Casey is Home, Great Danes, Moving

In a small space of time we have had some big events go on. First our move to Minneapolis, then Casey, Dan's youngest brother, came back from his 2 year mission in Melbourne, Australia, and getting jobs w/ real responsibility. 

 I'm the most nervous about the latter. I know that I have earned my degree, taken all the classes, and had some previous experiences but I don't want to let my team down or anyone down for that matter.  I have worked w/ this product before and know some of the people so that's positive and negative. Positive because I'm familiar w/ soup production, the formulas, and the programs but negative because my chance for a new 1st impression has been taken away.  Dan reminds me that obviously my 1st impression must have been good since they requested me to be back in the same group, which I hear is unusual.  I just have to be confident right.!?!?

At the airport w/ all of Dan's Family.

Since Casey's gotten back a few people have made remarks how he is looking and even having some mannerisms like Danny.

Casey teaching how to throw the boomerang.

Dan trying to throw the boomerang.

The last saturday we were in Utah I had the opportunity to go to Great Dane Day.  It's a local club of great dane owners that get together 2x a year. I tagged along w/ Iris and Jefferey and had a great time. This one was one of the best, there were contests and plenty of doggie treats.  When the Danes started to play you definitely had to give them their room.  They are a powerful breed but really puppies at heart.
Iris, Jefferey, and their Dane Samson. He placed 1st as best wagger, 2nd as most obedient, and 2nd as best barker and came home w/ some awesome toys. This is their 2nd Dane. Bo passed away less than 2 years ago from cancer and Samson is such a great dog, big, slobbery, clumsy, but great.

Imagine how tall this dog is.  It's coming out of Iris' arm pit. He was such a sweetheart.

Puppy Great Dane, isn't he cute. You got to enjoy the time that you still can carry them.

For awhile and even now I'm in denial about being in Minnesota.  We lived here for 3 mo last summer while Dan and I were doing our internship w/ General Mills. So coming back here again and now it is somehow permanent is surreal to me. We moved in to our apartment and its a slow process getting everything where it should be, where we want it to be and into storage. We opted to have a 2bd/2ba apartment and thank goodness we did. There are certain perks w/ having 2 bathrooms and I will enjoy them thoroughly. 

Here we are in the moving truck that came to take our stuff away.  It was quite a jigsaw puzzle to get the boxes to fit just right so there was a wall.  Thank goodness Dan nor I had any part in that.

Entering the great state of Minnesota!!!

Dan did most of the driving of the 1300+ miles.  It was done in about 23 hrs w/ stopping.  Not my favorite trip but it saved us some money by not flying. We rolled out of Orem at 3:45 am and drove all the way to Des Moines, IA.  We were not planning to drive that long, construction areas littered I-80, and I do not like driving at night in unfamiliar areas but it ended up being allright.
With moving its requisite that you must buy new furniture that comes in about a billion parts. Dan hesitated at me taking on this challenge but I was insistent. I told him that it was all part of the experience, you know....follow the 30 page 55+ step-by-step directions, put a part in backwards, get mad, expletive (optional), calm down and try again.