Utah - "You're Brand of Summer Fun"

Reed, Jensen and I were able to go to Utah for a couple weeks and just had a great time.

Highlights:

- seeing family (grandparents and cousins)

- Cafe Rio (we almost filled up a whole card)

- Cherry Hill with the fam

- Getting Vettori family pics done (finally), check out our pics here

- having babysitters

- playing tennis

- going out with friends (we're sorry if we didn't get a chance to see everyone. It was quite the whirlwind)

- petting zoo with the Mackays

- Going to several parks with the Barbees

- Silver Lake with the Edwards

- Churrasco at mom and dad's

- seeing my cute little niece, Isabella for the first time

- Utah football game - GO UTES!

Thanks everyone for a great time. See you in December!

Jensen and Kira wasted no time getting to know each other.

Reed loves his nieces and nephews. He was in heaven.

We went to a petting zoo with some of our friends, the Mackays. Jensen did not love the pony rides.

But he did have a good time with Oliver (even though it doesn't show in this pic).

On our was to Vovo's house, just diggin into this peach. Thanks Grandma!

Here's the first time we met the newest addition to the Vettori family, Isabella. She is now 6 months and just so stinkin' cute.

Jensen had definite issues eating when we were in Utah, but when it came to pizza no one could stop him. He ate like 3 full pieces.

We went to Cherry Hill with both families and had a great time with grandparents and cousins.

Look at all those cute babies.

Jensen with his uncle Dan

We went up to Silver Lake for a bbq with the Edwards. Kira and Jensen obviously had other ideas. They would not sit still for a minute. Gotta love 2 year olds!

Here comes trouble!

I don't if you can tell from the million of pictures of them together, but Jensen and Kira hung out a lot.

Jensen loves his Vovo!

We were so excited to get to go to Utah's season opener football game against Utah State. They of course won. We had a great time. Thanks Scott for the tickets!

RUN. DRIVE. SLEEP? REPEAT.

So we did it! 195 miles starting in Winona, WI to Minneapolis, MN. A bunch of members of our ward and some random people we were lucky to pick up, ran 195 miles. We did the Ragnar Relay, The Great River Run, and great it was. We started at 7 am and finished at 1 pm. With very little sleep and several injuries between all of us, we made it. It was my first Ragnar run and I had a great experience. It's a definite test of character. Running 3 different times, getting very little sleep, eating and drinking when ever you can, and being squished in a van with 5 other stinky people. Life doesn't get any better than that!

Here's all of us at the end of the race. Way to go, team Kamanuwanaruna!

Reed and Jensen came to cheer me on my 2nd leg in Bay City. It was my hardest leg of 8.3 miles with 1.5 miles all up Maiden Rock, all up hill. It was listed as my hardest leg, but I would have to say the last leg I ran was the hardest for me. It was only 3 miles at 4 am, but it took everything I had to finish. I ran a total of about 20 miles and would do it again in a heartbeat (well ask me again when I can go downstairs without wincing).

Here's after Maiden Rock. I was so happy to be done.

Most of us ran the last leg with Mara, our last runner. She did awesome! We had quite a team.

He doesn't look that excited, but he was definitely my biggest fan, aside from Reed. Thanks for all the support, boys!

Fun in the Sun

Today was a great warm Minnesota day. Most of the summer it's been in the 70's, which I just absolutely love. This beautiful weather definitely makes you forget about the harsh winter. It's been nice to be outside and go to parks and ride the trails without dying of heat and sweat. But this week it started getting a little warmer like high 80's so we decided to bust out the $5 kiddy pool and play.

I'm not so sure what he's doing here. We did just learn head, shoulders, knees and toes so maybe that's what it is.

Don't mind the toes and the plumbers crack.

You know you take a lot of pictures when your kid starts saying "shees" and giving a fake smile the minute you bust out the camera.

Kind of Random Stuff

We went to Como Zoo this last weekend because we couldn't go swimming because it was too cold and because it's free. Can you believe we were wearing long sleeve shirts and pants in the middle of July? Global warming, my eye! Needless to say, we're back to the great MN summer of 70 degrees I love. Sorry, you think we would have taken more pictures, but this is all we got. But the video at the end I think makes up for it.

This was the other day when I went to get Jensen after his nap. What a little stinker!

Not only did he balance himself on the side of his crib, but managed to grab everything in the drawer and have a little party with it. He looks very inquisitive, doesn't he?

Don't let this picture fool you, there were more, many more all around his crib. But how can you be mad at this face?

Now this is my favorite. We were just walking through the zoo and he heard some music in Como Town, the little amusement park inside the zoo, and this was his reaction. All I have to say is, he is definitely his father's son.

4th of July Weekend!

We had a great 4th of July weekend. On Friday we were invited to go to Bryant Lake of one of Reed's intern buddies' boat. It's been a long time since we've been wakeboarding and we definitely felt it the next day. Jensen loved the water and loved driving the boat (you'll see what I mean). Here are some pics of our weekend:

Reed tearin' it up!

Like I said, loved driving the boat!

Gotta make sure there are some good tunes on.

Don't judge me, it's been a long time.

I loved that life jacket, but I don't know if you can tell Jensen did not.

I thought this was such a cute pic of Jensen and his daddy.

He's always pointing to something. I just wish I knew what he was saying.

On the Saturday we went to Taste of Minnesota. It was kind of like a small State Fair with just as many crazy people. I loved it! This was right in St. Paul on Harriet Island, beautiful place right on the river. They had games, vendors, music, food and more food. We had a great time till, well, you'll see:

You gotta have funnel cake at the fair, right?

There's always those air jumpy things and Jensen went in and just had a ball.

This is us on the river. I don't know if you can see, but there were some fierce storm clouds coming in.

That's right, we got caught in an awesome MN rainstorm. We were literally in the rain for no more than 2 minutes and we were soaked head to toe.

Later that day (and I say day, because it was about 7 pm) we lit some fireworks of our own.

He thought they were so cool. After every single one this was his face, "Whoa!"


He loved the sparklers, maybe a little too much. When it went out he grabbed the end and burned his little fingers. It was sad, but I guess it's a right of passage. Grandpa called it; it happens to everyone.

We had a great 4th of July, but we missed our friends and family!