Fathers

I know Father's Day was two weeks ago, but is there ever a time that we shouldn't celebrate the important and meaningful people in our lives? I have been immensely blessed to be surrounded by really good men in my life and I wanted to write about them for you! We have plenty of bad men in the world, I hope this is a good reminder that there are good men too!

(Also, I know that an aesthetically pleasing blog post wouldn't have SO many pictures, but I just LOVE all of these photos and I already narrowed it down... TWICE... so you're just going to have to deal with the pictures that were left.)

I have a Dad who has always worked hard to provide for my family, who sets a good example to me of kindness and optimism, and who loves my Mom and all of us. He always does the right thing, even when it isn't the easiest thing. He is also the most grateful person I've ever met. While I was on my mission, he was going through chemotherapy and I remember getting emails from him about how he was just SO grateful for all of his blessings when I think it could have been really easy to not really feel that at the time.

I have a Father-in-Law who is steady and loyal and who taught my husband how to be a good man and to always look for ways to serve others. When Ryan was growing up they went to every single service opportunity their ward offered, even while he worked 2 jobs to provide for the family. And he is an awesome grandpa to Rose.

This is Ryan's dad with a baby Ryan! 

I have a husband who is wonderful in every way. He always strives to be better than the day before, he loves Rose and me to the ends of the earth, and he works really really really hard to provide for us while also going to school so we can have a better future. He is fiercely loyal to me and to those he cares about, he's kind to those who don't fit in, and he will drop anything to help someone in need. I fell in love with him while we were dating because every time we visited someone he would do their dishes. He's the best Dad to Rose, always willing to read her a book, spin her around, or give her a piece of chocolate when she points to the candy jar. She gets so excited every time she hears the door open when he comes home from work. I LOVE being his wife.

I have a grandpa who is a good example to me of quiet service. While he shows a grumpy exterior, he will always show up to help out, even when it is inconvenient. He is forever making gifts for people I would never even think to thank, like the mailman, doctors and nurses who he has met while in the hospital, and neighbors. He's a hard worker and one of my favorite people to sit and listen to as he tells stories.

Also, how cool does my grandpa look in this photo with my mom? 

I've had bishops and a mission president who saw my potential and always encouraged me to be my best self, while also always being willing to sit and talk to me when I needed guidance. They were busy men with a lot on their plate, but they always made me feel like I was important and as if they had all the time in the world to sit and listen to me. 

I am so grateful for the many good men in my life who make it easy to believe that I have a loving Father in Heaven who knows me, cares about me, and has my best interests in mind and to believe in a loving Savior who literally gave everything to save someone like me. 

This world seems to have a shortage of really good men, but here's a shout out to all of the good men I know, who have helped to shape me into the person I am today, and who give me hope for a wonderful future ahead.

Our Trip to Washington

Ryan and I met in the beautiful state of Washington about 4 years ago while serving as missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I loved it there, I loved the people I met, I loved the small towns I served in, I loved ALL the green, and the flowers and the trees and the water. I just loved everything about it and wanted to go back as soon as I came home.

However, life happens, and in my case I immediately went back to school, started dating Ryan, we got married, we worked all summer, we had a baby, I graduated school, and there just never seemed to be a good time to go back.

Ryan promised me that we would go back eventually, but I wanted to go back sooner than he did, so last summer he promised me that we could plan a trip to go this summer, and it really happened! We both got time off from work, we saved up money, we booked all of our places to stay, I contacted as many people as possible that I wanted to see when we went, and we took off!

We took 9 1/2 days for our trip. Our first fun stop was in Portland, Oregon. We visited Multnomah Falls, went to Powell's City of Books (the largest used and new bookstore in the world! It takes up an entire city block, and literally has a million books!), then ate dinner at an Italian place where I got some sort of pasta, and Ryan got something with squid ink nooodles (they were black). I love window shopping and walking around big cities, but Ryan hates them, so that was pretty much his limit for Portland, but we had fun anyway!

Just a small portion of Powell's Books. 

On Day 2, we drove to the Tillamook Creamery and did the tour and the cheese samples and then spent $84 on cheese and chocolate... My love language is chocolate and Ryan's love language is cheese... so we set aside $100 for Tillamook cheese before we even got there.

How cute is this tiny Rose-sized jug of chocolate milk??

Spending so much time in the car, means diaper changes in the car, which was NOT to Rose's liking. 

After Tillamook, we drove along the coast and stopped at Cannon Beach for lunch. We ate some delicious razor clams and clam chowder at The Wayfarer restaurant (which has windows looking out on the beach!) It was pricey, but we also planned to spend money on seafood while we were along the coast because Utah doesn't have any oceans nearby. We only had a few minutes left, but we let Rose play in the sand near Haystack Rock and she thought that was a much tastier treat than the seafood we offered her.

We then kept driving through the beautiful forests of Oregon and Washington toward Elma where we spent the night. I made Ryan drive all the back roads and through the neighborhoods  of the Elma Ward so that I could point out different things I remembered from my time spent there. It is so bizarre to come back to your mission when you aren't a missionary anymore. It was actually a little difficult for me to go back and drive around knowing that I'll never get to experience being a missionary in that same way ever again. Which I rationally knew before going on this trip, but wasn't exactly prepared for emotionally. So, we pulled over for a little while so I could kind of grieve for a little bit, and then we moved on and enjoyed the rest of our trip. It was a ton of fun to see so many people that I met and loved while there and to introduce them to my family. I missed out on a few important people to me, but I had also tried to prepare myself for that possibility before the trip and all was well.

These are California Poppies which actually do grow in Utah, but I didn't know that they did and while I was on my mission, these were my absolute favorite flowers. I think they are so pretty and they only open up when the sun is out. They close up when it is cloudy or night time. 

Smitty's is a small burger/shake shack that you can drive through in Elma and they have these mini sized raspberry shakes that are so good! I wish more places sold mini shakes, because they are the perfect size for me! I am never able to finish regular sized shakes!

Over the next week we went from Elma to Olympia (where Ryan and I met) to Tacoma to Belfair to Silverdale to Gig Harbor back to Tacoma and Olympia to Centralia and Winlock. Ryan is not quite as sentimental or possibly unhealthily attached to people as I am so he introduced me to three families that he met on his mission and I made him meet at least 20 people for me.

In Olympia we were devastated to find out that Grandpa's Icecream had been sold and wasn't there anymore. *sob!* but we were able to go to Tumwater Falls which is a pretty trail we went to for a Zone activity once as missionaries. I wanted to recreate this picture:

but the totem pole was nowhere to be found and half of the area was under construction. We were able to recreate this picture instead though, which was almost as good:

More pictures from Tumwater Falls:

In Tacoma, my main desire was a cookie...or should I say, "The Cookie" from Metropolitan Market. If you are ever in Tacoma you MUST stop here to get one. They are always fresh out of the oven and have the perfect amount of chocolate chips! (Which, in my opinion, means there is more chocolate than cookie...) We also wanted to eat at Boathouse 19, which I remember tasting better than it did... but I learned on this trip that you can't trust missionary taste buds! (It wasn't bad, just not as good as we were expecting.)

We went to church in Belfair, which was my first area as a missionary and I kept many people from going to their Sunday School classes because they hung out with us and played with Rose instead... oops! We had lunch at Big Bubba's Burgers and then wandered along the beach looking for shells and sea glass. I didn't make Ryan drive up and down every street and through every neighborhood, but I really really wanted to.

Rose entertaining her fans. 

Allllll the heart eyes!

Even MORE heart eyes for this view. What a hottie!

If you look closely you may be able to spot something that isn't a rock or a shell in this picture. 

We spent the night in Silverdale at an airbnb and just relaxed. We made spaghetti for dinner and drank the old fashioned root beer that comes in a glass bottle and watched Aladdin (the animated one) on VHS. We also walked around Island Lake Park. Silverdale is the only area that we both served in. Ryan was there a year before I was, so the whole area was familiar to both of us. Island Lake park was a place we both went to hand out pictures of Jesus and mormon.org cards. It's also a beautiful park with lots of cool trees.

The most perfect hair photo I have ever gotten. My hair never looks this nice! 

A special sister missionary was staying in Gig Harbor and Monday is sort of like her day off, they can hang out with other missionaries, buy groceries, and email their families (or call now too!) so we surprised her at her apartment in the morning. We definitely threw her for a loop, it was very entertaining for us, but maybe not so much for her. ;) We took her and her companion out for lunch and then let them get on with the rest of their day. (This special sister missionary is Ryan's sister who was called to the same mission we served in! How fun is that? We just couldn't help stopping by to see her while we were there.)

Our last stop in Washington was Centralia and Winlock. Winlock is another teeny tiny town with a lot of character and I just love the whole place! This one I DID make Ryan drive up and down every street and we walked along all of main street (which actually isn't very big). We had dinner at Guadelajara's and I was able to get a good handful of family's from the ward to come have dinner with us so we could see them all at once.

One of the most special parts of the trip happened while in Winlock. While I was a missionary there, we were introduced to this amazing couple who lived in a house that had been designed to look like a train station. Ken and Sally lived there. Ken had a big and unique personality. They weren't interested in hearing the message we had to share when I was a missionary, but they told me that if we ever needed a place to rant or just refresh that we could come over and they would give us old fashioned soda and fancy chocolates. Ken told me that I shouldn't get married until I'm at least 30, and I told him that wasn't likely. He also told me that when I get back to Utah I needed to go to Brigham City and send him some chocolate from Idle Isle. Him and his wife were always doing service for people in the community, they were some of the most Christlike people I had ever met. When I got home from my mission I went to Idle Isle and I sent Ken and Sally a box of chocolates. About a month later, I was informed that Ken had been diagnosed unexpectedly with a really aggressive form of Cancer and died 12 days later. :( My chocolate didn't get there in time, but at his funeral, Sally had a refreshment table of fancy chocolates, and my chocolates got there in time for that. I really would have loved for Ken to meet Ryan and Rose, but I was able to find Sally and introduce them to her. I think if we had waited until our next trip she wouldn't live there anymore and I wouldn't have been able to find her, so I'm so glad we were able to catch her this time.

We spent the night in a historic hotel in Centralia and then in the morning began the long drive back to Utah.

It was an exhausting trip, because we stayed in a different place every night and we visited with so many people even though we are both quite introverted. But it was also so so fun to get to show each other such huge parts of our lives that changed us so much.

I hope it isn't too long before we get to go back again, but next time we'll just stay in one place so we don't have to haul our luggage and the pack n play in and out of the car every single day. :)