Wow, what a week!

Well we have piled most of our summer vacations into the past 10 days. We've had a blast, but I'm so happy to be home and back to my routine. I am going to attempt to document our trips in chronological order, but I'm still trying to get the hang of moving pictures around after they're downloaded, so we'll see how it goes.

Our first destination was Vail, Colorado. Mitch's sister EmRee lives there and her 2 twin girls were getting baptized. The whole family (all 6 kids, spouses, and 19 grandkids) made the trek to Vail to hold the first Moncur family reunion. It was a HUGE success!

We made a little stop in Moab on our way to Vail. Having grown up in St. George, I cannot believe I have never been to Moab, it's super cool! Now I know why my roommate Christine is obsessed with Moab! We stayed at this little cabin/RV park where we swam (Marin's favorite parts of our trips all revolve around water... she's obsessed with swimming we have found and she's not a bit afraid of the water. Scary, I know). We hiked to the delicate arch, ate at Zac's Pizza, and then left at 5 a.m. the next morning for Vail.

As a teenager, I probably would have thought this was lame. Now that I am older (and MUCH more mature) I appreciated how amazing this phenomenon of nature is. It is HUGE!


We arrived in Vail Sunday morning, made it through church, and then we got to see where we'd be staying. A man in EmRee's ward was able to get us some condos up at Beaver Creek to stay in and they were LUXURIOUS! Vail, Colorado is a pretty upscale ski resort town. It's very much like Aspen, as in "A little place called Asssspen...where the beer flows like wine and the women flock like the salmon of Capastrana..." (from "Dumb and Dumber" if you're not familiar with one of my favorite lines). Anyway, we were right up at the ski resort and it was amazing. There were pools, spas, gyms, shops, and my personal favorite-- free hot chocolate stations. Here is a picture of our lodgings for the week:


And one of the best things was seeing the wildlife right outside our window every day!

Yes, that is a black bear with her 2 tiny cubs!

Vail really is a neat town. You have to park in a parking garage and then walk into the town. There are a ton of amazing shops and the landscaping is so beautiful. This is Marin's grandma, Marin, and me walking around the shops.


There were a bunch of little fountains for Marin to play in. Right after I took this picture, she face planted and got her clothes sopping wet. Luckily, I found a restroom with a hand dryer and was able to dry her clothes!


We walked to this fun park that was just a big pirate ship. The kids had a blast and we even managed to get all 19 of them in a picture. Marin is the one in the stroller. She wouldn't get out of the stroller for anything.








We went to another little park that Marin loved. She had a blast!



We went on some paddle boats


And floated sticks and dandelions down the river


The adults (or the girls, I should say) got some great shopping in too. We also had access to the Park Hyatt's gym and spa. Nicole, Jana, and I kicked some butt at the nicest gym I have ever been to!

Anna and Allie's (my two twin nieces) baptism was so nice. They are the cutest little happy girls you'll ever meet. Mitch's sister EmRee (3rd from the left on the back row) made the whole event so fun and the fact that she prepared awesome meals for all 33 of us all week was amazing. It was so fun to have the whole family together. Here is a picture of Mitch's cute red-headed family at the baptism.


Would my husband let us just drive home after all this excitement? No way! Since he (and his brothers) are the ultimate sportsmen and love to play more than anyone I know, Mitch planned to head back to Moab with his brother and bike the slickrock trail. They left after the baptism, arrived in Moab at 1:00 a.m., then woke up at 5:00 a.m. to bike. His brother's wife Alisa and I stayed behind in Vail for the night, then picked them up in Moab and proceeded to drive back to Utah. Marin was a champion in the car, driving for 9 hours in 1 day! Here are a few pictures of the bikers:


At 6:00 p.m. on Thursday night, we finally got home! Did we kick back and relax at that point? No! Mitch and I had a cruise to pack for! We drove to the airport Friday morning at 6:30 a.m. It was Mitch's firm's 60th anniversary, so they took all 50 employees and their spouses on a cruise to Mexico! We had an absolute blast! Mitch works with wonderful people so we couldn't have picked a greater group to go with. We took a total of 7 pictures of the whole event (you're probably thinking that's great because this has been the longest posting ever). We're not used to taking pictures without Marin in them! Anyway, we did tons of fun things, ate lots (way too much!) good food, and got a lot of sun. Thanks mom for watching Marin the whole time for us! We had a blast! Here is a sampling of the few pictures we did take:


All in all it was a great 10 days!