Fall Break Fun

So for Fall Break, Dan and I, and our friends Jeff, Michelle and baby, (and the USU Rocket Team) went down to New Mexico to the Navajo Nation!  The rocket team were down there to do outreach to 800+ elementary school kids about rockets and rocketry.  They did an awesome job!   Afterwards, we went to the Four Corners Monument!  It was fun to see all the different booths that people had there.  Baby even got a free bracelet even though he's a boy haha! 

That night we were going to go to Arches and find a campsite and camp for the night.  Well, there wasn't a camping site or hotel room within a hundred miles of Arches.... So we ended up sleeping in the car, with four adults and a baby, and a lot of stuff still in the car.  Let's just say it was not exactly the best night's rest any of us had gotten in a while.  But we went into Arches that morning and did some hiking and had a fantastic day!  I'll post more pictures later!  But for your enjoyment, here is a video from that morning.

Help!!!

So I need some ideas for a couple of things.  My birthday is coming up and Dan has been asking me what I want, but I don't know what to tell him.  There's not really a lot of things I want currently, I mean I have a few ideas that would be nice but none of them are must haves.  Here's my list so far:
-hiking shoes
-camelbak backpack
-one of those cool chairs that I posted about earlier

Anyone have any other ideas?

Also, I need a good idea for Dan's anniversary gift.  Our first anniversary is about six weeks away and I don't know what to get him!!!  I know the first anniversary gift is paper but I don't know where to go with it.

P.S. He won't read this so don't feel bad about posting any ideas!

Sunday dinners

We enjoy cooking around here.  A couple of weeks ago, before school started, we decided that we wanted to try our luck at making Indian food!  It was really fun and delicious. 

Because of this, we decided that we really wanted to try making a lot of other new things.  So this weekend, we decided that we wanted to make French Onion Soup for dinner!  Boy it was delicious!  We even found a recipe that was French Onion soup for 2!  Perfect serving size and everything!  We enjoy cooking together cause it's like a mini-date for us when we do that.  Today was no different!  We had a blast cooking and enjoyed eating it together. 

Here's a picture of our soup!

I want...

one of these!

Or some various form of this...
The end...

First Day of School!

HAPPY FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!!  (At least for everyone that started today!)

Today was our first day of school... kinda.  So Dan has lots and lots of classes (17 credits) and I have one class and thesis credits.  So really it was only Dan's first day, mine is tomorrow.  But I will be working on my thesis this semester doing my research and finishing my plenum design!  Yay!  Go me!  But Dan has lots of classes he wants to take and he is also going to be working on his senior project this year, the rocket team.  This means I am going to be an engineering widow this semester.  This might be a good thing though cause it means I can get a lot done for my own stuff without feeling like I'm abandoning Dan.  But at the same time, we're not going to see each other except at night.  Here's a peak at our schedule for the semester.

So ya... we are never going to see each other!  Good thing we make dinner a date every night more or less!  But overall it should be a good semester!

Some of our goals for the semester include:
-Get better at doing FHE
-Exercising every day (or at least every other day)
-Get my research done and thesis started!
-Rock the rocket team!
-Have fun!
-Go on more dates
-Follow our budget more closely

I hope everyone has/had a great first day of classes!  I'm betting I'll enjoy my first day tomorrow!

August Update

So life has been pretty busy lately.  For the last month we've had trips and things to get done all before school starts.
To start the month off, we went on our honeymoon!  It was FANTASTIC!!!!  We stayed at this amazing little bed and breakfast in Parowan and loved every minute of it.  We went to two plays at the Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City, Music Man and Richard III.  We hiked in Cedar Breaks, Kanara Falls, and Zion NP.  And we just had a fantastic time!
We also moved!  We are so excited to be closer to campus!  We love our apartment even if it still isn't all together yet. 
I also got to go to a SWE (society of women engineers) event!  It was SO AMAZING!!!!  I went to Austin, TX for a few days to learn all about my region collegiate position that I have this year!  (I get to keep up a blog for the region and let them know what's going on and give advice!)  If you ever wanna read it, it's the Region B blog on the side! 
We also are trying to get as much work in as we can before school starts.  It's been a fantastic summer and we are sad that it is almost over but excited to start our last year at school here! 

Easy peasy pumpkin squeezy!

So this has nothing to do with pumpkins but it is really easy. Today we made what I am now going to call the Merkley Easy Enchilada. We again just took stuff that we had lying around to make it.
All it is is chicken, black beans, salsa verde, sour cream, cream of chicken soup, cheese, tortillas and some enchilada sauce from the packets or whatever.
Mix together everything except the enchilada sauce into a bowl and then you can either layer it like a lasagna or spread it into tortillas and roll and place in the casserole dish. Then spread some of the mixture on top of the tortillas.
Preheat oven to 325 and mix up the enchilada sauce. Drizzle some on top and pop it in the oven for like 20 minute and you are good to go!
I've seen this done a lot of different ways but this is how ours turned out and I thought it was delicious and very filling. Add some roasted anneheim peppers as a side and it would have been even better! :-)