This Summer; An Update

So, this summer has been way busy! It started out the good kind of busy, full of fun and activities and trips and things... and then turned into work busy for the past like two months. Eesh. But nevertheless, it has been a great summer! And while I'm sad to speak of it in the past tense, I am getting very excited for the months to come. I love fall!

But anyway, since I haven't blogged at all about summer, here's a "quick" photo update. (I'm using the term "quick" loosely... this could get long...)

First, to kick off summer right, we went to the Happiest Place on Earth for 10 days! And stayed with Alysse and Chasten. And it was magical. There are a ton of pictures, but they've already been transferred off of this computer and onto the external hard drive, and honestly I am just way too lazy to go get it, and besides, they're already posted on facebook so... you can go look here if you want. There are a few that are still on this computer though, so I'll just post this one...

Amour.

Besides that trip, this summer has been made up of a lot of hiking...

Hiking to Battlecreek falls with Sean's sister Rebecca and kids. Here Sean and Dash are setting the pace.

At the falls...

Rebecca and Miley.

Such cute kids!

And we also did a lot of rock climbing!

Sean is very excited about rock climbing. Actually, excited is a huge understatement.

Starting to climb. This boulder in AF canyon was pretty tough...

... and pretty tall. Did you know bouldering means you don't have a rope? You just have a crash pad and a spotter and the routes aren't as tall. Except I still feel like this is pretty tall...

Me and my new rock climbing shoes. I like them quite a bit. I am smiling on the outside but am terrified on the inside because I have never just bouldered before (well, outside) and this one does not look easy. Turns out, it was not, and I made it maybe, um, five feet?

...But I am actually glad I didn't make it to the top, because once you do, your reward is to jump from the top onto this tree/log situation and shimmy your way down. This is like a good 30-40 feet up at this point. Um, call me a sissy pants, but no thanks. Sean of course made it to the top though, and managed to make it down in true non-sissy form.

This is at Maple Canyon, which we went to quite a bit this summer because we LOVE it! I just didn't bring my camera when it was just us two because, well, it's not a great idea to take pictures when you're belaying... We also went to Rock Canyon, but again, no pictures from that either.

There was the annual Thomas Family Reunion, complete with golf, shooting, duck races and rocket launching... Again, same situation as the Florida pictures, so click above to get to facebook if you so desire.

There were Fourth of July festivities! And again, a lot of fun with glow sticks (and my camera) this year.

Then there was a trip to Saint George/Vegas/Zion's with my fam:

I think this was called the Weeping Wall...

Little Mermaid at Tuacahn-- so cute!

Your family doesn't sacrifice a family member each vacation? Huh. Weird.

My family. :)

Some family rock climbing at Maple Canyon on the way home.

I'm pretty good at belaying.

Oh, there was a weekend camping/geode-hunting trip out by Dugway in the deserts west of Utah lake with David & Tami and nieces and nephews...

And also a road trip out to Colorado to see my good friend Sierra's wedding. Sadly, I don't have like any pictures of that though...


Well, those are some highlights of our summer anyway, me and blogger are fighting so I'm going to quit before I freak out. But one last thing to add...  there's a new member of our family! And his name is Ron Burgundy. Behold...

(Not our actual bike, but it pretty much looks like this. Only we have the extra seat on the back instead of the trunk right now and we ended up taking the windshield off.)

It's an oldie but a goodie that is supposed to run forever.  (It's a 1983 Honda GL650 Silverwing, so it's older than both me and Sean, kinda funny.) We were thinking about just getting a scooter but... for the same price, we're getting a lot more bang for our buck here. And it doesn't hurt that motorcycles are just a tad bit cooler than scooters...

So everyone, watch out for motorcycles out there!