The Big 2-6

On July 6 John turned 26! We had a ton of fun celebrating (even though we both had to work) by having dinner with John's parents, eating cake and ice cream, and mini golfing at Boondock's. Since John and I like to celebrate the "birthday week" instead of just one day, we have more plans to do fun stuff this weekend like dinner with my grandparents, and going out to lunch and shopping. Yay for birthdays!!

The red velvet cake I made for John!

The birthday boy with his cake!

Blowing out his candles

John and I mini golfing!

John and his mom playing Deal or No Deal

Opening gifts

John and I after opening some of his gifts

The 4th of July!

For the 4th John and I went to the Sandy City fireworks with John's parents and our friend Chris. I didn't take many photos, but we had a lot of fun! And we even got some yummy homemade ice cream to eat during the show thanks to John's mom!

Our Trip to Wyoming

This last weekend John and I went to Wyoming to visit my grandparents for a few days. I like to try to get out to see them at least once a year, and 4th of July weekend was really the only open weekend we had, so we road tripped out there to spend a little time with them. They just got a new dog a few months ago (a cute dalmation they named Liberty), and they really wanted us to come up so we could meet him and visit with them. We spent most of the weekend relaxing (I even got to take a couple of naps!), and had a really good time!

One the way home, since it's Independence Day, we thought it would be appropriate to stop at Independence Rock, which is a large rock out in the middle of nowhere in Wyoming that many pioneers considered an important landmark. Many worked to make it there by the 4th of July on their journey. For them that was a big feat to have made it that far across the plains, and several of them carved their names into the rock to show that they had been there. It was really cool to be able to see that and realize some of the struggles our ancestors and founders went through for freedom. I am truly proud to be an American!

Me with my Grandma & Grandpa

John with my grandparents

Liberty!

Independence Rock

It was really cool to see this flag flying
at the top of the rock for the 4th

John in front of the rock

Me in front of the rock

The Best Weekend With The Worst Luck

Last weekend John and I had the opportunity to go to two of my best friends/college roommates weddings. I am still not sure why they decided to get married in the same weekend (Thanks a lot, Ash and Shay!!), but it gave us an excuse to take a mini-vacation, which is something we absolutely love to do!

Friday night was my friend Ashley's wedding. It was a lot of fun. She had it in this cute little garden in the small town of Castle Dale (a little south of Price), and she and her new hubby, Kevin, even did one of those awesome wedding dances where they start out slow and then bust into this cool choreographed routine.

Me and Ash in college (I didn't take any pics at her wedding)
This picture is one of our finer moments!

After her reception and lots of tasty treats, John and I went to a bed and breakfast. The B&B was the ONLY place to stay in town that didn't look seedy or run down, so we were glad to have found it. The room was very purple, but also very comfy and we had a great night relaxing and even found a pizza place that was still open at 9 p.m., haha.

Me and John in our room at the B&B

Our cozy purple room!

The cute "swan towels" in our room

Me standing outside in the backyard of the B&B

John with the B&B's live-in cat...it really liked him!

The front of the San Rafael B&B

The next morning we woke up, ate breakfast, and went to one of Emery County's finest places to site see...."The Wedge." It is a really weird sounding name, but they call it Utah's Grand Canyon, and it really is just like that. It's just a way smaller version, but it was really cool and we're glad we drove out to it.

John standing way out on a ledge overlooking
Utah's Grand Canyon

John at "The Wedge"

Me at "The Wedge"

A view from one of the overlooks

The river down below

After our visit to "The Wedge," we went to Joe's Valley, another one of Emery County's finest sites (who knew???) to try our hand at fishing. We didn't catch anything, but we had a great time relaxing next to the lake and talking.

Relaxing by the lake

The water was super high where we were sitting...
this is probably why we didn't catch anything!

I thought this cloud was cool...it looks like a whale!

John getting ready to cast out!

After all of this fun, things just had to turn! We had printed Google maps to get from Castle Dale to Delta (where my friend Shay's wedding reception was) so that we wouldn't get lost. Well, Google maps took us on this terrible, rocky dirt road and we were in MY car (Pontiac G5...not an off road vehicle!), and Google wanted us to stay on this road until we got to Ephraim. This obviously was not going to work after we had made it a few miles up this rocky dirt road (that also had a sheer drop off one side) so we turned around and because we had no cell phone service, had to drive back into town to buy an actual road map (take that, Google maps!) and figure out a normal route to Delta.

The dirt road before it got bad...

We finally made it to Delta, but we were a little early for the reception, so we pulled off in some shade to read/nap for about an hour, but when we got up, WE HAD A FLAT TIRE! So we coasted into the nearest gas station and after some arguing and stressing out, we changed it to the spare and made it to Shay's reception just in time. I got lucky and was able to see a couple of my really good college friends there and visit with Shay and her new husband, AJ, a little. She looked beautiful and I loved her cute backyard reception and refreshments.

Shay and I in college (I also didn't take any
pics at Shay's wedding)

After Shay's reception, we got on the road to come home, but because we were on a spare, we had to drive between 55-60 mph the whole way home....and John made me listen to his "zombie apocalypse" podcasts on his iPod, so not only were we driving slow in the dark, we were driving slow in the dark while listening to a story about zombies that like to come out at night...that was SO fun...

All in all, the title of this blog sums up the weekend...it was a great weekend, but man, we had terrible luck! I am really glad I was able to see two of my best friends on their wedding days though, so I think a little bad luck was worth it to be able to go to their receptions. And you know, now we have a good story for the grandkids, too! :)