Camping and My New K-7

As we were sitting in our little hallway at work on Friday my friend and I realized the summer was half over and we had spent it sitting in a little hallway at work. So I started looking at trips to Israel, which would be really great! But just not feasible. Dave and I came up with a better solution. Camping!! In the LaSals!!! Without a cabin, or even a camp trailer to sleep it!!! What an adventure.

What I really needed was an opportunity to play around with my new K-7. So Friday evening we took off, just Dave and I and the Landcruiser for sleeping in. . . and driving, of course.

By the way, these little units work MAUVALOUSLY!!! There were flies and misquitoes in abundance where we camped and hiked, but not one mosquito bite on me!!

Somewhere in this forest of trees is a tree my Dad carved his name into when we first moved to Moab. He took us up there once, stood at the top of the mountain, pointed way down to the very bottom and said, "it's right there." And we walked right to it! But we didn't have a camera that day, so Dave and I have tried and tried to find it again to take a picture.

But we are starting to think it's one of these downed trees :(

We separated so we could cover more area, and I kept getting caught sitting on a log reading my K-7 how-to book. I am a quick thinker, though. I just told Dave I was faster than him, I could cover more area than he did, and I was just waiting for him.

When Dave sat down to rest he wanted me to take a picture of him. When we got home and he saw the picture, he said, "That's a pretty good picture of me, don't you think?" I said, "It would be if you had smiled in it." He said, "I AM smiling." So here you are ~ a picture of Dave . . . smiling.

We did find a "True Love Tree". So we carved our names in that one so someday our kids can hike to the very bottom of a mountain ravine and traipse around trying to find it.

In case you can't tell, these trees started out as two and grew into one ♥♥♥♥ Just like Dave and I did.

This tree we dubbed The Love Seat Tree. Pay no attention to that somber man sitting beside me. He thinks he is smiling.

I was also able to work on my '"smooth water" picture taking ability. Here are a couple that turned out pretty good!

My new K 7 has a shake reduction system built into the camera body. It works pretty good. These are both hand held shots.

It was a fun camping trip, I learned a lot about my new camera, and Dave found the skull from some dead animal to bring home. So, even if we DIDN'T find the tree we were looking for, we still had an eventful time. The End.

A Wedding Continued . . .

Here are a few more pictures of the cutely (which is the marriage of two words, cute and newly) married couple I got to take pictures of.

This is one Kimbrey expertly photoshopped. Isn't it enchanting?

This one is moments after they exited the Temple. Do they look happy or what?

And just a cute shot of a cute couple.

The beautiful cake and the cutting of the beautiful cake . . .

Now that a few days have gone by and the stress is gone, it was kind of fun to do. And it inspired me to finally upgrade my camera. Because that's what Dave wants for Father's Day. For me to get a new camera. Really. He told me so himself. What a great guy, huh?

A Wedding . . .

When my friend Danny asked me to take pictures at his son's wedding, it was the closest I have ever come to saying no to something. But I just couldn't do it ~ say no, I mean. So, after making it clear that I was NOT charging for the photography, but "You get what you pay for!" And after he told me that I only needed to take six pictures, and if ONE of them looked good I was fine, I consented to be their wedding photographer. Considering that I don't have the right equipment, the right knowledge, and the pictures were going to be taken at 11:30 AM when the sun is at it's worst AND I would be photographing a girl in a white dress standing next to a white Temple, I was really, really, really nervous.

But now that it's over, it was kind of fun, and some of the pictures turned out not too bad. After having gone through only one of four memory cards, here are a few of my favorite so far . . .


Whew!! I don't think I ever want to do that again.

These Fergalicious Shoes

Last fall when Marie-Laure, our French guest was staying with us, she and I went shopping in Grand Junction. They were having one of their BOGO sales at Famous Footwear and I convinced Marie-Laure that if she would let me buy her some shoes, I could get some for half price. Great reasoning on my part, don't you think? So cute, hip, stylish, 19 year old Marie Laure picked out these shoes . . . Fergalicious brand ~ and although I knew a little about Fergie the rap singer, but only because Marie-Laure was living with us, I had no idea these shoes were hers, too. So, I started looking around the store for some shoes for ME! Now, shopping with Marie Laure always went something like this. Me, "Marie-Laure, look at this. Isn't this cute?" Marie-Laure, ( with a French accent) "Pfff, is for old person." Me, "How can it be for an old person? We we are in the juniors section of the store." Marie-Laure, shrugging, "If you waannt!" And that would be my cue to put whatever I thought was cute back and walk away. Looking for shoes was no different, so when Marie-Laure suggested I just get another pair of the same shoes she picked out so we could have matching shoes, I followed her suggestion. That was last fall, and since then I have become just a little bit obsessed with these shoes!! They are cute, comfortable, cool, you don't have to bend over to tie them, and every day when I'm getting dressed I look in my closet at my millions of pairs of shoes and inevitably I pull these out and wear them. They have become by far my most favorite pair of shoes. Ever. So today when I slipped them on my feet yet once again and realized they were starting to . . . . wear out ~ YIKES!!! I jumped on line to try and find another pair JUST LIKE THEM. I didn't find another pair in my size :( but I did find a review several people had written about my shoes, so I read the reviews just to see if these people loved my shoes as much as I do. One of those reviews went like this: "I really love these shoes, although my husband says I am too old to wear them (I am 27)" . . . . Wow! If she only knew.

Hunter Canyon: A New Hike and a New Arch

We did not wait long to introduce Brody to our world of hiking. Today we ventured out on a short hike, the first of many for him I'm sure. The desert was in full bloom . . .

and the weather was finally warm, so we decided to try Hunter Canyon . . . . because there was an arch about 1/2 mile up the trail and, seeing as how we were hiking with a one month old baby, and a girl who had given birth just one month ago, we needed a landmark to stop at, sit down, and evaluate whether we should continue on, or ooohh and ahhhh at the beautiful arch, turn around and go home.

I did mountain climb like a goat up to Hunter Arch to get pictures, but those will come later, because getting those pictures is a story all on it's own. By the way Michelle, we found another arch for you! Anyway, there really is a reason my face is so red in this picture.

But today's story involves a little boy and two bigger little boys who stayed behind to throw rocks in the water while Dave and I climbed up to the arch.

Throw rocks and revel in the enormous splash they made. Look closely and you can see the look of utter delight on Brennan's face. And the splash marks all over the rocks.

See, the way to tell the size of the boy is by size of his rock, and let me tell you, the rocks just got bigger and bigger . . . .

And so did the splashes :)

Should I be worried that my family finds joy in such simple things?

It's Been Quite A Week . . . Or Two!

Nearly two weeks ago I jumped in my car and headed "up north" to help Chase welcome this little guy into the world.

My role in the whole labor and delivery process was a different one this time around. Where I was part of Kimbrey's sub-support team when Chase was born, when Brody entered the world Chase and I were home playing. And although being there to watch Chase enter this world was wonderful, watching my daughter sick and in pain was not. So being home playing with Chase was much more pleasant for me. Here are Chase and Drew building pinewood derby cars.

No, Drew has not reverted back to his eight year old self. The young adult ward here was having their own pinewood derby. For Family Home Evening. And Drew cut a big hunk off the end of his car in order to make it Corvettish. That cut off piece was Chase's pinewood derby car. Later that night when we were outside Chase found a hunk of wood, picked it up, held it up for me to see and said, "Car!" I'm afraid we've completely confused him. It was a fun couple of days hangin' out, just me and Chase.

Then this guy came home. Icing on the cake!

On Friday Dave pretty badly wanted to exploit his grandsons for political gain by taking them to Governor Herbert's birthday bash at Hogal Zoo, but the bash didn't start until 5:00 and Aiden, who had come to see the baby with his Momma, had a long drive home, so we took the boys to the Children's Museum.

Chase is a little bit fanatic about hoses. He loves them! Whenever he sees a hose of any kind, he "needs" to touch it, or if he can't touch it, tickle it. Or if he can't tickle it, just longingly look at it. The Children's Museum was hose heaven for Chase.

Hoses, hoses, everywhere. What is a two year old lover of hoses to do? Play with them, of course!

Here he is checking the chickens for eggs ;)

And here is one of Aiden on his construction equipment. See how in to it you have to get? Even screwing up your mouth helps get the job done. Yes, were a fun group while we were there, but there were a couple of sad boys when we left.

Waiting . . . Waiting . . . PAYOFF!!!

Celebration time. Brennan just scored a full tuition scholarship to USU. He had been nervously awaiting word that seemed a long time coming, but it came today!!!

It came while he was out, and being used to just opening his mail without thinking. . . because most of it comes to my house . . . I opened his notification letter, so I knew before before he did. Which was a good thing.

Because it gave me time to set up this celebration!! Congratulation to our soon to be Aggie. I wish they had made the scholarship conditional upon his getting his hair cut! Maybe I'll have to talk to them about that . . . .