HAPPY PIONEER DAY! 7/24/15

Zach and I took Friday off so we could thoroughly enjoy our 24th holiday and have a long weekend. We got up early that morning and went to the Ogden Parade with Tytan and the twins. All I can say is that I am no longer in Coalville haha. This parade was huge and had a ton of people watching going on! Where I grew up the parade was

so small.....in fact small enough that it turns around and comes back again:) I grew up thinking all parades did that! After the parade we headed up to Mountain Green where we were able to go swimming at the Browning pool. The pool was so pretty because it sits right in the mountains. We loved getting to soak up the sun and the twins even learned how to jump off the diving board on

their own. We went back to Zach's parents house to barbeque dinner before we headed out to the rodeo. Bob had just got back from Alaska so we took full advantage of grilling up some of his fresh yummy salmon. Zach and I headed back to our house to

hurry and get ready so we could all head to the Ogden Pioneer Days Rodeo. We have gone the last few years together and it is one of my very favorite rodeo's! After the rodeo we drove up to Evanston...yes we drove up there at 11 o'clock at night. We had to make it up there so we could get up early in the morning to go scouting for deer:) I drew out for a Wyoming deer tag this year with NO points so we are trying to track down a good deer for me to shoot in the fall! Zach and I got up early and hopped

on the four-wheeler to ride behind my parents house. We hiked a little ways to overlook the mountain side where we found a ton of deer. We headed back to my parents and made breakfast and took a little nap together. Later that afternoon we went out on a horse ride

with my Dad. It was a beautiful afternoon and we enjoyed the weather and time being outdoors.Saturday night Grandma Hope and Grandpa Floyd came over and we played Mexican trains. It is always a good time when this game gets started. Sunday we went to church with my family and played with the kids. This summer we have made it a goal to not waste any of our weekends and so far I think we have been successful!

*Happy 4th of July*

I love the month of July....warm weather, swimming, patriotism, shaved ice, rodeos, barbequing, and long days. We headed up to Evanston Friday after work. Saturday morning we got up and headed to the church. Our sweet Kolb's was getting baptized! I was able to talk on baptism and it is so special to see Kolby making such good decisions. After the baptism we went to Colt and Meg's for lunch. All of the kids headed up to Grandma and Grandpa's and played a mean game of football in the backyard with uncle Zach. It is their absolute favorite! Summer and Dave came up with their kids and Bob and Susan. We played outside ALL day long. Water balloons, sprinklers, football, baseball, four-wheelers, and riding bikes all included:)

We barbequed burgers for dinner and set off a few small fireworks and sparklers. Evanston puts on an awesome firework show and so does the rest of the town haha. Luckily my parents live at the top of the hill overlooking the town so we are able to lay out blankets on the front yard and watch the whole town light up. It was a

very fun 4th of July and I think will become a yearly tradition!

~Flaming Gorge~

June 6, 2015

Zach and I had gone up to spend the weekend with my family in Evanston. My dad was finally home from working in North Dakota so we were pretty excited to be able to spend some time with him! We decided that we would get up early Saturday morning and go fish at Flaming Gorge. The weather wasn't supposed to be great, but we don't get a lot of chances to go so we thought we would take the risk! We got up EARLY at 3:30 AM to head out. After we got the boat unloaded we headed to the pipeline to fish for kokanee. We started trolling and got a few bites. We reeled in a couple little ones and then we got a big one on! I started reeling it in and right when we got it to the net it flipped out....well that was the last of our fish catching for the day haha. We went all over and fished for mac and other fish but didn't have much luck. It was windy so it made it harder to fish and we got snagged a few times. Finally around 3pm we decided we should head home. It was a good thing because the clouds moved in and the storm passed through. Even though we didn't catch a whole lot, it is the time with my Dad and memories like
this that I cherish.

Here Fishy Fishy.......

I love to fish! Zach likes fishing but if he had the choice he would choose to go hunting first. I don't like to freeze to death so fishing is right up my alley. The last couple years we have gone up to Pineview in the spring and have gone Crappie fishing. There are a few weeks that they go crazy and you catch a fish with almost every cast! We had so much fun and caught so many fish that we

went about 4 times. When we got off work we packed a picnic and headed up to the lake to fish until dark. Our second trip Tytan and the twins came with us. Tytan and Madden loved it the most and Maverick was just happy to be free. I had been helping Madden cast and then she would reel it in all by herself. We were joking around saying how funny it would be if she actually caught one on her

own. Literally two minutes later I saw her line jumping and sure enough there was a fish on. When I told her, "Madden you caught a fish!" she started screaming and jumping up and down and reeling as fast as her little arms would go! She kept yelling, "shish, shish, shish." I was amazed that the fish stayed on the line....we were able to

Madden's first fish

catch the cutest picture of her with her first little fish using my pink fishing pole. 

ERIC CHURCH

May 25, 2015

Memorial Day we were able to go to the Eric Church Concert! Perri and I had gone to see him at the first of the year. His band had all gotten really sick so when he played he played completely acoustic! It was an amazing concert, but he announced then that because we wouldn't get the full version of his show that they would return on Memorial Day for us all to come see him again! It shows you what kind of artist he is that he would allow his fans to come to an entire second show for free or your could turn your ticket in and get a refund. My cute little Perri is pregnant and was starting a new job and she said that she would like to give her ticket to Zach. I was sad to not be able to go with her, but I couldn't wait to surprise Zach! I wrote him a little letter to tell him what we were going to be doing and he was like a kid on Christmas! He LOVES Eric Church. We ended up heading down to SLC early and going to dinner and then headed to the concert. It was such an awesome concert and Zach of course loved every second. Thanks again Perri for letting Zach go!

SPRING HAS SPRUNG

 May 4, 2015

Oh how I love warm weather! I really can't complain because we have had such a mild winter. I would be completely okay if it became a yearly event though! We have been going out to Zach's property a lot because of the nice weather. We also have to enjoy the time out there right now because in the summer the

mosquitoes are terrible and will eat us alive! Today we decided that we would go out to the property for our FHE. I grabbed a few groceries and when we got off of work we headed out to the property. Zach whipped out his flag and got it hung on his homemade flag pole and then he got us a fire going. It was a beautiful night and was so peaceful.

After we got the fire going we turned on a talk from this last General Conference titled, "Filling Our Homes With Light and Truth."  In the talk it stated, "In order for us and our families to withstand the pressures of the world, we must be filled with light and gospel truth." The talk was so uplifting and strengthened us to want to

be better and more prepared for our future little family. After we listened to the talk we cooked hot dogs over the fire for dinner. We stayed until about 10:30 that night because we were enjoying it so much! I loved getting to talk, laugh, reminisce on some of our favorite memories together, and to just have quiet....being in the country does something for me that nothing else can! It is so peaceful to have time away from the hustle and bustle and just listen to the crickets sing.

Our First Valentine's Day 2/14/15

So Valentine's Day was pretty fun because not only was it the day of LOVE, but it was also six months to the day that we had gotten married! We celebrated a day early because I was scheduled to work a 10AM-10PM shift at the ER on Valentine's day. We grabbed a pizza and cookie doe from Papa Murphy's. It was their "Valentine's special" so it included cookie doe that was dyed red and a pizza in the shape of a heart (cheezy I know, but I LOVE cheezy). We came home cookie the pizza, lit some candles, cracked open a bottle of sparkling cider, made a fort on the living room floor, and turned on a redbox! These kind of dates truly are my favorite. I'm pretty sure we both fell asleep 20 min into the movie, but at least I got plenty of snuggling in! Zach came the next day to work and had lunch with me. It was nice and warm so we ate outside on one of the tables. Seriously can it be in the 60's every February? I was a happy girl to have some sunshine and time with my main squeeze. Overall our first Valentine's day being married was a success!.

HAWAII~ HAPPY NEW YEAR!

January 1, 2015

January 2, 2015

We were so blessed to go to Hawaii for the first of the year! We flew in on January 1, 2015! It was such a fun way to start the year out. We had gotten up early and flew most of the day. We landed in Waikiki around dinner time, so we went to get our rental cars and then headed to a fun restaurant on the beach. We had rented a convertible for the week. It was pretty fun but......We didn't fit too well with our big bags haha. I'm sure we looked ridiculous driving through the city with our big suitcases on our lap. After dinner we headed to the home we were going to be staying at for the next week. We were staying in a cute little town called Kailua. Bob had met a lady at Browning who has a home in Hawaii and Utah. She was so kind and offered to let us stay in their beautiful home!

Our first day it was a little bit cloudy and had been raining a little on and off all day. (luckily their rain is a mist). So we decided to go on some hikes! They were so much fun and had amazing views! The next day we had a blast! We started our day out with a little jog on the beach. After we got back

we headed to the beach by our house for some sun and boogie boarding. The waves were a blast and I was pretty happy to start my tan out! Afterwards we headed back to the house to get cleaned up so that we could head to North Shore. We stopped at the Laie temple

and then headed to the Polynesian Cultural Center.We met up with Dave's brother and sister in law that are living in Hawaii and enjoyed the PCC together. The luau and dinner that night were so much fun and definitely one of our highlights this trip. January 4th: We had our

first full day of sunshine today! We drove to North Shore

again, stopped by and got a shaved ice, rented some surf boards and paddle boards for the guys to try, and went to Turtle Beach to snorkel. At the end of all of that we stopped by Sunset beach to watch the waves and beautiful sunset. January 5th: We had a pretty relaxed day beach

hopping. We did a lot of swimming, laying out, and boogie boarding. January 6th: We beached around our house earlier in the day and then ended up in Waikiki later on that day. We explored the town and the beach. January 7th: This was our last full day in Hawaii and we made the most of it! One of my

favorite roommates from USU lives in Hawaii with her little family. They have started a zipline company on North Shore and I had told her we would be coming to Hawaii for a trip so we needed to catch up. Ashley and Nick were so sweet that they told Zach and I that we could come go on their whole zipline course for free! We got up early this day and headed

to North Shore. Summer and Dave dropped us off at the zipline and then they headed off to play for a couple hours. The zipline is absolutely amazing! It runs over all of these amazingly gorgeous hills and orchards where they produce a lot of the produce for the island. The other awesome thing is that you get the view of the

ocean as well amongst all of this. The course was so fun and it built up to us being able to go upside down and backwards on some of the runs! Once we were done we met up with Summer and Dave and Ashley and Nick and went to lunch at a yummy joint right close to the zipline. It was so nice to get to catch up and visit with them! They are both so much fun and the best

people! After lunch we drove all along the shore and stopped from beach to beach. The waves were huge and so cool to watch. There were some crazy people out surfing in these gigantic waves so we stopped and watched them for a while. We continued pretty much all along the coast line and stopped at the Dole Pineapple Plantation. I had been craving this place our whole trip! We got their pineapple

icecream that had fresh pineapple sliced on it. YUM! We

finished the day in Waikiki. We swam and body boarded, walked around this really neat hotel that had outdoor fish and aquariums, and ended with one of the most gorgeous sunsets we had seen the whole trip. January 8th: Our last day we got up early and went for our last jog/walk on the beach and then stayed at the beach until lunch time. Then it was time to head back to pack, clean the house

and get ready to head to the airport. We loved every minute of this trip and getting to spend time and make memories with our family!

Our First Christmas! 2014~

I will share the gift

We celebrated Christmas Eve at my parents house! Christmas Eve

is always our big day together. My Mom makes a delicious dinner where we have prime rib, shrimp on ice, etc. YUM! After dinner my Mom shares a Christmas/story of Christ with all of us and then we open presents. This year we all wrote out a piece of paper that had on it, " I will share the gift by......." and then we filled in how we would share the true gift of Christmas. After we had written

The boys in their new hats

them out we shared them to each other and it was so neat to hear what everyone had thought of. Later that night we drove down to Mountain Green to sleep over at Zach's parents house. All of his family slept over except for Keeley (since they are in Russia). That night we watched Christmas movies and visited. Early that next

Our First Christmas Tree

morning we got up to go open presents. His family tradition is that everyone has to wait on the stairs before going down and we sing Christmas Carols. We watched the kids open their presents and then Zach and I opened ours together. We got this really cute picture frame from his parents! I had given Zach a couple shirts, colagne, a new pair of sweats, and some new slippers. He had written me out a letter that said "Aloha Steph." We are going to Hawaii!!!! It was a letter confirmation

The Morris House

for some PINK snorkeling gear for me! After that I opened a letter that said, "Do you want to see me?" And when I opened it was a picture of Eric Church! Yay! He knew how much I loved seeing him in concert. Zach and Brent each gave Perri and I tickets to go to the concert so we could have a fun girls night on January 31, 2015:)

Morris Caroling

After opening presents I had to get ready and go to work in the ER the rest of the day. We feel so blessed to have all that we do and to have our amazing families. We know that we are so lucky!

Our presents to each other

Christmas Day