WONDERFUL AND SWEET!

When I think wonderful and sweet I think Abby and Briana!!!!



Miss you guys ;)

Ode to my semester at BYU!

Well I have finished my first semester here at BYU and I must say that this has been an amazing and very unique experience. I have decided to go back to BYU Hawaii in the January but it is not because I have not enjoyed myself here. To be perfectly honest this place has been a blast.The work load here has been substantial but not over the top and I have not had great grades but have done fairly well overall.
BYU is a unique place. Its the land of the over achiever. Nearly everyone here is a good student, good person, who has some sort of talent in music, sports, art, dance, or they can at least speak another langauge. As far as girls go there are a LOT of pretty girls!!!!! The problem is there is also a lot of cool guys.
Its actually is a funny thing. Lots of people at BYU get married, however very few people date. The other day I was in a hot tub and I asked how many of the eight guys in the hot tub had a steady girlfriend......no one raised there hand and these were eight, cool guys who played sports, had served missions and were good looking. However almost all of them had been on a date in the last week. Everyone here is afraid to hook up because in most cases they are a cool guy hooking up with a cool girl...and when that happens then the inevitable is that the relationship will work out. So everyone dates casually. Its weird but I have been able to date a lot of girls this semester.

The religious atmosphere of the school is great. It is so refreshing to see so many people honestly trying to stand for something. So many people my age are just out looking for a good time and something to please themselves. Its great to see so many people looking to serve something greater than self. Not everyone here is perfect but there is an honest effort to live better and it shows. My classes also have been awesome. OK ANYONE GOING TO BYU MUST TAKE AMERICAN HERITAGE WITH BROTHER HOLLAND!!!!!!! Best class of my life. Its this amazing class, not so much about history as about ideals and principles that America is all about. Still, all of my classes were interesting. The work sucked but the lectures were entertaining, engaging and thought provoking.

This semester like so many was filled with good times, great friends and adventures!

Like driving through the mountains of Utah in the fall in a BMW convertible that your super cool uncle let you borrow!










Like Waking boarding in the coldest lake ever





Like Going eighties dancing every Thursday we could



Like going to southern California on an "epic surf trip"














Like Caroling with real Llamas to random people!



Like Snowboarding!











AND ALL THE OTHERS!!!!!!



Really my life is so blessed and I am thankful for the time I have had here. Still, I have a chance to live in Hawaii and I have decided to investigate it futher by trying it out. We shall see, perhaps my heart will call me back to this place, perhaps not. However, regardless of what happens in the future this semester has been a great time and I hope to have more like it!

My Dad is a tough BAD A!

Well I decided I had to dedicate a blog to something that is pretty cool about my dad. My dad is a trapper! Yeah you heard right. Just like Daniel Boon and Jim Bridger my dad is a real life fur trapper.



Now I myself am an amateur trapper and can skin a bobcat pretty good but if you want to see an expert look no farther than Ira Hansen. All hyperbole aside, what my Dad does is impressive. My dad is no weekend warrior trapper, his trap lines will stretch over the course of several hundred miles through some of the toughest terrain Nevada has to offer (again this is not hyperbole).







Sometime I even get a little nervous about him doing it as it is so incredibly demanding and he is in areas that are so remote.







Actually trapping has been a major part of my life. Many of my baby cloths were paid for with fur money. Also my mission was paid for with fur money. I helped my dad trap the year before my mission and of the 25000+ dollars we made doing it, my cut was the money for my mission.

My dad has trapped everything from beavers to muskrat, to kit fox, grey fox, to coyotes, to our number one and most important animal.....The Bobcat.



Trapping with Dad is always so fun. Still, its also tough. Waking up at 4:30 and spending the whole day bouncing in the hills of Nevada checking sets in every gully, canyon and rockpile along the way is tough. I remember on one of the checks, pulling up in the frosty night to an old shack in the middle of nowhere. It was an old cowboy line shack that cowboys use while moving cattle over long distances. Sleeping in the complete silence of that cabin with my just my dad and me there and no civilization for more than 50 miles in any direction, is a cool feeling. Then waking up to the beautiful desert sunrise just gets you ready to take on another day.



There is something very satisfying about going out into nature and making a living from the raw materials nature provides you with. And there is nothing more thrilling after a hard days work than seeing a nice big Tom in your trap.



Like father like son.




I only hope to be half the man my Dad is!

NEVADA MEN!

I have not blogged in while.......yeah i know i suck! Anyway I am now finishing my first semester at BYU and upon thinking on the events of this past semester, I have decided that our yearly deer hunting trip and the trapping adventures with Dad deserve a full blog!

Every year since I can remember all of us Hansens gear up for the ultimate man adventure in the wilderness. We head up to a remote area north of Elko and engage in around a weeks worth of hunting, hiking, camping, shooting.....shooting....shooting, bomb making, football playing, fort making, jeep driving paintball playing, army playing, story swapping, candy eating, super man adventures. Its so much fun every year and some of my fondest memories growing up are of this yearly trip. This year was no exception.

We had a blast doing all of the stuff we love to do.


We hunted sage hen and rabbits.





We fished for trout


We shot guns


we shot more guns


we shot bigger guns


we did dumb things!



We blew up propane tanks by shooting them in a fire with a 30-06!



And we hunted deer



Still more than just the cool things we do there is the environment. Its a chance for us as guys to embrace our rustic natures and abandon civilized life and get dirty and have fun. Its great to forget about girls, work, school, and drama to simply bask in the joy that comes from watching a propane tank explode like something off Bond flick! Its fun to share these adventures with dads brothers and cousins and then swap stories in the cabin at night!


I sure hope this trips tradition never fades!