Birthday girl

Our Charlee girl turned 1 years old on November 21. I still can't believe we have 3 dogs. But I don't know what we would do without her. She is so freaking goofy. Woody and Axel love having a sister to play with. She is the most chill, loving dog ever. We love you Charlee.

Park Interpreting

Last week I got to spend 4 lovely days reflecting in Capitol Reef. I had the opportunity to learn a lot about the history and geology from one of the coolest, most passionate park interpreters, Ho. He runs the UVU field station down there and knows everything you need to know about Capitol Reef.

Better late than never.

Happy (Belated) Halloween. :)

Good Oak

February

"There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery, and the other that heat comes from the furnace.

To avoid the first danger, one should plant a garden, preferably where there is no grocer to confuse the issue.

To avoid the second, he should lay a split of good oak on the andirons, preferably where there is no furnace, and let it warm his shins while a February blizzard tosses the tress outside. If one has cut, split, hauled, and piled his own good oak, and let his mind work the while, he will remember much about where the heat comes from, and with a wealth of detail denied to those who spend the week end in town astride a radiator."

-Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac, And Sketches Here and There.

Some good ol' fashioned fun

For my Wilderness Skills class, we decided to go to Grand Gulch for our final trip. We had a blast, and if you've never been, you should go. There are so many amazing ruins, petroglyphs, and pictographs it's unreal. It's fascinating to learn about the history behind the Anasazi culture and to try to picture living how they once did.
The best part of my whole trip, was that I was the only girl. Just pure old fashion fun with the boys. :) Thanks guys for an awesome time!

Happy Birthday Grammy!

Grammy Antoccia turned 90 on October 4. Happy Belated Birthday Grammy. We love you!!!

Back to reality.

Grand Cayman
Dave, Me, John, Al, Tom, Rach and Scottie.
Spelunking, zip lining and repelling in Belize.
Snorkeling in Grand Cayman

Jay, Alyson, Rachel and I had the time of our lives on our vacation. Jay and I just want to thank Al and Rach for celebrating our 4 year anniversary with us. It would NOT have been the same with out you two. A few things we did, hung out in Miami-went to South Beach, in Grand Cayman, we went snorkeling and we swam with HUGE stingrays. (we should be getting some pictures soon). In Belize, we went spelunking, did the zip line through the jungle, and did a little repelling too. In Honduras, we spent the day at the beach swimming out little hearts out and did the same in Cozumel. At Paradise Beach in Cozumel, they had all these fun blow up toys to play with in the water, as well as sea kayaking too. Loved it.

We took so many pictures and quite frankly, I am too lazy to post them all on here so here are just a few of the 350 that I took alone; so not including Alyson's pictures. If you want to see more, I have them all posted on facebook. I'm not going to lie, we were the life of the party and we made friends with everyone! Seriously, everywhere we went on the cruise, people were like...hey we saw ya'll dancing, or saw you singing etc. It was so funny! We made some great friends from San Diego, Key West, Philadelphia, Puerto Rico, Croatia and more!

I may sound a little cheesy right now, but I am seriously so thankful for everything and everyone in Mine and Jay's lives. I don't know what we would do without all the love that surrounds us. :)
JJ, Al, Jay, Rachel, Jorge and J in Cozumel.
Jay, Rach, Al and myself in Cozumel. The gang and our new San Diego friends, Brad and Morgan. My favorite picture I took on the whole trip! AMAZING!!!

PS-Thanks to Bre and Shae, Jen and Jer for helping with the kids! Especially Bre since she was the lucky one to clean up Charlee's diarrhea :)