Let Freedom Ring!

(I'm posting things right after another because I have SO much to catch up on. 

Make sure you check out previous posts so you don't miss anything.)

Our 4th of July this year was a little different. Usually, Nate is home so we have a nice breakfast, spend the day doing something fun and out of the ordinary but this year was spent packing up and cleaning from our awesome weekend at Bear Lake. We had to be out of our cabin by 10am so I packed up all our stuff the night before so i'd have time in the morning to help my mother in law get everything else done.  We were able to fit all our STUFF inside the cab of Nate's truck to allow room in the bed of the truck for all the coolers and storage bins we used to cart everything up to the cabin. 

Once we all left, we decided to meet in Salt Lake for lunch.

So, Adam, Tonna, Jess, Justin, Avery, Jordan, Scott, Val, Nate, Hailey, Addy and myself all met at this amazing mexican resterant called The Red Iguana.

Thanks to Adam and Tonna for the referral. It was really great food.

(Hailey looks a little intense in this photo.)

SMILES!

SURF'S UP!

Pretty cute lil' surfers if you ask me.

The Lunch Crew

The three of us with our weird talent:

Touching our noses with our tongue.

Picture taken on Jessica's phone.

The BEST Family Photo ever taken. 

AND the creepiest, thanks to Ben. 

Addy loves her Uncle Ben. A LOT.

After lunch, everyone headed home. When we got to our house, we realized how tired we all were. Nate fell asleep on the couch immediately. I hung out with the girls for a while till it was time to head back up to Scott and Val's to unload the truck and light some fireworks. Addy fell asleep on the way and we had to eventually wake her up. Not even unloading the truck woke her up.

Nate was pretty excited to light off his 'illegal' fireworks this year, since most of them were made legal.

Addy wasn't as excited. She stayed pretty close to grandpa.

Hailey running away from fireworks.

These boys were crazy. They kept tying together firecrackers to make a bigger firecracker. We were sure someone was going to end up in the hospital.

Nate. Spencer. Ben.

Nate running away. Pansy. :-)

Hailey was having a blast with the sparklers, till she got burnt pretty bad and then it wasn't so fun anymore. She grabbed the wrong end at one point when running closer to the house because of big fireworks the boys had lit and it burnt of her skin immediately. It was pretty sad.

But, she had Archie to make her feel better.

This night was amazing. On the drive home from Scott and Vals, it was sprinkling and as we drove on the freeway, the sky was just illuminated with fireworks. I have never seen so many fireworks in Utah County besides when we went to Stadium of Fire in 2006. It was absolutely beautiful. The girls were extremely tired and fell right to sleep when we got home.

Bear Lake Reunion: Day 3

We woke up to another beautiful day at Bear Lake. Everyone was hustling around getting ready for the day. Some were going to church, some were just having a relaxing day down by the beach. Either way, it was a little chaotic.  Eric had put together some family history information and before we all headed off in our separate directions, he gave us quite an insight to some of the family history at Bear Lake.

Our Room

Addy kept falling off the bottom bed so we finally took the matress off the top bunk and put it right on the floor. It worked. I don't know what her deal is. She's been in a big girl bed for almost a year and just started having this issue recently. Weird.

We went out to Church in a little town called Paris. This building had great significance to Nate's family so it was really neat to be there.  

Eating at the Paris Cafe.

After our lunch, we drove up the mountain on this REALLY long dirt road, and at the end of it, we found this amazing field of snow. It was pretty breathtaking. It was HOT and we were all in flip-flops and t-shirts. It was very weird. I feel like all these pictures were photoshoped because it just looks so weird to be standing in the snow dressed the way we were.  

It was a little snowy on the dirt road in parts so everyone piled in the back of the truck.

That night, we had a little birthday celebration for Grandma. Val had this cake made that turned out absolutely gorgeous. I was keeping an eye on all the kids so I missed out on hearing the conversation but Nate informed me that everyone gave some great memories about Grandma and it was a real special night.

Before the birthday bash, I had taken some pictures of each of the families that had come to the reunion.

This picture is fantastic except for two things... No Jayna and No Monika. :-(

All these little girls just had so much fun.