Franklin County Fair

Last week was the Franklin County Fair. Now the fair isn't necessarily my favorite thing in the whole world, but I do enjoy everyone coming back and hanging out with a lot of my friends. Since most of the summer I've been mainly been hanging out at home with my mom and Isaac it was nice to hang out with other people and catch up with them. Here's a break-down of my fair week.

Thursday:
I worked during the day and then came home and ate supper. After supper I headed over to Jamie's house and met up with Angela, Traci, and Jamie. We then walked around the fair for a little bit before we headed to the grandstand for the rodeo. The rodeo wasn't the best, but it was nice to catch-up with everyone. It was also the first time I believe that I stayed for the whole thing. My favorite part was probably the announcer saying 1 billion times "on a Thursday night" After the rodeo we got some mini donuts and looked at some animals. Then we went back to Jamie's house and played the game boxers or briefs and just  talked about things. It was really great to catch-up.

Friday:
I ended up babysitting for a family and so I didn't go to the fair. Instead I hung out in the morning with the kids and then came back in the evening

Saturday:
On Saturday I went with my parents and my cousin Gabe to the fair around noon. Gabe was doing a livestock judging contest so first we walked around for a bit and then we met up with the rest of the people doing the judging. We also ate lunch and just walked around some more. Then after the contest we headed back home. Then around 5 I headed back to Jamie's house and met up with Tara, Thomas, and Jamie. We went to the fair and walked around a bit. Then I found Anna and Ben and they joined us while we walked around looking at some livestock and things. Then Kelly and Nate also joined us and all of us went over to play bingo. We played for quite a while and both Jamie and Tara won. After bingo we headed to the grandstand for the Rodney Atkins concert. We decided to head to the beer garden. At the beer garden Traci and Paige met up with us. Then Macala came for a bit to chat with us. I didn't pay a ton of attention to the concert. I mainly just talked to everyone and caught up. It was again great to see everyone. After the concert Tara, Jamie, Thomas, Paige, Traci and I headed back to Jamie's and again played boxers or briefs before going home.

Sunday:
I started the day by going to church with my family at the fairgrounds. Then I stayed and hung out with Jamie, Thomas, Traci, Dean, and Gwana and we walked around the fairgrounds for quite awhile. We looked at the train set, historical museum, and pleasant hill. Traci and Jamie even taught us a small little lesson in the school house. After doing that the Wirtjes crew went back to their house for lunch. Traci and I decided to walk around a little more and then we went to the talent show, and hypnotist. After that we went to the grandstands for the monster truck show. Traci's parents, Jamie, and Thomas all met us in the grandstands and sat with us. The show wasn't that good since they didn't get started on time and then they just had long pauses between things where they weren't doing anything. After the show we ate some food. Then Traci and I went back to my house and watched the end of the bachelorette.

The fair was quite a bit better this year than it has been for me in the past. I think it was because I haven't gone in 3 years and this year I really hadn't seen a lot of my friends in awhile. I loved catching up with them and really seeing them for 3 days. It's been a little bit of a letdown this week not spending time with any of them.

Books, Books, and More Books

Here is a list of the books that I've read since the last time I posted. They were all really good and I would recommend them to anyone to read. I'm not going to give a description of them or a picture because I'm being lazy, but I thought you may want an update if you're looking for something to read. For each of the books there is a great description on amazon.

In a Heartbeat-Sharing the Power of Cheerful Giving by Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy

Paper Towns by John Green

Time of My Life by Allison Winn Scotch

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

50 Shades of Grey, 50 Shades Darker, and 50 Shades Freed by E.L James

Overwhelming Adventure-Color Run 2012

Friday we starting our epic adventure to the Omaha Color Run. Erin and Mary Beth drove from MN to my house so we could start the adventure. From there we loaded up the car and drove to Little Wall to change cars with my parents and get the expedition and pick up Carina. Then we headed to DSM to pick up Courtney and Amelia from there we drove to Omaha to one of Carina's friends houses and spend the night there. We arrived a little after 11 and so we pretty much went straight to bed.

We then woke up at 6:45 am to get ready for the run. We wanted to try and get there around 7:45 to pick up our packets since it sounded like it would be crazy trying to get it on race day.

We found a great parking spot and then went to get our packets. It took a maximum of 5 minutes to get our packets so then we got our numbers on and hung out for a while and took some pre-race pics. Around 9 we headed over to the start line and waited with the first wave of runners.

We waited until just before 10 am and then they let us start the race. At each km there are volunteers who throw the color at you. It is a powdery color and they try to aim for below your head, but with all of the dust you end up breathing a lot of it. This makes it a little tricky to run since it's can be quite hard to breath especially if its 97 degrees outside. We all started together running and ending up splitting off little by little. Erin and I stayed together the whole race and ended up running the whole thing so I was excited about that. After we met up at the end each of us got a packet of color and went around a stage and threw it up in the air at the same time. This would be fun in theory, but in reality it was super hard to breathe so we got out of the dust cloud pretty quickly. We then went and took some after pictures.

Overall it was an ok experience. I think the not really being able to breathe with the heat made it so that none of us would really want to do it again. I'm glad that I did it the one time-but that's really all that I need. Also since we were all quite sweaty it really made the color stick to us so when we went to get it blown off it didn't do too much. We then packed up and went to one of Mary Beth's friends and showered there. We got the majority off our bodies-but the pink was quite tricky to get off. Then we headed to the airport to drop Amelia off and then we went to Chipotle to eat. After that we headed back to DSM.

Once we got to Courtney's we took a little nap which lasted 2 hours. Then we went to Jethros to eat and shared some nachos and chicken tenders. Courtney, Erin, and I each got a chello tea as well. We walked to the redbox and got What's Your Number and watched that at Courtney's before going to bed.

In the morning we stopped by McDonald's for breakfast and then we headed back to Little Wall to drop Carina off and switch cars. When we got there my parents/grandparents weren't there and the camper with our car keys was locked. We also couldn't get ahold of them and Carina needed to leave so she would be able to get to camp on time. We ended up using our brains and Carina crawled thru one of the compartments and unlocked the door. It was quite a scene. My mom ended up calling us back around this time saying they were at church. Then we headed back to Hampton and I gave Erin and Mary Beth a little tour of the town. Then they headed back home.

For more pictures you can check out my facebook page.

Fourth of July Festivities

I saw lots of fireworks the week of the 4th. On Saturday June 30th I saw some while camping. On the 3rd I watched them in Hampton, the 4th in Urbandale, and the 7th in Waterloo.

For the 3rd my mom, Isaac, and I went to a family friends house near Beeds Lake and watched the fireworks from her driveway. I've never seen the Beeds Lake fireworks before and have always heard how horrible and slow they were, but I didn't think they were too bad. There wasn't too long of pauses between them so maybe they were better than usual this year I'm not really sure.

On the 4th I headed to Des Moines and went to the Ramada Inn, which has an indoor waterpark. There I met up with Courtney and her mom, and her cousin Kelly and Kelly's kids. During spring break of my sophomore year I went with Courtney to New Mexico and stayed with Kelly's family. It was great to see them all again and to hang out all the pool pretty much all day. I was really sore the next day from all the swimming, carrying, etc. that we did that dad. After swimming we went out to eat at Applebees. Then we separated and Courtney and I met up with Amy, Matthew, Steph, Amanda, and a couple other people and went to the fireworks in Urbandale. They were pretty good fireworks and listening to Amy's comments while watching was very entertaining. 

On Saturday I headed to Waterloo to hang out with Traci. I got there sometime in the afternoon and talked with Traci and Anna for a while. Then Traci and I left and went to Walmart, Hobby Lobby, and Staples to do some errands. When we got back we made some guacamole (which was delicious and I ate a ton of it) and grilled brats and ate that. Then we watched the movie the Ides of March, and then walked over to where they were shooting off fireworks and watched them. In the morning I went to church with Traci and then we spent some time watching Wimbledon. So now I'm very knowledgeable about tennis ;)

Camping some more

If you couldn't tell already we've gone camping quite a bit this summer. The last weekend of June we went camping at Little Wall Lake near my grandparents house with my grandparents and aunt and uncle.

On Friday I went to Des Moines to meet up with Erin. There we did a bit of shopping and I bought a new pair of running shoes, then we went to the movie Magic Mike, and then went to eat at Buffalo Wild Wings. It was great to see her again and catch up.

Then I headed to the campground and talked a bit and then headed to bed. On Saturday we got up early and headed to Des Moines for the farmers market. Carina and I had a little fun in the car with the strange straps that are there and I locked her up. At the market we each got a breakfast burrito and then walked around a bit and looked at everything. It was pretty hot out so we didn't stay for too long.

Then we headed around the Ames/DSM/Story City area for some Junkin' in June. My aunt and cousin were looking for some things so we all went together. I think everyone found a few treasures while we were out doing that.

We went back to the campground, showered, and then watched some of the boat races. It really wasn't that fun because there wasn't that many boats out there racing by the time we got there. So Carina and I ended up doing a little photoshoot.

After that we hung out for the rest of the evening, watched some fireworks, and chatted. On Sunday we  loaded up the camper and headed home.

Deb's Wedding

So sorry that I've stunk at blogging this summer. I'll try and do some catching up this week on what has happened in the past month.

On June 23rd my good friend Deb Huling married Aaron Masterson. I was one of the personal attendants (along with Traci). Leading up to the wedding I helped Deb make bracelets for the bridesmaids, make programs, and a decorate for the reception.

This was the first wedding that I went to that I really knew the couple so that was kind of strange/exciting. It was a good time and things went really well. Deb looked great, the food was good, it was a lot of fun to hang out with some of my friends. Here are some of the pictures from the day. (there are many more that I posted on facebook):