New things, April 15th & 20th

Because Kara's good friend Kassi had her baby girl a month and a half early, she was able to bring her to her baby shower. She was so tiny.

Kassi's going to be a great mom!

The CEO of Vivint, Kara's work, got a new car...a Ferrari. It's beautiful in so many ways. John is in love.

Corona Arch Swing, April 20th

Almost exactly a year ago, we visited and rappelled off of Corona Arch for the first time. Since then, some crazy kids upped the ante and started jumping off of the arch, creating the "world's largest rope swing".

After seeing their video, we decided we had to do it.

Leaving work a little early on Friday, we pulled into the Corona Arch parking lot around 4:00. The 1.5 mile hike in and up the side of the arch on the steep slickrock was a little harder and more nerve racking with our heavy gear bags.

After setting up the anchors, we let a bag of rocks do a test run for us.

It had a successful ride, so John was up next with the helmet cam.

It was a gorgeous night!

Follow the red anchor rope in this picture and you'll see John at the end of it, pretty much parallel to the ground.

Up next, Kara.

After swinging, we switched to another rope to rappel the rest of the way down. More easily said than done with all the back up gear to work around. Kara felt like Houdini hanging in mid-air trying to work her way out of the "magic trick".

Our friends, Dave and Bryce, showed up just as Kara was about to jump. Neither of them ended up jumping, but Bryce got some good footage and Dave cleaned everything up, rappelling off after John's second jump.

It was dark by the time we started hiking out, but the sky was light enough that we didn't need flashlights.

We couldn't wipe the smiles off of our faces.

New Mac friend, April 4th

We are now a completely Mac family. John won our first Mac (a 27" i-Mac) at a conference a couple of years ago. He then sold his big, heavy laptop and got a Macbook Air last year. Being fully converted to the lightweight Air, he just got one for Kara. It turns out they are pretty great computers...and you can't beat how lightweight the Air is!

Moab with the Morgans, March 30th-April 1st

A trip to Moab with the Morgans was long overdue...so we decided to remedy that.

Before meeting them at their house, we stopped in Arches to do our traditional run out to Delicate Arch for the sunset.

The next morning we made a big breakfast before heading out on a 40 mile road bike ride to the Potash mines and back.

That afternoon we took everyone out to rappel off of Corona Arch. When we got there, a huge group of kids were doing the rope swing off the arch, so we went a little further to a different rappel spot. Everyone except for Michelle, who is deathly afraid of heights, rappelled down (Peter, Hannah, Camilla (exchange student) and Camilla's friend from Spain).

On our hike back to the cars, we found some friends and stopped for a photo.

The next morning we did something we'd never done before...ran up Negro Bill Canyon trail head to Morning Glory Bridge. 

It was so peaceful and beautiful. We couldn't believe we'd never been there before and enjoyed being the only ones on the trail.

When we got back to the house, the Morgans were making a breakfast of German pancakes...yum!
After cleaning and packing up, we were on the road, stopping briefly in Arches again to show the exchange students Delicate Arch.
We went up a different way than normal for another perspective. We love this place!

Weekend of Entertainment, March 22 & 23, 2012

John's youngest sister, Natalie, helped bring "The Vagina Monologues" to UVU and directed it. It's a play written by Eve Ensler in the 1990's and "discusses the power dynamics between men and women and the unfortunate circumstance of women being abused. It addresses issues of rape and domestic violence as well as sexual insecurities and the impossible expectations that are set for women generally. It has been considered a forum for women to come together and be empowered by telling and hearing these stories. It's also an opportunity for men to think about things they usually don't have to think about. Hopefully, the play motivates men to support the cause of eradicating violence and abuse against women."

 
Walking into the theater, we had no idea what to expect. We had gone mainly to support John's sister. However, we thoroughly enjoyed the performance. We laughed, we cried, and we walked away with things to think about. We were so proud of Natalie.




The next night we went to to the Symphony to hear Rachmaninoff's 3rd Piano Concerto. This has been a Bankhead favorite for years. Beforehand, we met up with our friends, the Morgans, at the new City Creek mall for dinner at Blue Lemon.















There were two pieces played before Rachmaninoff. Richard Wagner's Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg and Edward Elgar's Variations on an Original Theme, op.36 "Enigma Variations". We weren't familiar with either, but enjoyed them both.





















After intermission we sat down, excited to hear what we'd come for.








The pianist was amazing. However, it seemed as if he'd played the piece too many times. There wasn't a lot of emotion behind his performance and he played it a little too fast.
It was incredible to watch his hands fly all over the keyboard and he made the most difficult part seem like no big deal, but we all kind of wished he'd slowed it down just a bit and played with more emotion.

All in all, it was a very entertaining weekend.

Greenhouse, 3-26-12

The last few years we've been starting our garden from seeds from the Seed Bank in Petaluma, CA. Because we start everything from seed, we start them inside a month or two before transplanting them outside.

This year we were excited to find a great little greenhouse at Home Depot that we moved our little seedlings out to.

However, the morning after moving them outside, we had a major wind storm come in.  The greenhouse wasn't tied down enough, and we came home to see this sad little mess.

Our seedlings that had been growing for a month were scattered all over the place. We were able to save a few, but had to replant most everything.

The good news is that we now have a use for our 55 and 60 pound dumbbells...greenhouse anchors.

New York law, 3-22-12

Part of Kara's job is to work with outside law firms to coordinate information. After coordinating with a particular law firm in New York, she received a package with all this fun stuff...a t-shirt, umbrella, mug, and chocolate. It's nice to feel appreciated.