That is a HUGE baby.

Wow! What a swell trip! You might wonder how driving 12 hours to stay in sweltering 110 degree weather, only to turn around and drive 12 hours home the next day, could be worthwhile? Well, I'll tell you. You take your favorite people in the world, throw in a little Tia Rosa's, take a trip to the temple, visit the Visitor Center with its soon-to-be marvelous Sister missionary, celebrate your favorite hairdresser's birthday, drive to Surprise to see your hero in life, see a big baby, and listen with pride (the my-son-just-earned-his-Eagle-Scout-award kind) to your good amiga's "farewell" talk in church, mix it all up real well and cook in the sun and you do have a great trip! Add for garnish, a slightly creepy hotel, Crack the Case, catching up with old friends, a healthy dose of Glee, and a microphone from your Wendy's kids meal, and, well, who could ask for anything more? I think canoeing to class might be the only thing that could've made it better. . . . and possibly another meal at Tia Rosa's.

Don't we look happy?


Jess loves to give her hair to the birds, as Angela points out here.

Sister McKenna showing off her future mish!

The Mesa temple is so awesome!


That is a huge baby!

I love us.
The drive? not so bad really. :)

Some Random Fo Toes

I came across these random pictures which I thought were fun. Here I am with my family at Conference. This last General Conference was so awesome. I got to go to the Conference Center for two sessions- beautiful sessions! Here I am with my familia. We're all squinty because we just emerged from the darkness and it was glaringly bright outside.


I love love love this pic. These are my absolute favorite people. And why do we look so happy? Most especially because we got to have dinner together and enjoy one another's company for one of the last times before everyone started moving away to the far reaches of the world!I'm quite proud of this pic. I was a little nervous that I might roll right off that thing. That was a fun ride, up Temple Fork.
Another great shot of us in our biking head gear. I can't imagine why I didn't post this before. Maybe I felt like this wasn't my most photogenic moment...

Castle Climbing and City

What's better than climbing? Nothing.

Except maybe climbing with people as stellar in character and ability as Emma and Brent. And what's even better than climbing with stellar Emma and Brent??

Answer: climbing with stellar Emma and Brent at Castle! that's what!

The photos you have before you are meager evidence of a truly stupendous week of Climbing in Idaho. It was a week of firsts for me. My first time ever climbing trad (yikes!), my first time on a multi-pitch climb (and I seriously doubt I'll ever convince Emma to go with me again :) ) AND, it was my first time reaching into a hand hold and latching onto a bat!! Unsure how to move past that part of the climb without using the aforementioned hold, I clung to the rock, and stared at that dark little hole until the mammal emerged. He sat there at the mouth of his miniature cave, looking at me and shaking all over. I didn't know whether to interpret the direct eye contact and shaking as fear, or rage. I was contemplating my options, when after nearly two minutes of the two of us gridlocked in a staring contest, he flew suddenly at my head and frantically flapped around in front of my face before flying off. No doubt as the third human to stuff their hand into his home, I was the last straw for the little guy. I'm a little proud that I didn't fall off the climb.


Here are me and Brent on a trad climb.
One of the cams was stuck purty darn good. I had to take a picture as a memento when I finally pulled it out!

I like this picture of Brent. I think he looks stoic. Brent is pretty much my hero. Not only is he an incredible climber, but he's extremely patient with posers like me. We get to climb harder stuff when Brent's around to set all of our climbs for us! :)

There were wildflowers everywhere and it was SO green. It was ridiculously pretty.Me and Emma smiling on top of Big Time. Emma may disagree, but I thought this climb was a blast. The polished limestone we have in Logan can start to get kinda old after a while. But this was true friction climbing for 5 pitches! A VERY different deal, and totally worthwhile.
Haha! Do I look hard core?
Brent taking on a roof.
Emma climbing like a champ. Here she is, climbing with a confidence and finesse well beyond my abilites.
Brent climbing.
Emma on a crazy hard, crazy fun route! This was probably our favorite discovery of the entire trip! A short way up this climb all the features disappear and all you've got to work with besides very vertical very smooth rock face are some tiny flakes, about as deep as halve a finger width. With concentrated effort you can inch up to said flakes and do some pullups, smearing your feet, to more tiny flakes above. If you ever go to Castle, check out the Gully.

We also found some fun climbing in City of Rocks, got to relax in the hot springs, and cooked gourmet burgers over the campfire, and spotted weasel! (I've never seen a weasel in the wild before.) Who could ask for anything more?