Bear Lake/Ava's First Camping Trip

For my birthday this year I got to go and spend a couple of weeks in Utah with my family.  Ava and I flew in late on the night of July 22nd and then drove up to Bear Lake the next morning with Michelle's family.  After a long (and beautiful) drive that included an unfortunate car breakdown, we met up with the rest of the gang at Rendezvous Beach.  While growing up my mom's family had their annual family reunion at Rendezvous Beach every year but we had to change locations when the family got too big.  I hadn't been back there since and I have tons of great memories there so it was a dream come true to get to go back!  My dad rented a couple of jet skis and we spent the day playing in the water and relaxing on the beach.

 Lily and Ava.  She LOVES to hold Ava, and Ava certainly loves the attention!

 Grant spent pretty much the whole day in the sand.  He loved it!

 Ava and her grandma.  As you can see, pretty much all of northern Utah was at Bear Lake that day, but luckily my parents scored us a great spot and we pretty much just camped it there all day long.

 Too cute not to include . . . 

 Jetta and Lily made a pie for Ava

 Life doesn't get much better than hanging out on Rendezvous Beach with my family 

 Harris was all tuckered out from all the fun in the sun

 Look at those sandy feet!

 Ava and her Papa

 Jake decided to be a typical older brother and play a prank on poor Austin as he slept

 He actually slept like this for quite a while before waking up and realizing something was in his mouth

 Pretty little Laurel

 Laurel and Ava hanging out at camp while we got dinner ready

 My sweet little camper

 Austin enthusiastically showing off all the tents

Grant helping cook the yummy corn for dinner

Ava was a champion camper.  I was a little nervous because it actually got pretty cold over night, but she slept soundly all night long.  Not much phases that little girl!  On Sunday we drove to the town where my mom grew up, Randolph, to go to church.  It brought back so many great memories of going to church there when I was little when we were visiting my grandparents.  

My parents with all of their grand kids in front of the beautiful church

We then went to the cemetery and visited the graves of my mom's family and had a great time telling stories about those wonderful people.   Then we headed back to camp, had an awesome lunch, packed up and headed home!  It was so great to get to go back to Bear Lake and spend such a fun weekend with my family.  Hopefully we get to go back someday and do it again with Drew.  We all decided he would be so much fun on a jet ski!

July Tidbits

Here are a few random tidbits from July that are worth documenting:

 Ava started pulling herself up to standing.  Here she is on July 9th.  Such a big girl! 

Then, on July 17th I went to get Ava up in the morning and this is what I saw.  I was so shocked!  Even though I knew she was capable of this because she could stand up OUTSIDE of her crib, I just wasn't mentally prepared to see my baby standing INSIDE her crib!  Needless to say we moved her mattress down to it's lowest position that night!

And, although some of you might consider scolding Drew and I for torturing our poor child in this way, I just had to include a video of one of Drew's favorite things to do with Ava.  It is quite entertaining, if I do say so myself.  Enjoy (and don't judge too harshly)!

Nauvoo Pageant

On July 16th we headed west to spend the day in Nauvoo.  We first met up with the Stones in Carthage for a picnic and then went on a tour of the jail.

 The picnic.  Notice the LARGE group of people in the pavilion behind us?  That's where we were enjoying our picnic until about 20+ minivans worth of family reunion-goers swarmed in around us so we decided to move camp.   

 A family pic that Dan took of us in front of the Carthage Jail visitors center.

 Baby Dean-O Stone and Ava.  They're best buddies.

 The Stones headed home that afternoon and we headed over to the pageant to meet up with our friends the Maughans and the Taylors.  The Taylors were in the pageant and it was so fun to see them there!

Drew and Tim Maughan enjoying the pre-pageant pioneer games

 Abby Taylor and Ava

 Eliza Taylor and Ava

 These two girls love Ava so much and are so darling with her.  Here they are helping her color.  So sweet.

 Ethel Hawkes with her daughters Julie Maughan and Anne Taylor.  Three of my favorite ladies!

Ethel Hawkes, The Taylor Family and The Dokos Family before the show.  The Taylors moved to Utah right after the pageant so it was wonderful to get to see them before they left.  

 Abby and Eliza dancing up front

 Austin Taylor standing on the right

 The beautiful finale of the pageant with the completed temple.  

And this is how Ava enjoyed the show.  She was such an angel throughout the whole day and slept through the whole pageant and all the way home.  

We had a wonderful day and really loved spending time in Nauvoo with our friends.  We are so grateful that we live so close so that we can go back often and be reminded of the incredible sacrifices that so many made on our behalf.  

4th of July

For the 4th of July we had a fun picnic at the church (that I took no pictures of) and then a barbecue at the Maughan's house that evening.  It was a gorgeous day and we had a fun time celebrating our great nation's independence surrounded by so many wonderful friends.

 Dan and Scarlett Stone and Ava

 Halle Nye had just caught a firefly and was so excited!

 KaSandra Hope helping Grace Bednar with her sparkler

 Drew is a pyro.  That's a given.  So it goes without saying that he LOVES fireworks.  He was totally in his element and had a great time lighting off many a flaming spectacle.  

 Ava wasn't quite sure what to think of all the fireworks, but as you can see from this picture, she couldn't take her eyes off of them!

 Bradford Olivier, Scarlett Stone, Grace Bednar and Liam Noonan all lined up watching the show

The Hope family with Grace Bednar and Ava

As cheesy as it sounds, every 4th of July I am reminded of how wonderful our nation really is.  We are free to go about our lives any way that we want to with more freedom than most.  I am grateful for the chance to enjoy this beautiful country every day and hope that I can somehow contribute to making it an even greater place for future generations.  

Arthur, IL Fireworks Show

On July 2nd we made the short trip down south to Arthur, IL for their famous fireworks show.  We had heard that it was one of the best around, and we weren't disappointed!  We went down early and did a little shopping in our favorite Amish shops, of course, and then went and staked out our spot in the high school baseball diamond to watch the show.

 Waiting for the show to start

 Ava showing off her latest trick - giving wet, slobbery kisses!

 Notice that storm brewing in the background?  

Read on . . . 

 These last three pictures were taken of three different fireworks that went off all in a row.  The reason the middle picture is so light is that at the exact moment that I took the picture of the firework going off, a huge flash of lightning lit up the sky and that's how my picture turned out.  Pretty cool, eh?

One of the reasons that the Arthur fireworks show is so famous is this.  It's a fireworks waterfall and it is quite impressive!  It started out as huge pillars of flame that lit a huge rope on fire and then fireworks just start pouring over the rope and it literally looks like a waterfall.  Pretty awesome!

Throughout the whole show the weather was getting worse and worse with more and more thunder and lightening.  Right after it got over we rushed into the car which was luckily parked right behind where we were sitting (Drew's handicapped parking permit sure does come in handy at things like this) and literally as soon as we were all inside the car it started POURING!  It rained the whole way home and we never even got wet! A good time had by all!