First Goose Hunt

We went to Jackson this weekend and the boys had a blast! Blake brought Tyler, Tyson, and Brandon to go goose hunting up there! They shot 11 geese, one banded! They were very excited. Morgan just hung out with her mom and dad while Blake was hunting. In the mornings and evenings, we were also fortunate enough to see a great elk show! The rut is on and the bulls were bugling like crazy; it is so awesome to see and hear! Here are some pictures from the hunt and some elk pics!

Labor Day!

My favorite part about Labor Day is the Ogden Country Club's fireworks. We always go the club for dinner and to watch the fireworks; they are spectacular. They always put the fireworks to music and it seems they go on forever! It is one of the funnest events the club has! This year we took Tim and Brittney and Cole Lueders to the fireworks; Cole loved them! It is a great way to end the summer!

Here is my darling mom and silly dad, after the fireworks!

The Lueders are such a cute family!

Here is my aunt and walking partner Lori, and my cute 15 year old cousin Andrea

We all had such a great time at the fireworks; I can't wait for them again next year!

Camping

I haven't posted in ahwhile, so I decided I needed to catch up. Honestly, I haven't been a very good photographer lately. Two weekends ago we went camping by Strawberry with Dunyons and McLaughlins. We had a blast. The boys went hunting in the mornings and evenings and the girls just hung out with the kids and played games. It was too hot for the elk, but Blake shot a nice deer with his bow. Unfortunately, they couldn't find it so we didn't get to bring anything home. We were so disappointed. Better luck next time boys! Here are some cute pictures of Sara and little Beau McLaughlin loving the outdoors!







Colby Dunyon is getting so big; he is running around now! He thought he needed the big chair!

Alaska Cruise

We had such a great time in Alaska! We went on the Princess cruise line on the 'Golden Princess' ship. We went with most of Blake's office as a reward for meeting some tough goals. Blake's grandpa Bert and grandma Gooney (you will see from some of the pictures why we call her Gooney) also came with us and some of Dirk's friends from college who now live in Louisiana joined us as well. The whole trip was awesome! The ship started in Seattle then went to Juneau, Skagway, Tracy Arm Fjord (where you look at glaciers), Ketchikan, Victoria B.C., and back to Seattle. It was pretty cold in Alaska, but it was a nice break from the heat here! All of the pictures are in the slide show, but here are a few great ones from each location!

Seattle

We didn't go see the space needle, but here is a great picture of it from the distance. We did go check out Pike's market, which is a great farmer's market and fish market. We also went and walked along the pier and ate some great mini doughnuts that Kelly remembered from his mission in Seattle!

Juneau

Our first port was Juneau. Blake and I took a fly fishing excursion that was awesome! We took a float plane to a spot where a glacier fed river flowed into the ocean. This wasn't the original spot the outfitters wanted to take us, but the seas were too rought to land where they had originally planned. Blake caught quite a few dolly vardon and a couple pink salmon; one was really nice. I caught one dolly vardon, but just enjoyed being out there! At one point, a momma grizzly bear with a cub swam across the river about 200 yards upstream from us. It was fun to watch them. While I was busy taking the bear's picture, Blake caught a huge dolly vardon and the guide couldn't believe I was taking a picture of the bears and not his fish. I did get one picture, but it is too far away to see much. Even though it rained most of the day, we still had a great time!

Skagway

In Skagway, Blake went fishing with Dirk, Trudy, Kelly, and Jen. Don, Jackie, and I visited a dog musher's camp where they use Iditarod dogs to pull you on a wheeled cart. I need to get some pictures from Jen from the fishing, but here are some from the dog camp. We learned that they don't use the typical Malamut looking dogs for the Iditarod. They are more like mutts that they breed speicifically to be lean and fast.

Joe, our dog musher, finished the Iditarod last year in 12 days. The winner finished in 9 days. He brought us this dog to pet and play with before we went for the ride. After we played with the dogs, Don, Jackie, and I walked around town and did a little shopping. There are many Native American Totem Poles in Alaska and I couldn't resist having my picture taken by one!

Blake was the number one fisher on the fishing excursion he took to Chilcoot Lake and they gave him that sweet blue hat to show for it!

Tracy Arm Fjord

A fjord is a narrow arm of sea bordered by steep cliffs, usually formed by glaciers. On Wednesday, we started up Tracy Arm Fjord to see the glaciers. We didn't make it up too far, however, because the icebergs to were too big and close together to get the ship up. The captain decided we couldn't get through on that particular day, but we still were able to see some gorgeous sights. The icebergs were magnificant.


That ship is much larger that it seems, which means the icebergs are also much larger than they seem! There is actually a small boat on top of that ship, which shows how large it really is.

Ketchikan

Ketchikan was wonderful too. It did not rain, which is unusual considering they get about 150 inches of rain a year. The boys went fishing in Ketchikan and the girls went bear watching! It was a blast! We took a float plane to an island where there is a salmon hatchery and the black bears catch the salmon as they are coming back up to spawn! We saw some awesome sights and a ton of eagles as well! The boys caught 11 salmon that they had shipped home! I will get some pictures of those from Kelly and post them!

That bear actually has blood on his nose from eating the fish!

Victoria, British Columbia

We pulled into Victoria about 7:00 Friday night. We decided to take a petty cab (that's the ones where the people pull you with a bicycle) and tour the city. It was very interesting to see the sights in Victoria and learn a little about Canada's government.

Here are some general pictures from the cruise: one of our ship from the air during a float plane flight and some cute ones at various dinners. You can definitely see why we call Blake's grandma 'Gooney,' she is just silly!

4th of July

We went to Jackson for the holiday weekend and took Ty and Randi Dunyon and Tyson and Nat Skeen. We had a great time just relaxing and hanging out. The boys had fun fishing while the girls just hung out and went shopping!

Blake and Tyson were having a great time in the Ranger in between casts!

On Saturday, Kelly and Chris Harris came up to fish with the boys. Chris caught the monster of the weekend, coming in around 24 inches!

Tagged

I got tagged by my sister-in-law Jen. So, here it goes...

Three Fears:
1. Spiders
2. Having another miscarriage
3. Close family member's or friend's death (I am not good at funerals and have a hard time with loved ones' deaths. This is a big one for me!)

Three Goals:
1. Create a happy home for a family (Doesn't everyone want this?)
2. Be an integral part of my dad's company
3. Get in better shape!

Three Obsessions/Collections:
1. Shopping (especially for shoes!)
2. Nintendo Wii (or pretty much any video game; I love this way more than Blake does! Oh yeah, we get our preordered Rockband today, yay!)
3. Did I mention shoes and purses?

Three Random Facts About Me:
1. I swallowed a penny when I was about 8 and didn't tell my mom for two weeks because we were on vacation and I didn't want it to ruin everyone's trip!
2. I am a reality show junkie (Girls Next Door, Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Snoop Dogg, Living Lohan, I love them all!)
3. I love to play Sudoku!

Three people I tag:
1. Randi Dunyon
2. Brooke Kap
3. Natalie Skeen

P. Ponds

On Saturday, Blake, Ty, Tyson, and Jed went fishing in Idaho. They all had a great time and caught some nice fish! There were some nice golden rainbow trout that were fun for all of them to catch! Hopefully, they will get a chance to go up there again this summer to catch more fish!