Six Week Summer

We had the best Summer ever!

I mentioned the last time I wrote that Ryan got six weeks off from Sam's club because he's a new dad, and we took full advantage of those six weeks! He did work for his aunt for two weeks, but only in the morning. In the time that he had off we:

• Went to a wedding for my cousin.
• Went to my brothers wedding.
• We had Ryan's sister come to stay with us for a few days.
• We went to visit my aunt and uncle in Brigham City.
• We spent a week down in Southern Utah camping with Ryan's family.
• We blessed Rose down in Cedar City.
• We spent a week here with my parents who came up for my brother's wedding.
• We lived on a houseboat at Lake Powell for a week. 

and then reality came crashing back down when Ryan started school and went back to work. But before that, we had a blast and wore ourselves out to our limit. 

I used to hate Sam's club, but their paternity leave is awesome, so they are definitely not at the bottom of my list now. 

I love this picture. Every time we go to visit my aunt and uncle, it is for a big occasion of some sort and there are a ton of people and lots to do and never enough time to sit and talk. I was so bummed to find out that the weekend we decided to go up, my aunt and uncle would be at a wedding, my grandparents were going to California for a week, and everyone else had to work. On the day that we were planning on leaving we decided to stay a little later, and we ended up finally having a chance to sit on the porch, during the sunset, and just relax and talk, almost like the adults used to do when I was a kid and we had our family reunions. This may seem silly, but it actually meant a lot to me and was one of my favorite summer nights this year. 

Rose's Blessing Day

 Jared's wedding.

 My grumpy little girl, also at Jared's wedding.

I think this picture is just the cutest! The UVU library has THE coolest stained glass installment. We took Rose to see it and she loved it. (Until she realized that she was hungry, then the bright colors weren't interesting anymore.)

Pictures from Camping near Navajo Lake... I tried to limit it to only a few, but I have this amazing power to take way too many pictures in a short amount of time... so it's not just a few...

Those eyebrows!

One of the best things about Navajo Lake is that it has FROGS! You just don't really get to see frogs very often in Utah.

This one is at Duck Creek. 

Aunt Megan putting Rose to sleep. 

We left the campsite a night early because the rain was extremely persistent and our tents were filling up with water. This rainbow was a beautiful way for Navajo Lake to say goodbye to us on our way out. :) 

Here are pictures from Rose's Baby Blessing. We had lots of family come all the way to Cedar City to support us and Rose. :) We are so blessed.

Also, the dress Rose is wearing is the dress that I was blessed in as a baby. :) We waited a little longer to bless Rose so that both of our dad's could come and I was worried it would be too small, but it was perfect. :) My grandma made that dress for me 23 years ago. Isn't she darling???

Four generations. :)

Doesn't he make a handsome dad? 

Family Reunion t-shirts

Here are pictures from when my parents and Carson were visiting before Jared's wedding. We all went to Bridal Veil Falls for dinner and a walk. Isn't Carson a cutie? 

Pictures from Lake Powell:

We had so much fun at Lake Powell with my cousins. Rose is a natural and did way better than I thought she would. She didn't scream every time she went in the water, and she got plenty of naps and sleep at night even though there were 20+ people on the boat. Ryan and I even had a couple of chances to go off on a jet ski to go hiking without her.

Ryan wanted another swimsuit for the trip, so the day before we went to Walmart and he was going to get something boring like solid dark blue or grey. I tried to convince him to pick something fun, so he told me that I could pick WHATEVER I wanted for him to wear. ;) This was my pick. He wore them all week like the good sport that he is, until they "mysteriously" got a hole in the back on one of his hikes and they had to be thrown away. :) 

That's me. :) I can do headstands on solid ground, so I thought I'd try on a paddle board. The first try ended with me in the water, but my second try was much more graceful! 

This is Ryan and I attempting our Goga trick on a paddle board. Definitely not as successful as my headstand...

We had the best summer this year. Last Summer we both worked full time at different hours of the day so we didn't have a chance to do very many summer-y things, so we wanted to take full advantage of his paternity leave. Also, growing up in Florida, summer meant spending as much time as possible in a swimsuit in the sun as possible. So, we tried to do that this year, and I think it worked out pretty good. :)

It'll be fun to see what we do with his next paternity leave. (Which will NOT be coming for a while, so don't get your hopes up.)