I Miss Summer

Now that we're into November (crazy, huh?), the weather here in Utah is starting to cool off, the air is completely dried out (and so are my lips, my hands, and my hair), and we're expecting snow this weekend. Sigh. As much as I love the holiday season, I'm really not a fan of the cold and the snow. So today I figured I'd finally post those pictures of our summer vacation we took in July! What better timing, right?

[Just a note: We really do mean to post on here more often. It's just that life has thrown us a few curveballs lately, so it's been hard to think of what to post. We'll fill you in on what's been going on a little later, but for now just rest assured that we're doing fine and feeling (relatively) well.]

In case you don't remember our last post (it was only 2 whole months ago...), Darren and I were lucky enough to get to take a vacation this summer. We visited my family & friends in California (and got to meet my older brother's fiance, Courtney), and then we went up to Seattle to visit Darren's brother and, well, more of my friends (hi, O'Neal family!). It was a great trip, and it was SO nice to go enjoy the California sunshine & the Seattle/western Washington scenery.

Enjoy the pictures!

Oh right: before our trip, we celebrated Darren's birthday!
He's 25 now, and we all enjoyed his Reese's cake.

 We also had my little younger brother, Michael, come stay with us for a week after he went to EFY. I think most of the time he was pretty bored (except video games), but we went mini-golfing one night, which was a lot of fun. Michael managed to lose a ball into the windmill AND another one into the pond at the end, at the hole where it can only go in the hole. It took skill.

Then we went to California & visited Old Sacramento. This is the boat, The Delta King,
that my great-grandpa was a captain of (if I remember correctly).

We also got to walk the grounds of the beautiful Sacramento Temple.

After 5 short days in California, we went to Seattle. Isn't it gorgeous??
This was the view from a park near David's house (David = Darren's brother)

David and Emma took us to see the troll under the bridge
in what was basically the Berkeley of Seattle.

The troll is holding a real, crushed VW Bug. Weird.

 Then we went out to the very far coast of Washington, to a tiny little town called Hoquiam, to visit my life-long bestest friend and her family (basically my second family growing up) -- The O'Neals. They were so great. They welcomed us into their home and let us completely invade their whole day. I hadn't seen them in YEARS so it was great to catch up.

Me with Amanda and Carol. Laura had to go to work,
and I don't know where Darren or Scott were.

This is the view from the O'Neals' deck. Jealous yet? Yeah, I was.
That's the Sound out there, and you can watch the tide come in & go out.

After visiting with them for a while (4 hours or so...), we drove a little ways out to a town where we could walk out to the ocean beach. It was so nice to walk along the beach in the nice cool weather. In July. 

Man, I love Washington.

Aren't we so cool with our sunglasses? 

The last thing we did in the Seattle area (other than me gorging on fresh, fresh seafood, of course) was visit the Seattle Temple. Which isn't even in Seattle. It's in Bellevue. Go figure. But it's gorgeous. The grounds were amazing, and there was even a little wooded trail that had benches and flowers and songbirds. It was so peaceful and beautiful and just so great to be there.

Seattle, WA, LDS Temple

Well, that's about all I have time for. Now I'm off to a Castle marathon with my neighbor -- hooray! Hope you enjoy the pictures of our summer adventures.