Jess and Chris Tied the Knot!

I have been on "Team Chris" since the beginning. Jessica had a couple of guys pursuing her and she made the right choice. Andrew and I have spent lots of time with Jess and Chris over the past year. In fact, I remember telling Jessica soon after they started dating that she had my approval to marry Chris. I think she was a little alarmed. Jessica is such a catch and obviously deserves the best. She got it marrying Chris. They are so good for each other.

Jessica and Christopher got married on Thursday, August 9 in the Salt Lake Temple. I'm so happy for them! It has been pretty smoky here, but the smoke seemed to clear out just for their wedding. The smoke was much worse the next day and following week. 

The sealing was powerful. My grandpa passed away in March which was sudden and hard. The sealer talked about people being present in the sealing who have passed away which hit me. The spirit was palpable. I'm grateful that James was in good hands while we were in the sealing. (Thank you Kaylee Beck!)

The luncheon was in the Joseph Smith Memorial building at the Garden Restaurant. It was at 2:00 and my stomach was rumbling LOUDLY during the sealing. Luckily mine wasn't the only one. I was worried that everyone in the room could hear my hunger.

The reception was later that night outdoors. It was hot, but what else can you expect in August? Jessica has a knack for decorating and everything was beautiful. The reception was a blast! I wish I had been hungry enough to eat more from the food truck. The waffles and fries were fabulous. There were also Italian Sodas and lots of outdoor games to play: bocce, ladders, spikeball, etc. Rob joined Andrew in a game of spikeball. It was his first time playing and he's a natural. They were both drenched in sweat afterwords. 

As soon as Jess and Chris got engaged, I told Jessica about my friend, Mandi, who is a photographer. Jessica ended up using Mandi for the wedding and loved how the pictures turned out. All (but 1) of the pictures in the post she took. Check out her website: http://www.mandiraephoto.com/ 

I can't believe my baby sister is married! Here's to spending another year hanging out with the happy, now married couple. Welcome to the family, Chris! 

Camping with a Toddler

Andrew and I have never been camping together for a reason. The reason being that I'm not much of a camper. I'm to blame and I take full responsibility. Andrew once found a steal of a deal on a tent and asked my thoughts. Why would anyone waste money on a tent? Clearly, I talked him out of it.

This year, the Ditto's decided to go camping for their annual summer get together. I wasn't necessarily thrilled by the idea, but we went anyway. Knowing that we would have a camper to sleep in helped. 

The campsite we went to was Camp Na Bor Lee which is about 2 hours from Spokane adding to our already long drive. The campsite was spacious and secluded. I could tell that it was beautiful. Unfortunately, it was smoky and we didn't see many blue skies in our time there. All of Andrew's family was there except for Birch and Sara's family who were welcoming Alex home from his mission.

I have categorized some memories from the trip into 4 categories: things that were hard, things I want to remember, things I want to forget, and camping tips.


THINGS THAT WERE HARD 

• Getting enough sleep.
• Going potty.
• Being filthy.
• Keeping an energetic toddler from drowning.
• Being eaten alive by mosquitoes.
• Eating food with annoying bees.

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER

• Andrew and I won the rook tourney! This resulted in Andrew giving me one of the biggest compliments he has ever given me-- that my rook skills have surpassed his.
• Singing songs by the campfire (before fires were restricted the next day).
• How much James loves his Granny. He has a hard time saying, "Granny," and started calling her, "Gaga," which was adorable.
• Seeing James interact with his cousins. He especially loved being around baby Rhett and using his baby walker. (Hopefully James' 26+ pounds didn't break it.)
• The adults going wake-surfing one night. I tried it out, but couldn't get up. Maybe next time.
• Loud music playing on the beach while volleyball, spike-ball, and other fun activities were going on.

Andrew did some cool tricks and his facial expressions were indescribable. 

THINGS I WANT TO FORGET

• How much dirt James ate.
• The number of bees there were. 
• James waking up hours before everyone else each morning and attempting to keep him from waking up the whole crew.
• The car ride home which lasted from 9:00am-11:20pm on Saturday.
• How sore I am. James slept between Andrew and I and it was a tight squeeze. 
• Andrew missing the turn towards Pocatello while I was trying to sleep. I opened my eyes and realized we were headed towards Boise. We had to turn around and I definitely wasn't happy about it. I have something to tease Andrew about now though. 
• Andrew mentioning mid drive, in the middle of the night, that he needs an eye appointment and that things look blurry. He has noticed his poor eyesight for a couple of months, but didn't bring it up because he knew I was worried about money. Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep during the drive because I felt like another set of eyes was needed. (FYI-- He has an eye appointment scheduled for Wednesday.) 

CAMPING TIPS FOR NEXT TIME... IF THERE IS A NEXT TIME

• Bring hand sanitizer. This would have been a life saver! 
• Bring bug spray or long pants to avoid looking like you have the chicken pox.
• Bring a flashlight!
• Bring a trash-bag to put dirty clothes in.

Yes, I'm glad we went and we made lots of memories. Will we make a drive that long again, to camp? Who knows, but at this point I would probably say it's unlikely. It might be a little too soon to ask. I just finished doing 5 loads of stinky laundry. Boy it's nice to be home in my large, child-free, king-sized bed.