Gaul Family Vacation 2014-2015

Hello! Long time no write...but I figured the event of the year was as good a reason as any to blog! This vacation was something I'd been looking forward to for a whole year, and it didn't disappoint! We flew the red-eye to Orlando the day after Christmas, and boarded the Carnival Sunshine out of Port Canaveral the next day.

Sail-off party

The first day was Nassau, Bahamas. Hans and I went to Nassau on our honeymoon cruise as well, but we didn't get to do any excursions that time. This time, we got to go to Atlantis! It was so awesome! There were a bunch of cool slides and stuff, but my favorite part was the lazy river...except it wasn't really a lazy river, it was like a rapid river. There were little drops and fast parts and stuff, and then at one part, it took you right into a slide/water coaster type thing. I definitely recommend this resort to anyone who goes to Nassau :)

Atlantis

The next day was a sea day, and then we went to St. Thomas. St. Thomas is sooo beautiful! We had an excursion to Magen's Bay, which I guess is one of the top 10 beaches in the world, according to National Geographic. It was super pretty: white sand, clear water, palm trees. The only thing is, it rained and it was a little cold. But we had fun anyways :)

Magen's Bay

View of Magen's Bay from the top of the island

After St. Thomas, we stopped in San Juan. I really loved San Juan; it felt very European, which I guess makes sense. We didn't have an excursion here, but we walked around town and visited the two forts: San Cristobal and El Morro. Both were really interesting and cool to see! I definitely hope I can make it back to San Juan again, it's such an interesting city!

Loved the cute, colorful buildings!

San Cristobal

View of the city from San Cristobal

El Morro

El Morro

That night was New Years'! I've never been to such a crazy New Years' party! The whole deck was PACKED with people. It was a lot of fun! And a good excuse to wear a sparkly dress :)

New Years' party

New Years' party

The last stop on the cruise was Grand Turk. Grand Turk is the most BEAUTIFUL place I've ever been to....possibly tied with Coco Cay. The water was an absolutely gorgeous, clear, turquoise blue, the sand was white....it was exactly like you'd imagine an island paradise. I wish we could've seen more of the island, but I'm pretty sure we were just docked at a little beach owned by Carnival, because it was just shops, a pool, a Margaritaville, and the beach. If you wanted to get anywhere else, you had to take a taxi or a bus. But still, I loved being there. I would totally live in a place like that if I could (maybe minus the hurricanes...).

Grand Turk

Grand Turk

The last day was a sea day, and then we docked again in Port Canaveral. A guy that my mother-in-law works with was kind enough to let us stay at his time share in Orlando. It was a Wyndham resort, literally right down the road from Downtown Disney, and it was SO nice. We got to stay there for 3 nights. Unfortunately, Hans had to go home the day we got back into port, but it was probably for the best...he hates theme parks, and I'm sure he would've hated the insane crowds at Disney and Universal! But the rest of us got to go to the Magic Kingdom that Sunday! I love Disney World. It's really just a nostaglia thing, but I seriously had so much fun! And it was cool to see the new part of the park as well! Disney really does such an amazing job with their theming...which they should for how much you pay for those tickets. But anywho, we rode all the good rides (the best ones we rode multiple times), bought some ears, and ate some delicious food (nutella and fruit waffle sandwich?? Yes please!). Overall, an awesome day!

Downtown Disney with Hans, Rachel, and Sophie

Downtown Disney with Hans, Rachel, and Sophie

Magic Kingdom!

Beast's castle

Eric's castle

Cinderella's castle, all lit up and icy for Christmas!

Fireworks show while we were riding the Seven Dwarves' Mine Train

On Monday, we went to Universal. I was so happy, some really nice person at my sister's church paid for her to come with me! Yay! So we ended up splitting for this one. Rachel and I went to Universal Studios, while everyone else went to Islands of Adventure. I've been so excited to go to Universal Studios since they built Diagon Alley...and I was NOT disappointed. It. Is. AWESOME. They set it up like a London street, and then you go through one of the buildings, and there you are in Diagon Alley! It looks exactly like it did in the movie, and they even have the dragon on top of Gringotts....and it breathes fire! Way sweet! So we checked out the shops, got some butter beer treats (frozen butterbeer for me, and butterbeer ice cream for Rachel...OMG SO DELICIOUS), and then we went on the Gringotts ride. It was SO fun!! I enjoyed it a lot more than the Hogwarts ride in Islands of Adventure. I think they fixed all the little bugs and smoothed it out. It was basically the same type of ride (4-D), but it was more of a rollercoaster as well. Very much worth it. So besides Diagon Alley, we hit all the older rides, and then checked out the new Simpsons part of the park, which was also very cool! I got a delicious pink donut (mmmmm, donuts), and we checked out Moe's bar. Everything looked just like the show! I'm really glad we got to do Universal, it's one of my favorite parks :) 

The front of Diagon Alley

Inside Diagon Alley

Diagon Alley

The dragon breathing fire

Inside Gringotts

Butterbeer!

The Knight Bus and Stan Shunpike! That creepy head actually talked too. Like, as in had conversations. 

Duff Man!

Inside Moe's

Homer Donut

I seriously had so much fun on this vacation! I'm so sad to be back in real life (and back in Elko). But now it's time to start planning for our next vacation.....PARIS!! :D

Elko and Lamoille Canyon

Oh hi. So it's been over a year since I blogged....sad face. But I thought I'd do a little post about Elko, since that was kind of a huge life change...

So we've now been in Elko for about 2 months. Hans is loving his job, and especially his coaching. He's coaching JV football (linemen) at Elko High and they're doing really well (4-2). Meanwhile, I've been working at Marshall's for about a month now. I actually really like it...not sure why I've never worked retail before, since, ya know, I love shopping and fashion and all that. But I'm over the womens'/juniors department and I get to do all the features and mannequins and stuff. So that's pretty fun. Other than that, it's just an adjustment living out in the middle of nowhere. The town itself isn't terrible, it's just that it's not really close to anything, and there's not much to do here. But I'm slowly getting used to it. (Hans could live anywhere...I don't think he's had as hard a time adjusting as I have).

So in other news, our moms are here to visit for my birthday this weekend, and we took a little trip up Lamoille Canyon. It. Is. GORGEOUS. Like, I seriously have a hard time believing that a place like this exists out in the middle of all this dust and scrub brush. But it does, and I love it. I desperately want to do some kind of photoshoot up here while the fall colors are still there, but who knows if that'll happen, so I just took a few pictures while we were up there. Enjoy :)

Rice!

Well hi. I wish I were good at blogging. I actually meant to write this one a while ago. BUT. I have a good one for you. I want to tell you all about the miracle of....

RICE!

Yes, I know, you've all heard it before. Dropped your phone in water? Put it in dry rice. Well, maybe some of you have wondered if that was legit or not. I am here to tell you that it is definitely legit. About a month or so ago, I dropped my phone in water. I grabbed it out immediately, but started panicking. At first, it was still working, but I figured I probably only had seconds. I looked up "what do do if you drop your iPhone in water" on google and found some detailed instructions. The first one (after drying off your phone as much as possible - use q-tips to get in the crevices) was to immediately turn off your phone. Well, by this time, the water had apparently seeped further in to my phone...and the on/off button had stopped working. So I had to skip that step. Next step: fill a ziplock bag with dry rice (non-enriched is better if you can find it, because it won't leave as much residue on your phone). Place your phone in the bag and make sure it is covered. Seal the bag and make sure you get all the air out. The next step was the hardest...waiting. You have to leave it in the bag for 36 hours. 

Well, at this point, my phone was dead. And since the on/off switch button wasn't working, there would be no way for me to see if it was working unless it turned on itself when I plugged it in.

So I waited. 

After about 24 hours, I took it out to see how it was going. I plugged it in for probably about 10 minutes...and nothing happened. So I started mentally preparing myself for the fact that I would have to spend too much money on a new phone...and put my phone back in the rice bag.

The next day, I took my rice-bagged phone and my charger to work with me. The 36 hours would be up around 11am. So that day, after I got back from lunch, I took my phone out of the rice, and plugged it in. My first indication that the rice may have done its job was that the on/off button was working again. My phone was still dead, but when I pressed the button, the charging symbol popped up. I was hopeful for the first time in at least a day or so. After maybe...oh, maybe 10 or 15 minutes? The little apple appeared...my phone was turning on!! I can't even tell you how excited I was. The rice had worked! My phone was fully functioning! ...except for one little detail...the main camera. Well...I was somewhat okay with that if it meant that I didn't have to drop a few hundred on a new phone. More than all this, I was super amazed that the rice had actually worked so well!

So over the next couple weeks, I learned to live without the camera. The front-facing camera worked still, but only in a couple of my photo apps, not in the actual camera program. So if I really needed to take a picture, I could (with some difficulty) take it backwards. I would just have to open the app and press the camera flip button.

I kept testing the camera, but lost hope after a while. Then, on July 4th, I was watching fireworks and decided to take a front-faced picture of Hans and I...I opened up one of my photo apps, and before I even pressed the camera flip button, I noticed...tada! It was working!!

So, in conclusion, rice completely fixed my phone! I had to be a little patient for the camera, but it came back! So if this unfortunate event ever happens to you, now you know what to do! Oh and also, I found the website (for more detailed directions): http://osxdaily.com/2013/04/11/dropped-iphone-into-water-save-damage/

Yay!

Life update...

Ah wow, I suck at blogging. Well, here are some updates...

My parents sold their house. Then they came out to look for a house. Then they found a house, had their offer accepted, drove out here, closed on the house, and moved in. Except that my dad had to go back to VA to finish out this year at work. Sooo yeah. My mom lives here now! And my dad will come out around Christmas. I've gotta say, it's pretty great.

Along with that, Hans and I will be moving out to Saratoga Springs to live in my parents' basement come December. It'll be nice to have more space, although the commute will take some getting used to.

Besides that, what have we been up to...let's see...lots and lots of football. Oh, we went to the Train concert in September. And it was awesommmmme! Hans will tell you otherwise...it was his first concert and I don't think he was one for the packed crowd. Also, he doesn't really like Train. But he likes me, so that's why he went :) It was cool because it was a smaller venue (Gallivan Center in SLC) so the bands all kind of interacted with the audience. I had a lot of fun, except for the many, many, drunk people, one of which kept whistling loudly in my ear, and another of which almost got in a chick fight. Like, seriously, it was actually pretty scary. I think what happened was that the lady in front of me bumped into the drunk chick's husband, and so the drunk chick had a spaz and started swearing at the other lady and trying to fight with her, so finally she left, and the husband was trying to calm her down so she took a swipe at him. Then he took a swipe back and she swore at him and stormed off. I didn't see her the rest of the time (thank goodness). Lesson: if you can't handle alcohol, don't consume it. Other lesson: Train is awesome in concert.

And speaking of concerts, I also get to go to the All-American Rejects/Boys Like Girls concert on Tuesday! I'm excited...that was my first concert back in 2006, and it was a blast. Really rough, because apparently BLG, Motion City, and the Format are extreme moshing music.... (?) ...but fun nonetheless.

And finally, I turned 24 last week. It's weird being this old haha. I mean, I know it's not old....but it's the oldest I've ever been! :D haha. But really...I hope that eventually I stop feeling old and just start feeling normal. I dunno...maybe once you become an adult, you just feel old for the rest of your life...makes sense...right? Anyways, for my birthday, we had dinner at California Pizza Kitchen (mmmm California Club Pizza....) and then we went to the Haunted Forest in American Fork. The Forest was fun, but also not as fun as it used to be...it's possible that I'm getting to old for that too haha. And then Hans bought me Just Dance 4 with a Kinect for our Xbox. Yeah, he did a good job. Probably because he's awesome? Yeah, probably.

K I'm really going to try to be better at blogging!