An Adventure Called Disneyland

Our fun trip to Disneyland started out as a total surprise to our nephews. My dad rented a 12 passenger van to take us all on this adventure. The night before the trip, James and I set up a scavenger hunt around our house. We invited the kids over for a "Mother's Day" breakfast and afterward we sent them on the scavenger hunt. While they were searching for the clues with Uncle James, the rest of us decorated the van and loaded up all of the luggage. The sign my mom is holding in the picture says "HOP IN... WE'RE HEADING TO DISNEYLAND!" The final clue in the scavenger hunt led them to the front porch of our house. Their reaction was HILARIOUS! They all stopped in their tracks and just stared from us to the van and back again. They thought we were just playing a trick on them and they didn't believe us until Grandpa showed them all of their luggage! Little Taylor had a smile on his face the entire trip and kept chanting "Dinneylan, Dinneylan!" It was priceless!

After a day and half of driving (which was surprisingly fun) we arrived in Anaheim. We spent the afternoon at Downtown Disney and shopped and played around. We especially had a ball at the World of Disney store where we couldn't resist buying this darling onesie for our soon-to-be little boy! Isn't it cute?!?

The next day we set off early in the morning to go to California Adventure. The best rides at this park are Soaring Over California, Toy Story Mania, & Tower of Terror. All super fun!!!

We spent the next two days at Disneyland... my favorite amusement park in the world. It was my 4th visit and it is still magical! I think it was the perfect time of year to go because the lines were pretty short and the weather was great. Sadly Splash Mountain was closed, but we still got to go on our favorite rides... Indiana Jones, Peter Pan, Space Mountain, & Thunder Mountain.

By the end of our 3rd day at Disneyland we were all exhausted, but we had a total blast! James and I can't wait to take our little guy there in a few years to experience his first magical Disneyland adventure!!!

Utah Jazz vs Denver Nuggets

My little brother Chris is getting married in a couple of weeks and for a last hurrah, we hit the road for Denver to catch the first Jazz game of the season. Our entourage consisted of Me, Chris, his buddies Isaiah, Jubal, and Jason, and our Dad!

Chris and his best friend Isaiah

Me and my Daddy

David Locke from 1320 KFAN saw us, the few Jazz fans amid all of the Nuggets fans, and came up to our seats to talk to us!

The Tip-Off

The Jazz were killed by the Nuggets, but it was still super fun to be there for the first game of the season... hopefully the Jazz can pull together and have a decent season!

Jackson or Bust!

A few weekends ago, I (Heather) hit the road on the back of my dad's motorcycle! There's nothing quite like travelling down the highway at high speeds with the wind flying everywhere and the stereo blazing. It's so much fun! My dad always asks me to burn a CD for each trip so we always have new tunes for the ride. Our entourage consisted of 3 motorcycles: Dad's, with me riding as passenger; my brother Chris, with his fiance Karen as his passenger; and Jubal, Chris' friend. The five of us had a blast hanging around Jackson Hole and touring through Yellowstone National Park. It was a super fun trip and I can't wait until next time!

Dad's Harley - the Ultra Classic (above)

From the passenger's point of view, this is the most comfortable bike ever! I've actually fallen asleep a few times while out on the open road!

Chris' Harley - the Heritage Softail (above)

This is the best looking motorcycle that Harley makes, if you ask me!!!

Old Faithful, Yellowstone National Park


The Town Square - Jackson Hole, Wyoming

Wrapping Up Summer

I can't believe summer is actually over! It went by so fast... wasn't it just barely Christmas? The saying is totally true that time flies when you're having fun! We had a blast this summer and thought we'd share just a few of the fun things that we did that didn't earn a blog post!

A competitive game of croquet with James' family - James won, but I still want a re-match!
We went to an awesome arcade with my BFF Ashley and her daughter Cameron. This was the loot we won with all of our hard earned tickets!

Here we are at Red Butte Garden... I tried to shove James into the pond right after this pic was taken, but he was too strong! Next time, he he he!

Summer isn't complete without at least one outdoor concert! We had a blast at the Peter Cetera concert at the Sandy Amphitheatre. Glory of Love from Karate Kid was the hit of the night, especially when my brother cheered: "Ralph Macchio is my hero!"

One of our favorite summer activities is the annual Jenkins' camp out at Capitol Reef National Park. This year we went on the raddest hike - just over 6 miles long! We had to climb down 3 waterfalls and the fourth waterfall we actually had to slide down. It was super fun!!!

You know how they say, "it's not over until the fat lady sings?" Well, in my book, summer isn't over until we go to the super fun annual block party hosted by our friends and neighbors, the Oliverson's. This year's theme was a Luau (in case you couldn't tell by our costumes) and it was awesome! Hula-hooping contests, water balloon launching, a limbo contest, and even a snow cone machine - what a way to say goodbye to summer!!!

A Weekend Getaway

Our fun friends, the Gailey's, invited us to their cabin up at Strawberry Reservoir for the weekend. We had a such a blast! We went 4 wheeling on Friday night when we got up there - James let me do the driving! It was my first time on one of those puppies and I loved it! We stayed up late playing fun games and then on Saturday we hit the lake and went boating - I let James drive this time, he he he! It was a super fun little getaway and we are totally lucky to have such awesome friends!

Oh, Canada!

Summer vacation this year was a road trip up to Canada! The first night Dad forgot to book us a room, so we ended up sleeping in this teepee! Just kidding! We sat in that teepee for all of five minutes to take pictures and we both ended up with several mosquito bites - ouch!

Our next adventure was driving through Glacier National Park - I've never seen anything like it! It was gorgeous! There were waterfalls everywhere and several stretches of road that were a sheer drop off! It was some scary driving!

Here is a picture of the whole gang at the Banff Springs Hotel! The weather was perfect for us tourists! We had a fun day of seeing the sights and getting acclamated with the locals! We had fun trying to figure out the currency exchange and the local language... we heard a lot of eh's and aboot's! Gotta love that Canadian accent!

This is a picture of Banff, Canada! Isn't is beautiful? We left our hotel, drove for about one mile and almost got side swiped by a black bear! It just barely missed us and then darted across the road. After our scary encounter with our little bear, we headed up to Norquay ski resort. A short 5 minutes later, we encountered another bear - this one grazing off the side of the road. Two bears only a few miles apart!

Welcome to gorgeous Lake Louise! As you can see in the picture, the lake is fed by a gigantic glacier! Although the water is FREEZING, we were daring enough to take a canoe out on the lake! It was amazing! My brother Chris took his girlfriend Karen out on a canoe also and in the middle of the lake, he proposed! Yay! We're so excited to have our fun new sister-in-law!

We finished off our fun adventure through Canada with horseback riding through Banff National Park and a one of a kind evening steak fry! We saw all kinds of wildlife: mosquitos, ducks, mosquitos, Canadian geese, mosquitos, and even a coyote! My horse was named Dally and James' horse was named Jackpot. It was a blast and a perfect way to see Canada! All in all, our trip was super fun - thanks to my family for helping us make such awesome memories!

Dirt, Bugs, & Racoons

We just went on a fun camping trip with our friends and neighbors, the Coon's: Dallas, Issac, Bennett, Maysen, and cute baby Gage! We had a blast hanging around the campfire, hiking, playing hide-and-go-seek, and napping under the shade of the only large tree the campsite had.


The first night, we had several visitors around our tent all night long - James assured me that they were probably just mice, but I wasn't convinced! So here I am crafting my very own weapon, just in case! Turns out that the lethal predators that I was so worried about were only racoons!


A camping trip just wouldn't be complete without roasting some hot dogs over an open fire! Dallas and Issac made dutch oven peach cobbler and it was seriously yummy!


After a weekend of dirty camping, here we are exhausted and ready to go home and take a shower! What a fun weekend!