Merry Christmas!

Skye and Wynter are such fun girls and were such good sports at our 'on location' self portrait photo shoot! We had a lot of fun and even had some pics turn out! Can you believe they still like each other;) I will post more pics after Christmas!
Happy Holidays from Ryan, Christy Jo, Skye, Wynter, Ollie and Huck!
Hope you all get what you wish for, the spirit of Christmas has definitely hit us..... I have had happy tears three times in 24 hours:) Sometimes you just have to believe.......

Random Stuff from October

So cute.... the Baby not the pile of poo!
Wynter's Birthday....Joshua really loved popping the balloons....so fun to have everyone over

Skye and Mom at the Zoo,
saw the baby elephant and the baby giraffe....so cute!

Ryan and his self carving;)

Shingle Time...

Thank goodness Ry got this done before today's storm! It looks awesome... and his first time doing wood shake!

My NEW Old Stove....LOVE it so much and the griddle reminds me of the good ol' days in Bountiful ...pancakes and grilled cheese...yummy

The shingle removal.... hopefully the last of the really messy stuff. I can't wait to post pictures of the final product....which will hopefully be done before winter settles in, if it's not you will just have to wait til spring because we are going snowboarding!

Snowbird

Swinging!
Wynter's Balloon!

I have never heard the girls laugh so much, I could hear them from so far away since they walked to the park in front of us and I found them at the magic mirror! They were hilarious.....Snowbird was very relaxing and fun. The girls rode the alpine slide thanks to Grandpa Vic and had so much fun riding the lift without skiis, they thought it felt weird. Fabulous dinner thanks to George and Marla and beautiful weather, music, mountains....Love Snowbird and am grateful and happy we get to visit G-ma and G-pa Great in such a 'great' place.

Canoe Trip 2009

Good Morning to the world!
Am I enjoying the view or pooping in a bucket?

One of the beautiful canyons we experienced!

My favorite campsite of the trip, our deserted island... it was so awesome!

At Green River State Park, the start of the journey only 68 miles to go! Labyrinth Canyon
here we come..... what a great way to spend our anniversary. We saw so many beautiful things and paddling was pretty mellow. Our longest day was 23 miles and I was a bit bitchy and hungry by the time we found camp. But after a delicious river meal and a fire all was well
and we slept amazing!

We saw geese, wild dogs, blue heron, deer, a buck and we think a bear or a beaver... I say large beaver because I didn't want it to actually be a bear. Come to find out Ry actually did see some bear scat and was nice not to tell me and just quietly put the paddle by the tent for protection.... The echoes were amazing and we thought a lot about how cool it would be to hear Native American ceremonies in the canyon. What a serene place to relax and unwind, we did not see another soul for 2 and a half days.....

After 3 days of hard paddling the last night was spent on the island in the sand with red canyon walls, a great sunset and sunrise and only 9-ish miles to get to our take-out. We saw a cool inscription from 1836 up a canyon on the way. Huck became a great river dog sleeping under his polka dot umbrella and was hilarious checking stuff out. The wind made the going slow but we made it to Mineral Bottom by about noon.

AND!

We had some beer fairies leave us a treat in our car somehow still cold and boy did it ever make us smile...thanks Chelsea and Derek for braving the road and finding our car ...that was such a sweet end to a great trip.

Last Days of Summer!

This was so cool watching this storm come in...then the downpour started, we were soaked!

The girls ended up with about 3 inches of water in their tent by morning!

Day 2 Rain is awesome!

Wynter's poncho?

Before the storm began...great night and fire and roasted marshmellows

Skye's sandwich, yummy

Skye at the Point!

Wynter at Inspiration Point

Skye and Huck at sunset

Mom and Wynter

Checking the Mountain Goats out!

Wynter Anne

This is from a great trip to Inspiration Point, this was a great night hanging out. The weather was great, our dinner was awesome and the sunset was beautiful. These photos are in opposite order just for fun! Every trip we have been on this summer has had some sort of rain or snow or both....we seem to have a theme going on for 2009! The storm blew in over night and scared all of us to death it was so loud....had to get up in the middle of the night to put a rain fly on the girls tent. Heard the dogs howling all night, wind, rain and more wind. It was pretty funny.

Now the kids are back in school.... I am sure we will have many more great times to come!

Old Stuff Makes Me Happy

The end of summer... always is a bit of a bummer..... I LOVE having time to spend with Skye and Wynter and Ryan when he is not working hard.

Skye had a very fun and frustrating summer with soccer/football but she improved a lot and did awesome, she just played for a new team and they struggled to win.

Wynter is always willing to play anything, went to Pineview and played on the swing! Even I got involved, good thing there are not pics for that!

Then, so cute of G-gma and Skye and Wynt, love this so much and so love the time we get to spend with family, speaking of family I thought I would add this pic for my Dad, Victor G. thanks for giving me this table that was G-Gpa Fergusons' when he was a little boy. It was left outside in the rain, but! I think that I did an okay job showing the fact that it was a loved and now is a cherished table/island, thanks Dad. I have cried about three times since it has been in my kitchen and not because I was sad but because I am sooo grateful and happy I get to love this for a long time...

The Garden

Garden Fun! Finished the Blackberry patch fence, the trellis is from the house next door that they removed off an old porch and some picket fence. It was fun and looks really cute! The girls just picked the first batch and we made blackberry cheesecake!

The bird bath is new.... I know.... but I had to have it because it is a Lotus Flower. Very Zen with the random perennial bed, that is doing splendid thanks to some great wild flower seeds and roses from our wedding last Fall. More pics to come of a few projects that are getting their final touches.. hopefully this afternoon if I can stand the heat, pushing 100 degrees plus...ugh
Can't believe it's August..... but look forward to planting a new section of daffodils!