Yellowstone 2009

We went for a quick trip to Yellowstone on Friday and Saturday. It was a lot of driving, but so much fun. Mitch grew up in a little town about 2 hours east of the east entrance to Yellowstone, so he has lots of great memories there and wanted to start Marin young! I can't get over how beautiful it is every time I go. We met Mitch's parents and grandparents there and had a great time. Here are a few (okay, many) pictures:



Marin was so happy to be with her "Grandma at Oming" (grandma from Wyoming)


Hmm, looks like I could have used a couple bobby-pins...


This is what Kate did the entire time-- munched on her hands and slimed herself with spit. She was such a good little thing the whole day!


How about this for a picnic area? The lake is so pretty!


Marin looks a little nervous because Mitch told her this was the Dragon's Mouth and she was sure there was a real dragon in there (oh, and maybe because I'm hanging her over the edge above boiling water... he he not really, but that's what this picture looks like!)


And, don't forget Old Faithful. Marin wouldn't look at the camera. In fact, it looks like we were all a little tired at this point.

The girls did great, had a great time, and so did I! We love Yellowstone!

Boo Yah

I learned 3 very important things at the gym this morning:

1. There are not a lot of viewing options on any channel at 6 a.m.
2. "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" and "Saved by the Bell" are, in fact, still in syndication.
3. I still know every single word to the opening songs of both of these shows.

To use a phrase that was popular when I watched both of these shows faithfully--- Boo Yah!!!

July 4th

This year for the 4th of July we decided not to travel anywhere and see what Logan has to offer in the way of Independence Day festivities. We were not disappointed. I love that July 4 was a Saturday so Mitch got Friday off of work too. On Thursday night we went to the Hyrum City fireworks. They were just Marin's style...short and sweet. Every single time a firework would go off she'd yell, "Oh mom! Beautiful! That's a [insert color of firework] one!" She loved them. Then the next day, our neighbors invited us to go along with them and try out their new sweet boat! Marin loved every second of it, she is seriously such a water girl. This huge perma-smile was plastered on her face almost the entire time:


Here's Mitch attempting a backside roll:




Ahh, Kate's first time at the lake. Mitch was so proud. She mostly slept :)


Then Mitch took Marin to Logan's fireworks show. He said it was actually a pretty awesome show, but Marin got bored after about 10 minutes and was ready to go home. Mitch made her stick it out to the end though. The next day we went to the Hyrum City parade since Logan is only doing the Cruise-In (car show) parade and I wanted to go to a parade where candy was involved. Sadly, Marin just didn't have that killer instinct I always had when it comes to getting the candy at a parade. She got like 5 pieces and basically ate them as they came. There were some older kids around her that had bags full. Too bad it would have been socially unacceptable for me to be out there shoving the kids out of the way to fill my bag...


Later that night we had a little barbecue at our house with some neighbors and let off a few firecrackers and sparklers, and whew!, that was the end of our celebrations! For some reason this 4th of July, I got a little more sentimental than usual about what a great country we live in and even teared up a bit when the flag passed at the parade and we all stood and put our hands over our hearts. I'm so thankful to live here! Hope you all had a great 4th of July weekend too!