Political cartoon

So, Kristal told me that I had to post a blog today. This is part of her new plan to keep our blog updated. I guess she is running out of good material already or something. Anyway, since all my in-laws post all these awesome pieces of art all the time, I thought it was my turn to join in the mix. I won't pretend that my art skills are all that great, but I came up with something. It's a political Cartoon I call down economy.

When I was younger I went through a time when I thought nothing would be better than to be a comic strip cartoonist. I decided that I should go back to those roots in my artwork, due to my lack of steady hands and patience. I am actually kind of proud of my attempt.

This was the first time I have ever researched and thought long and hard about what I was drawing. I have never sketched anything out so many times to come up with a finished product. that is why I also posted my sketch page. The final drawing is rough, but you get the message and I think it's a newspaper worthy drawing and message. (I realized also that I like drawing Rhoald Dahl hands. Ones that don't always have tips to their fingers. He is one of my favorite artists, no joke).

Flee Market

A trip to the South is never complete without a trip to the good ol' flee market!

Glorified yard sale

We didn't want to touch anything because it was all so gross.

It's comforting to know that you can buy your tires at a place you trust.

This shop just looked utterly junky so I had to capture it.

Our trip wouldn't be complete without a visit to the "Fine Flee Cuisine"

We most definitely didn't eat there.

Cypress Gardens

Cypress Gardens is a beautiful place, I don't know how to describe it exactly, but it's sort of like a zoo/park/swamp. They have a reptile house where you can see all sorts of creatures, full length alligators, a butterfly house, a huge swamp where you can hop in a boat and cruise around, and great trails throughout! We got season passes and have been several times, it's really been a blast!

We tried to explore different parts of the park every time we went. They had cool landmarks along the trails. Here we're sitting in a rocking chair off one of the paths where we ate our lunch.

Parts of the trails were flooded, however, we didn't let that hold us back.

Ruins of a church that was used in the movie The Patriot. A lot of that film was done here.

A small alligator we encountered while rowing along in our flat bottom boats.

We had to go under several bridges, some were alot harder to go under due to the rise in the water.

Robert and I decided to renew our vows for our two year anniversary at this beautiful gazebo we stumbled across off another trail.

We came upon another larger alligator in the wild. I was really scared of how close Robert was, I didn't want him to lose a hand.

Franken-Turtle is a favorite at Cypress Gardens, he's the large one in the picture. A farmer saw him in his swamp and shot him in the head, threw him in the back of his truck, forgot about him for two weeks, then sold him to a friend who wanted the shell. The friend then forgot about the turtle for another two weeks, then when he went back for him, realized he was still alive, so he gave him to the park here. They wired his head back together, and here he has lived ever since.

If you look closely you can see the wire in his head.

Alligators

We tried to be cautious, but one still managed to gnaw at my leg in the corner.

This is a fake tree that was made for The Patriot. There were several around the parking lot.

Robert unfortunately met the Shadow Man during our visit here in the south, who turned him into a stone frog. This is me kissing my prince back to life.

Thankfully my kiss broke the spell, and we lived the day out happily ever after!

South Carolina!

I decided that I should start doing this blogging thing for real, so It might not be that great, but I am going to try really hard to post regularly since none of my family members have a direct link to my blog anymore. I'm hoping to change that, and make up for all the lost time, since I haven't blogged since April 2009 when Robert and I came back from Costa Rica.

So here's a little taste of what Robert and I have been up to this summer. When Robert graduated this April from BYU with his Business Management degree, and we experienced first hand how tough the job market is right now, we decided to drop everything in our life and move to South Carolina. I had been wanting to do a traveling nurse assignment for a while, and when the opportunity presented itself, we jumped at the chance. I have been stationed at the Medical University of South Carolina in the heart of downtown Charleston.

MUSC is a teaching hospital, and so we get some pretty crazy surgeries coming through, abnormally large growths on the sides of people's faces, which they claim always started as a bug bite. Also gun shot wound victims are common as well, and when asked what they were doing to get shot, they claim that they definitely weren't doing anything illegal. They were of course at church, or giving food to the homeless. It's definitely different from the hospitals in Utah, but I'm learning so much, and loving the people, even if the humidity is killing me!

Robert's first trip to the Atlantic wasn't as exciting as he had anticipated, since there were few waves to be had, however, our trips since have been much more enjoyable.

Charleston is home to the longest suspension bridge, it's several miles long, and is quite daunting to drive over.

Market street is a long road that is completely filled with outside shops, and has been "the market" for a long time. Not only would they sell their wares and food, but slaves were also sold in the market.

I was excited to pay Rhett Butler a visit. After he dumped Scarlett he went into business and set up shop in downtown Charleston of all places!

One of the coolest things we discovered about the south, is after it rains you can go into the woods (your backyard) and find fossilized shark teeth!

We were pretty excited by our finds. Several of the teeth we found are 70 million years old!

This is a shard from a Megaladon dinosaur tooth!