We were able to go to my brother's house in Idaho for my immediate family reunion. It was great to see everyone and spend time with the family. We flew in on the 22nd and let me just say a 45 minute flight is amazing. It goes by so fast. I loved the short flight. The 22nd is my sister Mindy's birthday, so that evening we celebrated her birthday and my brother took some of us sight seeing in Boise which is the city he lives in. He lives about 10 mins away from the airport which is perfect especially since his wife Alysha is a pilot. It is a tradition in our family that when it is our birthday we have to take a bite out of our cake using only our mouth and usually someone smashes your face in the cake...it's fun!!! Since it was Min's birthday she had all of the grandkids help her blow out the candles and she wanted Dylan to help her take a bite in the cake, but as you can see from the pictures, she ended up smashing Dylan's face in the cake instead. haha :) That's our family for ya! The next day the boys went golfing in the morning while us girls got massages. Callen was a little jealous and wanted to be one of the girls since he loves massages, but he still had a good time with the guys. That afternoon we decided to go to the hot springs, but come to find out after driving for about an hour on a windy road, the hot springs haven't been open for about 10 yrs. So, we ended up stopping at a little river and played in the water. The water was freezing but everyone still had a great time, especially the boys taking turns diving in the water and the grandkids putting mud all over grandpa. On Friday, all of us except for Chels and my Dad's wife, Donna went river rafting in the Payette river. We had to separate into 2 groups since there was so many of us. Our group was me, Callen, Mindy, Pat, Brandon, and Alysha. We had a lot of fun and Brandon and Alysha were both able to ride the bull, which means they got on the very front of the raft and held on for dear life. haha We went through some pretty rough rapids, but were able to get through them due to our awesome guide Gary. However, nothing was about to prepare us for our very last rapid....The waves were too big and rough that it knocked all of us except for our guide into the water. Our raft has a rope around it, so we were told that if we ever do get knocked into the water, we are supposed to grab the rope and pull ourselves up. All of us were really scared when we got knocked into the water, afraid that we might drown. The waves kept hitting us in the face and luckily for me I was the first one to make it back into the raft. I remember being under the water and seeing a lot of white small bubbles above me and thinking I was further down than I thought I was. Not having been able to take a deep breath before going under, as soon as I came up I took a deep breath and grabbed the rope. I got into the raft and saw my sister, brother, sister-in-law, and brother-in-law get pulled in, then I thought, "oh no" where is my husband? I look out into the water to see Callen far away and water keep slashing him in the face. He had this look of fear in his eyes and that's when I started to panic and I yelled out to him and told him to swim, swim, swim. We finally got him into the raft and he struggled to catch his breath, then we all realized we were all in some pain from the water. Some of us had cuts and blood and some of us were really sore and had bruises. We were just happy to be alive. The thing that scared me is that when I made it into the raft I noticed that my life jacket was almost completely off of me. I was talking to my grandpa's wife, Patty about it and she told me that my uncle's friend died in a rafting trip because he fell into the water and his life jacket fell off. Heavenly Father was definitely looking after us. After rafting, some of us drove about 10 mins north to some hot springs. We didn't know we had to hike almost 1 mile up to them though, which was a pain in the butt, especially since some of us didn't have the proper shoes. It was still fun though, especially seeing the nude guys as soon as we got there...that was Callen's favorite part. haha ;) jk Later that night my Dad had put together a white elephant game for us but they were super nice gifts, so Callen and I got a coin counter and lantern. A couple of nights some of us were in the mood for Dairy Queen, so both times, me, Callen, Pat, and Jay went and oh my heck, those 2 times had to have been the funniest times ever. The first time Pat drove and he had to repeat himself a million times for the lady and he asked about almost every blizzard and how it tasted....soooo funny!!!! The last time we went which was on Saturday night, Jay drove and the same thing happened again. The lady could not hear us order and when we finally pulled up to the window to get our desserts Pat got a large cherry shake and as soon as Jay handed it to him, Pat dropped it on the floor and it went everywhere....we all were busting up mostly because of Pat's hilarious remarks, like "we aren't gonna do well in our checkout..."....we had rentals that's why. I can't remember the other comments but we couldn't stop laughing.
Saturday morning we took family pictures and then some of us went shooting. After that we went to a place which I can't remember the name but it was like a beach. It had sand and water and there was a huge fountain in the middle of the water. We had a BBQ and played soccer and minute to win it. The trip was a ton of fun and unfortunately it went by way too fast.
4th of July weekend was fun also because my sister Mindy and her family was able to come into town. We spent the weekend in Park City at their condo at the Canyons. Callen and I went up there on the Friday night before the 4th. We woke up Saturday morning and watched the womens soccer game and wimbledon tennis matches. That day we played tennis and went swimming while waiting for my sister's family to arrive. Sunday we went swimming and hot tubing and just relaxed. On Monday we went to the outlets and got some cool stuff at Lids and Adidas. We also went to the Chocolate Factory and later that night Mindy and I spent some time together shopping at Walmart. It's hard to be away from my family and I missed them as soon as we departed. My niece Pyper drew us a picture to hang on our fridge and in the front it says, I love Callen and Auntie Muffie Forever!!! It touched my heart. She's my little twin!!! :)
I was happy to spend the 4th with a member of my immediate family and that being one of my best friends, Mindy. As most of you know, my Mother passed away on the 4th of July in 2009, so now when that time of the year comes, it's not a very joyous time. It's been 2 yrs now and I miss her so much. Her birthday was 2 days later on the 6th and my brother texted me a picture of the sunset in ID and he told me that he felt like it was my Mom giving him a hug to help him through the day at work. That touched my heart so much and even though my Mom isn't alive, she is still very much apart of mine and my siblings lives. My sister Mindy has been the one that I have looked up to as a Mom since my Mom isn't here. Mindy took my Mom's place at my wedding and helped me so much. When I was sealed I looked at her and saw her crying so hard and I knew it was because she wished my Mom was there and I knew my Mom was crying even though I couldn't see her and to me Mindy's tears were hers.
Next on our list is to go to Tropic for the 24th and go camping, so we will keep you all posted on how that goes!!!
