July Heat 2008 - first half...

Isn't she an angel? My cute cousin Shawni took this shot.

July has been a WAY fun and HOT month! We started it out with an AWESOME 4th of July weekend. My cousin Ben and his wife were in town with their kids, so we went to a neighborhood pancake breakfast with them. There was an awesome and HUGE slip & slide set up for the kids. I didn't go down it, but my cousin and his kids did, and it looked pretty dang fun. Later that evening I played in a quartet for a wedding up in Heber(who gets married on the 4th of July?) and then we headed up to Sam's cabin. While I was playing at the wedding Sam went to the store to get ingredients for home-made ice-cream, and he locked his keys in the car. There he was with a hungry, screaming child and his keys locked in the car.....but luckily the police were able to help him get in quickly and everything was ok. So, we didn't get to see any fireworks on the 4th, but we had a very nice evening at the cabin. On the 5th Sam's family joined us at the cabin, and we spent the day relaxing, horse-back riding, and eating an awesome BBQ. And the highlight was attending the Oakley Rodeo that night, where we got our fireworks show. LucyMae is such a good little baby - putting up with us taking her to the Rodeo and all the noise.



The next day was Sunday, May 6th, so we chose to bless LucyMae. Sam gave a beautiful blessing and then we had family and a few friends over to our house for some light dinner. LucyMae and her cousin, Clark, were actually blessed on the same day. It was kind of a crazy day between making it to Tenille and Paul's meeting in the morning, getting the food ready, and going to our own meetings. But it was a great day and LucyMae was so good and quiet during her blessing, and pretty much the rest of the day!

We are grateful for the Bee's and Harmon's who make it possible to attend baseball games on certain Monday nights for only $3/person. Most of Sam's family came up from Orem to attend a game with us on the 7th. LucyMae was a little angel again....and everybody loved having another chance to hold her. She has been starting to make some pretty funny faces as you can see below.


I am in the Young Women's presidency now, as 2nd counselor, so I got to go to part of this year's version of "Rough Out Camp". It was on the ward level this year, and our tri-ward chose to go to someone's cabin up in Midway....fun, but not really roughing it! I only went for one of the 2 days because I have LucyMae, but she was a little angel for that as well! All the young women loved getting a turn to hold her. She was the life of the party.

When Robyn Barker comes in town she ALWAYS gets all of us high school buddies together again for some sort of gathering. She is wonderful! This time we had an awesome BBQ in her backyard, and there was a pretty good turnout of people too! It is always so fun to see everybody. We tend to get so busy and wrapped up in our own crazy lives that we hardly ever see each other....so thanks to Robyn for always bringing us together.


My cousins Ben and Noah come in town every summer for a conference for the company they work for. It is such a great excuse to get to see them every year. Noah was only able to stop by for a few minutes, but he got some GREAT BIG smiles out of LucyMae. He and Kristi just had their own little girl named Lyla.


LucyMae has been getting more and more fun and responsive. It is so fun to just snap shot after shot of her and see all of her different facial expressions. And she and we have been so lucky to live SO CLOSE to family. My sisters and brother are over almost every day to play with her, and I get a little free-time to get some things done.

We are determined that LucyMae is going to love the outdoors. We went up the canyon for an evening bon-fire and roasted marshmallows with some of my siblings. She had a great time. So far our plan seems to be working because whenever she gets fussy all we have to do is go walk around outside or sit on our porch-swing and she calms right down.

We also spent a couple of days, during one of Sam's weeks off, up in Teton National Park. It was our first camping experience with LucyMae, and again she did really well. It was a little harder to feed her in the middle of the night, being in a tent and all. We spent the first night camping at Colter Bay. It was GORGEOUS! The next day we found another campsite at Signal Mountain because Jenny Lake filled up at 9:30am! Oh well, it was a great campsite. Then we spent the day hiking up at Phelps Lake (which is where Rockefeller's private ranch was, but he willed it back to the park service and the hike to Phelps Lake is much easier and shorter now...because a new route is available to the public). LucyMae loved just riding along in the Baby Bjorn. We went to the famous jumping rock and had a great time. Sam took a pretty amazing picture of me jumping that really shows how amazingly beautiful it is up at Phelps Lake. If you haven't been there, you should definitely go! The water is cold, but definitely worth it!



On our way home from Jackson Hole we stopped off at Bear Lake for 2 days. My mom and her husband, Don, have a fun cabin up there. Sam's brother and his wife, Andy and Amy, met us up there. And my sister's family, Brittani and Aaron, stopped at Bear Lake on their way down from Canada for a visit. It was a big, fun party up at Bear Lake. We got some fun water-skiing in, some beach knee-boarding, a little sun-soaking, and a wicked game of volleyball. We bought a life-jacket for LucyMae, just so we would have one. We didn't take her in the boat yet, but she sure looks cute in it, even though it's still pretty big.

Before Brittani and Aaron headed to Denmark for a little vacation and work, we had a fun evening at a pool. I started having too much fun with the camera and all of them jumping off the diving board. All the little kids at the pool were mesmerized by Sam and his tricks off the diving board, as you can see in the pictures. By the time I had gotten the camera out, I had to get out of the pool and feed LucyMae. It is interesting how OK I am with missing out on SOME of the fun now that I have a baby. It's just the way it is and I am totally ok with it. But everybody else had fun trying to do crazy things for my camera. Watch the slide-show.

July was a GREAT month for friend get-togethers. We had another one at Andrea and Abe's house on the 22nd. Jill Hunter was in town and it was SO good to see her. I haven't seen her in at least a year. I just love all my high school girlfriends. I sure wish we could get together more often.....my fault for never arranging any of the get togethers...I think I am about to turn over a new leaf!


So, I have become a picture-crazy mom. I can't believe how many pictures I took this month. I am going to do another post altogether to finish up the month. Life is just getting more and more fun.

OUR BIG NEWS:
Sam has been accepted to the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology for his master's in Biomedical Engineering. He has secured a research assistantship and a 2/3 tuition scholarship. We have made arrangements to defer until next semester however. So, we will be moving to Rapid City, South Dakota at the beginning of January! Crazy! We are so excited to be moving, but also so excited to be able to stay for a few more months. Rapid City is supposed to be totally beautiful, with the Black Hills and the Badlands right there. We will finally get to see Mount Rushmore. So, anyone who has never seen Mount Rushmore and wants to check it off of their list of things to see in the United States, you will now have a free place to stay! We will LOVE having visitors, so please don't forget about us once we move.