Up to Date

Okay. This is not Erin. And I also have no idea what I'm doing. Or something. Occasionally Erin thinks about getting caught up on the blog, but then I see her eyes glaze over when she realizes how much time has passed. I figured I'd help her out. Just this once.

July

Erin and I both had birthdays. There was a party. People came down. Fireworks. Look! Pictures!

Behold Travis' shame at losing the pushup contest.

The always adorable Rowan.

Don's enviable camping chair.

We also went up for a Smith family reunion. See?

Erin wanted me to add the pretty one, but funny faces trump all.

August

Erin's sister Cindy came to visit. We were all invited to cruise down the river. It was the first time Erin and I had gotten on the river in the 3 years we've lived here.

Not actually us, but you get the idea.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Two cute ladies and a really ugly guy.

 There were also some hikes or something...

Notice the picture in the bottom left hand corner where Sean slips and falls into a giant pothole. What a loser!

My first experience with quicksand. And scorpions the size of my hand. I prefer quicksand.

September

Erin (who is really hot) got me climbing gear for my birthday, so we were able to go climbing several times throughout the summer. There is even photographic evidence!

That is definitely me. Not Forrest.

And then we went to Boston for [insert long, boring, unimportant story], but we were able to stop by the temple while we were there.

I like how the flash brings out my eyes...

October

Apparently nothing happened in October.

November

We were able to go down to west Texas (eww gross) and east Texas (oooh nice!) to visit family and friends. Good time was had by all. Except for the Turkey. Cause it was dead.

The Jay Gowen Family. We visited them. In Texas.

Jay and Shauna were fabulous hosts. And they make surprisingly good gumbo. We spent an entire day trying to find pig trotters. I'll leave the rest of that story up to your imagination.

December

Ya know...Christmas

January

Our super good friends, The Gales, came up to spend New Years Eve (it turned into New Years Week) with us. There was a slug* of appetizers. It's always a party with the Gales around. No picture evidence of this event, though.

We also decided to adopt a dog from the local Animal Shelter. His name is Jack (or Jak; we change the spelling at random (because it's funny)). Here is a picture of him and Erin falling asleep together on the floor. Aren't they adorable?

I don't know how they look so cute when they sleep. I look awful.

February

Erin got a job at a local credit union. Here's a random picture of someone working that I stole off the internet.

This could totally be copyrighted, so let's keep this between us, m'kay?

Wow, I really started running out of steam at the end there. That is the last 9ish months in a nutshell (Why do people say that, anyway?).

If you have any questions or complaints please direct them to my facbook account and I'll get back to you next time I get on The Facebook. Bwa ha ha!

*Slug: unit of mass in standard units. Approximately equal to 32 lbs. Stupid SI units.

Guatemala Day 5

This day was the Sabbath, and the building the branch met in was just down the street. It was fun singing the hymns (I think Sean and I did pretty well) and I know Relief Society's lesson was on families. Everyone was very nice and welcoming, and everyone loved Emree.

After church, Sean and I got to spend the afternoon with our parents, which was really nice. That night we had a family dinner. Can you tell that Emree found a new cuddle buddy?

Since I didn't take a lot of pictures Sunday, I will take this time to talk more about Panajachel. Here's some of the vegetation:

Here's some of the ways that are used to deter people from trespassing. Yes, that is cut glass:

Here is the fabulous hotel we stayed at - Casa Colonial:

Guatemala Day 3

On our third day, we went on a tour of the lake with our parents. We went out on a chartered boat, and visited three of the cities around Lake Atitlan: San Juan, San Pedro, and Santiago.

San Juan was very artsy. We stopped by several art galleries, and walked by shops. It was a beautiful city.

By San Juan is the Mayan Nose. Can you see it?

San Pedro is known more as a hippy town. We went to the top of a hill to get to a huge Baptist church. It was very beautiful, and had fantastic views of the surrounding areas.

Last we went to Santiago. We were a little short on time since it looked like a storm was brewing. We went to the large Catholic church there. This church had some tragic moments during the the massacures during the 80's and 90's. I could see the Mayans seeking sancuary on the church grounds.

Then we went to lunch. This is what happens if you order a fruit plate in Guatemala:

On our way back to Panajachel it started to rain, and it came down hard for a while. Kinda fun during a boat ride!

Northwest Trip Part 2: Washington

After saying farewell to the Bundys, we left Oregon and drove up to Washington to see the Maners.

There were a few spots along the road where the air smelled funny. After some investigation, we decided the smell was coming from the mills where they processed the lumber.

The first night, we had a cookout in the backyard. 

The girls had fun taking turns with my camera....

The next day everyone took the day off work and school, and we ventured to Mt. Rainer. It. Was. Beautiful.

While we were in the Seattle area, we tried out three different donut shops, checked out the new outlets, hung out, and Jenn introduced me to Charming Charlies. (We just found out it's expanding to Utah. Be excited!)

Sean and I got to go to the Seattle Temple.

 There were chestnut trees all around the temple. While we walked around, we kept hearing lots of clangs and pings. That was from the trees dropping their nuts.

Sean and I drove into the city to try out and authentic ramen shop. It was pretty tasty.

Us adults got to go on a date night to Seattle. We went to see Second Hand Lions: the Musical. It hasn't been on broadway yet, but it might someday. The performance was a premier and they are still revising it based on audience responses and input. I think it has a lot of potential.

To end our trip, we took the parents and older kiddos to a soccer game: Seattle Sounders vs. Real Salt Lake. We didn't realize when we got the tickets we were kind of in a supporters section....It was intimidating being in that stadium with over 55,000 spectators....most of them wearing lime green. Since we were noticeably supporting Salt Lake we got boos and hisses, but everyone was cordial. It probably helped we had some cute kids with us.

Our trip was so nice, it made it hard to leave. There were some stowaways in our car, and after driving them around the neighborhood we returned them home.

Thank you Justin, Jennifer, Brandon, Lindsey, Katelyn, Dylan, and Weston. We loved spending time with you guys in your own place.

Jenn also blogged about our trip here.

Season for Hikings

It's that time of year again! The time when we are given a list of hikes from work. If we take a picture with the item at the end (typically a toy), we get credit and a little health bonus. As you can see below, we had some difficulty finding one of the boxes.

The easy hike: Millcreek.

The medium hike: Hunter Canyon

The hard hike: Jeep Arch

The bonus hike: Landscape Arch

A New Seat in Time for Labor Day

About a year ago, our new neighbors gave us some chairs they had inherited from past friends. This meant we had outdoor furniture! A place to sit when taking off shoes covered and filled with Moab dirt. A place to sit and watch storms while the husband tinkered on the guitar. However, these chairs were getting plastered with the sprinklers several times a week without much protection for the wood.

They were painted red and orange. Their names were painted accordingly:

 I sanded these babies down, and wasn't too careful of what I tracked inside the house....

I painted away with the vibrant Million Dollar Red. It looked closer to pink when I put it on. *face palm* Thankfully it dried darker, so it was closer to the look I was going for:

The ending result: a cheerful entry to the house that will be protected from the elements and look nice year round!! They look better in person. You should see for yourself!

 

 As for Labor Day weekend, we played and tried out some new forms of Moab recreation. We went rock climbing at Ice Cream Parlor. (Outdoor rock climbing was a first for me!)

Who doesn't love playing in the water at the beach?? Oh, oh pick me!! A beach off the Colorado River? That works!

Thanks Sparks for introducing us to some new recreation!