Trek

Last August our ward split and Spencer was put on the high council. His assignment is over a ward, and also over Young Women. We were so excited about that knowing that Emma was almost 12 and he would have some interaction with her in terms of his calling.

Right before Christmas the Stake President asked Spencer to be the Trek chairman. At the time I don't think either of us realized how much this entailed - neither of us has been on a Trek before. There was so much prep work and time, especially in the month leading up to Trek. I not only have a tremendous appreciation for the Pioneers, but also for those who work so hard to make these events happen.

My parents happened to still be here for Shareholders (for almost the whole time we were on Trek) so the kids were taken care of. We left at 5 a.m. on the Monday and drove out to Pawhuska Oklahoma to a church ranch where Treks are sometimes held (sidenote: Pioneer Woman lives really close to there). We started walking, and Spencer had in charge of photography as well as helping with the food. 3 miles in it was HOT and our food committee showed up with lunch, which was amazing. We made it to base camp and had to quickly set up everything. Spencer was so busy running around, I honestly talked to him for 5 minutes total the entire 3 days.

The second day we made a huge loop and did the women's pull, and also had some time in the river. That was huge because I felt DISGUSTING. Lots of bugs and hot weather. On the last day we hiked back out where we had hamburgers and hot dogs and root beer floats.

What I kept thinking as I was on Trek was There is so much money and effort going into this, by SO MANY people. It is obvious this is for some reason incredibly important for these youth. The nightly devotionals were fantastic, and Spencer did such a great job with the details.

I also met a lot of incredible people throughout the stake and loved that opportunity. Here are some of the pictures I took.

first two weeks of summer

With no snow days this year, the kids were out of school before the Memorial Day holiday, which is AWESOME! That weekend, our friends from CA, the Ralph's, came up to AR for the weekend. We did the boat and hung out and it was so fun!

The next Wednesday, my parents flew in! We went to Tulsa to get them, hitting up Costco and Sprouts first (yessss!).  On Thursday night my mom and I went to Kenny Chesnay (!) - it was a great concert and he was an incredible performer. Old Dominion opened for him and I really liked them for their two songs I know ("Break up with him" and one other that I can't remember now).

Friday was Shareholders, which was quite entertaining this year. James Corden hosted (he is FUNNY), then Andy Grammer, Jordan Smith, Maxwell, Nick Jonas, and Katy Perry performed.

Unfortunately we had some crappy weather and some crappy luck (a big bolt in the tire) so we didn't make it out on the boat that weekend. But our neighbors let us use their pool and that was really great.

The last 2 1/2 days my parents took care of the kids while Spencer and I went on Trek. I know they all had a great time - more on Trek later!

summer!

My kids really got out of school almost 3 weeks ago...but I've become a horrible blogger (though a better Instagrammer...).

The last day of school was the awards assembly. Both kids racked up the awards (most notably, all A's all year long), but we were at the school almost 3 hours by the time both grades' assemblies were done.

That same day, Spencer and I decided we REALLY needed to go to the temple, so Danielle saved the day and watched Sadie and then the big kids after they got home. Kinda anti-climatic, but it was our one chance in the next few weeks that we could make it.

We got to the temple in time for the 5 pm session but the skies looked SCARY. The rain was sideways and crazy as we ran to the temple doors, and they were locked!! There were cars and we knew it was open...but suddenly we realized we were hearing tornado sirens. Eventually the temple workers saw us and let us in, and made us go down to the basement. After a few minutes they let our session go through, but we had flickering lights throughout, and I could tell it was still stormy. When the session was done they asked us to leave quickly, as they had shut down the temple after we had started. I was so grateful we made it in, especially considering the 3 1/2 hour drive we had made. Crazy weather. Made it home by 10:30 pm, and felt so grateful.

Tyler got sick pretty soon after school got out. We don't know what it was, but it wore him out and he had a dry cough. He had his baseball tournament and made it to the second round before they lost. It was fun to watch him this year.

On to the rest of our fun/busy summer!

cruise 2016

I need to write this all down before I forget. I know my blogging days are coming to an end so I'm going to finish out the year (maybe?) and get it printed out...so I need to stay on top of it in the meantime.

Camille and Brian, our "cruise buddies" decided that for their 40th birthdays they wanted to do a cruise with us again. The only week they could do it ended up actually working for us too (their spring break week). I had a really stressful couple of months and this timing ended up being just what I needed. Issues with Sadie, issues with my calling, and issues with my health all felt like a lot at the time. Anyway...we were looking forward to it. One of the many perks of traveling with Camille is that she is a planner and she finds out a lot of details about places. After selecting the cruise with 4 "new" places, we knew we needed to maximize our time in each location. (Remember? We don't take "vacations.")

The cruise was out of Miami so we flew in the night before and I marveled at how the hotel that looked SO NICE online managed to be so dumpy. Oh well. The next morning we listened to conference and made our way to the port where we boarded and ate lunch while listening to Elder Christofferson's wonderful talk on Fathers. We finally met up with those guys and while their luggage took 5 hours to get to their room, we finished listening to conference. Then we were off!

Our first day was a day at sea. I can't sleep in past 7 so I knew I would be the one to get up and reserve chairs on the Serenity Deck (no kids allowed there=quiet). Spencer read his book while I went running on the outdoor track, then he worked out while I read. We hung out outside most of the day - it was cloudy and sometimes even cool, so it was do-able. I have no idea what we did that night - we did eat dinner every night in the dining room because the food is SO much better, but I forgot what show we saw. We played games each night until midnight-ish, while eating ice cream and pizza and candy.

Tuesday was our first port day - Cozumel. We had to quickly hurry to the ferry to Playa del Carmen, where we hopped on the bus to Tulum. We had heard this was amazing and was a must-do, but I was skeptical. Needless to say, it wasn't my favorite excursion. The ruins weren't all that impressive, the beach was pretty but small and crowded, and we had no extra time when we returned to the island.

Fun, but not my favorite. (So many iguanas!)

On Wednesday was Belize. This was a tender stop, and it was a 30 minute ferry ride to the island. This was the most primitive and untouched of all our locations. Usually port areas are nice but this one didn't have much nice going on. However, I really liked it for that reason. Who knows if it will become really commercialized in the next 10 years? We were on time but so many people were late getting together with our excursion group, and we left 75 minutes past when we were supposed to. We boarded a school bus probably from when I was elementary school and drove an hour and 15 minutes to our cave tubing location.

Cave tubing was really fun. We had to hike in carrying everything and the caves were really cool. Our guide was a tiny Mayan guy named "Too Tall." :) When we were done we were provided with lunch that was really good, but we were nervous about time and had to really push the guides to get people back on the bus. We truly barely made it back for the last tender to the ship. Kinda stressful. But FUN day aside from that issue. The drive was interesting - lots of poverty. I took pictures to show my kids.

Our next day was Roatan, where we had a zip lining excursion planned. Routan had a beautiful port (Carnival spent $60 million there to make it really nice) but WOW the poverty right outside those gates and throughout most of the island was stunning. I took SO MANY pictures to show my kids so they never forget how privileged they are.

We got to the zipline and it started to rain. Bummer! But it ended up being great because it was cool and it made the zipping way faster.

At one point they told us to let go and pushed our legs up high so it felt like we were flying upside down. Camille and I did it and the guys opted out. :)

There were 14 platforms/ziplines, and this was definitely a highlight of the trip for me. We also got to hold a monkey for a few minutes.

After, we went to the resort beach for an hour to hang out. It was still drizzly so Spencer and grabbed our masks, ran down to a rocky area, and snorkeled, while Brian and Camille did the stand-up paddle boards.

It was not enough time there but it was a gorgeous part of the island that i'm glad to know about. We headed back to port and got to shop and look around before getting back on the ship (I love not being rushed).

Our last port day was Friday - Grand Cayman. I haven't been here before but felt like I had before. It was definitely more "Americanized" and was quite the contrast from Honduras. We had an hour before the tour group picked us up so we did our shopping then, as well as found some Wifi (the first time for me all week).

We went to the beach club for our Sea Doo's and this part was super fun - we rode them out to the sandbar of Stingray City. Right as we started going, the water was choppy and the salt water kept spraying right into my eyes.

We made it out to stingray city and got to play with and hold the stingrays. I had always heard the bottom was the softest thing ever and the top was like sandpaper. But both sides were suuuuper velvety. They were also heavier than I realized. We got some pictures (those are coming later) and I even kissed one. I tried to feed him, but he just bit my finger instead.

We got back onto our Sea Doos and went to Rum Point to snorkel - it was really pretty, but I was tired and could feel that I was getting sunburned. We got on to go back to the beach club; luckily the water wasn't choppy this time so I could see better. BUT Brian got gutsy and started going in circles, and knocked them both into the water. The problem was his wrist kill-switch broke off so they had to chase down the Sea Doo. I laughed so so hard...I also think it will be a good story to Camille someday... ;)

We went to the public beach part of 7-mile Beach for an hour or so but Spencer wanted to go so we parted ways and went back to the port to be tendered back to the ship. I wasn't feeling great - dehydrated/drank too much saltwater/sea-sick/who knows what else so Spencer did most of the shopping and I sat down.

We got on the ship and I felt gross until the next morning. But we still had to play games! That was our second Elegant Night and I sure didn't want to participate. :)

That ended our excursions. Tulum, cave tubing, zip lining, and Sea Doos to stingrays. It was pretty incredible and I'm not sure I can pick a favorite day. Our last day was "at sea" and one of the coolest parts was being able to see Cuba for most of the day. We mini-golfed that evening before dinner, right as we passed Havana.

We all took the "5 Love Languages" test that night and then played games one more time (well, we thought it would be our last time). On Sunday morning we got off early and headed to the airport - funny enough, we were all on the same flight to Atlanta AND we were sitting right behind Brian and Camille. So we got a little more game time in. We said bye in Atlanta and I totally cried! Camille is like a sister to me - we have been dear friends for 11 years and have talked on the phone at LEAST twice a week that entire time. I always feel like we always pick up where we left off, and we never run out of things to talk about. Best cruise buddies ever!

We came home to happy kids and Kathy had done a phenomenal job. Sadie is extra clingy but not in an annoying way. This vacation was just what I needed.