Landscaping With a Tractor

My sister, Katie and her husband Jared are doing some amazing landscaping in the front yard and Jared has purchased some beautiful rocks. When we arrived he was pretty frustrated because one rock and slid out of the "bucket" of the tractor and bent his edging. He was not a happy camper. It was pretty amazing to watch him at work.

One of the rocks in their front yard looks JUST like a dinosaur egg. We sat on it to take this sisters photo--Me, Christine, Michelle, and Katie--just before we left for home.


Landon had been really fussy until we got him behind the wheel of Doug's car--he looks completely content.

Tennis Lessons

We went to the park with some of the cutest kids in the world and played tennis. It was so fun. Taylor was quite the hitter--check out that form!

Landon was so excited that there were tennis balls everywhere that he could collect--he was out little ball boy. The grin on his face was great. He had the most curious way of crawling under the net. At one point he stopped and enjoyed a rest in the middle of the court near the net.


Kylee played for a few short minutes.

But Jacob, he was pretty insistant on "getting" this thing. It was so adorable. He would say, "Dad, I'm not good at this!" But then, he would pick up the racket and keep trying.

Here he is looking back at the ball he just missed.

Look at that effort!


Uncle Doug pitched in to help. He is one of the best teachers I have seen with little kids. He would take a lot of time to teach even though I know he would love to be playing Jacob's dad, Aaron, in a game of tennis. Only occaisionally can you see it on his face...

Steve's Wedding

Steve and Megan were married on Friday, May 3rd in the Rexburg temple and Doug and I had been invited to the sealing. It was a beautiful temple and we had a great time with them as well as Steve's family & friends.



David leading the way to the luncheon.

My mom and her girls. She is an amazing lady.


Steve, Tiffany, Andrew & I used to spend many hours together in high school back in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Andrew flew out for the wedding. I hadn't seen him in almost a decade! It was so fun to catch up.


David single-handedly took home the leftovers from the luncheon.

This is David's girlfriend, Chelsea. We had a lot of fun with her.

Hey Baby Let's Go To Vegas

We had a great time soaking up the sun. We left Utah on Thursday morning and packed up the car while it was hailing and snowing. After driving a few hours south, we had sunshine and went camping at "Valley of Fire" State Park in Nevada.


Some anciant characters engraved in rock.

We took a late afternoon hike climbing around some red rock--it was beautiful.




We pulled into Vegas and stayed at the Meridian Resort. I felt like a movie star. Doug is excellent at finding deals on the internet and he got 10 points for this one. We hung out by the pool and played a bit of tennis.


Doug had never seen the Bellagio fountains so he was pretty fascinated.




We went through the MGM Grand on our LONG walk back to our resort from the Tropicana (where the Bodies exhibit was) and saw these real, live lions that we could walk under them in their habitat. They were gorgeous.


We were glad to be off the strip for a moment, even if it was still smoke-filled inside the MGM. It was a wake-up call to both Doug and I. I didn't think one city could have so much evil in it and they flaunt it as "Sin City". It was pretty awful and quite sad. After having countless people try to hand us pronography as we walked, I felt so frustrated. Here Doug and I are holding hands, and we are still having photos of naked women shoved at us. There was a lot of cigarette smoke and a lot of alcohol. It took my lungs a few days to recover. It was a reality check and next time, I would rather pay for a taxi then walk along the strip.

Paying to Look at Dead Bodies

Doug was out of school for 4 days and we planned a trip for me to see "Bodies The Exhibition" as part of my birthday present. Doug found a great resort with NO CASINOS! It was amazing and so fun. I loved the exhibit. I just finished my anatomy and physiology course through Clayton College and this was my "Anatomy Lab". I highly recommend it--Doug didn't even pass out, so it's Doug proof.