My lack of creativity

Well it's Grandma Harvey's 80 birthday next week and the only reason why I can blog about this is because I'm pretty sure that the Harvey's don't have internet. Moving on, all the kids and families of the kids have to make a scrap book page for a book we are making her. Since I am not creative at all, I called on my sister Marianne to help me......more like do it for me. I even offered to pay her to do it but she would not consent. So I went over to her house with a couple of pictures and some paper that I picked out and went to work. Well I did a little, you know taping down things and helping her trace.....I even picked out some more paper to use for my page out of her incredibly stocked craft room. Anyways, the page looks great and all I can say is "Job well done Mari, you're a genius when it comes to crafts...well in all things for that matter" Anyways, I think Grandma Harvey will like all the pages that will come from the Michael J Harveys, they all have the same.....shall we say Marianness. I'm saying this as a compliment, the MJ Harveys pages are going to look phenomenal, too bad for all the other Harveys, they will have a lot to live up to. So here is a sneak peak at the page...so hopefully this will help you Liz.

Moving

So it is official, well it was official several months ago when we decided to go to Chicago for law school. What is official is our apartment in Chicago. They called us on Saturday and told us they finally have an apartment for us. It is on the 26th floor of the north tower (I think there are about 40 floors in each tower). They asked us if the 26th floor was okay because they usually keep the law students below the 21st floor. So we could be loners way up there, but hey we got an apartment and apparently they have been hard to come by!!

Gelato

I hate to leave Provo this fall because we just got the most wonderful gelateria called Maestros. I've tried other forms of 'gelato' here in the US of A and it is just ice cream. Nothing has ever compare to the wonderful smooth and creamy taste of Italian gelato, but this place is authentic gelato. When you see it, the ice cream looks fake- like it is plastic for display- just like Italian gelato, and they even have wonderful flavors such as nutella, hazelnut, sweet cream.....oh so many wonderful flavors. Now there ate too many wonderful places to choose from for dessert- Pudding on the Rice, Smart Cookie and Maestros. Life is so hard!

The Trek

Last week we had the Harvey family reunion. My dad was in charge of it this year and planned out a handcart trek since many of our ancestors made the trek west via handcart. Anyways, it was surprisingly fun, I would have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed myself and the song Count Your Many Blessings never meant so much until I had to pushed/pulled a handcart loaded with stuff up a hill covered in rocks. It was an adventure to say the least. What added to our adventure was the fact that we had to wear the traditional pioneer garb. I was a technologically advanced pioneer and opted for dry fit shirts and wicking socks, and instead of 7 petticoats- I wore basketball shorts. I know that if the pioneers could have worn these things, they would have. Here are some pictures of us as pioneers etc.

4th of July

Happy 4 of July one and all, I know this blog is a little late in coming, but we have been out of town- so it's catch up time. Anyway, this 4th, I decided to take advantage of our local 5k for the last time before we move. It is officially known as the Provo Freedom Festival 5k and 10k. It was a pretty good race considering I haven't really been training for anything in particular. I did manage to win my age group- 20-24 and was the 6th women to cross the finish line. So really I suppose I shouldn't be disappointed. I even managed to walk away with a plaque of a foot- lovely trophy I know. Anyways, here is a picture of my faithful husband who comes to watch me race during the wee hours of the morning. He is such a good sport. My training friend- Chelsea ran the 5k with me which was tons of fun. Lucky for me, she is also moving to Chicago this fall where her husband will be attending Northwestern's med school and so we will be able to train and race together many more times!!! (She ran the Boston marathon the year before me.) So for the rest of our 4th, we mostly just lounged around reveling in the fact that neither of us had to work. And we ended our day watching the fireworks of Stadium of Fire which was a pretty spectacular show. So there you have it.

The Hood

So as some of you might know, our landlord is determined to raise the rent after we leave because "this neighborhood is too nice, people would gladly pay more to live in this place." Well I don't know how much time he actually spends in this neighborhood. So let me tell you about the hood. Well I suppose we will start with our neighbors to the east. The 'weirdo family' or the place with the yurt. They are an eccentric family, their family vehicles consist of a giant economy van, and a tiny car and extremely tiny truck-as you can see, I made Bill stand beside the car so you could see that it is Mr. Bean sized. The father of this odd clan is also quite different himself. Unfortunately I couldn't very well take his picture, but so you understand he wears kilts all the time, cargo kilts, camouflage kilts, kilts with pants underneath, and kilts with chacos. Let me tell you, nothing makes me happier than seeing this tall man drive up in his tiny truck wearing a kilt and chacos. They are very nice people just eccentric. (they also have a yurt, and currently it is decorated red white and blue, in celebration of the 4th- very festive). Our neighbor down below is crazy and very stinky- imagine a stinky bachelor pad and multiply that by...10. I try to stay away from him. Our neighbors to the west have a lot of kids, they are fairly normal. And finally, (of the neighbors I feel inclined to include) we have our neighbors across the street. Liz and Derek can testify to the madness that lives in that house. Bill and I have come home several times during our time here to see a line of police cars in front of their house. Lets just say that sitting out on our front porch at night watching their house is like watching the Jerry Springer show. Their young kids have a large vocabulary of bad words which they use everyday, whether speaking to their parents or a passer by. Lovely family. So maybe raising the rent is a good idea, the entertainment you get by living here is definitely worth $75 extra bucks.