A Day at the Lake

Curtis and Jason

Curtis Wakeboarding

Emily and Steph

Jason Getting Ready to Skurf

We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends here to help us out and get us acquainted with Arizona!  (And to invite us out for some fun!) :)  Emily and Jason invited us to go to the lake on Saturday with Mark (the dentist Emily used to work for here).  So, we were up and out the door at 4:30 (yes...that's A.M.) to go hit the water!

Curtis, Jason (in water), and Emily

We met up with Mark, and his friend, Curtis, at Mark's house, then jumped in the Sequoia and headed out.  Curtis and I have only wakeboarded a couple times each and it has been a while.  But, we both got up on the first try and did alright.  Hopefully we'll get many more chances to hit the lake and get better! 

Mark Skurfing

All of the guys skurfed too!  It was a couple of the guys' first time on a skurf board, but they did pretty well.  (And, of course, Mark made it all look too easy - you can't tell this guy owns a boat at all!  Ha-ha!)  :) 

Em and I soaked up some rays, while getting to enjoy the vast array of music from "DJ Marky Mark's" playlist.  And we occasionally jumped in the lake to cool off from the Arizona heat.  All in all, it was an awesome day!  We were totally worn out when we were done, but we had so much fun! 

Kiesig Fam Reunion



Cassi Making Strawberry Shortcake at Papa's House

Before my big move to Arizona, I got to spend my last week hanging out at the Kiesig Fam Reunion!  We were supposed to go to Yellowstone and have a big extended family event, but we planned a little too late and there were no available campsites or cabins.  So, my dad and his siblings decided to still get together and have a "mini reunion" in Twin Falls & Boise. 
We went hiking to Balanced Rock in the morning.  Then spent a couple hours on the Hagerman River on a pontoon boat for lunch.  The lunch was made by a nationally famous chef that cooks for the Snake River Grill in Hagerman - it was delish!!! After that, everyone went back to dad's house for naps and to relax.  Then we BBQ'd at dad's house...trout...sloppy joes...hot dogs...potato salad...deviled eggs...rolls...and more.  Then strawberry shortcake for dessert!  It was an amazing meal!    

Scotty, Delany, Vicky, & Dad

Lexi & Steph at Balanced Rock



Ken & Jeni

 
 



 





My Favorite Tree at 1,000 Springs





    

  

Watermill at 1,000 Springs



1,000 Springs Boat Tour

 (Lexi, Vicky, Ken, Jeni, & G'ma)



The Capitol (Delany, Scotty, Ken, Vicky, Jeni, Dad)



Go Broncos! 



Some people stayed in Twin and went to Shoshone Falls the next day...some people headed back to Boise to relax.  Then, everybody met up in Boise to hang out for the 4th of July.  We went to the parade downtown.  Then headed over to the capitol to be tourists.  While we were there, we only felt it necessary to write "Go Broncos" in the seats (as you can see above).  We also wrote "Go Orange, Go Big Blue."  Now they have something to look forward to, they next time they meet.  Then we headed back to Scotty's farm and played lasso golf...ate...played a cornhole tournament...ate...drove remote control cars...did I mention that we ate?!  Scotty BBQ'd for all of us and we had burgers & brawts & pulled pork...watermelon...cantelope...potato salad...and key lime & graham ice cream sandwiches.  After a while, everybody that wanted to go, got ready and headed down to Ann Morrison for the fireworks.  They weren't very long, but they were good!  I love fireworks!!!  The 4th of July is one my favorite holidays!!!  Everyboday camped out under the stars the night of the 4th.   We had a campfire and roasted smores.  Then we woke up to a yummy dutch oven breakfast!  Then everybody had to head back home. 

   

Jeni, Scotty, Ken, & Vicky playing Cornhole

Dad & G'ma watching Cornhole

    

I had such a good time hanging out w/ my aunt's & uncle's, dad & Jeni, and Lexi!!!  (And Tiffer & the kids when we were in Twin!)  Loved that we still did the "mini-reunion" before I headed off on my new adventure! 



 

 



The Road Trip...w/ a Few Bumps in the Road

I told Curtis that I would blog all about our adventure in getting moved...so, here it goes. 

To move to Arizona, my dad offered to drive the horse trailer down w/ our stuff in it, and we had Curtis's truck.  We were also supposed to have a work van (for Curtis's business) to drive down (but, that's a whole different story that you don't even want me to get started on).

We got a late start on the morning of Memorial Day.  Decided to head down to Phoenix through Nevada.  We had planned to stop in Henderson and stay the night to break up the trip a little and see my older brother that lives there.  And things were going pretty close to how it was planned...until we noticed smoke coming from the driver's side of the horse trailer about an hour past Wells, NV (right outside of the miniscule town of Currie)!!  My dad limped the trailer up the road to a pull out where there was more room to check out what was going on.  Come to find out the tire was shot from the axle and bearing breaking!  Yikes!!! We barely had any cell or data service, but were able to look up Les Schwab Tires.  A guy aswered the phone and noted that he was on call, but he wasn't coming to tow us on a holiday!  (So much for the Les Schwab commercials where they save people on the holidays and help them make their events and stuff!!!) He gave us the name of a towing company, but wouldn't even look up the number for us on that either!!  We looked it up on the internet and were able to call.  The second company was nice, but noted they couldn't tow the trailer on a truck, they would just have to pull it behind their truck and limp it back to Wells.  So, we decided we could do that ourselves and not be out the money from the tow.  So, we found a 2X4, jammed it in the spot that was rubbing on the axle, and slowly headed back to Wells.  (Yep, an hour outside of Wells, and we had to turn around and go BACK!)  We even had vultures swarming above us out in the middle of the desolate desert...looking at us like we were their next meal!!!  (Ok, actually we saw them on the road when we were headed back to Wells, but it was the first time Curtis had seen vultures and he wanted me to write about it.)  :)

We got to Wells dreading the possibility of having to order parts for the trailer and in the meantime, renting a Uhaul, unloading the horse trailer, and loading it into the Uhaul and hitting the road again.  But, things just seemed to work out.  Thanks to my stepsister and a connection that she had, we found a shop to repair the trailer that night.  And a store in town had the parts (and we caught them 20 minutes before they closed!).  The trailer was fixed in time for us to go enjoy dinner!  We ended up staying in Wells that night (it was an exhausting day).  Then we hit the road the next morning and headed to Henderson to rest and play a little.  Then the next day...off to our final destination...Maricopa, AZ!!!

We are (will) be living w/ our friends Emily and Jason down there for a while.  They're awesome!  :)  We got the room all set up for Curtis so he'd be comfy.  And then the next day I got back on the road w/ my dad and stepmom and headed back to Boise.  (No complications on the way home...well, except we accidentally took the scenic route home -ha-ha!)  I got to experience driving w/ a horse trailer.  Not too bad...a little freaky at night over the Hoover Dam bridge w/ lots of traffic and semis and curves in the road...but, I managed. 

So, Curtis is enjoying the heat...softball...staying busy getting everything going for his business.  I'm back in Boise working a few more weeks for my dental office and getting the house cleaned up and ready for renters.  Then I have a small "Kiesig" family reunion.  And, after that I'll be hitting the road again to AZ to join my hubby(at least this time, I'll know my way)! :) 

Moving to Arizona!!!

A lot has been happening in the last month for Curtis and I.  We’ve been running around busy getting house projects completed…putting up gates, finishing the stone around the deck, putting up gutters, getting the yard cleaned up, and getting things sorted and packed...

Yep, packed! 

Curtis has decided to join the world of entrepreneurs and start his own business!!!  And he’s chosen to start his business in Phoenix, Arizona!!!  It couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that his favorite basketball team is the Phoenix Suns…or that spring training for 15 of the MLB teams is in Arizona!  Or that you can play year round golf or softball! 

Actually, Curtis has researched a lot of the car markets in big cities, and has decided that for places we might want to live, Phoenix’s market offers a good chance at success with a small business doing interior repair on cars.  He has been working very hard to get everything set up and arranged to have everything he needs to get his business up and running.  (He’s really excited to take on this new venture…and has been happier than I’ve seen him in months!)  J

(For those of you that may not know…Curtis cannot stay in Boise and compete with his former boss for at least 2 years, due to a non-compete clause…and we don’t want to deal with the legal headaches we might endure if we stayed and tried to open a business here immediately. )

At the end of May, we are moving Curtis down to Arizona to get his business going.  And I will be joining him one month after that to obtain an Arizona dental hygiene license and begin my job search.  We are renting our house out here in Kuna.  And we will be living with friends temporarily in Arizona until we can get things completely up and going. 

Look out sunshine...here we come!!!