visit from ruby

Richard surprised my mom and flew in for the weekend with Ruby. It was good to see them both, even though Ruby scared the crap out of Landon despite him being twice her size. Don't let this picture fool you, I had to Photoshop this face onto Landon since every time Ruby was near he started crying. They are the closest cousins in age, almost exactly 2 months apart. By the end of their visit Landon had warmed up to Ruby just enough to handle being in the same room as her with out bursting into tears. We miss having Ella and Ruby near by!

sl,ut

Salt Lake, UT. That's right, we finally took our summer vacation! Well, we'll count it as that anyway. Sam's friend got engaged a while back and we really wanted to be at the wedding so I booked some flights to SLC. A couple of weeks before we left Sam decided to call his buddy to find out where the wedding would be held so we could arrange for our hotel to be close by. Little did we know our hotel would be thousands of miles away no matter where in Utah we booked it... the wedding was to be held in Hawaii. OOOOPS! They changed the location and this buddy forgot to share that vital bit of info. No worries, we headed up to Salt Lake anyway (thanks to the "no refund" policy at the airline). Sam's family came up to meet us, which made the weekend great!

This is a White Alligator (i think it's fake, looks like the paint is peeling off)

They had a really cool bird show

We even got to eat at Ruth's!!

The next day we went up to Park City for the art fair, and to shop at the outlets!

saving grace

I'm trying to be good, HOWEVER, I have a disease that makes it very hard. Immediately following any meal, it is absolutely necessary for me to eat something sweet. No matter how full I stuff myself there is ALWAYS room for dessert. I've tried to ignore this craving, but it is simply too strong. Therefor I consider it a disease, and diseases mustn't go untreated. Luckily I have found these little jewels which actually suffice quite nicely. In fact I think they're delicious.

*Beware; there is a close cousin of these little treats out there that are AWFUL! Trust me, stay away from the Rice Cakes!

the big 1

We celebrated Landon's first birthday yesterday. I can't believe my baby is ONE! He is such a joy in our lives, I think we'll keep him around for a while! Here are some pictures of the festivities. (thanks in large part to Posey!)

the dark knight

We, along with some family members ordered our tickets for The Dark Knight; The IMAX Experience months prior to the July 17th midnight showing. We arranged for overnight babysitting, we even arrived at the theatre hours in advance to secure a good seat. You can imagine our disappointment upon arrival to find that amid the 50% full auditorium EVERY seat was "saved", mostly in rows at a time. After confirming with the manager that seat saving was NOT allowed, we sought out the most prime of seats and (all 6 of us) chose to sit down despite the fools that claimed, "those seats were taken". We ignored the name calling and threats that accompanied this action, and after an hour it mostly stopped. We weren't the only ones upset by the ridiculous amount of seats being saved because after we sat down several managers came in and announced the rules. They had to do this a couple of times, because it was really hard to understand that one person CANNOT save an entire row. The movie was awesome, and the crazies who dressed up were almost as good! Who would have thought that the IMAX experience would include a real live blood bath, and special appearance by the "Hulk"!

fangs II

Why does my sweet child look like this lately?

Because he's now growing adult sized molars. TWO of them. I'm starting to think this kid is actually 3yrs old, not 11 months.

mitchell's wedding

One of Sam's best mission buddies got married last week. I had the opportunity to get to know David while we lived in the same basement (for a few weeks) right after Sam and I got married... I know, it's a long story... kind of. Anyway, he was one of Sam's groomsmen in our wedding. Since David's wedding took place in Billings Montana, Sam got to take a road trip with some of his good friends, Chong and Dubois (Matt) from Utah. They rented this really cool car, and even got to sleep in a tent along the way! Knowing Sam, and the 2 other guys in the car I have no doubt that the majority of the conversations over the weekend were most likely "R" rated. I hear the scenery, and the wedding were beautiful! However, nothing compared to the company. Sam has endless stories, of fun stuff with the guys and 2 other couples they met up with there. I am so jealous I didn't get to go. Hopefully we'll get to see most of these guys at the next wedding on our agenda, in August.

* I realize this post would be much more exciting if told from first person perspective. IF Sam ever gets a free moment (highly unlikely) I will have him re-tell the story.