Pioneer Day

I have never really celebrated Pioneer day growing up and I think that is because I didn't live in Utah!! Pioneer day here is celebrated just as much as the 4th of July!! So we made sure that we had a good day. We got together with Jenna and Cole, and Melissa and Jeff and went to this little water park in Provo. It was so fun. It really is designed for young kids but we were playing just as much as they were! Later that night we went to a minor league baseball game in Orem. We all laid out blankets and sat on the grass. It was nice and the sunset was beautiful over the mountains. Too bad we lost. But the best part was that there were fireworks at the end of the game. They were probably some of the best fireworks I've seen!! So we definitly had a wonderful Pioneer day.

Down in Alabama

We just got back into town from visiting Alabama. The Graffs now live in Alabama and Matthew's sister was getting married. It was such a fun visit! I am so glad we were able to go. I was surprised how hilly and green Alabama was. The wedding was very nice and Aubrey looked so pretty. I absolutly loved her dress. I thought it looked so good on her! The night before the wedding we had a big swim party at the club house in the townhome complex where the Graffs live. It was the perfect place. They live kind of in the woods with the big Coosa River behind them. The view from their backyard is amazing. I felt like I was visiting a resort or on vacation somewhere not in Alabama! Then the next day the wedding was wonderful. They had a beautiful ceremony in the Birmingham Temple. Everything turned out perfectly. That night the reception was at the same clubhouse. Here are some pictues.

Here is the view from the Graff's backyard! So pretty! We actually went kayaking down this river one of the days after the wedding. It was an all day event. It took us about 4 hours to finish! We went over rapids, went swimming and got tipped out of our kayaks! It was so fun but I couldn't bring my camera but it would have gotten destroyed!

Here is the happy couple just coming out of the temple!

Matthew and his little sisters outside the temple.

Matthew and I at the reception

Aubrey's brothers carrying her while her new husband is below!

The wedding party

Bridesmaids! We kept getting asked all night if we were sisters! This is Aubrey's best friend from when they were 12.

The newly weds leaving the reception!

Matthew dancing with his sister!

Matthew and his brother played rockband for a significant amount of time while we were there!I actually got pretty good on the drums!

Snowbird with Emily!

One of my good friends from college, Emily, invited Jenna and I to come up to Snowbird Resort to spend the day with her family. Her family has a timeshare there and they go up every year. She was so nice to invite us up. Emily now lives in St. George with her husband and little girl so we don't get to see her much. We had such a blast. We were able to see the beautiful mountians of snowbird in the summer time (I usually see snowbird covered with snow during ski season). We played tennis with Emily and her siblings, we found a little park for Cade and Emily's little girl to play at, went swimming, went down the alpine slide and had some wonderful cooking from Emily's family. Ok I have to tell a funny story about the slide. So Matthew and I started down the slide at the same time seeing who could get to the bottom the fastest. When I reached the bottom I looked to see where Matthew was and poor thing, his scooter had flipped from under him and he fell out! It was actually kind of funny because he did it right in front of where everyone watches people sliding down. But he really got scraped up! His ear, elbow, and knee now have some ugly scars. Probably not so funny for him. Well we really had a great time and loved our day with Emily and her family! Here are some pictures of the fun we had.

We wanted to go to this park but the trail was a little difficult to bring strollers but here are Cole and Landon (Emily's husband) offroading up to the park!

This is right before we left in the evening! We hadn't took a picture of just the three of us the whole day!

Cade somewhat enjoyed the swimming. We went in the evening and I forgot how chilly it gets in the mountains! Good thing the pool was warm!

Matthew and I getting in line for the alpine slide. What beautiful mountians!

The boys getting ready to go down the slide!

The girls getting ready to go down the slide!

4th of July!

We didn't do a whole lot on the 4th but it was nice to have a fun, relaxing day. In the morning we got together with two other young couples from our ward and all made breakfast together--wait, I should rephrase that.... The men all made breakfast while all the girls went in the other room to talk! But it was a fun get together and a good way to start off the day. Then in the evening we drove out to Matthew's aunt and uncle's house and had a BBQ. Matthew has lots of aunts, uncles and cousins in Utah as well as grandparents. It was nice to hang out with them and to see them. We really don't see a lot of them too often. We had lots of food, games and when it got dark we enjoyed our own fireworks while we made somores! It was a great way to spend the 4th. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera!