Adventures in Swan Boats

Saturday was such a beautiful day in Boston! The summer sunshine finally showed its face and gave us a glimmer of hope that things were going to get better. I took this opportunity to take my mentee to the Boston Public Garden to ride the Swan Boats.

The Swan Boats are peddled by a human in the back. This would have to be the worse summer job of all time!

One of the highlights of the trip was while we were waiting in line, a group of 200 people dressed like zombies paraded through the park. Their faces were painted white with blood all over their bodies and their hair was all ratted. Many looked as if they could barely walk. I saw a sign that one of them was holding it read: Zombies are People Too! ummmm, technically Zombies were People, not really sure that they still are! It was pretty funny though! I just couldn't believe such a large group of people were so dedicated to this cause! If I have learned one thing in Boston, it is that people HAVE causes and they fight for them! So Hey, I guess Zombies are just as good a cause as any. I mean, they may have looked a little silly next to the FREE TIBET protesters, but they just looked silly anyway so no big deal!

Yard Work

For Memorial Day this year, Christian and I spend a solid 4 hours working on our front yard. Our house has been the eye sore of the neighborhood for a year now and I was not about to let this continue.
This was my first time actually doing yard work for my very own place; apartment dwelling didn't really provide the opportunity to do this. We both found that yard work is very therapeutic and enjoyable.....and makes you really sore the next day!
Here is our yard before:


This is our yard after we were done:

McDuff enjoyed helping with the yard work! He did really well off the leash until he saw Charlotte across the street. It was like watching a toddler run across the street without looking to their grandma cause they know they have candy!

Pretty flowers!

I didn't know a fence was there?!

Not only did we clean up the yard but we also took down these GHETTO Christmas lights that have been strung around the house all year and didn't work! It was not easy taking those down as they were staple gunned to the house, but we did it! Our house looks a million times better don't you think? Did our hard work pay off?
There really is a sense of accomplishment once you do something like this; I keep going outside just to look again.

Our Church

Does anyone know what this building is?

It is where we go to church! Pretty cool, huh? It isn't your average LDS Chapel but we love it! Yes, it is equally cool inside! We love the Kendall Boiler and Tank Co.

Ouch!

I had an experience a week ago, that I am just now willing to talk about. As many of you know I had a rather horrifying experience with my eye brows a few months ago. I went to a salon to get them waxed and left with pieces of skin missing off of my face with scabs to prove it! (Don't you hate the word SCAB?) This did not A) look good and B) feel good.
My eye brows grow like weeds; seriously monstrous out of control weeds that overtake my face! Not pretty! The time came last week that I could no longer take it, something had to be done with these overgrown creatures.
I had seen in the mall, at a kiosk ladies that do threading; a technique using thread (go figure) to remove facial hair. The thread acts like scissors cutting the hair at the root. I had talked to some people at my job and they said they loved it and it was much less painful than waxing. I thought to myself, this is a good solution to not getting my face burned off, so I went for it!
Christian and my friend Lisa went with me to the mall to perform the task, I didn't think it would be a big deal. We show up and yes, it is in the middle of the mall so EVERYONE can watch you! Whatever, they can watch me I don't care! I even heard one lady actually ask her husband to stop so she could watch because I had "such great eye brows" (that is code for disgusting looking, all over the place weeds.)
All was well until....the threading started! OUCH! This pain was more than I could bare! It was like plucking each hair out slowly and painfully! Oh the agony! I couldn't scream, I was helpless......I was in the middle of the mall being watched by EVERYONE! After one eye was done I seriously thought about asking her to stop; I could figure something else out for the other eye. I somehow talked myself into saying NOTHING! The pain began again!
Thoughts in my head: "Are you flipping kidding me? This hurts less than waxing? I don't think so!"
Then I started feeling light headed and remembered that I was NOT BREATHING due to the pain and had to tell myself to "breath" and "you can do it."
Twenty minutes of HELL later, no seriously that is what it was! I looked FABULOUS! The weeds were gone and my eye brows have never looked better.
I am just not really sure what to do at this point. When the time comes again, I do not know what to do. I honestly don't think I can endure that kind of pain again, but I really don't want scabs on my eye lids either.
Does anyone have any other suggestions?

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day Mom!
I love my mommy, she is my best friend. I talk to her every day and I love her so much. I know she hates having her only daughter live so far away but she is very supportive. My mom always makes me laugh, she is so funny. My mother is a very compassionate woman and is always trying to figure out how she can help others. My mom loves to clean her house, BBQ, garden, drive to Idaho for lottery tickets, take care of my grandma, and watch movies! My mom is lots of fun to be around! I love her so much!
My mom had me at the very young age of 18 and her whole life she has worked hard to make sure my life was a good one; I never went without anything.
Love ya mamma.

Happy Mother's Day Mom!
My mother in law is a wonderful woman! She is incredibly spiritual and talented. She is a amazing mother as you can see through evidence of her seven children. She has taught Christian so many wonderful thing and I know he admires and loves her so much. Mom is always doing something for someone else and we often have to encourage her to do things for herself. She is a talented sewer (made our beautiful curtains), baker, musician, leader, friend and mother.
I am so appreciative of how accepting and loving mom has been toward me! She is an amazing woman!
Love you mom!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Dad!

I have to give a shout out to my dad who shares his birthday with Mother's Day this year! My dad is a wonderful father! Growing up I spent every other weekend with my dad and we always did fun activities. My dad took me on vacations, just me and him, to Las Vegas and Disneyland. He was always at every single soccer game I had for nearly 10 years. Dad came to all my school plays and award ceremonies growing up; he's always been so supportive!
One of my fondest memories growing up was going to hockey games with him. At first we went to the Salt Lake Eagles games and then later the Utah Grizzlies. I really love hockey!

My dad is super cool! I love ya dad! Hope you had a fabulous birthday!

Happy Wedding!

Our little brother Davey got married this Saturday! He got married to the lovely Kasey and we cannot wait to meet our new sister in law.
David has always been the hunkiest ladies man out of the Gentry boys. You know the quarterback of the high school football team that took the State Championship, the rocker in a band, and all around nice guy! David is a true catch and we are so happy that he found such a wonderful bride.
Unfortunately we couldn't make it to the wedding in AZ this weekend; we were super bummed!
Congrats to David and Kasey! Best wishes to you both eternally! We will see you in June!

Favorite Spots

Oh, the cute boy....When we lived in Louisville, Duff loved to look out the sliding glass door. No sliding glass door in Boston, but we do have a window where he can go crazy watching the squirrels get into the garbage. There have been many times he has almost fallen off the couch.
When Duff isn't using the couch as a jungle gym, he uses it as a bed and snoozes. Isn't he the cutest?

Dinosaurs, Butterflies and Musicians..Oh My!

It was a busy and eventful weekend, would you expect anything less from us?
As you may or may not know I recently became a mentor; it is like being a Big Brother or Big Sister. I finally got matched with my mentee last week; she is a 13 year old girl who is so cute. Due to confidentiality and what not you don't get to know much about her, but she is awesome. My goal is to do something with her every week for at least an hour. Our first activity was this Saturday and we went to the Science Museum. The program I mentor for received a grant for free tickets, so we were able to get into the museum for nothin'. We also got to see a movie on the IMAX which totally rocked and we went to the Butterfly Exhibit.

I really love dinosaurs, so I was excited for this part of the museum but it was kind of a let down. There were only two full dinosaur skeletons, what is up with that? I hear the Harvard Museum of Natural History has a better exhibit on dinosaurs.

We loved going to the Butterfly exhibit. It is in a greenhouse and there are butterflies flying around everywhere. There are hundreds of them so if you are afraid of things flying at your head, this is not the place to be. It was pretty amazing to get to be so up close to so many of these beautiful insects. It was the highlight of the museum for us both.

We had a really great time at the museum. I think my mentee is getting used to my somewhat spastic personality, and she seems to like me (I think she just likes to get out of the house and do fun stuff). We had some moments where good conversation occurred. I am really excited about the experience to be a mentor, I think it is going to be a lot of fun!
I got back from the museum to see that C had cleaned the house! "Let's hear it for the boys....lets give the boys a hand." Thanks for cleaning the joint up babe, you rock! Really, I told him he had to clean up the house because he invited some of his colleagues from Brandeis over for a BBQ before they left for the summer, and I am a little anal about having a clean house when people come over. He did a great job!

We bought this grill for $40 from a couple leaving the ward a few months ago. We have been dying to bust the thing out and grill some hot dogs and hamburgers. It worked great! I forgot how amazing BBQ'd food tastes! It is a little piece of heaven on earth. It was fun to get all these musicians together, we played a game called, "In the manner of the Adverb" it is an acting game and it was sooooo funny to see these people get out of their comfort zones (sober) and act out some scenes. It was a great time had by all! I am glad C has so many great people to learn from and support him at school.