Keep At It!

"I am deeply impressed by the way my family worked after having lost everything following World War II! I remember my father—a civil servant by education and experience—taking on several difficult jobs, among which were coal miner, uranium miner, mechanic, and truck driver. He left early in the morning and often returned late at night in order to support our family. My mother started a laundry and worked countless hours doing menial labor. She enlisted my sister and me in her business. . . ."It wasn't easy, but the work kept us from dwelling too much on the difficulties of our circumstances. Although our situation didn't change overnight, it did change. That's the thing about work. If we simply keep at it—steady and constant—things certainly will improve."
- Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Seams Like Perfection

Heather is my awesome sister in-law and friend. She's gorgeous, a fantastic cook, a wonderful mother and wife, and she's got the creative gene to design and make the most beautiful handbags you've ever seen. We're not just talking fabulous, we're talking FAB-U-LOUS!!! Go HERE to check it out and return often because she's got some dang cute ones in the works!

Denver Day 7: Saying Goodbye

We had a fabulous trip! Every last minute was awesome and we couldn't have asked for a better vacation/field trip. Here are some pictures we took as we drove the long 12 hours home.

Denver Day 6 continued

Later on that evening after we at a delicious meal at Mama's Cafe, we saw the long-anticipated Broadway show Mary Poppins. It was fantastically, fabulously, AWESOME!!!!! Again, no pictures allowed so here's the curtain before it started just to prove we were there. The singing was phenomenal. The dancing was phenomenal. The acting was phenomenal. I mean we're talking about flawless scene changes that were mechanical and almost like magic, no guys dressed in all black trying to smoothly change things in and out. The house was like a real life pop-up book where the doors opened up to reveal the long banister, fireplace, and kitchen and the actors really did walk inside the pop-up house. Mary Poppins slid UP the banister and she flew OVER the audience as she came and went with her umbrella. My favorite scene was Step In Time where Bert danced on the side of the wall and on top of the ceiling upside down, it was amazing!! When it rained on Bert's pictures, it really rained. When they sang Feed the Birds, the birds really flew. Definitely the best stage production and special affects I have seen! Absolutely phenomenal!!!

Denver Day 6 continued

To pass a few hours before the Broadway show we went to the Denver zoo. In all honesty, pretty disappointing! We saw maybe four animals and we wanted to take the little train ride which was an extra $2 each for a lousy 20 yard circle with no animals to see. It was a real drag and not worth the money at all. I'm sure its usually a decent zoo but definitely not the case when we were there.

Denver Day 6

(Proceed with caution if you have a weak stomach).

Today is only free day Lance had with no labs or classes. We purchased tickets to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science where the main exhibit we were interested in was Body Worlds. We weren't allowed to take pictures unfortunately but take our word it, it was worth every penny! In short, this German mortician embalms with a process called plastination which preserves bodies indefinitely. He then takes the bodies and dissects them to show specific muscle structure or the like. He also show cases other particular things like the whole nervous system or the digestive system or the arteries in a head, etc. It's so fascinating and I highly recommend it to every one!
Our tickets also included admittance to the rest of the museum so we went to the Egyptian mummies exhibit. They talked about the god of embalming, Anubis, and what they believed regarding the afterlife. There were two mummies on display that were purchased by a wealthy Colorado man in 1904. These mummies were from 1000 b.c. and show two different women, one of a mummy of a wealthy woman and another that of a poor woman, showing the differences between mummification, etc. One of the neatest things is that a doctor from the 90's wanted to know the condition of the mummies inside the linen wrappings. He took them from the museum to a university hospital where they did CT scans. Unbelieveable! It shows how well preserved the rich woman was and how many amulets she had within the wrappings (porcelain good luck charms), and gold foil over the embalmers incision. The poor woman CT scan showed her brain still intact, several broken bones, no amulets, and very few linen wrappings. It was so interesting and intriguing, we loved it!

This is the mummification of a poor woman.

In all it was the icing on the cake at the close of a week of mortuary labs for Lance!

My Passion

I've made a few changes to my jewelry blog! I added my recent jewelry designs, a "buy now button" for convenience, and a few other changes including a give away!! Head on over and check it out here!

Denver Day 5

Lance finished up with his labs early today and when I picked him up he introduced me to some of his classmates. Oddly enough, 90% are female and I find that very interesting. The first thing one of them said was, "Oh you look so much prettier than the head Lance sculpted of you." Thank goodness someone said that! I have yet to post the final picture of how the head turned out but it really looked nothing like me.

We then went to the mausoleum which is one of the largest and most ornate we have seen. There are about 7500 bodies in there. You can purchase a room for a family which has a locked gate and has several spaces for family members. You can decorate and have anything in the room you wish, the prices start at $200,000+. There are 3 levels including the basement and then there's the tower which is completely locked and reserved for families who purchase the whole level. These start out at $1,000,000+. It was truly amazing to see and very impressive!

After a quick nap at the hotel we went to a fun house where we played miniature golf and a few games of bowling. Lance beat me at everything, it just wasn't my night but we had so much fun!

Denver Day 4

Today I ventured out of the hotel to do some shopping. Much to my disappointment I found nothing to buy but a swimsuit for the many trips coming up this summer. I'll probably end up taking it back because I was disgusted with the bulge, rolls, and dimples and ewwwww.....white, yucky, cottage cheese legs and behind. Gross! I may be thin but take my word for it, underneath the clothes is not a pretty sight. Thank goodness we believe in modesty!

Denver Day 3 - Michael Buble!!

On my chillaxing day in the hotel while I was flipping through channels, I stopped and watched Michael Buble's music video. Then I thought to myself, "Self, wouldn't it be awesome if he was putting on a concert this week right here in Denver?!" So I went to his website and low and behold, he was in Denver the very next day for a one day concert! Whaaaaaa???????? I texted Lance to get his opinion on spending money for the tickets.....what was I thinking? Why did I even question myself, DUH!! So we got the cheapest tickets we could find and went to the Pepsi Center for this ridiculously awesome concert! Man, it was a blast and everything was fantastic! We were of course on the very top in the nose bleed section but who cares, it was absolutely AWESOME!!!

Fireworks after the opening number!

Encore with confetti and more fireworks!!