~St Thomas~

Dave and I thought we should go somewhere fun for our 15 year anniversary.  The day after we were discussing where we should go, a friend asked if we'd like to go on a vaca to St Thomas.  We were all in!!!

We had a lot of fun snorkeling, laying out on the beach, zip lining, night swimming, getting messages, and island hopping.  It was a very relaxing vacation.  We took the red eye flight out to St Thomas, and hadn't even been at our place 5 minutes when Dave and I were asked to be witnesses to a wedding.  Lol.  I was kind of embarrassed because you could totally tell we'd been traveling all night.
The beach we were staying on was gorgeous!!!  We literally walked right out of our room onto the beach.  It was amazing!

Enjoying some Pina Colada's on our patio.

Iguanas were everywhere!

Great Bishopric photo. Hahaha!

Megan's Bay was a favorite of ours.  The beach and the water were gorgeous!!!  We went there several times.  In fact, we decided one night to go night swimming there.  We were really surprised that the beach was empty, except for one couple walking their dog.  We didn't understand why more people weren't out there doing it, because the water was great!!! We even all dared each other to swim out to the buoy and back.  Which we all did.  It was a little creepy, because you really couldn't see anything, it was so dark.  Well, the next day, we asked a waitress about night swimming at Megan's bay.  She said you'd have to be crazy to do that.  We asked why and she said because of sharks and eels. lol.  Needless to say, we didn't do that again, but it kind of became a joke.  Everywhere we'd go, we'd ask locals if they'd recommend night swimming at Megan's Bay, and every single one of them said "Heck No!!!  You'd be crazy to do that!"  I guess we were being super adventurous (maybe stupid) and we didn't even know it.

We had fun island hopping.  We also visited St. John, Jost Van Dyke, and the sand island in all the Corona commercials.  It was fun to see how the snorkeling was a little bit different at all of them.  My favorite snorkeling spot was off an island in the British Islands.  We chartered a boat and he took us there.  The snorkeling was amazing!!! It was like you were in an aquarium.  I saw a HUGE manta ray swimming right at me, literally like 10 feet away.  I got kind of freaked out and started frantically swimming away.  Luckily it got spooked and took off in the other direction.  We saw all kinds of fish, colorful coral, turtles, jellyfish, etc.  It really was amazing!  Best snorkeling I've ever done.

We all belong to the "Sea Band Club"

Our boat guide took us to the cutest little town that he said the villages in "Pirates of the Caribbean" were made after.  He highly recommended the deep fried Hot dogs.  Dave decided to try one out.

We also had fun watching a meteor shower one evening on our beach.

We had such a great time.  This is a definite visit again vacation spot!!!

~Scout Overnighter in the Uintahs~

I thought for sure they were going to cancel the scout backpacking trip because of the rainstorm that was expected to be here through the night, but they didn't.  I gave Hunter the option of football practice or the scout overnighter.  He chose the overnighter.  I mentioned that it probably was going to rain, and he said that was ok.  So we packed him up, and sent him out the door.

A couple hours after they had left the rains came pouring down.  Hard.  There was lightning and thunder and pouring rain.  All I could think about was I hope Hunter was warm.  When he got home I found out that was not the case.  The boys all slept under tarps.  Except for some prepared leaders, and Jake Ballard, who brought their own pup tents to sleep in.  Jake ended up having 4 boys sleeping in his 2 man tent, lol.  Hunter, Davis, and Nate Michael's tarp tent was not working and they were drenched.  When Hunter pulled out his sleeping bag from the night it look like it had been thrown into a swimming pool.  It was completely drenched, inside and out.  He said at one point he poured a whole puddle of water out of his sleeping bag.  He also said it was a little scary, because they had thunder and lightning going all around them.  He was freezing, wet, and he couldn't sleep.  He said that when the rain calmed down a little, he and Davis noticed some of the older boys were up trying to build a fire out of the wet sticks, lol.  He and Davis got up and decided to help.  They did manage to get a fire started and sat around it the rest of the night trying to stay warm.  He came home exhausted and cold.  I asked him if he'd wished he'd have chosen to go to football practice instead of the overnighter, and he said no.  He had fun!  I guess it was a good experience for him to learn not only that he could survive hard things, but how to also start a fire when everything is wet around you.  I am so grateful for amazing leaders that plan such fun activities for the boys to help them learn and to grow.  I know this is a camp out Hunter will never forget!

~Neighborhood Swim Day at Cherry Hills~

My kids have really missed not having our seasonal Cherry Hills pass this year.  We decided we needed to have a neighborhood pool day at Cherry Hills, so we could say we went at least once this summer.  It was so much fun, and the kids LOVED having tons of neighbor friends to play with. (I wish I would have gotten a picture of the whole group together.  There were about 32+ neighbor kids here playing today.)

Garrett is getting more brave as the summer wears on.  He loved going down this slide in Pirates Cove.

Cardiac Canyon is a favorite!

Garrett was so funny.  He was so excited to go down the dragon slides.  That is until they got up to the top.  Then he cried and cried.  He'd go down, and say "again".  Then he'd get up there and cry and cry, lol.  Funny kid!  Mckell was such a good sport and kept taking him down over and over.  She really is the BEST big sister!

Mckell was determined that before we left for the day, Lexi was going to try Cardiac Canyon.  Lexi did, but cried the entire way down, lol.  It's funny cause as we were leaving the park for the day, Lexi commented to me that Cardiac Canyon was really fun, lol.  You'd have never guessed that by the look on her face.
We have the BEST neighborhood!

~Girls Camp~

It is so much fun being in the Young Womens.  I was so excited to be able to go to girls camp with these cute girls!

It was a stake girls camp this year.  We went up to Heber Girls camp, which was a lot of fun!  It was fun to bond with all of these young women.   They are such fun, sweet girls!

We had tons of fun sitting around the fire, talking, and learning to do the whip.

I was glad Dave and I were able to be up there together.

They had tons of fun activities planned for us.  From a ropes course to crafts, canoeing/water fight, and spiritual firesides.  It really was the funnest week.

I can honestly say that I really missed these girls after I got home from girls camp, lol.  I LOVE my calling!

~Razor Riding Day Trip~

We thought it might be fun to take the Razors out to ride the Knolls with Marc and Randee.  It was a lot of fun playing in the sand (which was so soft) and driving up all the sand hills.

Mckell's orthodontist, Dr. John Pobanz, is doing a contest like Flat Stanley.  If you take flat Dr. John with you places and take pictures you may win something.  So Mckell is holding flat Dr. John in a lot of her pictures :)

It was a fun day.  We only got stuck a few times :)  about an hour into the trip, my kids started fighting about who was going to ride with dad in his razor.  I guess I don't go fast enough, and up the fun steep hills like dad does, lol.

We stopped to have a picnic lunch in the only shade we could find, lol.  Pretty sad shade.  It was a fun day though.

~Camp Hunt~

This was Hunter's first year of officially going to scout camp.  I honestly was a little worried for him.  I worried about what he'd do if he got cold during the night, I worried if he was going to like the food and get enough to eat, I worried mostly because this was going to be his first time away somewhere from home without Dave or me.  I can't imagine what it's going to be like to have him go on a mission, lol.  Luckily Dave went up for the first 2 days of scout camp, so that eased my worry a little bit.

Hunter loves going to scouts because he is in with all of his buddies.  That makes it fun for whatever they do.  He was so excited about scout camp!

The first thing you do at scout camp is the swim check.  When our boys arrived it was freezing, like 68 degrees and raining, not to mention that the water at Bear Lake is not the warmest.  But that didn't get them out of the swim check.  Hunter toughed it out and passed the swim check.  Way to go Hunter!!!  A couple of our boys didn't, so I was proud that Hunter toughed it out and did it, in the rain and all.  It took the boys forever to get warmed up after being in the lake though.

When you don't have tables and chairs to play cards on you just play in the dirt.

The last day there, the boys went boating and played in Bear Lake.  They had a great time.  It was funny to hear the boys talk about all the cute girls up at scout camp, and to hear all their funny stories about their week.  I'm so glad that Hunter has such a good group of friends that he will go through scouts with.  It really does make me worry a little less about him while he is away. :)