Are you ready for Adventure?

Posted by Tracy



You better be! Because in June of this year, filming will begin on the fourth installment of Indiana Jones Adventures! That's right ladies and gentlemen: Indiana Jones is returning! As a devout fan and follower, I felt it my duty to prepare you all for the inevitable excitement of our Hero's return.

The official announcement was made on January 2nd, 2007, after a screenplay was finally approved. You can find more detaild about the upcoming film on the Indiana Jones fan site or at imdb.com. Harrison Ford will of course be starring in the film as Indiana Jones. Other cast members have only been rumored as of now.

To get you all in the mood I have provided the below video.



If that doesn't get your heart pumping... well... ...then shame on you!

This Point in My Life

Posted by Hanna

It is so exciting to think that almost two years ago I was wondering what I was going to do with my life. I had finished my degree in vocal performance at West Liberty State College, got married, and moved to Utah… all of which were somewhat not in the way I had imagined for my life but ended up far better than I could have planned for myself.

Tracy and I decided almost two years ago to move to Utah for him to go to BYU. When we got here I ended up feeling like I had no real skills for a job that I would enjoy for the next few years. I was very glad I had gotten a degree in something I am passionate about but at that same time I was discouraged that I couldn’t just get any job.

I was debating whether to go back to school for nursing or cosmetology. After touring Paul Mitchell the School for cosmetology here in Provo I was so excited about diving into the beauty industry. Fifteen months later I have successfully finished school, have become licensed, and have a great job at the salon of my choice! I can’t believe I am at this point in my life.

Paul Mitchell the School was such a wonderful experience for me. I met so many wonderful people, made great friends, learned amazing skills, stretched my creativity, and learned how to serve on a different level. The beauty industry is so much about serving and making others happy! They come to you to relax, to have you listen, and to have you make them feel good. There are so many opportunities for me in this industry and I can’t wait to see where it will take me. This really is the right place for me.

Two weeks ago I started my job at Remedez Hair Spa, an Aveda salon, in Orem, Utah. It was my number one pick of salons in the area, and I am so grateful to have landed a job there. It really seems like the perfect fit for me. I am starting out as an assistant stylist, which means that I am in training and assisting the top stylist. I will be doing this for a couple of months and then will be a full time stylist taking my own clients. A lot of salons now have you start as an assistant as a kind of transition period from school to a salon. I have already learned so much from watching and helping Danine (a master stylist at Remedez) over the past two weeks. It is fun to learn a new color line, new products, and new tricks. Danine is very talented and my time as assistant will be very beneficial to me and my career. I am excited though to take my own clients and begin using my own creativity in my everyday work! I will say, my coworkers seem very friendly and I believe I will really enjoy working there for the rest of my time in Utah.

I feel so blessed and so guided in our decisions individually and as a married couple. Tracy and I continue to realize in many ways the blessings from the Lord in our life. I am happy to be at this point in life and know that the best timing, in all things, is the Lord’s timing.

Lunch with the Deans

Posted by Tracy

About three weeks ago I was invited by one of the tax professors to attend a lunch with him and the dean of the Marriott School of Business. Three other students were going to attend the lunch, so it was going to be a great chance to get to know the dean on a more personal level. The invitation was in large part due to the success of our xTax team.

I of course accepted the invitation to attend the lunch. Not only would it be a fun experience, but it would be a great chance to get my name “out-there” and earn a ticket into the accounting program.

The lunch turned out to be so much more than I thought in fact. Not only was the dean of the entire Marriott School there (Dean Hill), but also the Director of the Accounting School (Dr. Stocks). So in essence, the two most important people I could meet as far as my BYU education goes, I got to meet at this lunch. The lunch was held on the top floor of the Business Building in a small conference room with an entire wall of windows overlooking the BYU campus. The food was excellent (delicious steak salads and plenty of deserts).

The lunch turned out to be quite a success in getting to know the deans and getting them to know me. We all told our individual stories of how we got to where we are, and it was truly fascinating the things I learned from the lives of the deans. I had a marvelous time at the lunch and it was a truly great experience. As we were leaving from the lunch, Dr. Stocks turned to me and asked, “So we’ll see you in the fall, right?” I responded, “I sure hope so.” He smiled and said, “We’ll see you in the fall.”

Our First Time Skiing… Ever…

Posted by Tracy

Yeah, so … Hanna and I had never been skiing before (as of Feb 24th). Well, I get this email from one of the PricewaterhouseCoopers’ recruiters about a ski day that they are having, and that they would pay for Hanna and I to go (another recruiting event). Well, seeing as we could get voted out of Utah for never having skied before, we accepted and began preparing to be bruised.

We were both pretty excited and the day before rented our equipment and got everything ready. The next morning we headed up to the Sundance Ski Resort (talk about a beautiful drive with all the snow through the canyon) for our first day skiing. PwC had reserved a nice lodge and provided a wonderful breakfast for us when we got there. It was gorgeous. The little ponds and creeks up in the snowy mountains mixed with the log cabin lodges and roaring fire made for a wonderful start to our day. After breakfast we went to the base of the mountain where the first lift was and practiced walking around on our skis. I wish everyone could have seen the two of us! After a little while, I mentioned to Hanna that perhaps it would be easier going downhill since we would have momentum on our side and we should just give it a try. So after ten minutes of having skis on our feet, we started up the lift.

On our way up we sat next to a wonderfully kind gentleman and his daughter. You could tell they were pros. We struck up a conversation and quickly the discussion led on to it being our first time skiing… ever. I remember him asking, “So this is your first day? You mean, this is your first run?” “Yup”, we replied. “And you haven’t ever had lessons or anything?” “Nope” “So have you guys been on the bunny hill?” To which we replied, “What bunny hill?” hahahaha. Good times. We got a crash course in simply getting off the lift, but the second our skis touched the snow, Hanna and I were rolling over each other, falling down the hill.

We made it down though and although it wasn’t without some tumbles and bruising, we had a wonderful time. We can definitely understand why people love it so much. You just feel like you are flying – and you can’t beat the scenery. The mountains and trees were gorgeous. We hope to go again soon, hopefully when I am not making a fool of myself in front of a Big Four accounting firm I want to someday work for. On that note, we had a wonderful lunch with the people from PwC at the lodge. They had a kind of presentation during lunch were they talked about recent successes of PwC and some on-campus recruiting stories. The BYU PwC Partner also felt it necessary to have me stand up and give a brief summary of xTax on the spot (Keep in mind, I am the youngest school wise of all hundred-some people attending) which was interesting. But in the end it turned out to be a fun and wonderful experience for Hanna and me, and a great way for me to continue building a relationship with a great company.

PricewaterhouseCooper’s xTax Competition

Posted by Tracy

I thought it was about time that I start catching everyone up on what has been going on. I figured I could start by explaining some of the stops I have made on this Journey to an Accounting Future. (Sounds breathtaking, huh?) Laugh all you want, you’re gonna read about it anyway…

Back in October, 2006, a professor made an announcement in my Accounting 210 class about a competition that was going to be hosted by one of the Big Four accounting firms. He said it would grant the participants great exposure, experience, and generally a great time. It would also be a great way to get your name out there for admission and recruiting purposes. So I signed up and got teamed up with some wonderful people.

xTax (short for Extreme Tax) is a competition, hosted by PricewaterhouseCoopers, where students are given a large tax issue and must give a presentation before judges regarding their solution. The presentations must be 12 minutes long and there is a 15 minute question-answer session. The presentations are judged on critical thinking, presentation quality, and teamwork. Teams of five students first compete within their own college. The first place teams from all colleges submit videos of their presentations to the PwC main office and these presentations are reviewed again. PwC then selects five schools to attend the national finals in Washington, D.C. Our team did very well and placed first at BYU, and in December of 2006, we found out we were going to nationals.

At D.C. we were treated great! They had a private room for each student at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in downtown D.C. We were able to spend an evening with former Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee (Chairman Archer) in the Capitol Building. He took us on a special tour and even allowed us to go onto the house floor for a portion of the evening. It was awesome! We had a meal at the Capitol Club (a political hotspot) which was a special experience as well. Although we didn’t win the first place prize at Washington D.C., the National Finalist experience truly changed my outlook on the tax services field. I met some amazing people and had a wonderful, life-changing experience that I will never forget.

Watch a video discribing last year's xTax competition or check out PwC's xTax site decribing the competition's details.

It works! It really works!

Well, well, well. It really worked. I am suprisingly excited about this. After reformatting some things I didn't like (which required dusting off some extremely rusty HTML skills), the Blog looks like it should work quite well.

Hopefully this weekend Hanna and I will be able to sit down and catch everyone up on what is going on in our lives. This may end up being a great way for Hanna and I to keep a journal as well. Once I show Hanna how to post things on the Blog, we should be set.

Let us know what you think and stay in touch!

Welcome to our Blog!

Hello everyone! So, the other night Hanna and I were talking to Aaron and Jenny, and the next thing I knew - I had shamed myself by not having a blog. So, now on the path to redemption, here's our little blog!

Hanna and I thought this might be a way for people to stay in touch and up to date about what is going on in our lives. Sometimes we forget to tell you things that are happening since we can never remember who we tell what. So, perhaps this blog is the answer.

We hope you enjoy it and we should be setting up a Flickr account soon so you can see some updated pictures whenever you want. I guess the next big step is to acutally post things and keep up with this.

Know that we up here in the mountains miss you all! Hope you are doing wonderful!