Bear Lake

The weekend after Mitch got home from Cupertino, we went up to Bear Lake with his family.  It was one of those nice, relaxing vacations where you don't have to do a lot or see a lot, you just relax and enjoy spending time together.

The thing with going on vacation with Mitch's family is that they all like adventure and, as previously discussed, I do not like adventure.

On Thursday, we rented WaveRunners.  I didn't think I would like the WaveRunners because in my mind they fall squarely in the Adventure category.  Actually though, I ended up trying them anyway (going suuuuper slow) and it turns out, I DO like them (even when we go faster)!  So.  There's one adventurous thing I like.

On Friday, we went boating.  I definitely do NOT like boating.  Once, when I was little, my parents took me on a boat and I CRIED the whole time.  It was super traumatizing and to this day I don't even like being on the boat.  I tried not to complain too much though and went along for the ride anyway.  Mitch is a pretty good little wakeboarder though!  I think he was the only one in his family that could really get up.

And on Saturday, we rented ATVs.  I DO like ATVs.  I've been on them before and I liked them last time, so I was perfectly fine doing those again.  (Which is weird because they fall in the "adventure" category too.  So I guess there are two adventurous things I like.  WaveRunners and ATVs.  But that's the end of that list.)  Too bad we didn't get any pictures of that.  We got pretty dusty. 

The rest of the weekend was really just relaxing.  Mitch and I both read a lot.  I did a puzzle with Mitch's parents.  (They like doing puzzles with me.)  The boys played a lot of card games.  We played Ticket to Ride.  We ate.  Etc.

On Sunday, we went to church in Logan and then stopped to see the Brigham City Temple. 

All in all, it was a relaxing weekend.

Tracy!

Tracy's family stayed at my house while they were up here for the funeral and a wedding. I really like playing with Tracy. A lot. We had a lot of things to do while she was here and we got most of them done. While Tracy was here, she and I:

• made strawberry jam
• made "The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies of Your Life" (and ate them)
• swam (my second and third time in the pool since we moved in!)
• went to Texas Roadhouse (they introduced us to Texas Roadhouse in Idaho!)
• drove to Layton to find a shrug she needed for a wedding (long story)
• took Nathan to McDonald's to play on the musical toys (thanks for the idea, Kristal!)
• got Tracy a Kong Kone from Macey's (for some reason I think it's hilarious to get people huge ice cream cones and pretend to be surprised when they're so big)
• made cake pops
• did some crafts
• etc.

(I meant to take better pictures of our crafts, but then I remembered, "Oh, wait. I put them up in the attic already." Oops. So, all you get are pictures take at 2:30 am the day Tracy was leaving. And I meant to take more pictures in general, but we were too busy having fun.)

I really like Tracy.

And then they came back!

On Tuesday, Tyler and Brandon left and went home. On Wednesday, we got word that my grandma wasn't doing well. (See my last blog post, item 4: my grandparent just moved to UTAH!) We went up and saw her Wednesday night (though she wasn't really coherent) and she passed away Thursday morning. So, a couple days after they got home, Tyler and Brandon came back to Utah (this time with my mom and other sister) for the funeral. My other sister, Tracy, was already planning on coming up with her little family in July for a wedding, so she just came a little earlier (and stayed a little later).

While my family was here, we did a craft with almost all ( {cough}Sarah{cough} ) of my sisters and my mom. I don't have any pictures of the craft we did, but we replicated a sewing project that my grandma had in her house. We all would have wanted hers, so instead fighting over it, we made our own together. We also had a family dinner at my house and had fun talking and playing together. ("Um... I'm Sarah...")

This is my favorite picture from that night--

Nathan really likes Tyler.

And this is my other favorite picture.

While we were all talking, Brandon was bored. HA. Such a 12 year old!

Hanging with my bros.

Good thing I have Kellie to remind me to blog! (To be fair, "Blog something," has been on my To Do list...)

Let's see. I last blogged mid-June and I mentioned I was going to Denver for work. When I got back, I thought things would sort of start to slow down. (Think back. Up to this point in the summer, I'd already gone to Denver for a week, Jason moved in, Sarah moved out, graduation, my birthday, my parents here, and before that, our vacation.) Instead, the weekend I got back from Denver, my mom surprised me and told me that my other two little brothers, Tyler and Brandon, were coming up for a week to visit. They stayed at Em's house Monday through Thursday afternoon and then came and stayed at my house Thursday night through the next Tuesday. They were here for Canada Day and the 4th of July. While they were here, we:

• went to our ward's pancake breakfast
• watched fireworks
• went up to the planetarium
• went to the movies
• visited my grandma and grandpa
• etc., etc., etc.

I don't get to spend a lot of time with my brothers, so it was fun to have them here!

The Petting Zoo.

While we're waiting for Mitch to do his part of the bathroom redecoration project {which is scheduled for Friday!}, let's talk about what I did last weekend.

I went to Emily's house! And, although the title of this post is "The Petting Zoo," Em and I didn't go to a petting zoo. Her house is the petting zoo!

She has lots of animals, just like a petting zoo. And, because her animals are used to being around people, you can pet them, just like a petting zoo.

She has goats...

{Bucko, Feta, and Caroline}

And chickens...

{Most of the chickens have names, I just never remember them.}

And her newest addition is this little guy...

{Chuck}

And he's just as sweet as he is adorable. He follows people. And wags his tail when he likes things! {Did you know cows can wag their tails?!} And he has the most darling little moooo.

I got to feed him while I was there.

He was just born last Monday and he doesn't know his real mama, so Em is his "mama." He likes her.

There's also a "horse" at Em's petting zoo...

{Chalcy with Em}

The "horse" doesn't give rides yet, but she does know lots of tricks like "sit," "stay," "shake," "drop it," "leave it," etc. She also likes to play fetch, but only if there's nothing to distract her and sometimes she forgets which stick you threw because there are lots of other equally nice sticks on the way to the one you threw. And my favorite trick she knows is, "JUMP!" That's when she jumps as high as she can and it's hilarious.

And, finally, Em's very first pet...

{Paley}

It's funny to me that Alley and Paley are both black cats, but they look absolutely nothing alike. Also, it is just as hard to photograph Emily's black cat as it is to photograph my black cat.

Fun, right? Okay, now we can go back to waiting for my bathroom project to be finished.

St. George and St. Patrick.

I keep teasing Mitch's parents about how they're becoming winter regulars in St. George. They were going down for a few days this weekend, so Mitch and I decided to join them on Saturday and Sunday. It wasn't a long break, but it was nice to get away for a couple days. (We even left our computers at HOME!)

While we were there, we went to a bunch of the St. George Parade of Homes houses. I decided that I like the Parade of Homes (if you walk through each house quickly and if they're not Southwestern houses). There were some neat houses (especially the first one and the last one since those were the only non-Southwestern houses) and I think it'd be really fun to do the Utah County Parade of Homes later this year (probably fewer SW homes up here).

My mother-in-law and I also went shopping. My goal for the weekend was to find some leprechauns. (No, seriously. For my living room.) And I found some!

They make my house feel so much more decorated for St. Patrick's Day! (Mitch said they look creepy, but they're LEPRECHAUNS! And don't they look like leprechauns? Yes.)

And other than that, we mostly just ate and talked and relaxed and then came home.

Saturday.

On Saturday, we went to the beach (by way of Nordstrom).

By the time we got to the beach, EVERY parking space and EVERY fire pit was taken. With an emphasis on EVERY. (Granted, we got there late but, they were having some kind of event at every beach and it wouldn't have mattered when we got there, unless it was at like... before sunrise.)

After missing all of the prime sun hours (not Nordstrom's fault), we finally met up with my dad and brothers. To enjoy the (cold, windy) beach.

Not our best beach trip ever.

But we did end up turning the night around and enjoying our time together. Instead of a bonfire, we had a barbecue. And instead of at the beach, it was at my grandparents' house. But it turned out okay. And we were a lot warmer.

California.

(Almost caught up.)

We went to California last Thursday through Sunday. (Another reason I haven't been blogging.) Mitch and I had a planned a trip a while ago and we convinced Emily and Sarah to come with us. We actually left last Wednesday night and drove to St. George so that we wouldn't have to drive as far on Thursday.

Our hotel Wednesday night was pretty sweet (cheap). To be fair, it actually wasn't bad in general. The biggest (only?) problem was that they hadn't left the air conditioning on in the room so, when we checked in, the room was like 150 degrees. Not even kidding. While we waited for the air conditioning to work, we decided that desperate times called for desperate measures. Like filling the bathtub with ice cubes and water.

Seriously, it helped.

The hotel also had these sweet chairs. Too bad we couldn't stay longer and sit in them all day.

Thursday morning we were up bright and early to drive the rest of the way. That's always a fun drive. Many trips ago, we (Em and I?) started the tradition of not telling people where we were in the drive and when we'd be arriving. For some reason, Em and I (and Sarah now) think it's a hilarious game. When our mom (or now Tracy) ask us where we are, we text back pictures of things that could be anywhere along the drive. As though they'd be able to tell from some random tree that we're in Nevada. (Actually, sometimes you can tell the state but not exactly where.) Or, sometimes we'll text recognizable things (the Welcome to Nevada sign, the Baker thermometer, Whiskey Pete's, etc.) but send them hours after we passed them. So much fun.

Anyway, this time we stayed with my sister (Tracy), her husband (Freddy), and their baby (Nathan). Em and I haven't seen Nathan since he was here in March so, he has doubled in age since we saw him. When we first got there, he wasn't in a very good mood.

(When my mom text me asking where we were again, I sent her this picture. That was an easy clue.)

Our plan for Thursday afternoon was for it to be a Girls Day. We'd planned to get pedicures and do a craft together and then go to dinner. Eventually Thursday changed into a Lots of Other Things Day.

We did do our craft, but we don't have any good pictures of the doing part since Mitch turned the camera over to my brothers. {sigh} Instead, we have pictures like this:

And these:

That's right. If you borrow our camera to have a photo shoot and take pictures of bees instead of our crafting, we'll blog your car model pose.

We ended up taking an extended break from our Girls Day (and crafting) to go with the entire family to see Beauty and the Beast. It was pretty good, but also very, very long. And when we got back (at about 10:30), our craft still wasn't done. So. Rather than leave with unfinished projects (that would never get finished), we elected to take twenty minutes to finish them.

Twenty minutes in crafting time is equivalent to approximately three hours real time.

But we got them done!

Cute, eh? And mine match my Happy Birthday banner.

Anyway. Finally, at like 1:30 am (2:30 to us Utahns), we left my grandparents' house and went back to Tracy and Freddy's. (An hour drive.)

And that was Thursday.

Mission!

Tuesday night Mitch's little brother, Travis, got set apart for his mission.


He left Wednesday afternoon for the MTC where he'll be for a couple weeks before going to the Washington, D.C. South mission.

I love having brother-in-laws. They're so much fun. Especially because they've never had any sisters. He'll be a great missionary. We're really proud of him.

Before he left, I reminded him that the hard you work, the prettier your wife is. Just ask Mitch.

Mother's Day.

For the first time in SIX YEARS, I spent Mother's Day WITH my mom! She was here for my sister's graduation and came and played with me for a few days too.

We had lots of fun playing together. One of the things we did was make these Amy Butler bags. My mom and Em had planned on making them and they invited me to sew too.


This is my "take everything to keep me entertained at work" bag. It's so big that it holds all kinds of things and then some more things and has room left over. Part way though we were kind over sewing but we finished anyway!

Anyway. Thanks for playing, Mom! (And Emily and Sarah.)

Family pictures.

A couple weeks ago, Mitch's family took family pictures. (Oh, family pictures...)

They got a bunch of just Mitch and I (had we known, we would have brought other clothes for those pictures but, we didn't know that was part of the plan).

Aww, cute.

(Mitch thinks it's weird to have so many pictures of just us but I love it.)

(Also, we noticed we're each on the same side of every picture.)

Other things we've been up to.

We had my birthday...


(One year older and wiser too!)

And Em and Jeff and Sarah were there.

But then two days later, Sarah packed up all of her things...

And moved to her own little apartment!

(She came by to visit last night and she already misses us.)

The End.

Em and Jeff's Wedding!

A couple weeks ago (3 weeks? Has it really been three weeks already?), Emily and Jeff got married. Mitch took enough pictures that we basically have the whole day in slow motion (you know, like those animation flip books?) but, I'll just post some of the more important pictures.

Em and Jeff coming out of the temple...


Em with my dad and Jeff with my mom (in RED HEELS!)...


Em and Tracy...


All of us except one...


Tracy, Freddy, and Nathan...
(Nathan smiles about everything now!)


And other miscellaneous pictures...


And last but not least, the cake...


Which I made.

The End.