Disneyland With JayRad and Spam!!

Can I just start by saying that this trip was a LONGGGGG time coming?! We have been planning it since February of last year and we finally made it happen at the end of September. That was a long countdown (Trust me, I almost made a paper chain of days but figured it would be depressing).

We had been talking about a "friend" trip to Disneyland for almost our entire marriage so it was so fun to have it finally come together!

We left the day after my birthday around 11 to make the trek. Jared and Sam offered to drive since they have the most fuel efficient car. It was definitely good on gas mileage but it was definitely a bit cramped. We pulled out of their driveway after we had loaded everything up and the bottom of the car scraped on the cement. Nice. I bet we had 800 lbs of people and STUFF loaded in there. Good thing we are such cool people though or the drive would have sucked. We had a blast chatting, napping, and eating our road trip goodies.

We stopped in St. George for some lunch at Chick-Fil-A and then continued our adventure. We had to play lots of random car games but it went by fairly quickly. We pulled into the hotel late Thursday night and completely zonked out. We woke up FIRST THING the next morning to make sure we got to Disneyland/California Adventure when they first opened.

We thought about trying out our luck for a Radiator Springs Fast Pass, but the line was SSOOO long so we decided to just try getting on in the single riders line. We only waited for maybe 15 minutes and got on! We ended up utilizing the Fast Pass system for other rides, but the single riders line treated us very well both of those days. We almost always lucked out and got on in couples so we didn't have to ride with all strangers.

We enjoyed Dole Pineapple whips, Mickey beignets, and other goodies. We packed our own lunches to save some money which ended up being a really good idea. We ate dinner at the park both nights, which wasn't TOO expensive, but it was worth it to save where we could.

Both days we were there from 9AM until the Disneyland closed at midnight. It made for REALLY long days, but we sure did get our money's worth. We were able to get on every single ride we wanted to several times. The longest line we waited in was for the Haunted Mansion (which was decorated for Halloween, and it was about 40-45 mins. September is a really awesome time to go! The weather was a PERFECT 70 ish degrees, the lines were pretty short, and it's decorated for Halloween which was super cool.

Another thing I want to remember about the trip was Riley's sunglasses getting lost. He brought them with us the first day in my backpack, but it ended up being pretty overcast most of the day so he didn't use them. He remembered seeing them in between California Adventure and Disneyland, but when we went to leave the next day, they were nowhere to be found. The backpack we were using has kind've flimsy straps keeping items in the front pockets so we determined that his glasses and the case must have fallen out on a ride somehow. It put a huge damper on Riley's spirits because they are his favorite pair. Not to mention they're Ray Bans so they were almost $200 glasses. Nice. Before going into Disneyland for the day we decided we would try our luck at the lost and found. Riley had pretty much already told himself he could kiss the glasses goodbye, because what were the chances of them being returned? The odds were pretty astronomical, but I talked him into checking JUST to be sure. Well, long story short when we went to guest services the lady was able to find them! We could NOT believe it!! I thought Riley was going to cry tears of happiness over someone's honesty. She had no idea when, where, or how they had been found but they were still inside the case in perfect condition! The case was a bit scratched up (probably from falling around on a ride or something) but the sunglasses were there. Needless to say the trip was made!

Now for the fun part... a few pictures!!







Before the "It's a Bug's Life" show! Riley and I were so excited to take Jared and Sam to see this show, since they'd never been. Didn't disappoint, it's always so cute!

Here is one from Splash Mountain. We rode this ride like 15+ times. Totally worth it. (Also, a few of our pictures from this ride "Washed Away". I'm pretty sure they didn't like our poses... HA!)

This photo was taken on one of the two times we broke down on Indiana Jones. Luckily we were at the VERY end of the ride, so when they had to turn the lights on it didn't take away any of the mystery. I was thankful for that because Indiana Jones is my hands down FAVORITE ride. (We also rode on this one like 10 times). We missed our Fast Pass time for Radiator Springs the second day sitting on Indiana Jones, but luckily when we told the ride operators they were nice enough to call over and make sure we got on.

Sidenote: We also broke down on the Tower of Terror. Which really was horrifying, because I was sure we would plummet to our deaths. We had the worst luck with rides, I swear!

The boys were in absolute heaven in Cars Land.

Please notice their matching outfits. Spam and I call them "Thing 1 and Thing 2" for a reason... Here is our favorite part of the trip: the ride photos.





















As you can tell we had an awesome time. We really lucked out with some good friends who put up with our crazy. (And are pretty weird themselves!)

The countdown to our next trip will begin soon enough!

Camping in the Uintas-W/Friends from the Ward!

I had a three day weekend in August which almost never happens. We decided we needed to make the best of it and take a camping trip before the weather got too cold. As always summer went by WAY too fast. I realized today that we never got to go out boating! Sad!

We were originally going to go camp up at Smith and Moorehouse Reservoir (we really like that place), but we got talking to the Sorenson's from the ward who told us they were also going and already had a spot saved. They invited us to tag along and since more people is always better, we accepted their offer. We ended up going with Jordan and Alyssa (who slept in the trailer with us), the Sorenson family, and the Owen's family who are also in our ward.

It was pretty much just a weekend full of riding the RZR! The weather stayed nice most of the time, although we did get rained on for a bit. The Uintas are BEAUTIFUL so the scenery was amazing.

Of course it's never a complete camping trip without something going wrong! We realized we had a flat tire in the truck once we got up there. Luckily we were at a place where the boys could swap in the spare!







The Hendrick's

Us!

The Sorenson's

The Owen's

My Hottie Husband :)

Everyone from our "Adult Ride"

Our little family!

The friggin' cliffs of INSANITY. For real. This drop off was huge. Gave me anxiety when Riley insisted on standing at the edge and throwing huge rocks down. Really cool view though!

Riley standing at the edge watching the boulders fall down. I know I tend to exaggerate (mostly because I have no concept of height), but Riley agreed in thinking the drop off this ledge was 1000+ ft. I wish there was a way to show just how crazy of a drop it was.

We had a great time! It's always fun to get out and get dirty camping. Makes you appreciate your shower that much more when you get home!

Utah is such a cool place to live! We have TONS of beautiful places right in our own backyard. We love exploring and finding new adventures.

Jackson Hole 2013

This past July we were able to go for entire week up to run the Snake River and go camping! It was a blast and I'm so happy that Riley and I were both able to get the time off from work to be there. Our friends Mike and Alicia Sly were able to come up for a few of the days, too, so we had a really great time!

The very first day it was just Riley's parents and us, and the rest of the family would join us the next day. We drove and set up camp, then met up with the Sorenson family from our ward who was staying in Alpine for a family reunion. We brought up the RZR so we could do some riding with them before we did rode the river. I'm sure it's evident by the pictures but man was it DUSTY!



The Sorenson's are an amazing family and we were so happy to have the chance to meet up with them for the ride!

Here is a recap of the rest of the trip in pictures:

The Snake River truly is a beautiful thing. All the trees are amazing and the air is so fresh! The water is always chilly, but totally worth it.















Alicia was excited to have survived their first run!!

We made this fire all by ourselves! Built the log cabin and everything. Can't say girls never did anything ;)

On this particular run the raft was a bit under-inflated. As evidenced by the "raft taco" you see here.



Mike quite enjoyed eating his donuts inside two chips.

This picture has quite the story behind it. On this run we were about halfway down (but before we hit any rapids) with Wes guiding us. Riley looked over and noticed that his dad didn't have a life jacket on. The second he realized he had inadvertently left it on the boat, the whole demeanor of the run changed. We went from having the objective to hit every rapid head on to trying to miss them so we could get him safely back. The whole run was filmed on the GoPro, and the reaction Wes had when realizing he didn't have his jacket was pretty priceless. It was scary but luckily we made it down without any incident. Therefore, if we all look pretty terrified in this picture, that's why...





A few random tidbits about the trip:

-This was the first time in all the years of going that we were able to float the WHOLE river. Usually you drop in and get out at the same places because the bottom half of the river has some INSANE rapids and the lake levels are really high. Well this year the river levels were high and the lake levels were low, making it possible for us to float down the last section. We hit some HUGE rapids and saw some awesome scenery. Very cool experience.
-We ate elk steaks, omelets in a bag, pancakes, tin foil dinners, and an unhealthy amount of assorted cobblers. Delish.
-We played cards for countless hours before going to bed.
-We figured out how to take delayed pictures with my camera while writing our names in the air with glow sticks. Happiness ensued.
-We spent Sunday up in Jackson, where we bought ice cream and meandered around the little shops.
-We love making this annual trip a tradition, even if it means not being home to celebrate Riley's ACTUAL birthday.

4th of July 2013

Don't worry, I'm only four months behind on my posts!

On the evening of the 3rd we went to Centerville Elementary and watched the fireworks show there. They always put on a decent show, but it's never quite the same as Davis High's show!





Check out this cheeser! What a cute little face he has.




Odin absolutely LOVES his Uncle Riley. He calls him "Ya-Ya" and it's the cutest thing in the world. PS-My husband is pretty handsome, if I do say so myself. But for real, look at that smile.

For the actual 4th we were able to attend the Centerville Parade. We sat on Riley's parents front lawn and watched all the fun floats and collected tons of candy (mainly taffy, but I love it so I'm not complaining).









This photo was my attempt to get a decent sibling shot. You can see how well that turned out. This was actually the best of the 2 dozen others that I took, if you can believe it :) After the parade we made our way down to the carnival and ate some delicious snow cones. We also watched the police auction for a few minutes before heading back to set up the slip n slide.

We shared some special bonding moments....



After we had thoroughly exhausted ourselves running up and down the yard on the slide, we went home to clean up for the fireworks show. It's a tradition to go to Davis' show and have our special spot. We were disappointed this year to find that they had blocked off our "spot" because apparently they thought it was in a shrapnel zone or something. So...we had to find a different place to sit. It wasn't as awesome as in years past because we didn't get to sit as close, but it was still a good time!!



We drove the Wrangler to the fireworks, so of course we had a fun ride back home. These pictures were taken BEFORE we got mooned by some chubby kid at the light next to us...That was pretty awesome. I can't even imagine what our faces looked like AFTER that lovely event.





Needless to say we had a pretty eventful Fourth of July. It was packed full of food, family, friends, and lots of fun. We're so blessed to live in such an amazing FREE country.