came and left before Shane could finish spelling "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious." Here's a recap of what we've done over the past couple of months:

We cruised around Salt Lake on July 23. The Nova, Firebird and Corvette were cheered for driving along the Days of 47 parade route.

Jessen and Shane have the same thing on their license plates. Its their "car club" name, Accelerate.

We went camping with Shane's family and invited Brooke and Jessen along. Mmm...smores!

Shane finally talked me into getting a new LED flatscreen. The picture is amazing!

Then we decided that we were in need of a new bed. (Ours was Shane's bed that he bought about 8-9 years ago.) The memory foam bed took some adjusting, but I love it now!

Deal of the season: Fossil Stella watch for $34! The band is aqua, maybe not the white or clear one I wanted, but when I saw that it was only $34 at Nordstrom Rack vs. the $85 at Fossil.

There are things I like about fall, like being able to make pumpkin choc. chip cookies all the time. Due to the pumpkin crop devastation last year, there is expected to be a pumpkin shortage this year. So I went a little overboard when I found big cans at Winco. I bought 3 cans and only enough to make one batch. Since one batch is half a big can, I froze the other half. (Pumpkin balance: 2 1/2 cans) Then I saw 3 big cans for $7. I don't think I will run out for a while, with 5 1/2 cans.

State Fair 2010: Delicious foot long corn dogs, ice cream, cotton candy and fried oreos, with a side of seals, booths, and stinky animals.

After the fair, we had to take my car to the Infiniti dealership. The water pump went out and it overheated. There aren't many miles on it, thanks for the cheap part Infiniti. Had we not trailered it there (didn't want to have to stop 15,000 times to let it cool), we wouldn't have found that I desperately needed new tires. But now we are as good as new!

3 is a magic number....yes it is!

Shane and I celebrated our 3 year wedding anniversary this year. Somehow, and not by my pestering, Shane recommended going to Vegas again. We did a couple of different things that we haven't done in Vegas before and stayed there for the whole weekend. It rained while we there so we were able to enjoy the view that our room had to offer. We stayed at New York New York with a strip view room. I finally got to see the Welcome to Las Vegas sign, something I have never done in the many times that I have been there. (Shane was expecting a little more from the sign.)

I was being a dork trying to take my picture with the view.

Our room was in the Empire State Building.

This was the view from our room.

We also took advantage of the entertainment at New York New York. It is home to the Cirque Du Soleil show Zumanity. I have been wanting to see a show forever and Shane was curious to see what it was. The show was amazing and set in a very "intimate" setting. Most of the humor was crude and inappropriate, but the show was AWESOME!!!!! I highly recommend it to anyone with a sense of humor and that appreciates the performing arts. Be warned...there is nudity and a full fledged DRAG QUEEN! LOVED IT!!! I want to plan another trip to just get away and play.

HaPpY VaLeNtiNe'S dAy!

Hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day! But you don't have to have one day a year to celebrate LOVE. It should be celebrated everyday, between lovers, friends and family. Celebrate it with a hug, a kiss, "I Love You"s and even a simple smile. Let your cat rub his face against yours, let your dog cuddle with you while you blog and let your husband take your new car to work on your days off. And some may feel that Valentine's Day is just commercial, but it gives us a chance to give others tokens of our love. Tokens may be a kiss, a rose, chocolates, romantic gifts, time spent together, dinner or even something bought that your other wouldn't spend time on for themselves. This year I was feeling the excitement of celebrating love more than in the past. Don't get me wrong, I love to love Shane all year long, but this year I was just extra excited. I could not think of anything for Shane. I ended up at the mall with my mom and bought him some shirts. Figured he could use some. The night before he confirmed my choice of gift, because he didn't "have any shirts to wear. These are all old!" What did I get? On Tuesday morning during our morning ritual of getting ready while still waking up, Shane asked what I wanted for Valentine's. "A big hug and a BIG, FAT kiss!" Well, Shane said he couldn't find a big Hershey's Kiss at the store, but he gave me some Hershey's Hugs, along with some other delicious chocolates. The other thing I wanted to do was spend the day together, but that was a given. We drove to Bountiful to "just look" at a car and by 6pm on Feb. 14th, the car was ours! My Valentine's present was a new car! Not just a new car, but a 2005 Infiniti G35 with everything we had been looking for and more. So it may not be brand NEW, but it is new to us. I LOVE IT!!!!!!! And *I LOVe ShANe!* I will post pictures of my new gem once I get to taking some pictures. We've just enjoyed driving it too much to stop and take pictures. HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY to all that love, believe in love and live with love!

Dam it!

It's been a while since I have posted a blog, but I have been working on them, just not finishing them. So here is the post that was to follow the Vegas post.
On our way to Vegas for our anniversary, Shane and I were driving through Utah County and he asked what I wanted to do while we were there. "What about going to the Hoover Dam?" Shane asked. I have never been to the Hoover Dam despite my many trips to the Southern tip of Nevada, so of course I said "Sure, that sounds like fun." He must know me too well. How can I pass up a trip to visit something like Hoover Dam? It's kind of a dorky thing to do on your anniversary trip, but SO me! Shane had already MapQuest-ed the directions there from our hotel. But wait!!!!!! "I forgot my camera Shane!" As I am calculating in my head that it is going to take away from Tiffany & Co. time if we turn around, Shane says "Well its a good thing that I have mine." What a life saver! I love him! We went to the dam the next day and it was H-O-T!

This is part of the new edition to the skyline a the Hoover Dam. They are building a suspension bridge over the Colorado River side of the dam. Since it will be complete in 2010, you know I will be planning a trip to Vegas again.

We went on a tour of the dam while we were there. It was pretty cool to see how much is inside of the dam and how it works. This is the pipe that moves the water from the Lake Mead side of the dam to the other side. There's A LOT of pressure in there!

This is the generator room where the water rushing through the pipe above is turned into power. They were huge and the room was not as loud as I thought it would be. If I remember right, there are 6 generators in this room, which is on the Nevada side of the dam and 6 in the generator room that is on the Arizona side of the dam. That's a lot of power and water!

As you walk through the dam, there are these Native American designs in the marble that represent how the water is turned into power.

This is one of the tunnels that you have to walk through to get from room to room. If you know Shane very well, you know that he can get claustrophobic when he is in a small space underground. He was a little worried about it right before we went on the tour, but didn't seem to have a problem with it while we were inside the dam, until.......the elevator that is used to get us from floor to floor hadn't arrived at the time it was supposed to. The longer we waited and the more our guide talked about other people that have been claustrophobic on his tours, the antsier Shane got. I don't think that the elevator could have arrived any quicker.

This is the Lake Mead side of Hoover Dam. It was very pretty. While we were on the tour inside the dam, a girl in our group asked our guide why the rock around Lake Mead was white. Without hesitation the guide said "The BLM thought it would look nicer if we painted the white line around to contrast with the blue water." All she said was "oh." We all got a great laugh at her expense. Poor girl!

Now, its time to share Ashley's Hoover Dam Movie Moments with you!!!!!!!

Remember the 90's movie Fools Rush In starring Salma Hayek and Matthew Perry? I have always enjoyed this movie and often wished that I could have a place to go like Salma's character did with the dam.

Contrary to this picture.......you aren't allowed to sit on the edge of the walls around Hoover Dam. This is very dangerous! Duh! Please don't push her Matthew.

In the movie, every time Salma's character drives over Hoover Dam and crosses the Nevada-Arizona border she tosses a silver dollar into Lake Mead for good luck. I was looking forward to standing in the two states on the border line painted in the road, like in the movie. But guess what?!?!?!? In the movie there is a bold line in the road with large "NEVADA" and "ARIZONA" painted on their respective sides. ITS NOT THERE IN REAL LIFE!! All there is to show where the border is is this plaque. So you can't see me in the picture, but to get shot of the plaque I was standing in Arizona and Nevada. My first time being in two places at once!

My next movie moments were from Transformers!!!!!!!! When we were on the tour, a guy actually asked the silly question that was in my brain. "Where is Megatron?" Apparently he is on level 42 in the middle of the dam, about 20 levels below where we were at the time of the question. That's where we could have gone had we paid to go on the more expensive tour.

Since she is one of Shane's new favorite people to search on the internet, I thought while we were talking about Transformers, I would post this famous movie scene of Megan Fox from the movie. And as an Ashley side-note, her earrings are from American Eagle.

I tried to find pictures from the movie of the spots I saw, but I was unable to find any. In the movie, this is where Sam, Mikayla, Josh Duhmel's character and Tyrese are brought to enter the dam to visit Megatron's ice chamber (remember level 42?). They try to block out which side of the dam they are on in the movie, but in some scenes you can see Nevada Time under the clock. This would be the bridge they filmed on. And across from the bridge........

This is the EXACT same spot that Sam (Shia Lebouf) looks over the side of the dam and where the little devil of a robot falls out of Mikayla's purse and slides down to the bottom.

I know what you are thinking.......why would Shane ever want to take Ashley on another trip. Well, we had a blast and visiting sites like this is something that we both love doing together. In the 7 years that we have been together, we have been to places that at least one of us has never been and shared those memories. Yellowstone with our friends, Jackson Hole and Yellowstone on our Honeymoon, Las Vegas just to get out of town, Disneyland so that Shane could say he has at least been there and seen California other than LAX, Mexico on our first cruise, Moab for my first and second times, Arches National Park in the freezing cold on a motorcycle, Hole in the Rock outside of Moab. And there is so much more that we want to do. Make the most of your lifetime with simple once-in-a-lifetime moments that you will cherish forever.

Viva Las Vegas!

For our 2nd anniversary, Shane and I decided that we needed a little vaycay away. So we headed for the City of Sin, LAS VEGAS. It was nice and relaxing to say the least since we just stayed the night.

We stayed at Bally's for the fact that it was the cheapest we could find on the Strip, and also liked that it was right in the middle. We had no idea how awesome out view would be though. The picture above is out our window, over looking the pool at Paris. You can also see in the picture where they are building a whole new condominium complex right across from Planet Hollywood (formerly the Aladdin.) The city has grown so much since we were last there in 2006.
This is our room. For just $80 we got a king size/non-smoking room and the size of the room and bathroom surprised us, not to mention the view which you will see below. This is definitely our favorite place to stay now. I wouldn't mind making more trips here.I have two favorite places in the world. One is Disneyland where I can take millions of pictures and don't feel stupid with my camera. The other is Tiffany and Co. where I feel like a dork for even thinking about taking a picture. Since we don't have a store in Utah, I made Shane promise to go there with me. I love that place and my they serviced my jewelry so now it looks better than new. But I found out that there are 2 Tiffany's in Vegas now. One at the Bellagio and one at Caesars Palace. They're across the street from each other? Only in Vegas.This is the entrance to our hotel from the Strip. Shane had no idea where Bally's was until I told him that it was the place where the blue rings are. It was really cool looking at night..........and I saw a lady throwing up on the side of it. You could actually see the Bellagio fountains from our room!!!!!!!!!

The view of the Strip from our room at night.