Vacation After the Vacation

I had such a great time in New Mexico. I sometimes wonder how much other people spend on holidays in order to get away the way we do. We are all so fortunate to have Mommer and Popper and their ridiculous industriousness.

After the trip, I took a day and a night to visit some parts of Utah I had never been to, or at least some parts I don't remember. I drove from Coral Pink up through the San Raphael Swell to get over to Goblin Valley. I had a vague sense of what it would be like, but it has been so long since my first trip there, I had no idea what to expect. Most of these pictures are for you Dad, so you can see how much it has changed.

After camp, I took a quick side hike over to Little Wild Horse Canyon in the swell. It was late and I was going it alone, so I wasn't able to see as much as I wanted, but the slot canyons in there are out of control. There are a few spots where you literally have to suck in your tummy to squeeze through.

Make sure the volume is on.

Anyhow, it was just me so there wasn't a whole lot of craziness to take pictures of, but it was really wonderful to see some of those places. Goblin Valley turned out to be worth the drive. On the way back I drove through Capital Reef, which is a really under rated park. Its not too far out of the way if you are headed in the southern direction it is definitely worth the stop. Next time I post, I promise it will be something more interesting.

Mi Casa es Su Casa

It has been a busy July for us so far! We enjoyed having Sarah, Aaron, Pyper, Hakan and Finnley visit us for the 4th of July weekend. We made two trips into Kanab that day--once in the morning to watch the parade down the center of town (while Dean and Aaron golfed) and again in the evening to watch the 10 minute fireworks display (maybe a waste of a 30 minute one-way trip...) Pyper and Hakan thought it was awesome that the people in the parade threw candy to the spectators (we had to keep an eye on them that they didn't get run over when the parade made a u-turn at the end of Center Street and came back again). Hakan was thrilled to see Spiderman in the hometown parade and later, when the fire engines came by, Pyper was waving for them spray her with water while Hakan cowered behind me (Sarah had the presence of mind to duck into the nearby cafe with Finn when she saw what was coming). I made a pitiful campfire in the evening to let the kids roast hotdogs for dinner (which we ate inside since it was too hot to stay outside) and then we went back out to roast marshmallows for 'smores. It wasn't a fancy feast, I'm ashamed to say, but my intent was for the kids to get a kick out of it.

Pyper and Hakan got to experience some new things while at Casa de Campo. On Friday, while nearly everyone else was in Las Vegas helping move household items for a couple in the branch, Mom, Jennifer, Pyper & Hakan got to go to the 'farm' with Mommer to feed and water her horses, water the garden and also pick fresh spinach for dinner!

Dad and the other men helped Popper with the new terrace project that looks like will take more work than originally anticipated, but on our last evening there, Keith talked Popper into building a campfire for old times sake. So, using the firepan that the Cox's had given them, Popper inagurated the upper level of the new outdoor living area with a Montoya campfire! This will be a new favorite spot to congregate once the project is complete--and it will be awesome no doubt!

This years visit to Mommer & Popper's was brief but it was fun to get to see Terry & Ferrell, Tricia, Chris, Jordan (and Pico), Ashton & Wesley.
Mommer enjoyed having Finn all to herself for a while as well. Sarah's post about their trip will likely be more fascinating reading, but I had some pictures that I knew she didn't have and wanted to share them.
We missed having Aaron, Rachelle, Bryce, Dena, Todd & Kristen with us in New Mexico, but we are looking forward to the wedding in October and another chance for us all to get together again.

Our vacation

I hope everybody had a good time in New Mexico. I just couldn't come up with a plan for us to go out there that allowed us to use our time off efficiently and still get to see you guys as much as I wanted to. I just would have been all travel and not much fun.

Instead we decided to stay a little closer to home. We rented a cabin for a few days in north Georgia near a town called Ellijay. We've stayed there before (although in different cabins) and it's always a lot of fun. There is lots to do in the area and the place we rented is pet friendly so Zoey got to come with us. There was a small lake just a short walk from the cabin that Zoey got to go swimming in, although it was a little scummier than anything Dena and I felt like getting into. I thought that Zoey could swim pretty well from here trips to a creek by our house, but I think she was just walking on her hind legs under water. When I put her into the lake, she sunk like a rock and was barely able to tread water. I think her buoyancy is just too far forward because of her deep chest, so her back end just sinks and she can't go anywhere.




Thankfully, we thought that might be the case and brought a lifejacket with us just in case. She's a much better swimmer with that on and actually really enjoys swimming out to get her ball.




The next day we dropped Zoey off at a cool doggie daycare in Blue Ridge Georgia so she could play all day while we went up to the Nantahala River near Bryson City, NC to do some rafting. We have done this once before a few years back and had a lot of fun. We rented a two person inflatable kayak (called a "duckie") and took a self-guided trip down the river. It is a spring fed river so even in the middle of July the water is a chilly 52 degrees. We made it most of the way down the river without much drama until the very end when we got to the roughest part. We got a little sideways going into a nasty little hydraulic. We were both leaning back to try and prevent tipping over forward, but perhaps we should have been leaning forward instead because the boat just slid right out from under us and we ended up swimming. Dena thinks it was payback for chucking the dog in the lake.



If the animated GIF above isn't working, you can view the full carnage album on our facebook pages or click the link below.

LINK

They had to throw a rope to get me out and a dude in a raft had to paddle out to rescue Dena. It's a good thing they got us too, because just a few yards past the takeout is the "Lower Nantahala Falls", a class v rapid that could have really caused us some damage. As it was we still got pretty beat up on the rocks before we made it to shore.

On Wednesday we decided to go for a hike to enjoy the beautiful area a bit more. We had visited a local shop to get advice on a good day hike and they recommended the Conasauga River Trail in the Cohutta Wilderness. It was absolutely gorgeous and we will definitely have to do it again some time. There were lots of spots with cool little falls and river crossings. There were several times when I thought one of us would slip on a rock and end up swimming again, but we made it without any drama. Zoey is a good little mountain dog and even got to carry her new pack with all her own food and water in it.

We had to leave on Thursday at lunch time, so we got back to our house in the early afternoon. Dena and Zoey promptly passed out while I unloaded the car and went to play a game of Ultimate in the evening. We've spent the day today recovering from our wounds. Dena and I went to see "Up" and we're going to the dog park in a bit to let Z get some exercise.

We had a lot of fun, but of course wish we could have seen everybody also. I guess we'll have to wait until October and we'll see you all then.

Anyone have a sock?

Gone Fish'n

Last Saturday, Rachelle and I were invited to go sailing on her boss's boat at a place called Strawberry Reservoir. I hadn't really thought about it before then, but I've never been sailing before so I was really excited about the trip. It turned out to be such a blast. We got to fish while we were out and had some luck. I caught two good sized trout but had to release them because they were too big ( this is the truth, although I admit I phrased it just so to make the fish sound impressive - they were only about 18 in.) Anyway, I highly recommend this particular brand of recreation to anyone if they have the opportunity because it was such a nice time - an easy and natural kind of relaxation. Not to mention, the whole thing feels like the last 5 happy minutes of a movie you once watched. Good times.

I can't wait to see everyone in NM soon. It is pretty much all I want to talk about.

Break it down

This is made of awesome. Oh, and watch for the old dude.

Take that, Sarah!

i got quite the scolding from her for not updating my blog enough, so to answer her, i chose to give my blog a whole new makeover. i also intend to update it far more often, just to be able to say "in your face... what now?!"

indeed. in order prove Sarah wrong about my blog, i am doing exactly what she wants. go figure?

love you, Sarah. :)

A sad truth

It appears that Hakan will not be fulfilling his father's dream for him to become a world class body builder.

The other day I found him on our bathroom floor, staring intently at some pictures in one of Aaron's muscle magazines. When I asked what he was doing he replied, "I don't like dat guy. He's all yucky."

Sorry, Aaron, but I have to agree. Those guys are all yucky.

Hollywood here they come!!

I finally decided it's time to exploit....di mean, showcase those two little weirdos we know as pyper and hakan.  I'm sure you guys remember the videos I posted of them a while back; well, I finally decided to put them onto youtube.  You can find them by typing in "pyper gets puzzled" and "hakan is a sunbeam".  Tell your friends.

Good Times

This Memorial Day, Rachelle, Patrick and I took a trip down south for some down time. We had a really nice time, even though the weather forecast was not looking good. For some reason, I tend to forget how amazing the country is out here. Just the drive down would have been worth the trip. We spent the first night near Lower Calf Creek Falls, which turned out to be amazing.




Go figure, in the middle of the desert.





The next day, we stopped by the Petrified Forest near Escelante for a quick hike. It turned out to be really cool. Then we headed down to Bryce Canyon ( cause I've never been there) for a night. We got lucky, the weather wasn't too bad even though we did get some rain.




So, this picture is funny because it was almost the last one ever taken of us. Rachelle didn't tell me she was about to jump on my back and we came really close to falling over that little cliff behind us.






Sunrise






I can't wait until this summer, I am planning on living in the woods the entire time. Hope everyone is doing well.

My weirdos

While I was writing the latest post on my blog this morning, I noticed that the house was very quiet.
Eerily quiet.
Dangerously quiet.
I finished what I was doing and went to investigate, expecting the worst. When I turned the corner into the living room, this is what I found.


Have I mentioned that they're goofballs?

Competitive running

I ran my first 5k today and things went pretty well. I did the Cotton Row Run which is a 30 year Memorial Day tradition in Huntsville. I've never done a race on foot before, so it was a little intimidating. I ended up finishing strong and feeling good. My official time was a 22:35, but the photo of me clearly shows that I was well across the line with a 22:34. I finished 82nd overall out of 1677 and 6th in my age group (25-29) out of 70. Not bad for a first time. I think I could have gone a little faster if I had been a little more diligent in my training. The race day kind of snuck up on me, so I didn't really do much to prepare until the last week or so. My shins and calves were getting pretty sore by the time I finished, but I wasn't really all that tired. It's probably not something I'm going to get really into, but I might do it once or twice a year.



And in this week's episode of Zoey being a nut, we have her playing with our friend's Great Dane Patton. He's 5 times her size, but she uses her agility to try to out maneuver him.




I also meant to include this video a while ago, but I keep forgetting. It's from an Avett Brothers concert that Dena and I went to in April down in Birmingham. This is the end of the song that is the source of the quote at the top of the blog. The song is called "Murder in the City" if you're wondering. The title sounds a little dark and gruesome, but it's actually very touching. You can watch their video on YouTube if you want to hear the whole thing HERE.

Our trip to "boize"!!

I write "boize" because kristen keeps getting on my case about calling "boize" and not boise. Anyhoo...we went because one of kristen's friends from childhood was graduating from boise state.  We were going to leave friday after she got out of class but we bought a gps thingy and it took ALOT longer to load then i thought so we left at 3 o'clock saturday morning in order to get to boise by 8.  bah!!  So we got to the graduation and everything, which took like 2 or more hours. Even with a nap it felt like forever.  

We then went to Sarah's after that.  I played with the kids while Kris played with the baby.  The weather was gorgeous so we took them outside 

and played catch, 

throw, 

and get hit.  

It was a ton of fun.  I can't wait to see them again.

Hi

I don't really have much to say, but it's a lazy rainy Sunday afternoon, so I thought I'd take some pictures and post them up. I'm about halfway done with my fence, now. I'm pretty happy with how it's come out so far.



Here's a picture of me and my sweet little Zozo. She's getting all grown up. I hope you all get to meet her this fall. We're planning on taking her with us to NC for the wedding. If you're wondering why my hand looks so funny, I'm in the middle of snapping my finger to try to get her to look at the camera.



We also took a few family pictures that included the cat and the dog. I think we went through an entire package of turkey trying to keep the two of them occupied instead of trying to eat each other. This one is my favorite, even though it was kind of a disaster with my trying to keep the dog from running away and Dena keeping the cat from defacing the dog.




And here is a video of Zoey doing her favorite thing in the world, wrestling with another dog. I think she would do this until her heart gave up if we would let her.

It's tee ball season!

Pyper has recently begun her second foray into "organized" sports. I say "organized", but how organized is 5-year-old tee ball, really? One of the moms from our preschool group mentioned tee ball to me a few months ago when Pyper was still doing indoor soccer. I remember playing tee ball and baseball as a kid and having tons of fun. (Don't make fun- I had no control over my style at this age!)



I asked Pyper if she'd like to play and she seemed interested so we signed her up. She's had 3 practices so far and I'm really not sure how much of it she actually gets. It's obvious that she's enjoying herself, though. She gets to be silly with her friend, burn off some energy and she even got a new hat, team shirt, baseball pants, mitt & ball out of it (we bought the pants, mitt & ball). Her team is the Giants and she wears her hat EVERY. DAY. I think she even slept in it the first night she got it.

Another thing I'm not sure of is just how serious this league takes their games. With soccer they didn't even keep score. They just wanted all the kids to get to play and have a good time running around. I guess we'll see how it goes with this. Her first game is in a couple of weeks, so hopefully that will give them some time to learn a few more things.





There are a few older boys on the team who have obviously played before, but she doesn't mind. She was so funny at the first practice. I was trying to teach her how to throw by showing her that you step with your left foot as you throw with your right hand. Of course that got her thinking about it too much which made it even harder to do it the right way. She eventually got it, though. Then when they were running the bases at the end she decided that she needed to catch up with everyone in front of her and skipped first base all together and headed straight for second. She'll figure it out. I know she will. In the meantime she can have a grand time playing and we can have a grand time laughing. :)