A future?

Do you know who Jillian Michaels is? She is the hardcore trainer most notably recognized as the trainer on the show The Biggest loser (Alexa's favorite show). She has developed this attitude of wanting to be the next Jillian, with the ability to yell at her trainees, whipping them into shape literally by making them fearful of her.

She took a personal training weekend course at ISU this past semester and is working on becoming a registered personal trainer. She has one client that she started training towards the end of the semester and if you could only see the simle on her face when I would ask her how it went. She would always respong with something like, "She was a baby" or "She complained about doing pushups." I always just laughed, but knew inside that I also was fearful of the wrath of Alexa when it comes to fitness.

Well this could be looked at in two ways...

First off, I have access at virtually all times to my future wife, the hardcore trainer to push me to my limits and keep me off the couch. Although I found many excuses over the past semester to miss her cycling workouts, I plan to get back into a routine over break which started the second day I was home. I'm sure if the wind wasn't blowing the snow 20-30mph over the past couple days we would be outside going for a run.

Secondly, on those days when it is cold outisde and you just want to curl up on the couch and watch football all day with a blanket over you and maybe enven take a nap, doing a workout isn't necessarily at the top of your list of things to do. Although I was in this mood yesterday I may have found a new favorite way to work out. Watching the football game, while riding my bike on my indoor trainer as you can see below.

Even though I may not enjoy it at the time and would rather be relaxing than working out, wouldn't we all? I know after last year the importance of winter training in preparation for the upcoming summer, which I will have to fill you in about later. So if you are looking for a tough workout in preparation for anything, or just to lose weight, guarantee you know you don't need to look any further than Alexa, who is willing to push you harder than you've probably ever been pushed.

One more to go

And it is finally over. I finished my last final for the semester and am getting ready to head home for a couple weeks. Can't say I'm too sad to see it end, but there's always next semester. The end wasn't as climactic as I had hoped, but I'll just keep telling myself one more to go, one more to go, as long as I passed all of my classes but I'm not too worried about that.

I'm excited to head home though, and i'm ready to start getting this list of things that Alexa and I need to get done started. We should have an exciting break, and although our posts may be a little sporadic we will try to keep everyone updated as much as possible!

Oh and if you haven't read and commented on Alexa's post below about her future plans, please do! We're counting on your input! Thanks.

Career Plans (or lack there of)

As I finish up my last final of the semester and realize that I don't have much schooling left, I feel that it is time to seriously start deciding what I desire as a career. This is and has been the number one question in my life for a while and I have decided it is time to tackle it!
I have many options after I graduate, these are just a few that I am considering right now:

Do the required internship (being that I get accepted) and become a Registered Dietitian
I could go onto Graduate School for things such as, health education, physical therapy, ect
I could find a job with the degree that I have in nutrition
I could go on and get a degree in clinical laboratory science
Or I could start my own business of combining nutrition and exercise

As you can see by the number of options, I have literally no idea what would best suit me, which is a bit of a problem in making this decision. I have asked many people in my life and they haven't been much help in this decision. As I recall my sister saying, "Really, I have no idea what you would be good at." I hope she was meaning that I would potentially be good at all of these options so she couldn't decide, not that I am horrible at everything and there is no hope for me. Some days I do feel that there is no hope in making this decision. But anyways, back to the point

Therefore I am writing this blog in hopes that the rest of my family and friends who know me can help in narrowing down my decision. What do you picture me (Alexa) doing?
I am honestly open to anything, I just hope someone else may have a different perspective than I have.

Here are a few of the things I enjoy greatly or my passions and hobbies:
1. Nutrition
2. Exercise and Fitness
3. Art
4. Education and surprisingly Public Speaking (about things I enjoy of course)
5. Cooking and baking (healthy things)

Well I probably should get back to studying! Since that is the basis of my career plans!
I look forward to hearing your perspective on this situation!

Esmerelda

This past Friday Payton and I got to spend the evening with family and friends at Cornerstone Church's Christmas Production Esmerelda (and I was lucky enough to go again Saturday). This was one of the most compelling Christmas plays that I have ever seen. Here is a short description from Cornerstone's website of what the play was about:

"Once upon a time, in a world very much like our own, there lived a young girl. Lik all children, there was a time of year that she cherished above all. That time, of course, was Christmas. And so it was, that one Christmas she received a gift. Inside this gift lurked something dangerous, something that would change her life forever."

I would continue... but I know some people who still haven't seen the play so I wouldn't want to ruin it for them! But in this play, I saw a picture of Jesus that I had never seen before. Even though this is who I know He is, I never pictured it in the way that "Esmerelda" showed. He was compassionate, willing to give up anything to capture the heart of Esmerelda, just like he is willing to capture our hearts above all other things. He is waiting for us, he hears our cries, he knows our deepest desperation's and he rejoices in our joys. He is our king, a serving, gentle king who came and walked this Earth for the sake of us. To save us for the sin that we walk in daily. He took our sin upon himself, and was crucified on the cross, the most horrendous death, just to save us. This is something that is hard for me to image. Why would anyone die for me? But I know that it is out of love, unfailing love! And because of this I am forever grateful! I am set free from the sin that used to control my life so that I can live eternally in God's presence! And there is nothing that I can ever do to repay the Lord who saved me and you but to be grateful and to show his compassionate love to others.

And so it is my prayer that in everything I do may all glory be given to our Savior forever! I also pray this Christmas season, that it would not be about the gifts or anything else that distracts us from the true meaning of this season, but I pray that we will all remember why we celebrate this holiday and that is for the birth our our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who was taken from His glorious throne in Heaven to walk in this world to save us. He has come to save you, will you accept? If you do it will be the greatest decision that you will ever make! Please take time to thank Him and give glory to Him for this!

May you be filled with joy and peace this Christmas Season!

With all of our Love!
Payton and Alexa

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." Galatians 2:20

P.S. If you want to know more about Esmerelda or buy a DVD of the play let us know and we can pick one up for you.

Finals

With finals week looming next week it has been a crazy busy time for both of us to take some time to blog. Funny how professors wait till 2 weeks before the end of the semester to assign design projects and such. We are making it through though and are excited to take a couple weeks off for Christmas break. We have a lot of things to get done over break and I hope we will be able to find time to sit down and do them.

Finals week for both of us looks a lot different. I am currently finishing up a 17 credit semester with 14 of those credits being Engineering courses. I have four finals and a project next week all spread out.

Monday: Hydraulic Systems

Wednesday: Final Design report for Hydraulics

Thursday: Engineering Measurements

Friday: Fluid Mechanics and our Control Systems take home final is due

So I will be here in Ames until Friday late morning finishing up my finals. I'm sure it will be a busy week since I have spent most of this week just finishing up other projects and homework assignments due. (Deep Breath)!

Alexa on the other hand...

She is finished with her finals on Wednesday so her mom is driving down to pick her up and take her home early. It's so lame! She definitely has a tough schedule and is going to have to put some work into the next few days, but going home Wednesday? That's not fair, maybe i'm just a little bitter. I totally would have stayed until Friday with her had my finals been done before her. Oh well, just as long as she spends part of that time continuing to experiment with cooking (especially cookies).

Life goes on. I can see the finish line from where I am now and I really wish I could sprint the rest of the way, but I feel like it is going to be a marathon semester in the spring. Especially at the end with planning the wedding, closing on our house, finishing finals and getting married all within a month I am going to be glad when it is all over and we can relax a little. I hope your life is as busy as mine because even though it can be hard at times, it sure keeps things interesting.

Alexa caught me studying, watching a video lecture so she thought it was a perfect opportunity for a picture.

Hope...

With the Christmas season upcoming and the masses of people continuing to buy presents it's time to take a step back and see what other things we could be doing with our time, or more importantly our money. Take a look at this organization's video and the things they are doing to spread the love of Jesus during this time of celebrating his birth.

Challenging? What can you do to help? By saving a mere 2% of the money you spend and giving it away, America alone could solve the water problem for the ENTIRE WORLD! Think of the change that could bring. Why stop at 2% though? Spread the word, help the world! I invite you to visit their website here to learn more about the message they are spreading and how we can help out.

Thanksgiving Break

From the last post, you can tell that Payton and I had a very busy Thanksgiving break. Although it was still very relaxing. Besides for buying the house, which surprisingly didn't take up too much of our break, we were still able to celebrate Thanksgiving. For as long as I can remember, we have always gone to Dwight and Bonnie's house where many of our other family members meet to eat dinner together and celebrate the day of Thanksgiving. But not only do we get to eat a delicious meal, but we also have the joy of putting up Christmas lights on their farm (more pictures on that to come). Luckily it was fairly pleasant outside which made the decorating easier.

Besides for thanksgiving, Payton and I along with my sister Whitney, her fiance TJ and my mom embarked on our very first "Black Friday" adventure. And it was an adventure. We initially were planning on leaving at 4:00 am, however when Thursday night rolled around we all decided that we didn't need anything that bad so we changed our minds and decided to leave at 6:00 am. And sure enough when 6:00 am rolled around we were headed out the door on our way to Cedar Rapids. It turned out to be a very fun day, a must do again for sure! Even though I bought more than I had planned (which I'm sure most did, hey I'm just trying to help the economy right?) and we had along two young guys who went for one reason only, to go to Best Buy and once that was done, they were done! So besides for the constant complaining (which we ignored) we had a fabulous first "Black Friday".

That same night, we attended our first Christmas celebration of the year. Payton's Grandparents take the family out to the Amanas to celebrate the Holidays. It was delicious as usual (especially the cranberry sauce), as well as a pleasure to see the family that we have missed while at school.
And that wraps up the major events of the week. I hope you had a fabulous Thanksgiving and look forward to the Christmas season!

Home is...

WOW! This past week has been a rollercoaster for Alexa and I both. We came back for Thanksgiving break last Friday with no idea what we were going to spend our week doing. We had been talking about looking for housing for next year after I graduate so we went in to Johnson Real Estate in Vinton and talked to them about what we could afford and what was in our price range in town currently. After talking to them and the bank we felt we might want to start looking through some houses. Alexa and I had one house we really liked after looking at the few in our range and so we decided to go through 2 houses, the one we both really liked and another pretty similar.

What happened next was not to be expected. After going through both houses we were completely speechless and shocked. It was a very weird experience going through other people's house to look at possibly purchasing it. After talking later that night we decided that the house we had been wanting to look at would be a great fit for us, where the other house was just too big. With 4 bedrooms and 2 stories, we wouldn't begin to have the stuff to fill the house. So we decided to go back through the first house again the next night. After going through, now knowing what to look for we started to feel more and more comfortable with the place and the possibility of calling it home. So we talked about the possiblity of making an offer and the things we would ask for.

We ended up making an offer on Wednesday for the house. The seller had until 4PM on Saturday to let us know and that was a crazy couple days waiting for the call. We got the call on Saturday morning that she liked the offer except for the closing date which we asked to be May 30th so it would be after I start my job. She wanted to close on April 30th and after discussing it for 30 seconds we were excited to go in on Saturday afternoon and sign the final papers to buy our first home! Alexa and I are sooooo excited that we will have a great place to live that we can call our home. The house is located at 813 1st Ave in Vinton which will be great for me to drive to Cedar Rapids to work and for Alexa to drive back to Ames a couple times a week to finish school. I will be able to move in before our wedding and enjoy our new place right away.

We are both really excited about this opportunity. It all happened so fast and we can't wait till April 30th to start moving in and getting it ready for after our wedding. Now we are going to have to go back and add a bunch of things to our registries now that we have a better idea of what we will need so stay tuned for updates as we continue this journey. Check out the picture below of our new home (in 5 months).

SAVE THE DATE!

It is finally official! Our wedding date is May 16th, 2009. Sorry for the long wait and many changes in date. It truly is harder than it seems! Mark this on your calender so you can enjoy this special day with us!
We promise the date won't change again (well we hope not)!

Missions...

You may have noticed this past week a new item on the right side of our blog for the unreached people of the day. This is a subject that is close to Alexa and I. Two years ago for spring break we went on a mission trip to Piriti, Panama in the Darien Jungle. This was something that we had been looking forward to doing for a while and when the opportunity came up and we signed up right away.

Our trip was one of the best experiences of my life. We were able to help these people out and get more things done around the village in one week than they do in a month's time. The best part of it all was their appreciation towards us. They didn't take us being there for granted. They were accepting of our help and were glad to answer questions and talk with us whenever we wanted, even with the language difference.

There were so many great experiences that I still wish I could go back and spend another week there. If you have never lived a week with no worries, no cares, and no stress you would understand what I mean. These people aren't worried about who is winning the football game, who was elected president, or what time of the day it is. These people continue to live their lives as though it is their last day, always smiling and showing their gratitude towards you.

The joy of all this is that these people know who God is and that Christ died on the cross for them, just as he did for us. This is something that we take for granted so much. We grow up in churches being told what to believe, but never understanding why it is we believe it. We have trouble understanding that Jesus really was a man that walked on this earth just as we are now. He came with one purpose, and that was to do the will of the Father who sent Him. We were able to spend our nights in Panama worshiping God for what He is and what He did for us. If you have never heard someone in another language pray or sing praises it is an amazing experience and sends chills up your spine. To think that one day we will be walking around in heaven with these people all in the presence of the same God just blows my mind.
Here, though is where the bad news comes in as you can see in the map above. There are 6,630,000,000 people on this earth, 2,670,000,000 of them have never even heard of Jesus. That is just over 40% of the people on this earth who have never heard that there is one true God and His Son came to this earth as a man only to die and be raised to life in order that our sins would be forgiven. This is tragic because we who know this keep it to ourselves. We are commanded to spread the good news, so what are you doing to help the kingdom of God expand? What about that person you work with, or the person that always sits next to you in class? Ever thought about asking them?

We tend to hear big pushes for people to go overseas to go on mission trips, but I am starting to realize more and more now that there are so many people around us who don't even know. They could even be sitting next to you in church. How will you know unless you ask? The people in Panama just a couple years ago were walking around wearing loin cloths living off the land and being self-sustaining. They now are wearing clothes as we do and taking trips into the city to buy things to make life easier. A couple years ago they were worshiping spirits, in touch with the evil side and doing powerful things with it. They now know about God and His Son from people who cared enough to learn their language and teach them about God. There are billions of people out there just like them and we have everything necessary to give them this message, will you be ready when your time comes?

my better half...

A special thanks to Lisa Coots and Davis Photography
for our amazing engagement pictures.
You can see them here.

she cooks
she cleans
she cares and
she shares

she is gentle
she is kind
she loves and
she laughs

she smiles
she cries
she frowns and
she hugs

she prays
she reads
she listens and
she loves God

she is cute
she is loving
she is beautiful and
best of all she is mine!

Thanks for being so great that I had no trouble coming up with these!

look at my gun...

So Saturday was another big step in the marriage process for Alexa and I. We spent about 6 hours in the afternoon starting our wedding registry at both Bed Bath and Beyond, and Target. We started at Bed Bath and Beyond after doing some other shopping at both malls in Des Moines. The malls were so busy in the afternoon it was difficult to move around in any of the stores. I've never seen it that busy before, everyone must have needed something to get them out of the house and out of the cold.

It was an interesting process doing our registry and I had no idea what to expect once we decided to start. I figured you just sign a sheet and they give you the scanning gun and you go to work, but boy was I wrong. Bed Bath and Beyond had a couple special employees who specifically work with wedding and gift registries. So we were placed with our registry specialist who took us through the whole plan for our afternoon. It was a good thing we left a lot of time open because it took us a lot longer than we ever expected.

She started by helping us choose our dinnerware by placing it on a table with everything set up so you could see the placement of the dishes and how they all looked together. I'll admit, I was very overwhelmed and let Alexa make the decisions in this area. We decided after picking all these things out that they were all too expensive for our tastes and planned to delete them all from our registry on the internet after making her happy and picking them out. We thought it was a little outrageous to pay $12 per plate and $50 for 4 glasses so we shopped in the "cheap" area later and found more reasonably priced items. I personally think the "registry consultants" were just scam artists to get you to pay more money than necessary, but what she doesn't know won't hurt her.

We then got to pick out our cookware which the in-store manager who worked in the resturant business helped us pick out the best value for our money (Or I guess in this case our guests money). It was after this that we tackled the wall of kitchen utensils. This was crazy! A 20ft wall that was about 100ft long just full of everything you might need for your kitchen. It was then to all the mixing bowls, pans, cutting boards, storage, etc. that you could ever want. By this time both of our feet hurt pretty bad. Neither of us chose comfortable shoes for the journey and were reaping the benefits of it. We ended by randomly wandering throughout the store and finally picking out our towels. It was pretty difficult picking a lot of the things we might end up needing because we have NO idea where we are going to be living.

We then, after refueling with some pizza at Nick and Willy's (small place across the street from Jordan Creek in a strip mall that we randomly found one time), for some excellent pizza headed to Ankeny on our way back to Ames to register at Target. This was much more relaxing and is more what I expected with registering and then getting the gun and running around scanning things. This was the store that Alexa started to get annoyed with me scanning a bunch of random things, but the gun they gave you was touchscreen and a lot of fun to use.

That IS me scanning a large Sony TV on our gift registry.

We spent a couple hours in Target going up and down each aisle throughout the entire store (except the food) to find the things we wanted. This store was a lot more fun without such a strong emphasis on the utensils and hardware, but had more games and fun things that we got to pick out. We found a lot of things at Target that we liked better than what we picked out at Bed Bath and Beyond so we had to make sure and delete those things later.

If your interested in checking out our registries for either place click on the links to the stores below and it should take you there.

In the end we had a great time and I hope that we find out we forgot a bunch of stuff because I'm ready to go, gun in hand at those stores again and this time come out the winner. We're looking for your help though! Did we forget anything? Is there something that you just can't live without that we might want to add? Let us know in the comments.

Starting a career...

After coming to ISU in the fall of 2006 I joined as an undecided engineering student. I was trying to decide between Aerospace Engineering and Mechanical Engineering. After taking an introductory class to engineering in general I was exposed to each of the engineering disciplines and it made it an easy decision to pick Mechanical Engineering as my major.

Shortly after making the choice to go into Mechanical Engineering due to the variety of possible jobs that I could have I attended my first ever career fair. If you have never been to an Engineering Career fair let me try to show you how it looks and feels. With over 300 possible employers and just under 1000 recruiters that come to this career fair just the sheer size and number of people is intimidating as you can imagine from below.

After going through all the various options for employers I left feeling satisfied that I might get some calls back for possible internship opportunities. It didn't take long and I got my first call for an on-site interview with Terex | Cedarapids (www.cedarapids.com). After my on-site tour and interview I felt very confident that I might receive an offer. I tried not to get my hopes up, but a week later I received a call that they were impressed with my resume and job experience and were willing to give me an internship opportunity for the following summer.

The experience I received from the internship has been great and it has made the classes I am taking more real and easier to see applications to classroom problems. I spent most of the summer working on a portable rock-crushing plant. At the end of the summer I was asked to come back again and accepted.
So this past summer I continued my work experience in Cedarapids working for Terex. I got to do many things this summer I never imagined. Shortly after joining for the summer there were some issues for a new set of plants that were in operation out in Utah and I was given tasks to fix the design to solve these problems. The best part of it all was the chance I had to take a trip out to the Salt Lake City area and spend a week working on the machines to fix the issues that came up. It was a very difficult week, working about 14 hr/day in the 90-100+ degree heat, but the experience I had was invaluable. After returning I was able to spend more time making design changes to the plants being manufactured, which also allowed me to spend a lot of time in the shop overseeing the changes made. This gave me a lot of experience in overseeing a project to completion as I was able to see the equipment make its way to Australia.
It has been a great place to work and has been great being able to live at home and still be able to have a great job. About halfway through the summer I was offered a full-time position with Terex and I happily accepted it at the end of my summer. So it continues the journey Alexa and I are on, with being engaged and knowing what my job will be. It also tells us the area we will be living in which I'm sure will lead to more blog posts in the future to update you as we make plans for that future area of our lives.

American

It was a privilege this year to practice our duty as American citizens and vote for our next President. We tried our best to keep up on each candidate and work to be the best informed about each man that we could, not worrying about which party we belonged to. We wanted to be informed voters so that we could completely say that we supported one man against the other. And I would say that we did a good job of that by watching two of the three debates, keeping up in newspapers and even from some websites. We also took into account others opinions who we look highly upon to make our final decision as to who we would vote for.
I think more of our vote was for the moral stands that our choice declared and yes that candidate was McCain. However, because our choice for President did not win we will still hold pride in our country for how far we have come, regardless of the differences. And as Christ followers we are called to pray for our nations continuously as 1 Timothy 2:1-4 states.

"I urge you, first of all, to pray for all people. Ask God to help them; Pray this way for kings and all who are in authority so that we can live peaceful and quiet lives marked by godliness and dignity. This is good and pleases God our Savior,who wants everyone to be saved and to understand the truth."

This is our prayer and we hope you to will remember this no matter who your choice for President was.

God is good, he is sovereign and has provided. He is in control above all powers and authority. And the beauty of it is He always will be!

So our congratulations goes out to Barack Obama and his family.
Our prayers are with you!

(If you were wondering what a prayer for our nations leaders might look like, check out this great blog post from Ed Noble here.)

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The faces of Champions

We didn't have a picture of the entire football team to post on here last week, but now, here it is.

1st Row (Left to Right): Adam Crim, Eric Brumm, Jon Jensen, Mitch Cline
Back Row (Left to Right): Grant Stephas, Kaleb Applegate, Payton Schirm, Jeff Messerly, Dusty Schirm, Steven Walter, Bob Bronson

Champions

Note: This is part two of a two part series giving you insight as to the differences between my story and Alexa's story about our flag football tournament. See part one if you haven't already. So last night was it, my final flag football game as an ISU student. Although it was disappointing that it had to end, I made my mark in ISU intramural history (if that's possible) by winning the championship. It was a long road with our first two preliminary games taking place the first part of September.

Our first tournament game was on October 8th and we have played at least one game each week since then to get to the championship. Our first two games were fairly easy wins for us with our third game being a little tougher. Our semi-final game was by far our worst competition. We dominated the other team 44-12 by putting pressure on their quarterback, which they had never seen before and continually beating them with the deep ball. The best part about getting to the championship happened the night before we even knew who we were to play. Two of my roommates were on the same team in our bracket on other side. On Tuesday night this week they won their game 36-16 putting them into the championship as well. This caused some heated trash talking in the apartment, with each of us knowing WE were going to win the game.

Now comes game time. We started out with the ball to begin the half and made a couple of nice catches to move down the field, but our drive stalled about at midfield and we were forced to punt. Both teams went back and forth throughout the first half with neither team able to find the endzone. The second half started out much the same way without a score until about 5 minutes into the second half they threw a comeback to their receiver and our safety tried to jump the route for an interception and missed. This gave the receiver an easy opening into the end zone. The two point conversion was under-thrown at the goal line so it remained 6-0. With our next drive ending on a sack just past mid-field it left our defense in a difficult situation. A couple plays into their drive their QB scrambled down field and stopped dead. He had pulled a muscle in his leg and had to come out of the game. So Dane (one of my roommates) took over for them at QB and made a throw across the field to score their second TD. They converted on the extra point by a jump throw and they added to their lead 14-0. On our next drive we were slowly moving it up the field when I found an open receiver deep in the end zone for us to finally get on the board. We converted our 2 point conversion by running an option pass to the corner of the end zone and put ourselves within reach. The next series was back and forth with the other team not being able to get the first down. They were then forced to punt and ended up shanking it off the side of his foot to give us great field position. A couple plays into it under pressure I hit one of our tall receivers right in the end zone to tie the game. This was with less than a minute left. On the two point conversion in order to take the lead I hit the same receiver with a lob pass that he timed perfectly to come down with it in the endzone. We took the lead 16-14. The final attempt to drive against us failed on the first play with the pass intercepted. We then ran out the clock to finish out the last 30 seconds.

After losing in the championship last year it was great to finally win one. I can now wear my t-shirt around campus with pride, knowing the effort it took between all the guys on our team. I was worried after they scored their second TD that it was too much to come back from but we had a great comeback win that we will always remember.

Boys will be Boys

Note: Part one of a two part series giving you insight as to the differences between my story and Payton's about the flag football tournament.

Last night I got to experience my first flag football intramural game here at Iowa State. Of course it was the championship game of the B league (just joking guys, you are A quality) so I felt kind of obligated to go. Plus I was curious to what all of the hype was about. All of the previous games I just went about my daily business and kind of shrugged of the weirdness that Payton expressed before each game. I swear that he was at each game a half an hour before it started so he could "stretch". Yes that's right "stretch before a 30 minute flag football game. That means he warmed up just as long as the entire game took. That is one serious flag football player, although I'm sure some of his other teammates were there with him if not before.

Anyways, the championship game happened to be against the team that his two roommates were on. So you can image what all of the conversations have been about this week leading up to the game. Yes thats right, every conversation had to deal with football. What happened to us being at school to study? I guess this was more important than the assignments that were also due yesterday. Or maybe they are all in easy majors where they get to do these fun things everyday, I don't know. I wouldn't know what that is like.

Anyways, I had the privalege of video taping the football game. Who video tapes a flag football game anyways? Well apparently my soon to be husband and his roommates do. I have been told it is so they can go back and review the plays. Although that may be a little bit of a problem with my video taping skills. Sometimes I had a hard time focusing on the game when there were so many other things happening around me. That and I was using a huge video camera that was very uncomfortable to hold. Well lets just say I am no professional when it comes to taping, although I'm sure they will be very amused by the commentary that another girl and myself had during the game (Sorry Dane).

All I have to say about the actual game is that it was intense. Very intense. Sometimes I just don't understand because it is only a game. And even though it was suppose to be "flag football" there was definitely a little more contact than just pulling each others flags. Every play someone was laying on the ground. But I guess boys will be boys.

So it turns out that Payton's team won, luckily. Otherwise I would have had to deal with one grumpy guss, and that is no fun trust me! I couldn't tell you what the score was, other than it was close. I do know that Payton's team won in the last few minutes of the game, which made his day. You could tell by the scream he let out when they scored the last two-point conversion (see I do know some football ligo). I think this could possible be the happiest day of his life here at Iowa State. Now he has his Intramural championship shirt which he has been working for for the past three years (by the way, I already have two, sorry payton). Anyways, congradulations to you Payton and the rest of the team "The Flaming Tongues (this is their team name, weird).

Being a Mentor

Last year in the fall I was introduced to Youth and Shelter Services of Ames and their mentoring program called GRIP which stands for Great Relationships in Pairs. After going through the application and interview process I was given a 4th grader named Devaughn. For the past two semesters I have been going to the elementary school once a week for about 45 minutes to go to recess and eat lunch with him. It has been a great experience and I wouldn't give up that time each week for anything else.

So in the mentoring spirit, I thought I would share a few of the candid things Devaughn has said over the times we've spent together.

P: What is your favorite food?
D: Fried chicken and shrimp fried rice.

P: What do you want to be in the future?
D: A professional basketball player.

P: What are your hobbies?
D: What are hobbies?
P: Things you like to do in your free time.
D: Crack my knuckles.
P: That's it?
D: Well, I like to look cross-eyed too.

There are no shortages of fun times when we get together each week. Last year we spent most of our time during recess playing basketball, but this year he wants nothing to do with a basketball because it's football season. So we have been playing football each week. We go outside and play for about 10 minutes before anyone else gets to come out and then when recess starts we play a big game of 2 hand touch between the 4th graders and 5th graders. It gets a little rough sometimes, but I haven't seen anyone hurt yet. Below are a few pictures I took during my last visit.
Above is a picture of the overall game. Devaughn is standing on the left side with the white pants and white hat on. Below is a picture of Devaughn being overthrown going into the end zone (the cement). He was disappointed that he couldn't have caught the ball so I could get a good picture of him.
Mentoring for me has been a great break from the ups and downs that college life has brought and I look forward to spending my last year here with Devaughn playing football and i'm sure basketball in the near future each week, while I help to be a role model that he can look up to for answers and advice.

8 years!

Eight years ago today, I was twelve and sitting in a tree house next to the boy that turned out to be the man I am about to marry. Unbelievable, I know! I can barley remember my own life without Payton in it.

Together we went through braces (weird I know), surgeries, high school achievements, a year apart (well kind of with Payton at Kirkwood) and our latest journey at Iowa State. We've been through a lot and we've learned a lot together. I wouldn't trade any of the experiences, well except for the summer I spent at what seemed like 8000 baseball games (sorry Payton).

So I decided to take you through a photo series of our journey together, but I guess we started dating when film was still in! HAHA, wow that dates us. But here are a few....

Homecoming Dance 2002

Camping 2004

Homecoming 2004

Prom 2005


Payton's High School Graduation 2005

My High School Graduation 2006

Christmas 2006

Iowa State Beats Iowa 2007

As I have grown over the years, I realize how much our family has shaped us into the people we are today and I can't thank you enough for your continual love, support, guidance (even when we didn't think we needed any) and prayers as we continue our journey together. I look forward to spending the rest of my life with Payton, going where God leads us.

P.S. Our wedding date is almost finalized, hopefully by the end of the week!

In the beginning...

This is the beginning of our journey into the blogging world. Alexa and I are excited to bring you into our lives and show you the exciting and sometimes funny things we do. We have been on an amazing journey for the past 8 years and we can't wait to include you in our experiences.

To give you a little background...

We met in middle school, I was in 8th grade and Alexa was in 7th. We started our "middle school" relationship at a weekend birthday party and have never looked back. We've been through the ups and downs of life and are excited for what is in store for the future. We went through high school with every one asking "When are you getting married?" or "Payton, where is your wife?". Little did they know that their jokes were about to turn into a reality.

After spending my first year of college playing baseball at Kirkwood Community college, Alexa and I have spent the past 3 years at Iowa State University, me studying Mechanical Engineering and her studying Nutrition (check out her nutrition and fitness blog here). I am a senior and will be graduating in May, with Alexa graduating in the fall of 2009.

But the most exciting part about our journey happened this summer. I'd love to tell you the romantic (cough, cough) story about our engagement but I think I will leave that up to Alexa for a future post. Anyways as you can guess, on Mother's day this year we got engaged and are looking forward to spending our lives together. The wedding date is still up in the air, we started looking in June and then changed our minds to July 4th, but now are leaning towards sometime in May. Hopefully sometime soon we will be able to update you on our final decision.

There have been so many things that we have been through over the years and we hope to update you on the things we have done as we continue to keep you a part of our lives through this blog. Hope you enjoy being a part of our lives through this as much as we enjoy having you here.