whenever the camera comes out...

Chico tilts his head back, squints his eyes, and gives us a big cheesy grin.

 

He found this balloon during the dinner after the funeral. He looks so cute with his brand new pink tie that DADDY picked out, not me. Although I mocked Brent's choice at first, I have grown very fond of this pink tie on our blond hair blue eyed boy.

and a cute one from the tub :)

Moving on...

Brent's grandpa died last week.  It was hard to have him gone so fast.  We thought we had more time with him.  He was ready to go and be back with his sweet wife though.  He was ready to move on.  A few special scriptures I want to remember that he had written down:  "Perfect love casteth out all fear"  "The Lord is my shepard, he leadeth me to lie down in green pastures... though in the threat of death I will fear no evil for thou art with me"

Even though he wasn't my grandpa I always called him Grandpa because he felt like mine.  He was also so interested in our lives.  He asked such good questions.  He was genuinely interested in knowing, it wasn't just for conversation. I miss him already.  I only got to know him for the last 3 years.  Brent spent so much time with his grandpa and grandma as he grew up.  You could say they were like his second parents.  A lot of the good decisions he has made in his life were a result of his grandpa's influence on him. 
Grandpa and Grandma always lived in a way that would make them worthy to be with their children who died at birth. We want to follow the example they set and always strive to live worthy to be with our loved ones again someday. Grandpa we will miss you...until we meet again.

Grandpa was a military veteran and as such had a special military ceremony at his graveside.  It poured rain right during the ceremony.  It was really quite dramatic.

Shortly after the ceremony was over the sun came out and it was beautiful.  Such a random time for a thunderstorm on a beautiful June day.  Good memories though.

Meet the baby in my tummy

I get routine ultrasounds at every visit. This last ultrasound was a picture perfect day for our little one's profile. The first picture on the left is from when she very first started looking, we caught him sucking his thumb. Makes me love going to my doctors appointments that's for sure!

Does anyone know where my newspaper is?

I have been meaning to post these adorable pictures for about a month. Brent had the idea to put a hand towel around Chico when he got out of the bathtub. It fits perfectly and he just looks like a mini adult walking around brushing his teeth and multi tasking and such. We love our little guy.

Day 7... Awesome Arches National Park

Been wondering when I'd get around to finish posting about the trip? Yeah, I've been really busy with photography. Check out the photography blog and see our awesome pics from the wedding we just did. We LOVE our new lens! ANYWAY.... on to other awesomeness... 

We went to Arches and decided to hike Landscape Arch first so we'd be sure to fit it in. Normally this hike wouldn't have been so bad for me (just 3 miles round trip) but my allergies flared up majorly in Moab and I had a hard time breathing on the way up. Slowly and surely we made it to the top and oh boy was it worth it as you round the bend and see this...

 

It's even better in person if you can believe it. We stayed up there for a while enjoying it's beauty. We had a guy take a picture with our camera after we got the settings all set for him. We're really pleased with it! Don't you just love Brent's scruff, lol!

 

 

Wouldn't it have been cool if we could say Brent made this cairn? 

We hiked back down and then drove up the hill to Devil's Garden so we could hike Double O Arch. We got there and found out it was a 7 mile round trip hike but that you could do a shorter hike and still see some cool arches. We decided to just start it and see how I felt. I didn't feel great as we began but as we kept hiking I got more and more energy. I'm so grateful for that because it was the coolest hike! There were amazing things to see the whole way up!!! And yes, I made it the whole way up! Here are the pictures from Devil's Garden: (the view as you arrive in the parking area) 

 

Delicate Arch... longest arch in the world!

   

You have to walk along the fins during parts of the hike, it didn't feel too dangerous at the time...

 

Double O Arch! (the second arch is harder to see but it's just right underneath it)

 

Some of the fins were as big as a Cruise Ship!!!

After we finished hiking we drove Brent back down to Landscape Arch so he could hike it again. It was better lighting and oh boy was it worth it...  

AND he went against my direct wishes and hiked down into the bowl. He assured me it was perfectly safe... and yeah I guess it makes for a pretty cool picture. While he was hiking I drove quickly back to camp and started the dutch oven cooking some spaghetti. Then I drove back up and got him and we met up just fine and he was safe and I didn't need to worry. :) Here are some pictures on our drive through arches from off the side of the road: The following names are made up by us... 

Patty Cake: Sphinx:  

Egypt:

Back at camp... the Spaghetti didn't work out all that well. I think we went into town that night to get some ice cream for dessert. We were both pretty tired from so much hiking in one day. We all slept great that night!

Day 6...

This morning Brent woke up bright and early to hike Calf Creek again.  No new pictures to show from that hike except for this beauty:

While he was gone hiking I was working on packing up camp, while taking care of Chico.  He got back safely and we finished packing up and left around noon. We started driving and passed through Capitol Reef, Brent pulled over to take this picture that he likes to call Tsunami. Think about what a reef is and imagine the cloud isn't a cloud...

We got to Moab and drove around town and stopped at the store.  Then we found our campground and lucky for us the most popular spot in the campsite was open.  It really was a good spot, nice and secluded right up against the base of a cliff.  We loved it!