One Happy Kemper

Dont Forget!

2012-01-15T11:55:00.001-07:00

Dont forget to check out our new blog here!

NEW BLOG!!

2011-12-08T20:48:00.002-07:00

We have a new blog!!
This will officially be my last post on this blog. Sad. But exciting!
You can now follow us at our new address.
Please update your blogs and come join our new life at:

www.thestoryofchuss.blogspot.com

This blog has been good to me! Its followed my life for the last few years and Ive loved it. There is so much going on in our lives now, so Im glad to capture it all on our new blog.

Thanks everyone for looking at this blog.
Hope to see you on our new one :)

Wowza

2011-11-28T18:35:00.004-07:00

Its almost December!!
Where in the heck has time gone.
Because of all the wedding plans, my Halloween wasnt quite what I am used to. I am usually all out, I love it!In fact, it just took me like 10 minutes to remember what I was. I was a tich preoccupied at that time knowing I was going to get married in a few days!!
But I was pretty happy with how my costume turned out.
A few of my co workers worked really hard on our costumes this year! We spent lots of late hours putting these bad boys together.
What do you think? We made these out of camping foam, yellow fabric, old jeans, some spray paint and a lot of late hours!

We won first place in our work contest.
Speaking of work...I just celebrated my 5 yr anniversary with my company yesterday. Sheesh, time flies.
I bought Russ and I a couples costume, but we didnt end up doing anything Halloween night, just preparing for the big day. We did however go to dinner at Sugarhouse BBQ. Ill tell you what, what a great time to go to dinner! There was only one other couple there and it ended up being our friends! So we got to have dinner in a fantastic restaurant all to ourselves.
Obviously big things have happened in my life this past month. We have almost been married a month and I couldnt be happier. During this Thanksgiving month I surely feel blessed.
Because of my new life, I felt a new blog was in order! Ive started working on a new blog and am almost ready to launch one of many post...wedding, honeymoon, all life in between.
Stay tuned.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! And happy Cyber Monday.
PS. I STILL think Black Friday is the worst holiday ever invented. I can not think of anything that makes me more ornery (Well, maybe the DMV) then the thought of throwing Thanksgiving aside, staying up or waking up at ridiculous hours and fighting someone for something that is going to save you a couple bucks. Nope, cant do it. See?? I told you it makes me ornery! I just got almost all of my holiday shopping done in the comfort of my desk, in less than an hr. And Im sane, Im happy, and Im warm :) :)

Happy Holidays from the Black Friday scrooge!

Bridal Showers

2011-10-26T07:30:00.000-06:00

I feel like such a lucky gal.
I have had the most amazing support the last couple months in preparing for this wedding. My soon to be new sister in law, Russ's sister Sarah, threw me an incredible shower with all his family and my immediate family. She had decorated her place in my wedding colors and had printed pictures and hung them all over her house. It was so great, and I had a fun time.I cant believe I didnt get one photo!
My aunt Katy through me a shower with all my family. We shopped around Gardner Village and went back to her club house for yummy soups, salads and breadsticks. I can not believe it, but I didnt get one picture there either!
My wonderful friends from high school had a get together the other night over dinner.
I love you girls, thanks for the fun time and your support.
I at least got a pic with my phone!

Left to right..
Annie, Kailey, Tiff, Sandy, Heidi, Jeanette, Lauren, Me, Linds.
I play on 2 soccer teams, a womens team and a coed team. My womens team played in a tournament to end the season. After our game the girls organized a dinner to celebrate my upcoming wedding.
Thanks Sweaty Betty's!

Thanks to everyone that has helped in sharing all the excitment with me! Its been so much fun, and I appreciate all of you and your offers for wedding help!

A gentle woman indeed.

2011-10-22T07:30:00.001-06:00

My niece Oakley is probably one of the funniest little kids I know.
She has such a clever sense of humor, and is always so friendly.
Apparently right now she has watched a few too many movies about princes.
Earlier this summer I had stopped by my parents house and my sister was also there and was out in the yard with all her kids. I was talking to my mom and sister and Oakley kept trying to get my attention. When I finally looked, she was on her knee with a pine cone asking me to marry her. I wasnt engaged at the time so I had no idea where she came up with that one!
I was out to my sisters a couple weeks ago for a birthday party and as I was leaving she frantically runs ahead of me, runs down the stairs and plops on her knee with her hand held out to help me down the stairs.

Its really weird having a 4 year old being a..."gentleman" but hilarious!!
A couple of days ago I came to my parents house during my lunch break to see all the kiddos that were playing and to have lunch.
As soon as I pulled into the driveway all 6 of the nieces and nephews came running out to my car. I see Oakley pushing through the kids, I open the door, and boom! Down on a knee, hand out. It killed me. It's so hard not to bust out laughing.

Thank you Miss O, I feel like a princess indeed.
Where do kids come up this this stuff?
Not only is she a gentleman she is a killer soccer player :)

What up Heise!

2011-10-17T18:19:00.018-06:00

As Ive mentioned in previous post, my brother Cody and his family moved to Idaho the beginning of this year.
I hadnt seen them since I had been engaged so Russ and I decided to go up for a weekend and play. My parents also had planned on being there that week so our trip overlapped a bit.
We had a great time.
My brother lives in an amazing place with so many fun things to do!
The next morning after we arrived, we woke up really early and went zip lining! I really cant think of many things I love more than to zip line. The rush of stepping off the plat form, the feeling of cruising high over pretty land below, and then of course the excitement of coming in for the landing at mock 9.
Gangs all ready!

Me and Mei

The fun 4 wheel ride to the top..

The view from up top. It was really pretty to see the Snake river from above.

I was so proud of this little guy.
He was the first to go down (with the help of a guide of course) and he was terrified! He was trying so hard to be brave, but had to let a few tears fall.

After seeing the rest of us come down and getting a few zips under his belt he was having fun!

Russ and I having fun..

I was also so very proud of my mom! Her first time zip lining and she did great!

I have to give "funniest zip liner" to my dad. He just held his hand above the line and acted like it was no big deal. It almost looked like he was walking on air.

I will give the "The most handsome zip liner" award to Russ.

I dont know what award to give myself.
My brother dared me to start going upside down. But with each line, you only have so long and its really hard to flip your body upside down when you are harnessed at your waste and moving fast.
Each line I got better and better until I was completely upside down and hands off the line.

Well, as soon as I enjoyed my time upside down, I knew the end was coming soon. So the same strength you have to get upside down you have to use to get back up. As soon as I was upright I was coming in really fast and the brakes snapped and broke. Yep. It hurt. So I slammed into the end coming really fast and because I hit so fast, I immediately started sliding back down the line until I was just hanging above the ground in the middle of the line. The guides had to hike down and throw me a rope and pull me back in. All while my dad was laughing hysterically of course.
Initially, I was coming in so fast I moved the cable out of the way of my face, which left my arm in the way. I thought for sure I broke my elbow. But it was fine and still such a blast and got feeling better throughout the day.
I love this picture of my brother and Mei.

The best part about this story, is the company felt so bad,we all got free t-shirts and free admission into the hot springs! Score!
After zip lining, we went and played some golf.

My arm was still actually hurting at this point so Mei and I went and got everyone pizza. I love being able to spend one on one time with each of my nieces and nephews. We just sat in the pizza parlor waiting for our pizza to cook,shared a slushy and chatted. I cant believe she is almost going to be eight!
After pizza, golf and relaxing for a bit, we all went down to the hot springs! It felt so amazing! The hot spring is fed into a big pool so its nice and big and feels so warm and amazing!
We took full advantage of the "free" entrance. Next to the springs is a pool with a water slide which was like $1 every time you wanted to go down. But since we got the free pass, me, Cody, Mei and Russ went down that slide so many times. It was a blast! It was also cold and raining so it felt great going from a cold water slide and running next door into the warm hot spring!

We put the kids to bed and stayed up late playing games.
Russ is really modest with his winnings.

So much fun Kemps! And for any of you going up near Idaho Falls, swing in the Heise Zip line. You wont regret it. The people are great and its so stinkin fun!
PS. If you go, try and go upside down. Its really hard and I am not joking when I say its the worst my abs have ever felt. Such a great core workout.

Pre-Wedding Diet

2011-10-07T17:29:00.010-06:00

The Utah State Fair came into town not to long ago.
I have the best memories of the state fair growing up!
I look forward to it every year and would go every day if it was free. I love the food, I love to people watch, I love the rides and all the gadgets and gizmos a plenty!
This year, with wedding planning and rain, our fair schedule was a bit off.
One Saturday, we did wedding plans earlier in the day and ran off to the fair for a few hours.
The fair isnt exactly a perfect place to go when you are trying to fit in that wedding dress that has already been altered to fit you perfectly. But come on! Its the fair! The only thing I missed this year was the fried peanut butter and jelly. Mmmm, I love it.
We started off by sharing a foot long corn dog.

But that of course was just an appetizer, and mighty good one at that.
We then decided we had to try the pizza Philly steak sandwich!

We polished that off with a bag of jalapeno chips.
As we were walking to the big yellow slide (Who doesnt love the big yellow slide??) we passed the peaches and creme.
That was sure a treat.

Dont let all these pictures of Russell fool you. I consumed equally half.
There is just something about the big yellow slide. Grabbing a burlap sac and heading for the top.
Even though this is a hideous picture I love that you can see the fair grounds and SLC.

Russ and I have terrible luck. If we ask someone to take a picture for us in a cool place, they generally miss whatever it is we want in the background. For example; we went to SEAL beach and there were of course seals ALL around us. We asked this nice person passing by to take a picture of us and the seals and it was literally just a picture of us. There were loads and loads of sun bathing seals and there was not one in sight on our picture.
I asked another very nice lady to take a picture of us and the big yellow slide.

She must have heard big yellow shed. Thanks anyway lady.

After playing some fun carnival games, attempting to win a goldfish, seeing the carved butter attraction, looking through the art and photos, talking to bee keepers, begging Russ for the cutest "Its SO fluffy!!" (Said in Despicable Me voice) bunny rabbit, and enjoying some intense people watching, we prepared our departure with a funnel cake. And yes, we finished the whole thing.

If you are thinking I look high, thats because I was. High on sugar and fried goodness.
You would think after eating all that you would want to fall into a food coma.
Instead, we went straight to a BYU-UTAH football party. The nice friend that was hosting had made home made chili. We couldnt be rude an decline her offer so we wrapped up the night with a nice bowl of chili, rolls, and cookies.
I think at this rate my dress should fit just fine....gulp.
GO UTES!!!!!

The Proposal

2011-10-03T07:30:00.000-06:00

APPOLOGIES:
I must take a quick second to say sorry to anyone out there that reads my blog and has suffered through my terrible spelling/grammer and other mistakes.
I dont have a ton of time to blog, so when I do I generally do a few posts at a time and have them scheduled to post in the upcoming weeks. By the time I get to 3+ posts I am burned out and I never check my spelling or reread anything. Ive skimmed over the last few posts and its embarrassing. So, I do appologize, and I promise I am not as dumb as I sound.
Onward!

Right now, we are a month out from the wedding! I am getting so excited, and have kept extremely busy planning the last couple of months.
But lets first start with the proposal!
If you dont know Russ, and if you havent gathered from reading my blog, Russ LOVES the outdoors. He's been a ski instructor, river guide, worked with troubled kids in survival camp in the middle of nowhere, and the guy hikes a ton!
On July 24th, we had been up to Heber helping my parents move a few things in my uncles home. My uncle passed away last year and they were getting ready to rent his place. Russ asked if we could do a quick hike while we were up there.
It was SO hot. And we had been moving things in a very hot house and I just wasnt in the mood, but said I would go.
Moving took longer then we thought and I inherited an AWESOME old fridge and had to go back down to the valley to take it home. What I didnt know, is Russ was planning on proposing to me up in the mountains! I had NO idea.
So we totally ruined his plans by me getting this fridge and having to go back down to the valley to get it from my brother in law who offered to take it down in his trailer.
We got back to my house and unloaded it and I could tell her really wanted to go for a hike still. I was hot, I was tired but he was pretty adamant and he had been so nice to help my family so I gave in.
Since we had been moving, and I had known he wanted to hike I was wearing the ugliest outfit. Ugh...why does that always happen? I was wearing shorts that were 4 sizes too big, my hair was in pigtails (I never wear my hair in pigtails), and I knew it was going to be a hot one, so last minute I grabbed Eckos leopard print bandana to use on my head. Regrets.
So on the way up, I fell into a coma from being hot all day and driving in a truck without AC.
In this picture, we had just gotten to the trail head and I had just woken up.
But I love it because you can see I am not wearing a ring!

We started the hike and I started waking up a little, and tried to change my attitude about being there so Russ could have fun, plus once we got up into the mountains it was cooler then the valley.

Russ and I had talked about getting married and even had gone ring shopping the week before. BUT, I didnt know for sure what I wanted. I had picked out a band but didnt know what shape of diamond I wanted and we only had about a half an hr to look. The whole next week after we had looked we had something every night. So half way up the hike Russ started telling me how he was looking up honeymoons. I told him I thought it was sweet, but dont you think we should start with a ring?
He said the ring shop was closed on Monday due to the Pioneer holiday and we could go on Tuesday. He started asking me what shape of diamond I wanted etc.
We continued our hike with intentions of making it to the top of the mountain to a lake. After about an hr of hiking we ran into snow!The end of July and trail was completely covered in snow. Russ, unbeknown to be, was planning on proposing at the lake. He already had planned to propose up in Heber, and that plan got ruined, so when his plan B wasnt working out either I could tell he really wanted to just hike in the snow.

We started to hike in the snow, and it was steep, slippery and cold!
I could hear water running under us at certain points, and just felt it wasnt safe.
I told him I thought we should turn around and I didnt really want to be playing in the snow in July!

We started to head down the mountain and decided to just call it day and hike straight to the car. Russ told me he needed to go to the bathroom, so he ran down the side of the mountain out of sight.
After a few minutes he came running back up and I noticed he didnt have his backback on. I told him he forgot his backpack and he said there was a beautiful waterfall down the mountain a ways and he wanted me to come see it.
So we started down the steep mountain side and we came across a grove of trees.
Attached to the trees were blown up pictures of the 2 of us.
Russ is a VERY thoughtful person and will suprise me with something (flowers at my house when I come home from work, notes left for me to find them etc).
He told me he wanted to do something sweet for me since he had been dragging his feet in getting me a ring and didnt want me to lose my patience with him. So at this point I just thought he was being sweet and still didnt have a clue he was proposing.
He had picked a bouquet of wild flowers and tied a ribbon around them. He handed them to me and grabbed my hand to walk me over to the trees.
We went through each picture and he told me these were just some of his favorite memories of us and the fun times we had. There was a picture of us from Thailand, a picture of us camping with Ecko, one from our most recent roadtrip and a few others.
Then there was a big blank white piece of paper. He said he left it blank so we could take a picture of the 2 of us on the hike to add to our collection.
He set up the camera on a timer (which we always do) and had me go stand with the waterfall to my back.
He took a picture and hurry and ran over!
He went back to the camera and said it wasnt a good one, lets do one more.
So he set it up, ran over again and...

I could NOT believe what was happening!!
He totally and completely shocked the heck out of me! He said the sweetest things in the world, and asked me to marry him :)
I love how thoughtful he was and how we have an actual picture of him proposing to me!
My ring, I love it! I wanted the petite band and he surprised me with the diamond.

I wish I had a better picture of all the trees with the hanging pictures, but here is the blank one he hung for the engagement picture, and you can see some of the others in the background.

I know this is a major no no, but right after we got engaged Russ carved our intials into the tree :)

I honestly feel so incredibly lucky to have found a guy like Russ.
He is one of the most positive, genuine, thoughtful, and FUNNEST guy I know.
Can not wait to be married to him.

Porcupine

2011-09-28T07:30:00.000-06:00

We were loving the summer heat, and wanted to take a swim.
Russ talked about a place he used to go cliff jumping back in college.
We packed up the truck and Ecko and decided to go camp and swim up at Porcupine Reservoir!
Ecko loved getting out of the heat and taking a dip in the COLD water.

Russ brought his "Too cool lounge" which is basically like floating on the water in a blow up mattress.
I was so proud of Ecko! We got her to come on the lounge and float clear across the lake so Russ could impress the 100 people out there cliff jumping!
Ive said it once, Ill say it again..I have the coolest dog ever.

We paddled out to a really high rock with tons and tons of people. We watched everyone hesitate and finally jump off and Russ decided he wanted a turn.
He climbed the rock, and with out any hesitation did a beautiful dive off the top.
I wish I had a picture or a video, because not only was his dive amazing, but everyone up there was totally blown away so it was funny to hear their reaction.

After we got back to Russ's truck a few people came and told us someone hit his truck and ran.
Russ has an older truck that he doesnt care about so he was kind of bugged, but didnt care all that much...until we started to drive and couldnt turn left!!
So we had to take his truck apart so we could turn the wheel.
We called the cops and by a miracle and making an incredibly long story short...they caught the guy who did it. So that was lucky for us.
That night we had a fire next to the water, roasted some hot dogs and slept under the stars.
The next morning we went for a really quick dip in the water and headed back to the city!

Summer Lovin' had me a blast!

2011-09-23T07:30:00.000-06:00

So sad to think the summer is over.
I feel we got robbed this year of a summer as far as weather.
We still enjoyed a lot of summer activities...
A few trips to the pool!
We finally got our mountain bikes up in the canyon!

Its so crazy to think we live in the city, but can be up and out of all the commotion and in a beautiful, quiet get away in 15 min.

A few rodeos with friends!
We did make it back to Strawberry Days this year with a few friends. I was horrible at taking pictures this summer.
Nothing like a cup (or 2 or 3) of strawberries in creme while watching a buckin bronco!

Russ grew up on a farm, riding horses and hunting!
So its a lot of fun to go camping with his family. I get to ride horses, which I never did growing up!
The setting on our camera was really bad almost this whole summer, and I didnt notice until I took all the pictures off.
So not the greatest pictures.

His dad has this great mule named Ingersol( I have absolutely no idea how to spell it). Anyway, his dad loves this mule, but he is nice enough to let me ride him every time I go riding with their family. Im obviously not an experienced rider (Im wearing Converse in the stirrups) so he lets me ride him because he is the most gentle of the group.

We saw a drive in drive in movie, did a few hikes, and went rock climbing twice.

The best part of this summer, we got engaged on July 24th! Yahoo! All the pictures from our engagement are on Russ's camera, so I hope to post pictures and story soon. Its a good one!

Proud to be an American!

2011-09-19T07:30:00.000-06:00

I sure love the 4th. I love everything about it.
This year we did the same ol traditions as always...Parade, dinner, family sleepover and big breakfast!
Riverton Parade..
On the way to the parade (Cody still thinks he is in Taiwan)

After the parade we went over to a fundraiser carnival for dinner, games and a photobooth!

We went back to the ol parents and laid out the row of sleeping bags and surprisingly enough, had the best night of sleep ever on a family sleep over.
Thank you kiddos! If you look close, Russ and I are the only ones lucky enough to still be asleep!

My dad made his traditional Swedish thin breakfast!

Russ was preparing for this day for a long time. There is a record for most eaten Swedish thins years and years and years ago..like even before I was born for a total of 8 eaten. Russ went into breakfast ready to beat that record!
He did it!! 9 and a half Swedish thins. Makes me want to throw up thinking about it.
For the special occasion we played "For he's a jolly good fellow", made a fan tunnel for him to come out in

And the kids made some noise.

We celebrated little buddy's fist birthday!

Mei and I were getting our picture taken..

And K Bell wanted his picture with Russ(His favorite) by his new motorcycle :)

Because the 4th was on a Monday we had done the sleepover the first part of the weekend. That Monday, Russ and I had a good old fashioned 4th of July. We started early by getting up to run in my cities 5K...but 2 seconds into the run Russ had an injury to the ribs, so we went back to the park and had a fireman's breakfast and waited for the parade instead! Pancakes and bacon is way better then running anyway. After the parade was over, the firemen were doing a tug a war while spraying you down with their hose to make you let go of the rope. It looked so fun so Russ and I joined in and got SOAKED!Im sad I dont have any pictures of it, bu It was so much fun. Then they had another game where one team had one fire hose and a team across from you had another and you had to try and spray a bucket hanging in the air to the other side of the team. Im sure that makes no sense, but I dont know how else to explain it. Just picture a bunch of fun, in the middle of the park, and people getting soaked.
So we did that for a bit, went back to my house and got into some dry clothes and went back to the park to check out the booths. We got KFC (this is a rare occasion for me to eat KFC, but it was the 4th!) and had a picnic in the park.
It was so much fun riding my beach cruiser around in the park with my honey.
Then we decided to go swim! But when we got to the pool someone had pooped, so we scratched that. Why people dont put their kids in swim diapers is beyond me. This happened FOUR times to us this summer!
That night they had a really great concert in the park, so we went to the concert and watched a fantastic firework show.

Such a perfect 4th!

Sole Sisters!

2011-09-14T07:30:00.001-06:00

Well, we did it!
The middle of June my sister Kaysie and & I completed the Bear Lake half marathon. Yahoo!
What a fun thing.
My family rented a condo and have a fun weekend get together for the occasion.
The morning of the race, my wonderful boyfriend (Now fiance) got up at the buttcrack of dawn to make us breakfast. Now if any of you know Russ, he HATES getting up early. So when he voluntarily woke up to make us breakfast I thought it was very sweet.
Getting ready to leave! Look at these super cute shirts my sister made us.

Our cute chef

Our wonderful mom also got up at early to wish us luck and take us to the buses.
I couldnt believe when we hopped on the bus and it kept driving, and driving and driving. I didnt train too well, and never did run a full 13 miles before the race. Sheesh, that is FAR!
The bus dropped us off and it had been raining the night before so it was a bit chilly.
Kays and I stayed together for almost the whole race. We were always close enough to see each other through the whole thing. The first 4 or 5 miles, I felt GREAT. I was running faster then I normally would, and then hit the dirt road we had to run for a mile. Because of the rain it was solid mud! After already running for 5 miles and then hitting mud, it was hard!
Running next to the lake was a beautiful thing though.
13.1 is a long way for a non runner. Just as I was about to the point I was feeling pretty exhausted, my amazing family and boyfriend drove by, honking, yelling and taking our pictures to push us along (We had about 3 miles left).

I had been running along with this other girl, and she would pass me, and then I would pass her, and we would always cheer each other on as the other would pass.
At one point we were running along side each other when my family passed, and she made mention of what great supporters they were.
The next 3 miles were the most brutal of them all. Take note, if you are ever going to run a half marathon, make the time to really train!
Just as I was FINALLY making the round to come to the finish line, you can hear the loudest crowd and see them all spread out..of course, the awesome fam!
I will brag and say my family was by far the loudest cheering squad there.

Crossing the finish line

I loved the cute signs the kids made.

Later, Kays and I were in line to get some fruit and the girl I had been running with said "I knew when you were crossing the line, because your family was the loudest!" haha, I thought that was funny.
Thanks for the support Fam.

Mei like my medal

Such a great time!

The rest of our weekend we had a delicious pizza, attempted to swim but it was still to early in the year so freezing, played a little Frisbee and had races down the streets of Bear Lake. My team killed it.

We literally were pedalling our hearts out. Most of the time you see families taking a leisurely stroll on those bikes, nope, not our family. We were tearing around the corners, cutting each other off, trying to hit all the water puddles. It was awesome.
These crazy cats even had matching bruises. Im sad I waited until the end of the weekend until Russ's was fading.

Great weekend, and good feeling of accomplishment. I guess I can cross that off the bucket list!

Oregon Coast

2011-09-09T22:43:00.022-06:00

So much to post, such little time!
I just bought a "Groupon" to print my blog, Im so excited.But that means I have a lot of catching up to do!
I left off blogging over a month ago with our Memorial Day road trip (In May!), and its not September. The good news is Ive been busy planning a weddin'! Woohoo, less then 2 months away.
Back to the blog for now though, and lets go back in time to May.
We finished off our road trip getting back to the US and driving down the Washington and Oregon coast. It was so beautiful!
Since Im short on time, and heavy on posting, this post will be mostly pictures.
One of the first stops after getting off the boat was this beautiful lookout.
The West coast is so beautiful.

We stopped for a short hike..

That night we drove to Forks Washington, where Twilight was filmed.

I hate to admit this, but I was never a Twilight fan..I know I know. BUT, it was very entertaining being in a town SATURATED with Twlight stuff. The menu items were all named after the characters, the hotel rooms were named after them, there were cut out figures of them all over...it was hilarious.
Forks did have our favorite beach of the whole trip. The best part, we were alone almost the whole time!

Russ was happy to be at the beach!

We are getting so good at taking pictures of ourselves.

This picture was taken on another beach. Do not let this fool you, it was COLD. Everyone was walking around in coats and scarves and Russ was walking around with his shirt off. He was really ready for summer :)

Along the ride home we saw the most beautiful scenery!
I saw the most beautiful rainbows in my life...

Pretty back drops..

And of course, beautiful coastal views!!

We stopped for the "Worlds best clam chowder" in a cute small town.
I had clam chowder in a bread bowl and Russ had fresh crab!

Russ drives a truck and I drive a SUV, so we rented a car to save us on gas.
Our little rental got great gas mileage! If anyone is interested in a gas saver, this Ford..Focus (I think was great on gas. Ford didnt even pay me to say that.
I do feel bad that I am in this picture, because of the whole 10 days we were gone I swear I only drove this once. Thanks Russ, you did a fine job.

That night we camped along the beach. The water wasnt too close, but close enough you could hear it break on the shore. Unfortunately we had a lot of ground to cover so we didnt get to the spot until dark.
The next day we stopped at a really cool area that had this break in the rock that the water would come crashing through. It was really windy and cold, but it was fun.
Plus there was a Tiny dog running around that hated Russ and wanted to bite his ankles, so that was entertaining.

We had heard about a really good place to eat right along the water, and thought it was be a great chance to have a last meal of fresh fish!

There were all these cute little creatures out sun bathing. I thought Id join in.

We also stopped at the Tillamock cheese factory and did some taste testing, bought a TON of beef jerky and topped it off with some Ice cream.

I was pretty stoked to be in Oregon for my first time.

We covered a lot of road that day and made it all the way to California to drive through the Redwoods just before calling it a night.

Look how small the car looks in between these huge trees!

We had such a great trip!

The next morning we woke up really early and drove all the way back to Utah.
Half way home I got a frantic call from my mom telling me my roommate had called her to let her know my basement was flooding.
THANK YOU to my family who spent their whole Memorial holiday at MY house moving out my furniture and sucking out water and removing carpet until I could get home.
I owe them so much. What a pain to come home to, and such a helpless feeling to be 10+ hrs away while your family is working on your house on a holiday. Much love Kemps.

Introducing...

2011-07-26T09:14:00.001-06:00

The soon to be Mr and Mrs Nelson!!

I could not be more thrilled.
I feel like such a lucky gal to be able to spend forever with this guy.
He is so kind, patient, loving, FUNNY, and all around awesome.

OH Canada!

2011-07-19T07:30:00.000-06:00

Russ and I woke up really early the next morning and drove a couple hours to a ferry to take us over to Vancouver Island, Canada.
It was such a beautiful boat ride! That area is gorgeous. It was a bit chilly, but we stayed out on the deck and watched all the green islands go by, and hoped to see wild life (whales).

We made a short stop at San Juan Island.

Once we got on the island we drove around, found a place to stay and went to visit the famous Butchart Gargens.

It was amazing! We were told we went at a perfect time. Supposidly, the flowers were in the fullest bloom.

I had never seen so many bright, beautiful tullips.
They were huge gardens. Each area was from different parts of the world like Japaenese gardens, Italian..

This is one of my favorite pictures of this guy.

After we walked through the gardens, we stopped for Gelato and sat on the stairs to take in all the gardens while we ate it.

That night, stayed at a really pretty castle like place.
Surprisingly, it was inexpensive, and beautiful!

We went for a run that night around town. It was SO great. I LOVED it. For one, that night Canada had just advanced in hockey and everyone was going nuts! There had a been a big game that night that they won and everyone was stoked! As we were running, everyone was driving by honking their horns, and hanging out of their cars, and people on the streets were screaming at us in happiness asking if we watched the game. It was fun. After our run we stretched on the grounds of this pretty place...

Always having a good time :)

The next morning, we woke up and walked through the pretty gardens of our hotel and walked the streets of Victoria.

Victoria is such a pretty place. Lots of great buildings, fun little shops and restaurants right on the water, I loved it.

Later that day, it started to rain a a bit.
We took cover for lunch in China Town!

Victoria has a cute little fishermans Warf we spent the rainy afternoon at.

I would love this little warf house...so small, and oh so cute.

Evening in Victoria..

The next morning, we woke up early and went WHALE WATCHING!

It was so neat being out in the middle of the ocean and seeing these massive whales swim near you.

And the best part, I didnt even get sea sick...just a bit cold!

After the amazing whale watching, we had a quick bite of "Poutine" which was supposidly a real Canadian treat of fries with gravy and cheese curds.
It was actually really good!

Right before we were headed to jump on the Ferry back to US of A, I got to feed a wild little creature watching us eat our fries. He was SO SO cute!

Back on the ferry and back to the US!

Seattle!

2011-07-07T07:30:00.000-06:00

On our way from Spokane to Seattle we made a couple fun stops along the way.
We drove through The Gorge which was beautiful.
We also stopped just outside of Seattle in a cute little town called Snoqualmie. There was a beautiful waterfall we went up to.

As soon as we got into Seattle it was about 7pm. We hopped on a ferry, which I thought was fun. It was the first ferry Ive been on that you just drive your car on to. We headed over to Bainbride Island where we were staying that night with one of Russ's family friend.
Our ferry ride over...

This guy is a successful lawyer in Seattle and had an amazing little cottage of a place on 20+ acres.
That night we just chatted with the Mr and Mrs over some yummy rhubarb pie and went to bed.
The next morning we went for a beautiful run! If all runs were that pretty it would make for an easier time.

We got to take a little path in the forest, it was awesome!

The pretty road leading back to their place.

After our run, we got showered and ready, had breakfast and took a little tour of their amazing place!
Russ got to stay in his own place, a cute little apartment over the garage.

I stayed in a really nice basement apartment in the basement of their pretty home.

This house is just surrounded by beautiful lush land, and ponds, and gardens, and horse pastures. It was such a cute little, well big, quaint place just outside the city.

In the back, they had really pretty pastures full of horses and open fields. Everything was so green! We went at a perfect time of year!

I love their barn. The color was so different cute.

I LOVE dogs. They had the greatest dog that loved to play fetch more then any other dog Ive ever met.
I could throw that ball a million times and it would be right back at my feet.

If I was tired for a bit, it would lay it at the bottom of my feet and just stare at me. If my legs were close enough together, it would actually put the ball in between my legs! It was hilarious. He literally placed the ball right here.

We said our goodbyes and headed back on the ferry into the city.
When we got in the city we stopped at the famous Ivars for fish and chips and clam chowder.

We were so luck with the weather! The weather was perfect in Spokane and perfect in Seattle. Not one ounce of rain. We were really lucky.
We saw the space needle..

The gum wall...

And of course Pikes Place!
I was so excited to see Pikes place. On my BUCKET LIST, one of the things on my bucket list is to catch a flying fish at Pikes Place. However, I didnt know I would have to purchases a VERY expensive fish to do this. But, I think I will still cross if off the list since I got to be there in the action while I saw it done.

The flowers were so beautiful! And really inexpensive. You could get a whole bouquet for $10.

The market was cool. Lots of fruits and vegetables, some Ive never even seen before, all different kinds of foods, like chocolate pasta. And of course, the famous pig.
I think this is such an...awkward picture. Love it.

Also, great entertainment.

Pike place, you did not dissapoint.

After the market, we drove around the city and saw a few more sites. We went to a really pretty garden and to see the Locks, a small canal they fill up and lower to get boats in and out.
Russ's cousin lives in Seattle and was nice enough to let us stay with her and her family. We drove to her house, after a somewhat long detour ( I led us astray..oops. I was the navigator and made Russ miss our turn and ended up on a highway that didnt turn off forever. Again..oops)
She had made us a delicious lasagna dinner and took us for our own personal tour of the city. She wouldnt let me take a picture of her.
They took us to the troll under the bridge.

That is an actual VW car under the trolls hand.

I really loved Seattle. We had such an intense schedule and trying to get everything in. We wish we would have had more time in each place, but Seattle was a lot of fun!

ROAD TRIP!!- Part 1.

2011-07-03T07:30:00.000-06:00

About a month ago Russ and I took a fantasic 10 day road trip.
We started on a Friday around noon. We rented a car since I drive a SUV and he drives a truck, we thought we'd save more in gas by renting a car.
Our plan, drive up through Idaho, through Montana, up to Washington, Ferry to Vancouvor Island, Canada, and down the Oregon coast. Pretty intense game plan for 10 days.
We left around noon and met up with my brother and his family for dinner in Idaho Falls.

I miss these kids so much! We told my brother, but surprised his kids. It was fun.

We ate at The Snake Bite, which was right across from the falls, so we ran across the street before hitting the road.

We hopped back in the car and drove until we were tired. We stopped for the night in Salmon, ID and got back on the road first thing the next morning to our destination...Spokane!
On our way up, we drove through Montana and got directions from Russ's mom to see the house where he was born.
Right down the street from his first house was a Chelsea St!

He was born in a really small town, it was fun to see. There was a gate so we couldnt get right up to the house but we still got a peek :)

Russ's sister lives in Spokane, about a half hr away from beautiful Coeur D'Alene.
We met them there for a fun little hike. It was so so pretty. I want to go back and spend more time on a little house along the water.
Russ's pretty sister Virginia and her cute family.

Russ and his niece Kya stopping for a mid hike stretch.

The view from up top.

After the hike, we drove to Spokane to drop our stuff and their kids off at his sisters place.
That night they showed us around Spokane. I LOVED it there. The city was clean, there was so much going on, and it was really pretty. We lucked out with great weather too.
We went and had Thai food (mmm our favorite) along a pretty river.
Russ's brother in law just graduated law school, so he showed us around Gonzaga. It was such a pretty campus. Then we went and had frozen yogurt.
The next morning they made us a big nice breakfast and we hit the streets of Spokane for a bit before hitting the road.
The girls wanted to take us on a marry go roud. I do have to say it was probaby the funnest marry go round Ive ever been on.

This will probably not make sense since it didnt to me when they were explaining it the night before, but half way through the ride, this little thing comes down and has little loop things you have to grab. You are going kind of fast in a circle and you have to lean pretty far off your horse to get the loop thing, and then as the ride goes to the other side, there is a picture with a hole you try and throw the loop in. It was fun. And hard.
I rode with Kya and attempted to get the loops so she could throw them.

We walked around the park and there was this goat. If you put trash by its mouth it sucks it in. A Mechanical garbage can. A clever idea to keep a park clean.

There was also these really cute slide.

Not good on a bad tailbone, but fun.

I especially love the dead looking kid on the tire.

Pretty cool statues.

We also went to another part of the city to see some of the rivers.
The rivers were really full. It was pretty.

I tried to throw him over but he was too strong.

I really enjoyed Spokane and spending more time with his sister Virgina. She doesnt come in town too often so it was fun to get to know her better.
We said our goodbyes and headed back on the road to Seattle!

Mini mini horse

2011-06-27T07:30:00.001-06:00

I have an amazing cousin that is blind, and when she was a little bit younger, they were talking about getting her a seeing eye dog. My uncle mentioned to me that they had heard about mini horses they are training to lead the blind.
My life has not been the same since. I have become a total big dreamer.
These horses are AWESOME!!! They are tiny horses that they train just like dogs. So these horses live inside your house and wear shoes!
They are called Reebucks he he

Check out these sweet horses!

This one is wearing shoes that look like high heels. How weird and totally awesome is that?

I had big dreams of owning one of these horses. I just could imagine driving down the street with Ecko sticking her head out of one window and my mini horse sticking it out the other.
When I met Russ, I knew he was a total keeper when he told me his dad had mini horses. Dreams do come true. His dads mini horse actually had a baby awhile back.
We got to go hang out with it.By the time we could go down to his parents it was already 2 weeks old but I actually HELD a horse!

Isnt it the tiniest little thing. And to think, it was even smaller when it was first born!

I love this picture

A whole field of mini horses. I seriously couldnt stop smiling.Field of dreams right there...

And then I met Mr T. This horse was hilarious, and also the dad to little baby Bella.
He was the fiestiest bugger. He was chasing the other horses and dogs, and charging the fence. It was hilarious to see a mean, little tiny horse. Supposidly he is the smallest mini in Utah. Dont let this picture fool you, he was so small and had all that crazy hair...so funny.

I think little Bella might have a bit of fire in her from her dad.

If you want to see more pictures or learn about this awesome guide horse foundation, click here.

Summer Happenings

2011-06-19T13:38:00.016-06:00

Its kind of hard to believe its summer right now. I am at my parents for Fathers day..in June, and he just built a fire in the fire place! Its COLD.
It sure doesnt feel like summer, but Its still been a fun time so far!

As I displayed on my blog, The Race For The Cure is close to my families heart.
We had a great time running it this year.
A little pre run stretch.

We generally walk it as a family, but since my sister and I were training for a half marathon all my brothers and sisters and myself ran it.
Our team, "Sole-Soul"

My Cousin Ashley comes down from Bear Lake every year to run it.

There's always tons and tons of people, but ironically, we run into my friend Lauren and her mom almost ever year. Her mom is a breast cancer survivor!

First year we've run in memory of our Grandma.

We had a great time and we helped raise a little more money to help the cause!

ECKO TURNED FIVE!

My little black pup turned 5. After the race for the cure we had a bit of a birthday party for her. Pizza and dog bone shaped cookies!

The girls got special dog shirts for the occasion.

The family loves Ecko Smecko..

Well I dont think Kaysie does, but she did give her a hug on her birthday. That was pretty big.

Thanks to everyone for the fun gifts! Ecko loves her new pink jersey

And I love the new pooper scooper picker upper. Clips right on to the ol belt buckle and if Ecko uses the ladies room I have something right there and handy.
In fact, we used it the next day on our bike ride through the park :)

SOCCER
I play on 2 teams. My womens team took first place last season, but we didnt do as well this round. We still had a great time. Go Sweaty Betty's!!
My Coed team, Bieber Fever went undefeated the whole season...until the championship.
We still had a great time and kicked some serious butt.

My Dad doesnt like to have a lot of attention on him, but it was his birthday the other day and I threw him an itty bitty surprise party. He loves Morelias mexican food so I invited him there for dinner and invited all of his sisters to tag along without him knowing it. It was a success and he wasnt even mad :)

I wanted to post about this A- Because my dad is freaking awesome and B- I found these incredibly cute cupcakes that I thought I would share because I think they would be super simple to make, and they are so cute for summer gatherings.
When I looked up a recipe online, I found one where they used brownies as the hamburger patty.

This picture makes me laugh. If this doesnt sell you on the idea of hamburger cupcakes I dont know what will.

Golden Egg Drama

2011-05-09T07:30:00.001-06:00

I have the greatest memories at Easter time growing up. My grandparents used to have a tree farm and we would go every year on Easter and have a hunt, sit around the camp fire, and play in cabin that was on the farm.
Every year all the cousins would line up oldest to youngest for a picture before the Easter egg hunt began.
Now everyone is all grown up..well most everyone..so my parents have started their own yet similar traditions.
We sat around the fire, watched the kids fly their new kites and of course, an Easter egg hunt, which was the highlight of my Easter this yr.
My mom and Stud out by the fire pit.

These 2 crazy girls wore the same sweater and didnt even know it!

My sister made this super cute spring craft out of a branch and tissue paper. So cute right?

You cant have an Easter party without yummy treats.
My sister also made these cute Easter cookies with all the kids initials.

I made the traditional Easter nest dessert. My aunt Katy used to make these when we were little. I remember grabbing an Easter nest and running in the cabin with my cousins to eat it in the loft.

Ecko even sported her Eastery flowery bandana for the occasion.

My cute mom with the giggles

Then came the Easter Egg hunt...

The kids were finding eggs, they were happy with what was in their eggs..

They were loving each other and the older ones were sharing with the younger ones that didnt get as many eggs..

And then BOOM! The mention of the Golden Egg.
The kids were searching high and low, in and out, up and down until finally, Mei found the golden egg.

It doesnt stop there folks. That is when all hell broke loose.
Kel was screaming...

Oaks couldnt even breath

Faces were covered to block the teary shame

Tantrums were thrown

and then flipped over and thrown some more

Until my brother had the idea of giving Mei the money, and hiding the Golden egg for the very devastated Kel and Oaks.
The egg was hidden, the two searched liked crazy all over in hopes finding it.
Oakley finally found it! And it begins again...
Kel is crying, and then they take it away from her so Kel could find it and now Oaks is screaming her head off because it was taken away from her.
So they hide it again. Oakley calms down, Kel finds it! Opens it, and starts crying "Theres nuffing in it!"
Moral of the story...I dont think next years Easter egg hunt will have a Golden egg.
If you ever read the Hunger games...its kind of how I compared our Easter Egg hunt, every child for themselves. But they were just fine 5 min later and I wanted an Encore! It was fantastic!

Later, Russ and I colored eggs. I love coloring Easter eggs! This year, I do believe our creativity says it all.
Front row, mine, back row Russ.

Russ killed it for sure. Russ likes my hair best when I wear it in the side braid, so please note the pink egg in front with the pink side braid. That was his favorite of mine.
I especially like the ones of his in the back with the head band, and then of course, the one with the beard!

I dare say we are capable of taking a better picture, but its the only one of the 2 of us.

Hope everyone had a very Happy Easter!

Viva!

2011-05-02T07:30:00.000-06:00

My best friend Annie and I went to Vegas a couple weeks ago for a girls trip.
We thought it would be fun to get away from the cold and sit by the pool for a couple days. I cant say Im the biggest fan of Vegas but I was SO excited to go to the warmth and swim and even possibly come home a bit sun kissed.
Little did we know were had booked our trip right in the middle of a cold front!
The weather had been in the high 70's early 80's a couple days before we got there.
Right as I was heading out to the airport I had a nice little surprise from the boyfriend.
He surprised me with a very thoughtful "care package" for my travels. Every time I fly somewhere I always buy candy, a people magazine and of course gum.
He stopped in and had a nice cute bag full of this...

What a great way to start off the trip. So thoughtful!
Our flight was supposed to leave at 9 something. We got all loaded on the plane and sat there, and sat there a little longer until we had been sitting there for 3 hrs! They had to D-ice the plane before we could take off. Good thing for the Netflix app.
We landed, got our rental car and checked into our hotel at it was 4AM Utah time.
Vegas was not hot and sunny as planned. It stayed in the 50's but we still had a GREAT time.
We spent the whole first day shopping!
Annie and I could not be more different, in every single way. We have been best friends forever, and It just works for us. Same goes for shopping. We have totally different styles. It was so funny.
This is Annies totally happy in her store.

We spent a lot of time and money in H&M. I am so sad that they are coming to Utah by the way. I love going out of town and buying clothes you cant get here.
After shopping literally all day, we went to dinner, saw a movie and then sat in the hot tub. So nice!
We stopped by the Mirage the next morning for a little Beatles runway.

We ran into my friend Karen and spent some time with her.

Has anyone been to the Sugar Factory? I was so excited to go, and was kind of disappointed. Come on...$30 for a pimp my sucker stick? No thanks. But I guess thats what Vegas is all about right?

We spent some time walking through the gardens..

And of course, shopping some more!
Annie in her boot store, me in my high heel store :)

We waited until dark and rode the New York New York Roller coaster. SO dang fun. I had never been on it so it was so fun to go in the evening and see the whole city and all the lights!
One of my favorite things about flying Delta is the silly video they play before take off. The red headed flight attendant in the video says all seductively with her hand in front of her face "Smoking is not allowed"

We walked past the sign for Thunder Down under and couldnt help but laugh and think, "Thunder down under is not allowed"

Maybe one day Annie we can talk those boys into letting us go ;)
We missed the show we were supposed to see so we went back and of sat in the hot tub. Nothing like soaking after a long day on the strip. Such a long day, I lost the heel off of my right boot!

The next day the sun was shining and it was WARM! Still only in the 60's and we heard on the radio it was supposed to get back up to the 90's a couple days after we flew home. Oh well, we still got to soak up some sun on our last day :)

We went to another fishing hunting store for Annie which worked out really nice for me. I got to sit in a big ol lazy boy and get a massage while she browsed.
We went back to the strip and people watched while we were waiting for our show to start.

Man I love to people watch. So entertaining.
We saw a very funny comedy show/magic show. Then headed back to our hotel for a fancy dinner, and even fancier dessert. Too bad my pizza slipped off the plate and on to the floor. (But not too bad because Annies was better and she shared ;) )

We treated ourselves to yummy dessert. I had creme brulee and Annie had some kind of chocolate ice cream.
We wrapped up the night with some hot tub time.
The hot tub was empty all but the last night so it was perfect time for BFFs to bond.
Probably because just the time everyone was getting dolled up in their fancy shmancy outfits and high heels they cant walk in, we were settling in and relaxing in the hot tub.
Annie, this part goes out to you...thank you for making me laugh so dang hard at your run in on the black jack table. Thats all Im sayin.
Everything else? What happens in Vegas...stays on Facebook.

Trick?...or Treat?

2011-04-16T17:59:00.010-06:00

I seriously look forward to April Fools day every year. I LOVE it! One of my favorite holidays for sure...if you could call it a holiday.

I never do anything too big at all, I keep it pretty simple. I cant think of a whole lot of things that gives me joy then planning a prank and it going through beautifully.
The last two years have been pretty similar. You would think my poor victims would have made the connections, but luckily for me, they didnt :)
I never eat chocolate. That should be their first hint. Therefore, I dont make things with chocolate in it! But last year, I told Russ and my brother I made a treat for everyone to share. Chocolate covered marshmallows.

I made real choc covered mellows for those that I didnt want to prank, and so it would be more believable. But for Russ and my brother Cody, I made chocolate covered cotton balls :)

The year before I put an add on KSL for "Baby bunnies! Just in time for Easter!"
Poor Cody, got calls all day for people wanting baby bunnies and he didnt have a clue why!
I dont know if I ever mentioned I got a roommate? She moved in last November and is renting my basement out. She is quiet and nice.
She and I stayed up late April fools night bonding over our prank we couldnt wait to play on her co-workers and Russ and Cody.
We thought it was a good one and wanted to share in case you need an idea for next year :)
You will need:
One very nice brother that never remembers April fools day until its too late:

Homemade oreo cookies (again, I cooked with chocolate..1st hint)

And toothpaste

One of these cookies is full of toothpaste, the other with frosting. Can you tell the difference? Neither could they mu-ha-ha.

Russ and I drove up to Idaho for a weekend trip to visit my brother and his family. We happened to drive up on April Fools day.
I told Russ my roommate had made some cookies and sent some up with us for our trip (which wasnt all a lie! She helped!).
So we were like half way through and I decided to be a good girlfriend and offer him a cookie for his drive! He took a bite and said.."Hmmm their Minty." and then he swallowed and said it kind of burned. I busted up laughing and he proceeded to spit the rest of it out the window while on the freeway. I could not control myself. The "minty" comment was just too much.
So then we got up to Idaho and hung out with my brother and his kids for awhile. They put their kids to bed and we were all sitting in his living room talking around 11PM and he said "Bub, I cant believe you didnt do an April Fools joke this year, Ive been nervous all day."
And told him I had been too busy and we had to leave right after work and I didnt have time. We talked a little more and I said told them I had left some treats in the car my roommate had sent up with me. Cody was all happy and said "Its never too late for treats!" This comment made me happy. Very happy.
I went out to the car and got the toothpaste filled cookies, but stuck a real cookie on the edge to feed Russell so he could be eating a normal one and make them believe they werent a joke. It worked. Cody and his wife both looked at each other and said the same thing, "They are...minty". Cody then ran to the kitchen and spit it all out :) BINGO. With an hr to spare.

That next day we all went out to eat at a pizza joint. While Russ was showing Cody a video on his phone I slipped out the back and wrote a note and stuck it on his car without him knowing.
After we ate, we were all loading up in their jeep and getting the kids buckled with Cody saw the note:

I have the girliest handwriting so I tried my hardest to make it look like a guys. I also put a fake number, but an Idaho number to make it believable.
Cody walked around his car a couple of times inspecting every square inch while we were all inside laughing our heads off. I had told his wife what was going to happen so she wouldnt worry. As soon as he stopped looking and got in the car we all lost it.
I believe his exact words were, "Bubba, Im going to kill you".
If for some reason I go missing...remember those words!

SOLE=SOUL

2011-04-01T12:26:00.008-06:00

Hi Friends! I wanted to make everyone aware of a very important event coming soon! The Race For the Cure will be held on May 7th at the Gateway in downtown Salt Lake. If you have not participated in this event, it is a must! This is a fundraiser to help raise money for Breast Cancer research. Because of these kinds of events it allows people like my Grandma... To live 15 years after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Unfortunately, we lost her last year to brain cancer. Its so important to come together and do anything we can to fight Cancer. There are many things you can do to help. My wonderful mother has organized our team this year SOLE=SOUL and we would like to invite anyone that is interested to join our team. This is a 5K, that you can watch, run, walk, crawl...whatever you want to do. Come support those you know that have fought, lost or are fighting this disease. This is such a great event, and super emotional if you know someone that has been affected. You are welcome to read more about it here on their website: Susan G Komen website. When you go to the website you can join our team SOLE=SOUL, make your own team, sign up individually, or simply make a donation on line to help the cause. I hope to see you there :) If you have any questions at all, please let me know!

U-daho

2011-03-28T07:30:00.000-06:00

The sad day has come, my brother and his family moved to Idaho.
Before they moved my friend Heidi and I went over for a fun night of dinner and dancing. Heidi was nice enough to bring yummy tacos and a fun Dance game for the Wii.
Heids, I hope you dont mind I took some pictures from your blog.
Heidi and my sis in law.

I seriously am going to miss this little girl like crazy.

My brothers family.

The newest member of our family. I love the look on his face.

I can not remember the name of this dance game, but I loved it. So much fun. If I had a wii I would go out and buy it tomorrow. Kami totally killed it.

Then the day came to pack them up.
I had to work for the day they packed up, but headed over after work. They were pretty much finished when I got there so I got to just keep the kiddos entertained while they finished up. My niece "Mei" has a lot of neighborhood friends that are going to miss her so much. They all came over for their last day with her.

"Mei's" friends.

I love my nephews bubble here.

Last day in their Utah home.

The next day my whole family and Kamis family loaded up and headed to Idaho to help unload. I could not believe how cold it was up there.
We unloaded in their rental house, and storage unit and then had pizza and swam with the kids at the hotel. It was a fun weekend. I will miss them so much but look forward to getting away to see them!
They are renting a home now in the mountains until they can find a home they want to buy. Its in a beautiful area next to the snake river.

Is he not a stud? Best baby ever. He is always this chill and happy.
Miss you guys already!!

13.1

2011-03-21T07:30:00.000-06:00

I have talked for years about running a half marathon.
Well, its finally going to happen. Registration filled out, money paid, no backing out.
I strongly dislike running. I love sports. I love soccer and continue to play to this day. But just running..its SO different. Soccer involves an intense sprint, then jog, then run...Running is just, running at the same speed.
Everyone talks about how running is so therapeutic for them and such a stress reliever. It sucks to me, and is no fun at all.
I can play soccer games back to back and feel great. I can make it to mile one on a treadmill and be done. How do you get past that? Any pointers anyone?
Anyway, I am running it with my brother and sister and sister in law so I think it will be a really neat experience.
And what better place and time then Bear Lake at sunrise?!

I want so bad to love running. I really look forward to giving it a real try and seeing if I get to that point. Regardless, I think it will be such a great run along side the lake with my sibs! Wish us luck!
If anyone has any great running advice, I would gladly take it.

Crafty

2011-03-12T16:42:00.007-07:00

I am not a very crafty my person. My sister on the other hand...awesome.
There are so many crafty blogs and people out in the world right now. I feel like crafts have really taken off this last year. Is it all the stay at home Utah moms, or is it all over I wonder?
Either way, I have about a hundred things Id like to make. I really want to learn to sew. I would love to sew my own clothes and have something that no one else would have. Maybe Ill take a class this year.
Some of my coworkers put together a little craft night. Each month a different girl host and provides dinner and chooses the craft. Its been great fun.
I hosted in January so I thought it would be fun to do a Valentines craft for the upcoming month.
We made Valentines Topiary. Easy, fun, and super cute...I thought.
Emilie and Jamie. Jamie is the president of craft night haha.

We used lots and lots of hot glue.

Everyone has been so nice to make the yummiest dinners. I ran out of time that night so I bought pizza. Cop out for sure...but Pizza is the bomb. I could eat it every meal.

The finished product!

Oh Christmas Tree

2011-03-03T17:15:00.025-07:00

Yeah, you read that right. I know we are now in March, but I am determined to get caught up.
I seriously love December so much. I love the build up of the holidays and all the get to gethers and activities. I was really looking forward to the holidays this year and they turned out great.
The year before, Russ and I kicked off the holiday season with a trip to temple square and Thai food.
I love traditions and thought it would be perfect to do the same date.
So December first we did the same thing, Thai food and temple square.

This is not a great picture but It was my favorite tree.

He would probably kill me for posting this picture, but I dont think he ever looks at the ol blog anyway. Last year we stepped into the Joseph Smith Memorial building to warm up and go to the top for a view. We had found this ball room open so we helped ourselves to a little dance. This year it was open again...hey, its tradition.

Such a fun way to star the holidays and take a trip down memory lane.

Whats Christmas without an Ugly sweater party? Or in our case...4 of them.
We hit a few DI's and I feel like we really came away with winners. I found a really lovely Christmas dress and Russ had a...snug sweater.
Friend Christmas party..

I think my purple Uggs were a nice tough Russ.
The funnest table there...bar none.

Every year we do the nativity scene. I was Mary last year...my biggest role yet. I was demoted to the choir but we still took our job seriously.

The gang

I hate to brag, but I did win at finding the ugliest Christmas get up :)

Russ and his friends do a big ski trip up to Sun Valley Idaho every year. A few people went snow mobiling, most went skiing and Russ and I went snow shoeing.
I have wanted to go up in the mountains and cut my own Christmas tree for years.
It has snowed so much, and continued to snow the whole time we were up there. The snow was so deep so it was a big workout!

I had no idea looking for a tree would be so hard. You think there is a perfect one and then you hike to it and its no good.

We hiked around for awhile and then Russ thought he saw a perfect one....on top of the mountain!

Luckily..we found the most perfect Christmas tree ever!!

The only thing that would make this picture better was if Ecko was right along side him.

After we were all done playing in the snow the group met up at the lodge to go hot tubbing. This hot tub was incredible...it was the size of a huge swimming pool! I wish I would have snapped a picture.
Then we all met up for pizza and an elephant/ugly sweater gift exchange.
The group

After dinner there was an 80's band playing next door so we went and danced around for a bit. It was a fun trip!

Do you want to see how cute the tree looked in my house?
My first very own Christmas Tree..ta da.
These pictures were taken with my phone so pardon the blur.

Word of the wise. Dont wait until the last minute to put lights on your tree. You cant find lights anywhere!!! We had to use icicle lights...not easy to put on a live tree.

Then comes Christmas. Isnt it absolutely amazing how fast December goes?
Russ and I celebrated Christmas on Christmas Eve. We made Christmas morning cake.

Russ suprised me with the sweetest gift ever!
My very own Beach Cruiser!!

I cannot wait until summer to slap a basket on that bad boy and pedal myself to pool.
Santa brought me and Ecko a stocking.

I love Christmas day with all the nieces and nephews.
There was only one thing missing this Christmas...my Grandma. I have spent every Christmas I can remember having a sleep over with her. Even last year when she was so deathly sick, I spent the night up at the hospital with her so we could be together on Christmas morning. I miss her so much!
My parents are die hard U of U fans. Ecko got them these hats to keep their noggins warm this coming season.

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season!...3 months ago.

Give Thanks

2011-01-27T18:53:00.011-07:00

Sorry, Im still blogging about November, but we are nearing the end!
My birthday this year was on Thanksgiving, what better day right? Stuff your face all while being in good company. Also, its really distracting having a holiday on your birthday so it was absolutely perfect because I didnt want to turn a yr older, so it kind of felt like it never happened.
This year for Thanksgiving I went down South to have Thanksgiving dinner with Russ and his family. They are all such great people, so I felt lucky to be able to spend it with them. Plus, his mom is pretty much an A+ cook. She makes these homemade meat balls that will make you push your fullness level in your belly to the extreme. At least thats what they do to me.
I cant believe it, but I didnt take any pictures at his parents house :( but its not to say we didnt have a good time. Thank you N Family for having me over.
It was an off year for my family, meaning my siblings all went to their inlaws so my parents went up to Sundance and rented a cabin for the weekend and had Thanksgiving dinner up there. After dinner we went up to see my parents and sit in their cozy cabin. For those of you Utahn's it was a COLD Thanksgiving, so it was nice to sit in a nice cabin in the mountains cozied up to the campfire.

I think this picture is pretty impressive. Its one thing to take a picture of 2 people with the old arm extension trick, but 4? Well done.
Are these 2 cute?

What a nice fire.
.
After we went to the cabin we went to a late movie. After the movie which was after midnight I decided I was craving coffee cake, or monkey bread...whatever you want to call it. But since the dough needs to do its thing over night we stopped by Walmart on the way back to my house. BIGGEST MISTAKE OF MY LIFE. I am very Anti Black Friday. I had no idea you crazy people started the second you put your Thanksgiving fork down. All I wanted was frozen rolls, some nuts, and some pudding and I waited in line behind all these crazy moms with baskets chuck full of toys in the 20 or less lines. Not cool. No food, or dessert is that good. But we did it, and we barely survived and got out of there at 2 AM with my groceries. We got up to the line and the guy was like...this is all your getting? You dont want CDs or anything. I was like, no! Scan my 3 items and get me out of here, please and thank you.

Since the bday was on Thanksgiving my brother threw me a fun family party at the bowling alley. I cant remember the last time I went bowling with my family so that was a lot of fun. Thanks Bro for putting it all together.
A little behind the back action.

I love this of my mom.

Look at these kids!! Can they be any cuter?

Thanks Fam! I had a great time :)

unBELIZEable

2011-01-24T18:29:00.025-07:00

I have become the most boring blogger ever I feel.
Its taken me way to long to blog about our trip, I almost cant even remember the details which is exactly why I have a blog in the first place, as my journal!
We had a really fun time in Belize. It was of course...raining, but still a great time.
Russ and I went cave tubing while my parents shopped around town.

We took a couple hr bus ride to a beautiful jungle area where we got our tubes, and floated through a cave.
As we were driving through town I couldnt believe the poverty in Belize.
I think I have mentioned this, but when I travel somewhere I really like to put myself in their daily lives and think about what all these people are doing during the day, and the things they eat, and the homes they go home to..and then I jump back to my life, my days, our food, my house...there is a whole world out there. Dang, I wish I could see it all. Traveling, best education out there I think.
Back to cave tubing.
Getting our tubes..

Russ was the only guy in our group, just his style.

Going into the cave. The water was so pretty and clear, and cold.

Inside the cave.

We look really slimy and disgusting but a memory is a memory.

The next day we were supposed to go to Honduras. I was most looking forward to Honduras, to see the country and to go zip lining. I LOVE zip lining.

And this was as close to Honduras as I got. Stupid wind.

We made the most of the time onboard. They werent able to re-route us so we ended up playing a fun game of BINGO, sitting in the hot tub..

Eating free sushi...

Getting golf lessons

Then ending the night with some formal attire, and fine dining.

Quite possibly the most awkward guy Ive ever met, also known as...I cant even remember his name. He was so weird, my mind chose to forget him almost completely.

This night was the rockiest it had been as far as waves. I had to go straight to bed before I lost it, but not before taking a cruise picture!
I watched hundreds of people get the most ridiculous pictures in the most ridiculous poses, I couldnt help it..

I love Russ's face in that picture. Its the look of..not another Chelsea idea. You're a good sport Mr.
My beautiful mom

On our way back the boat was rocking so hard my parents were holding on to each other. I thought it was sweet :)

Some other pictures aboard the Valor..

These guys were amazing break dancers. Amazing.

Whats a cruise without overweight people, food (those go hand and hand), silly pictures, and towel animals!!

They didnt mess around with their hand dryers.

Mexican buffet at midnight? Why not..

I had a fabulous time. I was so happy I got to spend it with the people I did.
We had so much fun, we even put a down payment for another cruise. Yahoo..cant wait.
In this picture you will see one person who doesnt want to leave and one person that looks happier to leave. You can decide.

Cheetos, check. Book, check. Sucker, check. Neck pillow, check check check. Cap'n, we're ready for take off.

Cozumel, Meheeco

2010-12-29T18:04:00.015-07:00

Lets go back to the Caribbean shall we...to Cozumel!

This is where the clouds started rolling in for the rest of the trip, but who can complain with warm rain? Not me.

I won this trip through my work and part of the deal is I had to go somewhere there was a Del Sol store. We are a worldwide company and our stores are all in fantastic locations so thats not too bad of a deal. Since I chose a cruise and we had a port on every stop, we planned to visit the Cozumel store.
These guys were really great.

I work for the corporate office so it was a lot of fun to go to a store and see what goes on in the actual stores.
After we made our visit to the store my parents went and shopped and did their own thing and Russ and I rented a scooter and explored the island!

The water was so beautiful!

Sure wish we had more time to take all that in!
We unfortunately followed the rain cloud around the island. It kind of hurts to be in the middle of a rain storm cruising down a road in a dress. But it was fun.
We stopped and had a really good lunch on the water. It started POURING while we were there so that was a bummer, but at the same time pretty cool.

Russ went out in the water and snorkeled for the short time we had left and I hung out at the beach. A huge regret of mine not to get in the water but we didnt have a lot of time. I think he captured some pretty cool under water creatures.
These ones are my favorite...dont they look like such happy fish?!

I have no idea what this is?

And I think this is awesome!

After he snorkeled for a very short time we hopped back on the scooter and headed back to the other side of the island to catch the ship.
As we sailed away there was a really beautiful sunset. I felt so happy to have my parents with me.

Merry Christmas to all...

2010-12-23T20:03:00.003-07:00

Ecko & I were so prepared this year in getting our Christmas cards out early. We mostly just sent them to the family, but we still wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful year ahead. Much love...

Merry Christmas!!

Grand Cayman!

2010-12-16T17:46:00.019-07:00

The first day on the cruise was a day at sea. We mostly ate, sat in the hot tub, read and RELAXED...best part.
The first night was a formal night so that was kind of fun to dress up.
Some people went all out in a tux and the works.
Dont they look nice?

Doesnt our food look delicious? My first time having lobster.

One thing I dont love about being on a cruise is not having enough time to really see where you are, and get a real feel for culture and people. Since we only had limited time we did the typical organized tourist activities and they were great!
Off the ship in Grand Cayman

We did a sting ray/dolphin tour. I love dolphins, when I was young I used to want to be a dolphin trainer. How the heck I ended up in my boring job is beyond me.
Unfortunately, they didnt let us take ANY photos while with them, except you could purchase theirs for $7 a photo. Nah, the memory is good.
However, we did get this AWFUL pic of me and some dude. While we were getting the run down of the dolphins we all had to sit together in our swimming suite. This guy, sitting next to me my dad would put it "swallowed a watermelon".

I kind of feel bad for taking this behind his back, but at least we didnt show his face right?
In all fairness thats how I felt after the cruise.
From the dolphins we hopped on a fun little boat and took a ride over the beautiful waters to find the sting rays!

I'll be honest, when you are getting off a boat into the ocean of sting rays, you cant help but think of the Crocodile Hunter being killed by one.

My mom and dad hopped right into the action. I was SO proud of them.

My mom was one of the first to offer a kiss...

Russ obviously liked the rays

Isnt that water amazing?

I think I have said this in another post, but I LOVE snorkel face. Dad, your pretty much a 10.

Russ has a really great underwater digital camera. I became more comfortable with them and took a little swim. Gosh I love being underwater.

The red speedo you might remember from Thailand made an appearance...with the sting rays...and my parents. Ive cropped this photo just in case you werent in for a PG13 post.

One of my favorite moments of this day was when Russ and I were in the water and a sting ray decided to swim up and try and suck on my belly button. This is a very scary thing, and I may made a sound that has never come out of me before, quite...low. Without skipping a beat Russ says, "And thats my boyfriend everybody".
Such a great day in Cayman, I wish I could have seen more of it!

Cruise-Ft. Lauderdale

2010-12-04T17:39:00.017-07:00

Since it took me a whole month to finish my last post I think I will break my trip up again so it doesn't take me a year.
I got back from a Caribbean cruise Thanksgiving week. It was so great.
Back in February while I was in Thailand I won a trip through my work, so we finally got to go! Since I took a lot of time to visit Asia the beginning of the year I decided to give my boss a break, even though it was a trip from my work, and planned the trip at the end of the year.
I took my parents and Russ and we had a great time.
I have some friends that live in Ft Lauderdale so we decided to go out a couple days earlier to visit them for a bit. They had a chance to go to London at the same time, and we had already bought our tickets so they said we could still stay at their house and explore the city.
Planning a trip around a bf that is a huge hunter and a dad that is a crazy dedicated U of U fan, we finally found a week to go!

As you can see by my moms suitcase she was confused and thought we were moving to FL.
We got to Ft Lauderdale around midnight so just went straight to bed.
The next day we got up and went into town for a delicious breakfast and walked around town.

There was a Ute game on that day(an away game) so of course we had to drop my dad off so he could watch his Utes lose a terrible game. Sorry dad.
While he was watching the game Russ, my mom and I went to the beach!
It was a tich chilly, but so nice to be by the ocean!

We went back and retrieved my old man and went out on the water taxi. Ft Lauderdale is absolutely amazing. I could not believe the size of homes on the river ways. Insane! There were beautiful HUGE yachts parked outside of these multi million dollar vacation homes.

We went around on the taxi around town and stopped at one of my favorite restaurants ever, Bubba Gumps! I am going to try and hit up all the Bubba Gump locations in the world I decided this trip. Love the food, Love the movie.

I love this picture not only because its funny, but because of what happened when this picture was taken.
This shark was right outside a busy outdoor restaurant. Russ got his picture taken with his head inside the shark but I told him to do another picture because it didnt turn out (even though it did). He stuck his head back in the shark and was moving his legs all around like he was struggling so I told him to wait for the flash. But really I grabbed my parents and we ran and hid, while he was "struggling" with his head in this shark all alone with no one around. I was laughing so hard when he finally pulled his head out when he didnt see a flash and we were no where to be seen. Good sport Russ...

The water taxi went until midnight and we were on the very last taxi and still missed half of the route. Next time!
The next morning we went to a really good crepe place for breakfast and drove to Miami to catch our boat!
My parents and I had both been on a cruise before, but Russ hadnt. He was very excited, mostly about the all you can eat food.

Russ was on the water slide before the boat even started its engines. He was going to take advantage of every minute he could.
He was going so fast I only caught his arm.

The first day is always exciting with all the food, and places to explore. Im pretty sure Russ didnt stop eating that first day, except to go down the water slide.
I love this picture. This picture was taken after we had just eaten a HUGE nice meal in the dining room, and went on the back of the deck to find a hot dog bar.
I think the look on my face, and my dads says it all. I wanted to throw up just watching him eat it.

How that boy stays so skinny and fit is beyond me.

Halloween

2010-11-06T10:13:00.009-06:00

Holy cow, I started this post a month ago. As I write this now, its no longer fall, in fact its the big blizzard 2010 the media hyped up all day. But I will continue with what I had already written....

This time of year is so great. I love Halloween, I love the fall colors, I love sipping wassail and breaking out the Uggs. Love it all.
I also really love dressing up, I think its so much fun.
This year was no different, and I was able to dress up in 3 different costumes!
My friend Mason is obsessed with Halloween and throws a big production of a party every year. This isnt just a swing in for a chat kind of party. He plans it for months and has absolutely every detail planned out. Its awesome.
Last year he had a Zombie themed party and this year was a 1920's-1940's Hollywood style.
I was googling images online and found this lovely looking lady and decided to emulate the costume best I could.

After a few trips to DI and $6 dollars & a few changes later...wala!

When we showed up to the "Scarborough Inn" we had to check in and get a key at the front desk and follow the bell boy.

We had a pretty big group so they were checking in 5 people at a time as we checked in and received your key there was a clue, and one of the 5 of us was killed.
From there we went into the hotel lounge were we were offered a black widow (some kind of chocolate milk drink, or a bloody eyeball martini)
Here at the "bar" there was another clue when you got your drink, and someone in that group was "poisoned"

As we were sipping our beverages and waiting for the other guest to arrive, there was an old fashioned movie playing in the background and old 20's music.
Again, the details, unreal!

As the crowd started making their way in and more and more people were "poised" a waitress was bringing us "Severed fingers" which were pigs in a blanket and other Halloween appetizers.
Once everyone had checked into the hotel and received their drinks, we were escorted into the dining area where we were served vampire blood soup (tomato basil), skeleton salad (Caesar salad) and the main course which was ham, potatoes etc.
Through each course, multiple people would receive a clue they had been murdered during dinner.
Under all of our seats were clues, and we had to take our clue and find others in the group that had our similar words to form a team.
My team!

From here, my team was given a case file explaining we were in a haunted hotel, and this big extravagant story which I would really love to share but have to much to blog. Long story short, we spent the rest of the night in the kitchen with the made, the library with the nanny, the graveyard with the murdered family, the front area with the concierge and bell boy, and desert with the maid, trying to figure out who killed the Scarborough family.
There were cool hints like this...to through you off. So while we were in the kitch with the cook, she made it seem like it was the maid.

Turned out to be the nanny. It was such a great night and absolutely blew my mind the effort put into all of it.
The gals

The guys

The cast

The mastermind behind all of this

Thanks Mas, for letting me have a small taste of what it would have been like back then. Loved it.

My work also really loves Halloween. Ive been at Del Sol for 4 years now and I swear the costumes just get better and better every year. People go all out!
I was kind of a dud this year and just re-used a costume I used last year for a non Del Sol party.
Here are a few of my fav costumes from my coworkers:
Tetris

The girls in my department

Del Sol does some nice cash prizes. This guy is in my department and has won the last 2 yrs in a row! He made this costume from scratch!

We also have a pumpkin carving contest. Each department has to carve their own pumpkin. My department has won the last 2 years in a row..woot woot.
Here is our totally awesome Bob Marley pumpkin, complete with smoke coming out of his mouth as well as his music playing in the background.

I was Miss Oprah Winfrey. Its hard to tell in these pictures but I had a nice big bootay behind me. I shoved a whole bag of cotton in my thighs, butt, and stomach. It was hot, but nice and Harpo like..

Isnt my friends baby cute?!

On Halloween night Russ & I spent the first part of the night at my parents house visiting and eating chili and cider. We then went a Halloween party as Marge & Homer Simpson. I have to give total credit to Jeana. She is the most creative person in the world when it comes to Halloween costumes. Every year her family looks amazing.
Thanks so much Jeana!

I waited until the last minute looking for yellow body paint so we went to Walmart and got craft paint. It worked! But was super uncomfortable!

I think this is such a funny picture of Russ.
In his defense, it was really hard seeing out of those eye balls!

We looked a little rough by the end of the night, but we sure had fun dressing up!

Girls Weekend!

2010-10-14T07:30:00.000-06:00

We had such a great girls weekend a couple weeks ago.
After we went to our golf tournament we started our girls only weekend!
I posted something a few posts ago with the start of our girls weekend at Gardner Village.
The next morning we had an early start and headed up to Park City. My sister is a sucker for garage sales so we stopped at a few once we got up to PC. We then had a delicious pizza lunch out on the patio and headed to the outlets for a full day of shopping.
That night we went to a fun play my aunt JoSam found.

We got back to our hotel late but luckily the pool was still open for a dip!
We went down and swam and sat in the hot tub

The next morning we went to the Park Silly farmers market.

If you havent been up to the Park Silly you need to go next year. Its so much fun. They have so many fun vendor booths and really good food, and bands...its a lot of fun.

While we were on main street we stopped by Kimball Art Center . I really enjoyed that. Probably my favorite piece of the whole center was by this artist who would make an image out of spools of thread. Each spool was different colors to make up an image. The image was upside down, but there was a glass ball you could look through and the image would be right side up.
Example: The last supper

Made up of 20,000 spools of thread!

I thought it was one of the most creative pieces of art Ive seen.
I cant image the hrs something like that would take.

On our way home we dropped my sister off at her inlaws where her husband and kids were for dinner. When we came down the mountain we could see all this smoke. At the time we couldnt tell where it was coming from but as we got closer to her inlaws house in Herriman we could tell it was coming over the mountain.
That night I could not believe what it turned into.

I feel so bad for those that lost their home, or had smoke damage.
I remember reading on KSL a story of one of the homeowners that lost his home who was out of town when it all happened. I think luckily the others were able to grab as many personal possessions as they could before the police evacuated them. But I felt so bad for this poor guy who lived there 30+ years that had his whole life in that house. Yes, its a miracle more homes didnt go, and no one was seriously injured, but can you imagine losing everything you own? I would say that man deserves a Homemake over Mr Ty Pennington. It wont bring back family photos and heirlooms, but the guy could probably use a nice place to call home right about now.

Summa time

2010-10-07T07:30:00.002-06:00

I am so sad summer is over. I love summer with my whole heart, I really do.
There were a few little things I did over the summer that I didnt blog about but want to touch on, for my own memories sake.
My cousin Kelly and his wife were in town for a couple months and they own a very nice boat. They invited us out on the water a couple times.

I love to go boating. Even if I didnt do a dang thing but sit on the boat and be the flag girl I would be completely happy. This time out with my cousin we surfed behind the boat. SO much fun!
My 24th of July this year was perfect.
We went out on the boat first thing in the morning, then went to lunch with my good friends Tiff and Mitch, and then ended the day at the Real SL game with a concert and fireworks.

*******

One day this summer it was SO hot. I felt really bad for Ecko because she is dark and has a ton of fur. We decided to head up for a quick swim at East Canyon reservoir to cool everyone off.
It was so relaxing and fun. We brought some hummus and crackers and ate on the beach, and then went for a swim. While we were out in the water a cute but naughty little dog came and ate all of our hummus. But he and Ecko became friends so it all worked out.

Russ taught us how to skip rocks.

********

My work had a fun outing at the baseball field one night in the summer. My sis in law had just had her baby so their other kids tagged along with us for the night.
They are such good kids.

My boss's daughter got clocked in the head with a fowl ball, yikes.
Bel & Mei wanted to ride the little yellow train that goes around the baseball park so bad. After we watched a little of the game we decided to head over so they could ride the train. They werent taking any new riders, and was shutting it down for the night but we were lucky enough to squeeze on their last ride.

********

Em came in town for a short little trip and I went to my first 3D movie!
I think the glasses rock. Who knew that they were normal looking?

All I know is I got super motion sick, and didnt know if I thought it was worth the price, but Im so glad we got to go after we enjoyed a delicious banana nut crunch french toast breakfast. Miss you Em!

********

My brother and his family went down to St. George one weekend and invited me to tag along! My sis in laws parents have a super cute home we were all able to stay at. Mei wanted to ride with me in my car and we had a great time!

We danced to Miley Cyrus, she watched a movie, and asked me about a hundred times, "Bubba? Are we getting closer yet?" I thought it was adorable. I thought that only happened in the movies.
The weekend was exactly what I needed. We mostly hung out at the pool the whole time. Mei learned how to swim without her floaties. I was pretty proud of her.
I cant believe I only got 2 pictures of the whole weekend!

*********
My parents shared their 35th Anniversary this summer.

I love you both! Congratulations! You give me a lot of hope and inspiration.

*********

My friends from high school still get together often. We try for once a month but cant always make it.
We had such a nice dinner out on the patio. Its always fun to catch up and talk girl talk :)

Summer was really good to me. In fact, all of 2010 has been good to me. Im sad to see it almost over. But like I said before, I feel like I have properly mourned summer so Im ready for fall. So much to enjoy about the fall season!

Secret Garden

2010-09-30T20:39:00.016-06:00

Seriously, I found a secret garden at my house. Which is ironic considering all the time and effort put into the non secret garden.
I have a pretty good garden space at my house. Russ & I thought it would be so much fun to plant a garden this last spring. We planted a little late...maybe a lot late, and we planted all seeds but boy were we excited!

We planted a good $20 + of seeds and watered that baby throughout the hot summer.
You name it and we planted it. Zucchini, cucumbers, big tomatoes, squash, pumpkins, beats, peas, beans, cilantro...I could go on and on.
Nothing.Was.Growing.
We watered. Then we watered some more. And then I took one look at my water bill and one look at my chunk of dirt and had to put the kibosh on the garden.
Russ however was not ready to give up so I would catch him sneaking in some watering.
I told him if he wanted to keep watering it was fine if he wanted to pay my water bill, so he knew he was busted.
Then one day after a couple weeks of not watering, we got some growth!
We had our first pea! Seriously, it was sad how happy we were about this pea pod.
And it was perfect, it had 2 peas...one each!

Then we found this cute little guy. We called it the pearl pod.

And then, the greatest news of all! We had zucchini! Well, we thought it was zucchini but turned out to be squash. But we didnt care!

See that sad garden behind him? That should be FULL of veggies. But we'll take it!
We hadnt watered or cared for the garden in weeks. I noticed that there were some "weeds" or what I thought were weeds, growing in my walk way between my grass and my shed. So I just kept mowing over it every week.
Until one day Russ discovered we had baby tomatoes!!!

So here we are, taking all this time and TLC to plant this garden. I pay hundreds of dollars in seeds and water, and I mowed over the darn plant that we didnt plant and it grows tomatoes?!?
We had big plans with what we thought would be a massive harvest.
Like homemade salsa!
Sunflower market, Albertsons, and Russ's dads successful tomato plants really came in handy for us this year.

I swear we spent a whole week in my kitchen making salsa. We made 3 different kinds!
I loved the color of these peppers.

The kitchen(and Russ) was a total mess!

We had so much salsa!

Then we got done and were like...what do we do now? Neither of us knew how to can or had canning supplies so we had to freeze most of it! Mmmm mmm good.
This isnt even all of it. We had another huge bowl in the fridge.

This one was my favorite. We had fresh corn off the cob, and lots of beans and deliciousness!

We really were domestic. We also went up into the mountains one night and picked berries for hours! We picked so many raspberries that we were able to make a whole batch of jam!
I would suggest not wearing shorts when climbing a mountain to pick berries. OUCH. It seriously looked like I was attacked by a cat. I finally had to wrap my jacket around one of my legs.

Not only did we make raspberry jam, we had also gone up to Brigham City for Peach Days! It was a fun little old town festival. We had yummy peach cobbler and ate at Maddox.
We bought a box of peaches & made some peach jam too! Holy cow, I need a bigger kitchen.

Next year, plan on all of your freezers being this full because we are going to be so dang successful we arent going to know what to do with all of our produce.

Fore!!

2010-09-27T07:30:00.000-06:00

I enjoying golfing. I bet it would be really fun if you were good!
My family used to golf quite a bit before everyone started having kids. Lately, the only guarantee times for me to golf is at my work and family golf tournament.
Every year my work has a golf tournament in August. I would say most people I work with aren't big golfers but the owner of the company is a big golfer. Its always a good time. One of our teammates couldnt make it last minute so there was just 3 of us on our team but we still had a great time!
Me, Ashley, & Lisa

In the tournaments they do a scramble or best ball. So you all take a shot, and whoever has the best ball you all go to that ball and hit again...
This is never good during a scramble! Both of us were in the sand trap at almost the exact same spot.

I usually like to golf bare foot, but this year I actually started wearing shoes. It hasnt helped.

Thanks girls, for making it a super fun day!

We also had our family golf tournament. Every year a tournament is put on in my grandpas name "Kel Kemp" and all proceeds go to Huntsman Cancer Institute.
Its always such a fun time. Every year my mom, sister, sister in law and I are on a team. This year, my sis in law had just had a baby and my sister couldnt find a baby sitter so my mom and I golfed with my dad and brother.
My brothers friend was diagnosed with cancer a few years back and has been struggling the last couple of year. One year he came to the tournament very sick and was watched us play. This year he was able to come join us and play!

There was a little mix up so we had a five some, but it was great fun!
I think 18 holes of golf is just WAY too long. So I brought along my fart machine and raccoon skin hat to spice things up. Real mature...I know. No one is perfect at golf, so I thought...every time someone has a bad shot, they have to wear the Raccoon hat the rest of the hole. It was hilarious. We all had a chance to wear it (shows what kind of golfers we are!)
My mom :)

Yes, I had my fair share of wearing the skin

My brother, although a very good golfer, had to take a few shots with the coon skin.

My dad was a good sport and took his turn after a not so great shot.

I especially liked Zach way of wearing the hat. He wore it so the tail could be tucked behinds his ear.

The fart machine, even though immature...was great for golf! Do you know how many times people bend over in golf!?!
Thanks team! You guys were all great sports!

Thanks also to my friends husband Dave for taking the time and money to help support the cause! We all really appreciate it!

After golfing we have a nice lunch and raffles and silent auction.
Every year there is a package with a chi, and tons of great hair product. Every year someone else gets it, but I lucked out this year! Hooray! By golly Im going to have the straightest hair in town.

My neighbors always are so generous to donate packages to the tournament to raffle off or include in the silent auction. It all helps so much to raise money for cancer research so its all VERY much appreciated by all.
Thanks also to my 2 cousins who put a lot of time and effort every year planning it.

After the tournament, we began out GIRLS weekend! We had planned to go up to Park City, but Kami wasnt able to get away so we spent one night in SLC before we headed up so she could be a part of it.
We went to Garner Village to browse the shops, and have dinner.
My mom loved this witch that had a diet coke in her hand!

I love Garner Village, especially during this time of year.

Thanks girls for a great kick off to girls weekend!

Bear Lake, Oh how I love you.

2010-09-19T17:31:00.017-06:00

Russ and I went to Bear Lake...forever ago. I am really behind on my blogging but I hope to catch up soon!
We decided to drive up one weekend for a very quick trip. We both love to be in any kind of water and realized we hadnt been swimming in awhile so we drove up.
We had a nice lunch in Logan, and drove the rest of the way. I really do love Bear Lake. I have so many memories as kids going to Bear Lake a couple times a summer.
The lake was really high and we realized there wasnt a ton of beach area.
We pulled off to one area and saw an island we thought we would claim ours!

We loaded everything in the raft and I started to wade in the 6 inches of water to our Island.

Russ thought it was crazy to be pulling a boat and insisted we sit in and ROW to the island. We were basically dragging bottom and going .00010 miles an hr but he wouldnt give up. By the time I saw the two moms breeze past us with their beach gear, lunch, float tubes, life jackets, lawn chairs, etc etc I realized it was time for me to get out.

He pressed on. And made it.

Little did we know the reason our island wasnt already taken was because it was covered in Sea gull poop. Thanks you dumb birds.

But, we found another spot and took a good dip and swam around for awhile. Even if Bear Lake is unbearably cold, it was worth driving up to swim.
Russ is a whimp in the cold water so it gave me great pleasure watching him slowly wade it only to have me run, splash him to death and dive under. Feels so good.
We then went into town and had a delicious raspberry shake and hung out for a bit. It was getting later at this point and we saw an actual beach with real land, but you had to pay to get in. Everyone was leaving so we just drove in and hung out.
It was so much fun! We had our delicious chicken salad sandwhich from Costco and played soccer on the beach for hours!

It was a blast!

I think this picture is funny. Although we may look naked, we were fully clothed in beach attire.

Pretty little sunset.

The next day we did the same thing, but got there early to find the little beach that was available in the non paying section. Our little area was soon to be invaded so we hopped in the raft, and rowed out in the lake a bit. I was walking out into the lake and had stepped on the one and only huge rock in the water probably, so we loaded it up and made our own anchor!

It worked great! We threw it over board and didnt drift an inch.
Totally worth stubbing my toe for.

After spending a few hrs hanging out we drove back to SLC to meet my family up in the mountains. My parents have all of us over for dinner every other Sunday and this Sunday they decided to go for a walk to see the wild flowers in the Albion Basin.

The flowers werent at their peak that weekend, but it was still a beautiful walk!

We even ran into a mother and baby moose!

My goodness, I cant believe how big my family is getting...Love em all.

Manti

2010-09-08T07:30:00.000-06:00

We had a family reunion in Manti awhile back.
I had been to Manti before but it had been awhile. I really thought it was such a cute little town.
My second cousin Kristie spent a lot of hard work planning it down to every detail.
My family went earlier, but I had to work, so I drove down alone after work.
Kristie had planned an "amazing race" type activity they had done the night before that sounded so fun.
My parents rented a really cute little house for my family to stay in. It was fun to be stay there all together and most of the activities for the reunion they brought to that house so it was convenient for us!
Cody brought the ranger so he loaded up his kids and I crashed their party for a little ride in the mountains.

I love how Bel does his thumbs up.
I think its safe to say my brother doesnt feel comfortable with me driving that in the mountains with his kids in it. Sorry again Cod. Ill do better next time I promise! haha.

The kids then made their own box cars!

We had a delicious dinner of ribs, corn on the cob, and cheesecake!
After, my cousin put an awesome movie of a collection of pictures from our previous family reunions and the kids got to pull their cars in for a drive in movie!

The movie was great. It was so fun to see pictures from all the other family reunions and so great to see pictures of my Gram. We miss her!!
I love these girls.

My great parents

That night I was getting ready for bed and looked out the back window to the most beautiful view! The temple was basically in the back yard...so gorgeous!!

The next morning we woke up and everyone came back over for breakfast.
The cute little kidlets having a snack.

It was a quick little trip for me. I had to leave right after breakfast to meet a friend that was coming in town from Cali, but the rest of the family finished out another fun day together.

Its so great to have such a fun family.
Thanks again mom and dad for the fun house and for Kristie for all her hard work in planning!

Derby take 2

2010-09-02T19:52:00.013-06:00

I am so behind on my blogging.
Back in July we had our second annual demo derby outing with "the breakfast club".
Last years derby was really fun. This year was bigger and better.
Sabrina pulled off another delicious meal at her parents home in Park city. It has a beautiful view of the valley and the weather was perfect!
I have actually been REALLy bad at taking pictures this summer, but thank heavens for those that have.
There was a theme, the same as last year. I hate to say it out loud because I feel bad. But Im sure if you see our pictures you may catch on to what that theme was.
This guy here with Russ & I won the best dressed contest.

I think the fake sun burn, mustard stain, and teeth were all a nice touch.
Mason & Meggs:

Russ also really stepped up to the plate with some sexy daisy dukes.

I think every guy in that stadium was checking him out. Its a miracle he didnt get his butt kicked.
Group photo

Im pretty sure if you were at the Heber Demo Derby you heard our group.
Quite the crowd we had and quite the entertainers

Sabs came through and even got some candied cigarettes. Perfect little treat for the event.

The guys

The girls

And the most delicious corn on the cob Ive had all year. Anything covered in Parmesan cheese is delightful.

Summer would not be the same without one good derb.

Neverland...how do I get there?

2010-08-26T17:33:00.009-06:00

When people would complain about getting older it bugged me. It did. I thought...why not appreciate getting older and wiser etc.
The fact is, I am a hypocrite because this year has been the year it hit me. I dont want to get older.
I feel it already! I havent minded turning older every year but this year I am going to successfully skip over my birthday and pretend it never happened. I know its a few months away but I am already stressing.
A few things that scare me.

1- I can already tell a difference in my body. I dont have nearly the energy when I was in high school or early college. And I do not have the excuse of a having a child either. I can SEE a difference already as well.
2- WRINKLES. I love being silly with my Uncle Chuck. We recently took a picture of the 2 of us and I to my surprise...I have crows feet around my eyes!!

I have used and abused my skin and its SO SO sad. Why cant you get things through your head when you are young?
I remember my friends sister worked at a tanning salon and we would go tanning all the time! I would have to hide it from my grandma because she would always scold me about being in the sun and I thought she was just being an old ornery lady, when it turns out she was so smart.
When I lived in Hawaii I would go lay out everyday...without sunscreen!! I would get so dark, and love it, and then 2 weeks after being back in Utah it was gone. Worth it? I dont think so.
I couldnt find a picture of me at my darkest, but I found one. Its a horrible picture because its like a picture of a picture but you get the idea.

Sunspots...I got plenty.

And Im only 25! There is no way to reverse it.
Now, the first thing I do when I get to the beach or outdoors is put on 50 SPF around my eyes.
I do not want to look like this in another 10 yrs

Or this...

Its just not worth being tan for a couple weeks.

So Im going to be 26 this year. YU-UCK. To be single and 26 in Utah is like death and boy am I having fun..but really...Im pushing 30. I was having a discussion the other day with someone about kids and they asked how many I wanted and I said...4 or 5. And their response
"How old are you?"
"Ill be 26 in November"
"Thats not going to happen"

Ok. Thats ok. I dont need 5, but to not be able to do things because of your age!
Oh, and now, Ill be in a new category when I fill out the bubble sheets.

( )18-25 years of age
(X)26-100 Years of age...ugh.

But on a happy note (I really think we need one right now) I have done some amazing things in my life over the 26 years Ive been alive.
I feel really glad for the things Ive been able to do and the lessons Ive learned.
There's a quote I liked from the movie The Guardian with Ashton Kutcher & Kevin Costner, and its from the lady bartender and she says,
"Hell, I've always been old Ben. Ya' know what though, I don't mind. I mean if my muscles ache, it's because I've used 'em. It's hard for me to walk up them steps now, its 'cuz I walked up 'em every night to lay next to a man who loved me. I got a few wrinkles here and there, but I've layed under thousands of skies with sunny days. I lived and I loved, danced, sang,and sweat my way through a pretty darn good life if you ask me. Getting old ain't bad Ben. Getting old, that's earned".
Getting old is earned, Getting old is earned, Getting old is earned. Maybe if I keep repeating it It will soak in.
If not, I seriously am going to start looking for Peter Pan to take me to Neverland where I dont have to grow old.
Anyone else had a tough year to turn?

Cried like a baby

2010-08-10T21:05:00.003-06:00

I saw this video on my friends facebook last night and seriously cried my eyes out.
I think its easy to go on your day to day things and totally forget about all the men and woman sacrificing so much for us. Its also a small reminder of what their families go through.
I feel so grateful, and touched.
Might wanna grab a kleenex. Oh maybe pause my music at the bottom as well.

July 15th!

2010-08-04T20:33:00.006-06:00

I kind of made up my own holiday. Its worked out quite well for me the last couple of years. This year was no exception.
Its simple. July is my very favorite month of the year, and 15 is my favorite number. We are lucky enough to celebrate 2 holidays here in Utah in July, I thought Id be stingy and add one more. And there you have it, July 15th. Ive even had someone give me a gift on this day because they knew I loved it.
The BF was sure nice to me this day as well. He planned a mighty fine date.
I came home from work to a lovely surprise...a beautiful bouquet of flowers.
Then off we went on our date. This date screamed summer and couldnt have been better for the July 15th holiday- an outdoor movie at the capitol!
This picture is kind of blurry but still fun. Doesnt my ankle look broken? haha

If you look close, you can see the screen in the background. We got there just in time for a beautiful sunset.

While we watched the movie we had the most delicious picnic Russ had packed. Costco has this AMAZING chicken salad sandwhich mix. It has walnuts, and cranberries, and chicken...its so good. We had that on some nice soft pitas. Oh...so good.
One of my favorite desserts is fruit pizza. I had stopped by Kneaders for one of their fruit pie things for dessert. It was a dandy of a meal.

I had so much fun, the weather, the food, the company, all perfect.

Give Peace A Chance

2010-07-30T07:30:00.000-06:00

The other day my mom asked me on a very fun date...to see Sir Paul McCartney!
I thought it would be a great time, but I didnt think I would know a ton of his songs. I was wrong! And that old man can ROCK!
Before the concert my mom treated me to a hot dog. I had been craving a hot dog all summer and had been camping a few times but never got my hot dog.
We were sitting outside of our seats eating our dinner and I accidentally spilled my moms $5 coke :( I felt so bad so I said I would go get her a new one. It had just sat there and spilled over into the train (Convenient at least) while we ate. I ran down to get her a new one and as I was standing in line I get a text from her saying "Come back!!"
So I go back up the stairs and see my mom drinking out of her Coke bottle that had been on the ground for the last half hr. haha. She said she went to pick it up and it was still half full. That woman. I love her. Thats maybe a 'you had to be there' story. But I thought it was great...and gross. Half hr rule right mom?

We sat with my cousin Garrett and his girlfriend Karli

It was seriously one of the best concerts Ive ever been to.

We both love to people watch and that was one great spot for people watching. There were 2 people that took a peace of my heart that night. One lady, who was probably in her 50's that was obviously drunk, dancing her heart out and losing her sun glasses over and over and over. Then a man...maybe in his 60s with a dandy of an outfit that kept lifting his shirt up to shake his toosh. To both of those old drunk folks...I thank you for making my night that much more enjoyable.
My mom is always loads of fun. Thanks so much mom for taking me on a date and for finally getting me my summer hot dog.

We've been talkin' bout Jackson

2010-07-26T07:30:00.000-06:00

After our fun 4th of July sleepover we packed up the car and took Ecko for her first camping trip. I cant believe Ive had her for 4 years and this was her first trip.
There was a big group of friends going up to go down the river so we went up a little later to join them.
On our way, we stopped at our old stompin grounds and where we met 7 years ago. To our surprise there was a Camel on the side of the road. How random right?

It thought Russell's arm tasted good.

We took a canoe and our fishing poles to maybe do some fishing but it made for a packed ride for Ecko in the back. By the time we got there she had about had it.
We got there in the dark right as the fireworks were about to start. It was perfect!
We drove right into Teton Village and right as we were wondering where they would shoot the fire works from they lit up RIGHT next to our car. So we grabbed a blanket and pulled over and watched the fireworks right above us. Its was great. Poor Ecko about lost her mind, but we enjoyed ourselves.
Because we took Ecko I felt bad just tying her up for a couple hrs while we ran the river, so we did our own thing.
Here are a few of our friends that we got to see go down for a bit.

Matt joined us our own little adventure. We drove up to Jenny lake where we were going to go fisihing but the water was too rough. So we took a nice drive, saw a bear and the boys pulled over to stop at a few fishing spots.

She did so good on her first road trip

Matt & Ecko fishing

This is kind of a gross/funny story. But the boys were fishing and I was just sitting in a chair enjoying the scenery when I noticed I hadnt seen Ecko for awhile. I called her and called her and finally saw her not to far from me just rolling and rolling. She always listens to me really well so I didnt understand what was going on. I dont know if anyone Else's dog does this, but if Ecko doesnt like the smell of something...she will roll her body all over it. Well she found some human...do do and lets just say it was all over.
The boys were nice enough to give her a bath in the river.

We thought we saw a moose in the distance taking a bath in the river...

Turned out to be a rock. But it was still a pretty view.
We did see a bear off the side of the road though. I didnt get a great picture, but it was fun to see.
That night we had dinner at the very Delicious Bubba's.
Right as we finished dinner we were able to see another round of fireworks.
We then went to a new camp site with a few other people to get away from the big crowds. We roasted marsh mellows and woke up to a beautiful site!
Ecko was AWESOME camping. She just snuggled right on up in the tent. It was a big task trying to get Russ to let her back in the tent after rolling in human poop. But he gave in...we were both very grateful.

One of the guys camping with us threw up a slack line. Its a lot harder then it looks!

Some of us were better then others.

But we all had our fair share of falls.

Right up from our camp spot was fields and fields of sunflowers. It was beautiful!

We hiked up to a pretty waterfall.

The last day we met up with the group again for a super good, HUGE burger.
On our way back home the BF decided to take a scenic drive home which would take about 3 hours longer. Right when we were about to get off the dirt road back onto the pavement to start to make some headway, we ran into a bit of a problem.

An avalanche had wiped out the road. It was now 7 PM and had to turn back to go another way. It was a late night home, and super early Monday morning the next day, but it was a good trip!

The 4th!

2010-07-21T07:30:00.000-06:00

I know I am about a month behind, but I love the 4th so much I cant leave this post behind.
We have had the same tradition as long as I can remember.
When we were younger we would all sleep over at our grandparents house in their back yard. Once our grandparents passed, my parents carried on the tradition in their own yard. We all really look forward to it and have a fun time!
Since this year the 4th fell on a Sunday we did it the Friday before.
As tradition always has it, my mom buys all the grandkids matching 4th of July outfits.

This year, my parents even got Ecko her own outfit! I think she looked mighty pretty.

Our neighbors are always so nice to save us a spot in front of their house for our family.So thoughtful.

I love this picture of my cousin Burgon and Oaks

My very favorite part of the parades...well besides watching beauty queens trying to master their parade wave, is the cinnamon taffy. mmmm.

After the parade we go back to my parents for dinner.
Last year we did tin foil dinners on the fire pit, this year my sis made a delicioius pulled pork sandwhich.
Even though Baby Kemp was only a week old, he still made it to the party.

This isnt a great picture of either of us, but we didnt get too many on this holiday.

Then, we fill up our parents yard with sleepin bags and have a wonderful sleepless night under the stars. Wouldnt trade it!

Can you tell who doesnt have kids and who doesnt want out of their sleeping bags, praying for more sleep?

Well I guess that happens to those who have kids too..

I love this girl.

I have to add what a good sport Kami was. After having a baby a week ago she still came to the sleep over. They slep inside in a comfy bed, but I still couldnt believe it. She is so awesome.

My dad makes us his delicious swedish thins

A new comer decided to try and beat the record (8).

He came in at a close 7. Very impressive for a swedish thin first timer.
My nephew "Bel" has a crazy boy obsession with cars, tractors, trains, lawn mowers...basically anything boys like. Its awesome. He will go missing and the first place you look is the riding lawn mower, he is usually sitting right on it playing with all the buttons.
Well recently my uncle passed away and he owned an old (I cant remember what yr) Jaguire. Bel calls it Flo off of Cars.
It wasnt until I Googled Flo until I really appreciated that sweet comment from a 2 yr old.
Flo

Real life Flo

We all got to take "Flo" around for a little morning drive.

Pretty sure Uncle Charley would be thrilled with that little boys obsession with his car.
From there, Russ and I packed up and headed to Jackson Hole for the rest of the holiday weekend.
I hope everyone had a great 4th of July...a month ago.

And then there were SIX!

2010-07-17T08:43:00.011-06:00

I cant think of anything I love more then being an aunt. I was so excited for the first one (Mei) to come, I made a count down chart that pretty much covered my whole room in my apartment at Utah State. I was so excited.
I have so much fun with all of them, and love how each one of them are quite different in a lot of ways. I love them all with all my heart.
My brother Cody and his wife Kami just had their 3rd baby making that number 6 total!
For privacy purposes I try and use all my nieces and nephews nicknames but this lil guy doesnt have one yet.
So, Id like to introduce Baby Boy!

Mei(pronounced May) and Bel with their new baby brother

Russ and I came up right after our soccer game to see him. There is something just SO amazing to me about a newborn. It truely is a miracle.

Another thing that is a miracle is my sis in law. She seriously looked so pretty right after giving birth and the girl goes from pregnant to skinny in like a minute.
Brothers..

Who could not love all these crazy kids?!
Welcome to the family Baby Boy!

Such a Heffer

2010-07-11T18:33:00.005-06:00

I used to think it was so crazy what people would do for anything free!
People watching with freebies around is like Christmas morning sometimes. Ive made fun of these people my whole life...until Chick Fil A offered a free meal to anyone that dressed up like a cow.

I feel so ashamed

But boy, does that $5.25 feels good in my pocket.

Shamu! Shamu!

2010-07-07T13:03:00.023-06:00

A couple weekends ago my good friend from college got married in San Diego. We thought it would be a great chance to see an old friend and have a mini vaca!
Russ has a friend from college as well that lives in Carlsbad right next to the ocean so he was nice enough to let us crash there!
We flew in Thursday night after work, rented a car and headed to Carlsbad. We didnt get in until about midnight and Russ was up with his friend at 5 AM to surf.
Russ's friend Rob is a dentist and there was a dentist convention there that weekend so there were 4 other friends of Robs that were also staying there for the convention. It was a full house! But so fun. I spent 3 nights on a love seat, but who can complain when its free?! And literally right across from the ocean.
After Russ got back from surfing we went and had a delicious breakfast and headed to the beach.

We spent the day at the beach and then went back and got ready for the wedding.
Tags and his new beautiful wife Star.

They had a delicious dinner and beautiful reception!
Tags had another friend from Utah that came that I also went to Utah State with so he sat us at the same table. It was fun to catch up him.

The happy couple got married in the San Diego temple. The unfortunate thing is..it was COMPLETELY covered in scaffolding. I couldnt believe. We had heard from Rob (Russ's friend) that it had some scaffolding on it, but we didnt think it was covering every square inch!

Congrats anyway, to the happy couple. And thanks for inviting us!
We went back to Rob and his wife's house and as we were getting out of the car I noticed his neighbors backyard looked like a fairy tail. The picture didnt turn out well, but doesnt it look kinda fun?

The next morning Russ got up once again to surf, he came back, we had another delicious breakfast and went to Sea World! I was so excited, Russ hadnt been there since he was a young lad and I have always loved sea creatures so it was a good time!
Holy crap there are a lot of people that love Sea World too.
Look at how amazing these large animals are!

There was a show that was kind of a spoof on all the other corny shows. I thought it was hilarious. The walrus were making fun of all the dolphin and Shamu shows. I laughed hard.

We saw my very favorite kind of whales, the Beluga! I dont know why, but I sure love them.

We saw some funky lookin fish

Pet some Ray's ( I have no idea why this picture wont turn. Ive tried twice)

And watched them throw dough at the windows and watched the polar bears lick it off.

I was also reminded why sharks are a titch intimidating.

That night we went back and had some delicious pizza, and met the gang for a nice walk to Cold Stone.
We then went back to their house and watched the USA world cup game they had recorded earlier that day. Such a bummer USA.
Speaking of the World Cup, my boss was being pretty dang awesome the other day and let us watch the Uruguay -Ghana game...holy smokes. Best game ever.
The next morning..same drill..Russ got up early and surfed, and we went for the very best breakfast of all! 5 words people..Banana Nut Crunch French Toast. They literally
roll the toast in the egg mixture and crushed up banana nut crunch cereal. Amazing.

Im going to try it at home. Wish me bad luck..because if it works, its going to be bad news. I will eat that all the time.
After our breakfast we went for a bike ride on the beach cruisers. I want one. I wish it made sense to have one in Utah.
We took a nice little ride along the coast a few blocks.

I could see a boardwalk in the distance and wanted to ride our bikes to it. Russ was a little hesitant, and now I know why. It was a LONG bike ride. We peddled our little hearts out though. Our bikes had some issues that made the long bike ride even funnier...every time I hit a bump my seat would lean WAY forward, and Russ handle bars kept falling low as well. It made me laugh.
If you look at the far right of this picture you can see a smoke stack. That's where we started.

We met up with the group that wanted to give the paddle boards a try.
It was a ton of fun. I sucked at it, but it was so fun! I want to try it again. Dang, Utah needs an ocean so bad!

Then we drove to La Jolla. I love it there. It was so beautiful. We went to the seal beach where the seals rest.
You would never know, but there is a bunch of cute little seals sleeping behind us..thanks anyway though to the person who took the picture.

This one was my favorite. He was stretching all cute

Such a fun trip! I was glad we were able to cram as much as we did into a short weekend. We went to bed pretty late that night and had to get up at 4 AM the next morning to catch our flight, but it was worth it! Congrats again to Tags and Star, thanks for getting married so we could come to San Diego :)

PS. Am I the only one that thinks the new blogger layout is kinda tricky?

Nerd Alert!

2010-06-21T07:30:00.002-06:00

I will have to confess, that nerd is me.
But I guess it pays to be a nerd because I had a great weekend!
Just to set the story up, I dont own a working TV. I havent had a TV for over 6 months now. I have no idea what is going on in the world or entertainment except for the TVs we have at work that is only on CNN. I only catch up on whatever I can hear as I walk by.
However, there are a few shows that I TVO at my parents house and run and catch up on when I have a chance.
One of them being Wipeout. I love it, cant get enough of it. I love it so much in fact, I applied to be on the show and am just anxiously awaiting a call from ABC telling me Im exactly what they are looking for and come give those big balls a run for their money!
If you could keep your fingers crossed for me Id sure appreciate it.

I also really enjoy watching Brothers & Sisters.

Sadly, I am a whole season behind because when I do have time to go to my parents and watch TV I am getting caught up on THE BIGGEST LOSER!
I love pretty much everything about that show except the lame commercials by the contestants they try and squeeze into the already 2 hr show.
I feel so inspired when I watch, I love Bob with most of my heart, I want to smack Jillian around, and a million other reasons I think its great.
Who thought watching obese people work out would be so entertaining? But it is. Was that an insensitive comment? I apologize if so.
This weekend was the Ragnar. For those of you who dont know what that is, it is a race from Logan, Ut to Park City, UT which I think it was like 180ish miles.
I caught wind that 2 previous contestants Philippe & Sione from the show would be up in the VIP section. Naturally, I knew I had to go look for them and hope for a picture.
We headed up to Park City and once I saw the bazillions of people and the security guards guarding all the entrances I knew It wasnt going to happen, and I was instantly sad I didnt bring my zoom lens.
Luckily, I have a awesome BF that was excited for me to see these guys so he went in for the kill and I followed.
He walked right past the people at the front VIP desk and acted like he was walking toward the bathrooms. He thought there would be a "back way". Sure enough, there was an elevator. We hop on, and Im laughing the whole time thinking...whats next?
We get off and BOOM! There stands Sione. He is an ordinary person, from a reality show, but it still intimated me and I just looked, smiled and walked right on past and hid behind a wall. Russ rounds the corner and I smiled and said, "That was him".
Russ's reaction was probably my favorite moment of the whole day.
Here we are, 2 adults, hiding behind a wall with Sione on the other side. Russ said we werent coming all this way to walk right past him so he went back over to him by the elevators and asked if it was him. He then proceeded to embarrass the livin day lights out of me by saying I was his biggest fan, and we had driven all the way up to see just him, and could I get my picture taken with him.
Just a heads up, if you ever plan on going and stalking someone, and you dont think you will actually see them, be prepared to look cute regardless. I hate even posting these pictures of myself because I think I look hideous, but still! Its Sione!

He was on the second to last season with his cousin Philippe who wasnt able to come to Park City. Here is his before and after.

After I got a picture with him he asked if we were on our way up to the VIP. Russ continued to embarrass me by saying we were coming up just to see him. So he showed us to the deck and we chatted away.

A lady came up to us and asked us if we had our VIP badges and Sione jumped in and said we were with him and asked if she could get us 2 VIP passes.
So here I thought Id maybe see them, and if I was lucky get a picture...turns out we hung out for an hr.

We got all the scoop from behind the scenes of the BL.
I confessed my love for Bob the trainer

He told us about some of the other people on the show, and who he still stays in touch with.
I love her as well, even though some of her outfit choices are questionable.

Overall, I was super D duper happy. Mission...totally and completely accomplished.
After that we went down to the finish line and cheered for some of the runners.
We went back to the VIP, had some grub and I got a picture with one of my friends and an interesting group of runners.

What a day!

We hurry and ran back down to SLC to change for the Strawberry Days rodeo in Pleasant Grove. I had never been, and was excited to attend.
I am so glad its finally summer and time to do these fun summer activities!
Even though we were already running late, I still stopped and bought my first pair of cowgirl boots! What do ya think?

We had a nice big fun group. Im sad I didnt get any pictures of everyone, but we did get a couple pictures in our rodeo gear.

And of course, I indulged in some much talked about Strawberries and cream.

Bring. On. Summer!!

Love Thy Neighbor

2010-06-16T09:30:00.002-06:00

And I sure do. I have the greatest neighbors ever!
They have been so good to me. They are an older couple that lives across the street and they take such good care of me. They bring me dinner at least once a week, they water my flowers, they give me relationship advice, they compliment my outfits some mornings, and they are just FUN.
They are in their late 60's and early 70's.
I will give them an Alias for todays story.
The Mrs will now be known as Jane, and the Mr will be known as Jack.
I am horrible at gardening and yard work. For one, I just dont know how to do it, for two, I have no tools at all but a cat pooper scooper which is not intended for yard work, three, I hate spiders and overall I just dont like it.
I dont mind mowing the lawn at all. In fact its kind of nice.
Jane is always telling me I need to plant...see I already forgot what kind of flower...but anyway she is always telling me to plant this flower in my front yard since I have a huge nice tree that shades most of the front yard.
One morning, I was walking out the front door for work when I noticed a laundry basket full of dug up flowers. Jack, just like most days must have seen me staring at these flowers and sticks his head out his door and says "Chels, Jane is going to plant you some flowers". How nice I thought!
I go to work and return a dreaded 8 hrs later to my front flower beds dressed in tons of flowers. I loved it!
I walked over their house and Jane answered the door. Our conversation:
Jane: Do you like it?
Chels: Are you kidding? I love it! It changes the look of my house so much! Jane, that must have cost a lot of money, how much do I owe you?
Jane: Nothing.
Chels: Nothing? I want to pay for the flowers.
Jane: I stoled um' from the park.
Chels: Hahahaha ....(Then I think to myself, uh oh, I think she is serious).

Jane walks through the park every morning and picks up trash. She decided the flowers in the park would look better in my front yard.
So, she got a laundry basket, dug them up, and started planting. Then she realized she didnt have enough so she came back, got her husbands truck and dug up more!!
Thanks....I think?!?!?
What do you do? What do you say?
I have to say, every day when I pull into my house I feel guilty.
I have blurred Janes face to protect the guilty.

She still is young and hip. She has grandchildren older then me!
A nice little row of "stoled" flowers.

Turns out Jane is not a thief...no no. She is a hero. Because just a week later that park was completely under water. It flooded. So really she saved their lives. And I am proud to say I was a part of that.

These would have looked nice in my back yard...

For any of my cousins or siblings that may look at my blog, 2 words for you:
900 E, crunch!

Turns out these flowers are maintenance free.
Jane installed them and sends Jack over to water them.

Somewhere over the rainbow...

2010-06-13T14:47:00.004-06:00

Yesterday Russ & I went to a wedding up in Farmington.
The wind had been blowing like crazy, and there were tree branches and debri all over the place! It looked as if a tornado had touched down.
But the weather cleared for their wedding and it was a very touching outdoor ceremony and reception.
After the wedding, we decided to take a drive up Farmington canyon.
It was beautiful! So green,fresh rain, and this amazing rainbow!

The further up the canyon we got, the closer the rainbow was. Usually when you get closer it goes away. I was hoping to find a pot of gold, no such luck.
But I did spot a mighty cute leprochan.

Mighty fine Saturday afternoon drive if you ask me.

PS. Its the middle of June, and Im wearing a winter coat! What is up with this weather?

You & me go fishin' in the dark...

2010-06-07T17:33:00.018-06:00

We actually didnt do any fishing this Memorial day, but that was definately the theme of the trip.
For memorial day a group of us went down by Escalante for some camping and hiking.
Russ & I drove down with his friend Dan. It was fun getting to know him and listen to boys talk...holy cow, its funny listening to guy talk.
We got to the camp site around midnight and I had my first experience wearing a head lamp. I liked it.
The next morning we started out for a 12 mile hike! Im not a huge hiker so I was a bit nervous I wouldnt be able to keep up.
Good thing Ive been playing on a couple soccer teams! I would have been toast!
The group was great, the scenery was awesome, and it was so nice to have some warm weather!
The start of the hike

Here it goes!

We started out the hike as a group, but stopped at a stream. Russ left his sunglasses at the water so we went back and ended up walked a few hours behind the group. It was fun to hang out and go at out own pace!
Some pictures from the hike:

We walked a lot of the hike through water. It was so nice during a hot day to walk in some cool water! There were beautiful water falls through out the hike and a ton of lizards, some we even gave names.

Russ filled up his water bottle in a fresh stream

We met up with the rest of the group under a beautiful arch for lunch.

I thought this was a great picture Russ took of this lil critter walking on the sand

Russ's friend came up with a funny game. Stand up against the rock, eyes closed and wait for a water filled nerf football to fall and see who it hits!
Someone would stand in front of the group, and through it up high and wait for it to hit someone...crazy you might think, but it was hilarious to watch.

We found this cool tree stump that was hanging in the air like on the movie Dirty Dancing.

That night we had a delicious dinner around the fire, as well as a noisy night full of angry cows waking us up in our sleep.
The next morning, we all woke up a little store! So why not a little yoga in the dessert?

After yoga, we went to some slot canyons.

The slot canyons were awesome! There were some tight squeezes but it was so beautiful!

Group shot

It was a super hot day, so half of us went an hr away to a little river to swim.
The water was freezing and I didnt get any pictures but it was so nice after spending 2 days in the middle of the dessert!
That night we had yummy dutch over fajitas and Russ became the king of the camp out by starting a huge fire and then jumping over it!

The next morning we hung out at camp and started the 7 hr drive home.
We stopped at a cool look out for a picture.
It was crazy to go from hot hot desert to snow!

It was a nice Memorial Day. The whole drive home we just listened to music and it gave me a good chance to think of my family that has passed, especially the last couple months.
I hope everyone had a good safe Memorial Day!

Pick me up!

2010-06-01T09:49:00.004-06:00

Here is a good "pick me up" for a lovely Tuesday morning after a long weekend!
I was going through a file on my computer and ran across this quote I had saved from Mother Teresa.
I really loved it and thought I'd share.
What an amazing lady! I look up to her and all she accomplished.

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;
Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and GOD.
It was never between you and them anyway.

Told ya so

2010-05-27T16:22:00.009-06:00

I hate to say I told ya so, but Im going to.
I have wanted a Chia Pet my whole life.
So you can imagine the excitement I felt the first time I attempted.
It was supposed to look like this:

And mine turned out like this:

You might think after everyone laughed in my face and my very own sister says, in a very joking tone "Wow, you have quite the green thumb" that Id give up.
Nope, just as the quote on my blog says "Never never never give up" And this applies to Chia pets as well.
For all of you that didnt have faith in me and my special edition Obama chia pet...
feast your eyes on this!!
Day 1- High hopes

Just a few short days later (Sorry for the bad pictures, most were done with my phone)

And Special Obama edition today!!

I just wanted to tell anyone who has these say high hopes for a successful chia pet that its possible. Just takes a whole lot of TLC.
Besides the bald spot I think its not half bad!

Also, if you remember my Lucky Duck story, I booked my trip today!
In just a few short months I will be setting sail for the beautiful Easter Caribbean.
Im especially excited to visit Honduras!

I hope everyone has a happy safe Memorial weekend!

Bucket List

2010-05-17T07:00:00.002-06:00

I noticed that this would be my 100th post!
I decided to make myself a Bucket List.
In honor of 100 post, I came up with 100 things I want to do before I die.
I have been extremely lucky enough to go after what I want, and I hope that never stops.
So here it goes!
For those of you who do not want to read 100 things about me, I will provide you with a few pictures along the way!
Oh, and if you want to do any of these things with me, Id love that.
I thought this would be hard, but it really wasn't, and even after I wrote the list Ive thought of others, but here is a good start.

Chelsea's Bucket List- In no particular order

1-See a firefly- I always thought there was something magical about them. I feel like I should be dangling from a tree branch upside down or something.

2-Cherry blossoms in Japan- holding a paper parasol of course
3-Write a book
4-Visit every continent
5-Visit every state
6-Raise a happy healthy family
7-Christmas lights in Russia- It would be cold, but then I could wear one of those big fluffy warm hats.

8-Attend New Years celebration in NYC
9-Run a marathon. I cant say this is high on my list, but I imagine the high after completing something like this would be unreal.
10-Make a homemade meal...everything from scratch. Oh, and have it taste good too.
11-Road trip in an old hippy van
12-Plant a garden *See #17
13-Become fluent in a foreign language..preferably Spanish.
14-Invent something
15-Sit front row at a jazz game
16-See the tulip fields in Holland

17-Overcome my fear of spiders (I dont know if thats possible?)
18-Learn to ball room dance
19-Become friends with a celebrity
20-Be in love forever
21-Live out of state for an least a yr
22-Live in a different country for at least a yr
23-Become an excellent cook *See #10
24-Join a bowling league
25-Learn to sail
26-Go para sailing (This seems very touristy, but I think it'd be great)
27-Always maintain a healthy weight
28-Be a good example
29-Teach someone something they will remember their whole lives
30-Learn sign language

31-Play the guitar
32-Ride the worlds longest zip line
33-See The Northern Lights-the Aurora Borealis
34-Ride with sled dogs- This one is high up there.
35-Visit the Taj Mahal
36-Walk the Great Wall of China and take another (Gram) Picture

37-Learn more about photography
38-Visit an orphanage overseas
39-Teach English to a foreign child
40-Make a quilt
41-Always have my priorities straight
42-Graduate with a BS
43-Be a tour guide on a sweet trip
44-Go on an African Safari
45-Visit the Price is Right- Im already thinking of a good shirt that will stand out.

46-Be famous for a very short time
47-Become more "green"
48-Always listen to my heart/gut- I've learned my lesson the hard way.
49-Buy something from Tiffany Co- nuf said.

50-Write a journal for all of my kids ages 0-18
51-Write a journal for myself!
52-Always be sincere
53-Never worry what others think of me
54-Visit the White house- Hopefully I can see Bo, the Pres dog while I am there.
55-Learn to love running
56-Never take anyone or anything for granted
57-Own a boat- doesn't have to be big
58-Always be smart with money
59-Start my own business
60-Swim with dolphins!
61-Watch turtles hatch and make their way to the ocean. I think that would be great!
62-One day have a second house by any kind of water
63-Have my own real pizza oven
64-Teach my kids to be giving & respect their elders
65-Prepare a pantry with emergency supplies
66-Have a wrap around porch one day- See #62
67-Take more figure skating lessons
68-Step out of my comfort zone and face a real fear
69-See the glowing fish in Puerto Rico ( I cant remember what they are called? Russ? A little help on this one)
70-Attend a world cup
71-Stop biting my fingernails
72-Grown long hair and donate to Locks for Love
73-Always live in the now & not worry about bigger and better things.
74-Be good about documenting my life (pictures/writings/stories) * See #51
75-Ride a long board around for a summer
76-Own my own scooter
77-Send my parents on their dream vacation
78-Play in the mud...it just looks fun.
79-Spend a weekend at Niagara Falls
80-Go Ice skating on a real lake. I dont know this girl, but this is exactly how I picture my day on the lake. *See #67

81-Visit Alaska and see the Orcas Whales while riding around in a tiny boat.
82-See the Seattle Fish market and catch a flying fish
83-No texting and driving! (Gosh Im bad at this) Also high on the list.
84-Help someone plan their dream wedding- See# 59
85-Be better with public speaking
86-Eat Lobster- I want to wear one of those plastic bibs and dip it lots of butter..at least I think that's how you eat lobster?

87-Visit Sundance film festival- This is where #19 would come in handy, or even #46
88-Simplify my life
89-Donate blood as often as possible
90-Learn to read music
91-Be better at wearing sunscreen, especially on my face. I dont want to look old.
92-Visit Bora Bora

93-Be frugal
94-Learn to love winter sports...Winter gets long, might as well find something to enjoy it.
95-Be a more attentive driver
96-Drink more water
97-Design clothes
98-Retire comfortably
99-Enjoy the little things
100-BE HAPPY!