A very much needed update

Well since last writing a lot has happened. September 4th after church Chris and I went to meet our good friends Jared and Mandy in Swan Valley, Idaho to go camping. We made the trip out there and had a wonderful dutch oven dinner and desert. We sat around the campfire telling stories and singing songs. Jared's brother and sister-in-law with their two kids had come to have dinner with us and it was a wonderful night. However later that night we ended up cancelling the camping trip that we had planned. When Jared's brother and family were leaving we got a phone call from them a few minutes later. Jared was trying to assess the situation, however my radar ears heard the words mountain lions. Yep that is right 3 large mountain lions that were not scared of the car was a couple miles away from our campsite. We sat around the campfire and talked about it for a good hour or so and decided at about 10:30pm that night that we would pack up tent and head to Idaho Falls to stay at Jared and Mandy's apartment. Our main concern was the fact that we had Jared's dog with us, and Mandy and I wouldn't sleep at all that night if we were to stay. We determined that it just wasn't worth the risk because the cougars were not scared of people, and that is what worried us. At about midnight we were on the road and in Idaho Falls at 1am and went to bed at 2am.

In the morning we had our dutch oven breakfast that was planned and decided to head off the the Eastern Idaho State Fair that was in Blackfoot, Idaho. We had a great day with friends! Even though we didn't get to go on our camping trip that we had planned, it was just fun to spend time with friends. The most important thing was that we were all able to return home safe and sound. We also found out later that day that cougars in the area had been killing a lot of dogs, so we were grateful that we didn't take the risk that was up in the air and instead changed our plans and still had fun anyway. After the fair we went back to Jared's and Mandy's and had some pizza and watched a movie. It was a very fun, relaxing day!

Later that week on the 7th of September Chris and I went and worked at the Eastern Idaho State Fair in Blackfoot, Idaho. I had gotten a phone call from one of my professors the day before about the Idaho Farm Bureau needing people to run the both. We would just have to work a 4 hour shift, get paid, and also free fair admission. We had so much fun in that we were able to promote agriculture and teach kids how to milk a cow. We also taught the public about the bringing agriculture into the classroom program. Kids had a lot of fun and afterwards we were able to go and enjoy the fair some more. The first event that we went to was the Draft Horse Pull. It was so cool to watch these huge draft horses pull thousands of pounds. Here are some videos of the horse pull. These two horses were the middle weight champions and heavy weight champions.

Here are some pictures of the horse pull. The first one is of the horse pull champions. The second is just a really cool picture of the power of draft horses.

We had so much fun watching the horse pull. We also went and watched a steer show and draft horse show. It was pretty cool to learn how to judge the draft horses, I had never seen them shown before. Some people say that cattle intimidate them how on earth can I show them, well I would have to say that about the draft horses. They were jogging around the arena with them. I would be so worried about them running me over because they didn't turn fast enough or something like that.

We also walked around a meet the animals display that had just arrived the morning that we had to work. The animals were right next to us while we were working and I very much enjoyed them being there. A funny thing that happened with a family that were feeding the animals with the cups of food that they could purchase. I was watching a family and noticed that the goat that they were feeding was becoming very pushy. Next thing I know the goat had the cup in its mouth and the family was trying to get it from them. I then walked over to retrieve the cup in noticing that the family was very animal illiterate. However I had arrived too late, the goat had eaten the cup. I was kind of funny. The family was all distraught about the situation. My first question was if it was a plastic or paper cup. Luckily they said it was a paper one and I said "oh good, no worries it will be digested. If it was plastic I would be a little worried." I just thought that whole situation was kind of funny. We had another very enjoyable day at the fair.

Wow this is a long post, I will do more updating on another post