Reflections of Summer

This last summer went by so fast! It seems as if it has flown by with just a blink of the eye! Here is a recap of most of the activities that we did.

My Birthday!

The beginning of the summer started (more or less) with my birthday. I woke up and got ready for work while Ryan made me breakfast. My birthday was the first time that I really felt the nauseousness from being pregnant. By the end of the day I came home from work feeling very sick and not really in the mood for celebrating :(

However, despite how I felt, Ryan made me a delicious birthday cake. Unfortunately I only had one piece of the entire thing :( Maybe next year he will have to make it again, and I will be able to eat more of it with out feeling so crummy.

Liberty Lake:

We spent a lot of time at Liberty Lake. Most of the lake has private access so there are only a few spots where the "public" can get to it. We had some friends show us this area where it looks as if it is private property but the city actually owns it. Since it looks as if it is private there aren't a lot of people that go there. We enjoyed our days there where it was just the two of us to enjoy a small "private" portion of the lake.

so happy :)

Visit from Ryan's parents/Memorial Day Weekend:

Over memorial day weekend Ryan's parents came out to visit us. We showed them the city of Couer d'Alene and the lake where we hiked Tubbs hill. The hike was extremely green due to all the rain that we had been having.

The moose at the beginning of the trail

a good view of the lake

We showed them the Spokane Temple

We did a self tour of a cathedral that was in down town Spokane. The stained glass windows were definitely beautiful. It is always interesting to go into a cathedral because the architecture is so exquisite, but I am very grateful for our modest church buildings and beautiful temples. The spirit is there in our buildings where cathedrals have a cold and empty feeling. Mom had never been in a cathedral before so it was fun to do something she had not done.

Dad showing us how they use the kneeling rails.

Mom standing in a cremation cemetery just outside the cathedral. Kind of eerie.

Manito park was not quite in bloom due to a cold spring. Mom and Dad still had a very fun time imagining what it would have looked like had the flowers bloomed. I was very impressed with their knowledge of flowers!

Dad enjoying the horseshoe shaped shrubbery

Japanese gardens. My favorite part of Manito park.

We took them to see Post Falls (in Idaho) as well as the Spokane falls in downtown Spokane. The falls were raging! We were awe struck with the amounts of water just billowing down the stream bed. The falls start in Post Falls with the dam. They then go down the river and through Washington.

This is mom at the dam in Post Falls

The rest of the pictures are from downtown Spokane

We would literally get sprayed from the waters below. People were walking across the bridge with their umbrellas.

We showed them Ryan's school. It's a combined campus with Washington State University and Eastern Washington University hence the two names for both universities.

We loved having Ryan's parents come and visit with us. We thoroughly enjoyed their company and had a really nice time.

Father's Day!

Ryan got a grill for fathers day. He had been wanting one for quite some time. After he got it he definitely enjoyed those summer nights when he used it!

4th of July!

For the 4th of July we went to Liberty Lake with some friends and had a BBQ. The city launches the fireworks right over the lake so we had a prime location. The food was very good and company was fun as always.

Our friends; Amber, Tom and their little boy Corbin.

Waiting for the fireworks to start

Visit from the Wells family!

Near the end of July my parents and the four youngest came up to visit! They had a reunion in Oregon so they took the long way home and decided to stop and visit us! It was so fun to have them come up. We were able to squish 6 more bodies in our 1 bedroom apartment and have a marvelous time.

On one of the days they were here we went earlier in the morning and played some tennis. Once it got hot enough we took them to Liberty Lake to swim around. We were able to get a hold of a canoe which ended up being really fun!

David (17 yrs old) in the back of the canoe, Crystal (15 yrs old and one of the twins) in the middle, and Charles (13 yrs old) in the front.

Melissa (15 yrs old and one of the twins) beating me in a race.

After some coaxing we finally convinced my mom to come and play on the float tubes! I think she had a lot of fun on them.

On the twins birthday we all went down to lake Coeur d'Alene and hiked Tubbs hill. When we got to a little beach area David (in the grey shirt) was trying to teach everyone how to sling rocks. We definitely enjoyed some laughs as most of us tried to awkwardly sling the rocks out into the lake. David was a patient teacher :)

David teaching my mom

After the lake we went home and had a delicious birthday dinner. I don't think I have ever eaten so late in my life. We stayed a little longer at the lake so we actually didn't eat until 10:00pm!

On one of the days Ryan and I took them downtown to see the sights. We showed them the falls, where Ryan goes to school, and Manito park. The park was in full bloom and looking awesome. Ryan and I have never seen it in bloom so we really enjoyed seeing all of the colors and flowers. The boys didn't find Manito park as fascinating. I guess flowers don't hold their interest.

Manito park in bloom. Absolutely beautiful!

The Spokane falls which have died down significantly since May, but still very fun to look at. We took this same shot back in May when Ryan's parents came to visit. You can see how the water has died down. Before, you couldn't even see the rocks at the bottom left of the picture.

The picture below is from May. You can just see the difference!

David (in black) and Charles (in blue) playing around

Trip to Utah:

After my family's visit we caravanned down to Utah with them to continue our visit with family. Ryan had a 6 week summer vacation from school so we tried to take full advantage of that. We didn't take many pictures while in Utah but had a lot of fun visiting with family.

We spent the first part of our visit with my family down in Payson. I did some shopping with my sisters to get some very much needed maternity necessities, made raspberry jam with my mom and twin sisters, got together with my entire family and had a BBQ while watching an outside movie. My sister Beth and my mom also threw me a baby shower! They put a lot of time into it and I appreciated it thoroughly. Again, I don't have any pictures to show for it but I very much enjoyed visiting with cousins, aunts, and friends.

The next half of the trip was spent up in Heber. I was actually not feeling the best so I slept a good portion of the time. Ryan had a good time visiting with parents, the Ritchie boys, and Cory. We also were able to celebrate his birthday which was really fun to be able to do that with family.

Ryan's Birthday:

We went to Cafe Rio for his birthday dinner

With the help of nieces and nephews and my mother in law I was able to make Ryan his birthday cake. This is the first time I have ever made a shaped (other than square) cake. I was nervous but very pleased when it all turned out and actually looked like how I envisioned it. A big thank you to Garrett for drawing the football, and basketball on a piece of paper so I would know where to frost the lines appropriately!

Happy 28th birthday my love!

Hawaii Trip (which will be featured in another blog post):

After leaving Utah our next destination was Hawaii!!! We decided to divide our drive up into two days so we stayed at Scott and Natalie's house for a night. It is always so good to see them and their kids. Our flight to Hawaii was from the Seattle airport so the next morning we drove to Monroe which is just outside of Seattle. We stayed with my cousin Victoria. She let us park our car at her house while we were gone and she even drove us to the airport. THANK YOU! From there our Hawaii adventures start.

Since this is an already long post we are going to have to do our Hawaii trip separate. We had a blast and will definitely go into detail about our adventures in our next entry.

Adventures in Hawaii.....

Labor Day Weekend:

Fast forwarding to after our trip from Hawaii....it is now labor day weekend. We woke up Friday morning trying to decide what we were going to do for the long weekend when I asked Ryan if he wanted to go to Boise. We called up Natalie to ask her if it was okay to come on such short notice. After she said that she would love to have us we were packed and gone within the hour. We had a blast! It was very relaxing and fun to just visit and continue our vacationing with family. We unfortunately don't have any pictures to show for it :( but we had a blast! Thank you Scott and Natalie for such a fun and unplanned for weekend!

End of Summer:

The summer has now ended. It is officially the fall season and Ryan has returned to school to complete his last and final semester of classes. Even though the weather is cooler, clouds have come to cast their shadow, rain has started to fall and the leaves are changing their colors, we are happier than ever to have time continue and our lives progress.

In a short two months we are moving to Wenatchee where Ryan will do an internship and later have employment there. In another short...and yet long three months we will be having another member join our family! Life just keeps moving forward and we couldn't be happier with where we are heading.

Until then we look forward to the weekends when we get to relax/or rant, while watching the BYU games!