Yet Another Trip

So Preston and I have known each other for just over 2 years now and the other day we counted that we have been on 18 trips since we have first met. 18 trips in 24 months. And most of those are during the summer months. No wonder I feel like I'm never home and we never have enough weekends to get stuff done!!! I love it though. Every once in a while I get a little stir- crazy here in Provo so I enjoy being able to get out as often as we do.

Our latest adventure was with Lauren and Aspen (Preston's sisters) to go visit Saren, his other sister, down in New Mexico. Our nephew, Aceson, was turning one and they were having a big birthday party for him so we decided to go. Here is a run down of the trip.

For those of you who have never been to New Mexico, you're not missing much. It's pretty much mostly just dirt. Everything is brown and covered with dirt. Half of the streets aren't even paved. Just dirt. Most people don't have lawns. Just dirt. Wow, my feet look tan...no, wait...just dirt. I took this picture to try to show people the boringness of New Mexico but I it doesn't make it look as bad as I was hoping. Don't be decieved. The only reason you see trees is because we were close to a river.

This is all of us on our road trip.

Here is Aceson knowing just the right way to eat cake. :)

Here is the birthday boy opening his presents with his mom.

This is both sets of Preston's grandparents, Saren, Eddie & Aceson, Lauren and Aspen, and of course Preston and I.

Here is Aceson enjoying his birthday presents. He is seriously such a cute kid!

This was tank trying to climb into the truck through the back window. He kind of looks like he is about to eat Aspen.

Well, that's about the end of that. The other news I wanted to share is that I switched companies and I don't have to commute to Salt Lake for work anymore. Hallelujah!!!!!!! I can't tell you how much happier my life is when I work only ten minutes from home. The best part is, I get to see a little bit more of my husband now! Yay for that...I've missed him!

Seattle Trip

One of my very best friends, Rebekah, lives in Bremerton, WA with her wonderful husband and 4 adorable kids. It has become one of my favorite places to visit and I usually end up going at least once a year. Well, that's what Preston and I did for Labor Day weekend and we had such a great time, as always! I can never just pick one or two pictures to put up so sorry for the millions of pictures!

Here are some pictures of downtown from Seattle from the ferry. I love Seattle. I think it's such a cool city. And I especially loved that we had sunshine and blue skies for at least part of the time we were there!

And here was a great shot of Mt. Ranier. It's not every day you get a view like this in Seattle!

And here is my cute husband doing homework on the ferry. I love riding the ferry. It's such a beautiful, relaxing ride.

This is the Puget Sound Naval Museum and Shipyard as you come into Bremerton.

Some of you probably don't know this but Bremerton was where Preston originally proposed to me and we got engaged. Well, it was a place called Scenic Beach State Park right on the hood canal with beautiful views of the Olympic Mountains. We weren't able to get good pictures of it on our engagement day because of crappy weather so we decided to go back there on this trip.

This is where he proposed. Isn't it beautiful? I love it!

We took a few pictures of us while we were there but they didn't turn out too hot either cuz we couldn't figure out our new camera. =)
This is me reading "The Hungry Caterpillar" with Eli and Taylor. We read it about 100 times so I pretty much have it memorized now but I loved every minute of it!

Here are some cute pictures of the kids. This is Abby with her cute crooked smile.

This is Taylor. He is seriously one of the cutest, funniest kids I have ever known.

This is Preston entertaining the kids in the car. I love how Eli snuck into the picture.

We went out on the Lake while we were there so Nate and his brother could do some waterskiing. This is my favorite picture of Nate. He looks so GQ. =)

Rebekah and I on the boat

We drove out to Olympic National Park which is the only actual rainforest in the US. This is Lake Crescent which was really beautiful.

I love the color of the water.You can't tell but the water right here was probably at least 12 feet deep but that's how clear the water was.
We also went hiking up to some waterfalls and the entire forest looks like this..covered with moss. It made it look so...I don't know...fuzzy? I love hiking and the mountains and I've been in lots of different forests but this one was so different and really pretty.

Us at the falls.

The really pretty falls we hiked up to. I can't remember the name of them.

Me and lovely Rebekah.
So my maiden name is Crowley and it's not a very common name but as we were riding the ferry Preston noticed this boat out on the water. I thought it was awesome so I took a picture.
We did other fun stuff that we didn't get any pictures of. Preston and I picked blackberries in the rain and Rebekah made awesome homemade berry cobbler with it. We also went on a date with Nate and Rebekah to a little restaurant on the beach near a light house and it was so pretty there. Anyways, that wraps up our trip in a very long nutshell. Thanks Bek and Nate for a really fun weekend!

Lucky In Love

So I realize that several of my more recent blogs have contained apologies for un-intended mushiness/sappiness, as if it's a rare thing for me. Well, I'm throwing in the towel...raising the white flag. I give up. Once upon a time I took pride in the fact that I was completely devoid of all feeling and/or emotion. Apparently in my old age I am becoming a mushy, sappy person. I'm not exactly sure when or how this happened and I'm still a little embarassed about it, but I think it's about time I come to terms with it.

On that note, I've been thinking a lot lately about how lucky I am to have married such a great guy. I know, I know, we've only been married a little over a year...but I never realized how much I was missing when I was single. I had myself convinced that I was this super independent, strong-minded woman who didn't need help from anyone, let alone some stupid boy. I was so wrong. It has been so nice to have someone to lean on, someone to face things with, someone to work next to, someone to complain to when I'm frustrated or have had a bad day. (And someone who will kill giant spiders for me!) What's even nicer is being with someone who is so willing and happy to do those things for me.

With how busy everything is and especially with my longer commute from work, I rarely feel like making a real meal. He patiently comes home from work and helps me with dinner or just makes it for me. When I hit the snooze button a few too many times (which is pretty much every morning), he makes me breakfast AND packs me a lunch, even though he himself has to go to work as well. He does the laundry more than I ever do and if it weren't for him our yard would never get watered. He compliments me often and is so supportive of everything going on in my life. And even in the midst of his own busy-ness and everything he does for me, he never fails to say yes when someone else needs help. He is selfless and kind. He really is amazing.

When I stop and think about how much he does for me and how much he sacrifices for me, it really makes me realize how much I need to improve and how much harder I need to be striving to develop those Christlike attributes and qualities that seem to come so naturally to him.

In short, I am really grateful to Preston for everything he teaches me and does for me and especially for putting up with me. I now realize that boys really aren't so bad to have around after all. :)

ROAD TRIP!!!!

So I love how no matter how long you are gone from it, home is always home. I have lived in Provo now for like 8 years and I still refer to Colorado as home. Don't get me wrong, Provo is home too in the sense that this is where my wonderful husband, and our wonderful life together is...and wherever we are together will always be home...but so will good ol' Arvada, Colorado.

So this last weekend the Arvada Stake had it's 50th Anniversary and to celebrate it they had a big country fair/jubilee. There were hundreds of people there. I got to see so many people that I hadn't seen in years. It reminded me of just how much I loved growing up there, the great friends that I had, the many people who always made sure I was taken care of, and the amazing mentors and examples I had (and still have!) I felt so blessed to be able to see so many of those people again. I wish I would have had more time to tell them just how much they have meant to me through the years and how much admiration and respect I have for all of them. For any of those people who actually read this blog I just want to say how good it was to see you and how much it made my day!!

This is me with Rachel, Amy, and Jen...3 incredible girls who put up with me for so many years and who I think are so beautiful and amazing.
Preston and I also got to spend a lot of time with my Uncle Pat, including going golfing which was super fun. Most of you know about my Uncle but he is my dad's brother and has been like a second father to me ever since my dad died almost 16 years ago. He and I are very close and he is so good to me. He is battling cancer right now and has had to endure so much. I admire his strength and courage and enjoy any time I am able to spend with him.

Another highlight of this trip was that my mom decided to go to church for the first time in almost 15 years. We went with her to her new ward and it tugged at my heartstrings a little more than I expected to have my mom sitting next to me at church. I really want her to be happy and I feel like this will help her a lot. We also got to spend some time with my wonderful grandparents. My cute, sweet grandpa will be 97 years old soon, and my grandparents have been married for 66 years. They have such a great story and have lived such amazing lives and I am grateful I had a chance to sit down and get to know them a little better. When I think of the things they had to go through it makes me so grateful for what I have...and so sorry for future generations that won't get to hear about those things first hand and really develop an appreciation for how easy their lives really are.

On a funnier note, this was Tank's first road trip. (Okay, side note...when we decided to get a dog everyone kept teasing me about it being a replacement for actual kids and I would get so annoyed and tell people that was not true. But it's hilarious how Tank really has become our "kid". Don't get me wrong, he is not a replacement, we totally plan to have real kids...it's just funny how we have become THOSE people, the ones who are obsessed with their dog and talk about him to people like he is one of their kids. It's so embarrassing.)

Anyway, Tank literally slept the whole way to Colorado and we were bragging to each other about what a great dog he is and how he is always so good. Then on the way home, well, he hardly slept at all and spent most of the trip trying to find his way into the front seat to sit with us. We brought a couch home in the bed of the truck (p.s. thanks again Mom!) so we had to pile up all our bags and stuff in the back seat. It gave him a nice little step ladder to assist in his shenanigans. Here are some pictures of it.




Silly Tank. He makes us laugh pretty hard. But I'm pretty sure it's one of those things where you have to be there. We realize that the antics of other people's pets really aren't that interesting to most people, so sorry about that. =)

Sorry this has been such a long, sentimental post! It appears as though, the older I get, the more mushy I get. Again, embarrassing. Oh well, I'm sure I'm not the only one, right? Right??? =)

Where Does The Summer Go???

Summer always goes by super fast but this one seems worse than usual. We have been so busy and have had so much going on. Preston is doing an engineering internship and taking summer classes and I am currently commuting to Salt Lake for work (which sucks...but hey, at least I have a job, right?). On top of that I was called as the Relief Society President in our ward and Preston is currently the acting Elder's Quorum President of our ward so needless to say we haven't had as much spare time as we would have liked this summer. Anyways here is a run-down of our summer so far.

Our very first garden is doing great. This is actually an old picture before everything grew in but we are so proud! It has been so nice eating fresh veggies from the garden whenever we want and it has cut down on the grocery bill. We grossly over-estimated how much we needed to plant and as a result we have a plethera (I love that word) of extra vegetables that we have to keep giving away so they don't go to waste.

As some of you may know, we got a new puppy at the beginning of July. His name is Tank and he is a yellow lab/golden retriever mix. He is about 3 months old now and he is so much fun! He is super smart and makes us laugh on a regular basis. He has already doubled in size since we got him and his paws are huge so I'm pretty sure he is going to end up being a pretty big dog, which we are excited about.
His ears are so huge for his little head still. When he lays on his back he looks like a bat. Sometimes we do this while he is sleeping.Speaking of sleeping, herein is the source of much of our laughter when it comes to Tank. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. I just didn't want to bore you with the 20 other pictures we have of him sleeping in odd positions.
So shortly after we got back from Europe we went to visit Preston's family in Wyoming, which was fun. A couple weeks later for the 4th of July his family came to our house and we all went camping. This is Saren, Aspen, Kelton and Holton on a paddle boat on Payson Lake.

These are my little brothers-in-law Kelton and Holton. They were fighting but we made them take a picture anyway. I love how Holton didn't even try to hide the anger. Cute kid.

The week after that was my birthday, as well as the week I found out my Provo office was closing down and I would have to start driving to Salt Lake. Preston was creative and made me a huge homemade birthday card, as well as a tres leches birthday cake. It was really good! The week after that my dear Uncle Pat came into town to visit us and we had a great time with him. I love him so much! He is battling cancer right now and I don't get to see him much so I was really glad he came out.

A week after that was Pioneer Day and we both had it off work so we decided to do something fun. We were originally going to go to Aspen for the weekend but decided we had too much to do here so opted to stay in Park City for the night and try out some local fun. I have to admit I thought Park City was overrated. I mean, it's cool...but nothing compared to some of my favorite Colorado mountain towns. (P.S. I was told recently that I am coming dangerously close to crossing the line of becoming like a Californian in the way I view my state as superior to all others. I promptly informed them without shame that I crossed that line a long time ago and that Colorado is in fact superior to all other places. ) Anyways, I'm sure there are fun things to do if you feel like spending a lot of money, which we didn't. We walked main street, went out to dinner and rode the scenic chair lift ride.
One of the reasons we stayed at the hotel we did was that we found a package deal for a one night stay and 18 holes of golf at the Homestead golf course in Midway. We haven't played golf once this summer so we were super excited. It was our first time ever playing a whole 18 holes on a real course with a golf cart and everything. We stopped keeping score after like the 4th hole because we were both so out of practice it was useless! We had a great time though!! We are considering making golf one of our hobbies in the future.All in all it has been a fun summer. I wish we had more time to do fun things before it ends but oh well. We are actually going to Colorado this weekend to visit my family so that will be fun. Hopefully we can squeeze in another camping trip or two as well. Oh yeah, and Aspen, Preston's sister just moved into our basement. Hopefully she can stand living with a boring married couple! Well, that just about sums it up. I'll try not to take another 2 months to write again!