Winter Escapades

Don't get me wrong I love the seasons, and I love Utah. However my body seems to go into a dormant stage in the winter kind of like trees, I am satisfied with little to no outside excursions. Paul on the other hand would like to be go, go, going rain or shine, warm or below 0, and I absolutely love that about him! So since we've been married he has tried introducing me to different winter activities. This time around it was cross country skiing. I was very excited. Paul's cousin Keaton and his fabulous wife Sarah came along with Uncle James. 

The day started great, I was loving it, I was plenty warm, life was good. Then we had to go back down the hill... started out great, having fun, laughing every time I fell down. Enter pregnancy hormones into the scene and... pretty soon I was starting to fear that falling down was bad for baby, and because I was going downhill I was no longer warm from body heat. Recipe for disaster. Before long I was crying every time I fell down, and getting mad at Paul for not doing more. I realized after no one was to blame and sometimes you just have to do hard things. I decided after this escapade we would stick to activities I had done before while pregnant, for Paul's sake at least. Oh I love that man.

Food Again!

So like many pregnant woman, I suffered a complete loss of appetite in the first trimester of pregnancy, I lost 6 lbs and would make Paul take me to places where they had my cravings (the only thing I would eat). Now... I am loving food! My appetite is back and kicking, almost to hard. At first I was eating junk and loving it, including lots of sugary things, which for those of you who don't know, goes against my whole diet of the last year! So I decided it wasn't worth it to feed my baby poor nutrition so I got back on track and now am looking at beautiful fruits and veggies again.

 And since Paul and I are at the low end of the budget this month with text book costs I've had to get creative. Saturday we ran out of all our rice milk and soy milk and since grocery day is not till tomorrow I've been resorting to, let's say simpler horizons. And actually a friend of ours gave us this idea that I've been experimenting with.

  -3 Ingredient Almond Milk: 
 Handful of raw almonds (you decide) 
2-3 cups water (again your own choice) 
and 2 tsp vanilla extract

 Directions: Combine in a food processor and processes till you have chopped the almonds as small as possible. Now you have one of 2 choices: a) poor over hot cereal or whatever else with almond bits intact if you like the extra texture. Or poor milk through and strainer and have a relatively almond bit free milk.

J Tree

Paul and I went to Joshua Tree for our one year anniversary. It was pretty cold down there in southern California, and I admit the camping and climbing in cold winter weather is hard, especially when you are pregnant and hormonal. However we made it through and our friends Reesa, Jeff, Rachel and Spencer Joined us. We certainly did have a fabulous time!

Little Cotton Wood

One of the most extraordinary places in Utah to Paul and I is Little Cottonwood Canyon. At the entrance are beautiful cliffs and boulder fields of pure granite. And further up the canyon are lakes and trails. a Few weekends ago we backpacked to a small lake called Ceacret lake and the next day we climbed down in the granite. This is what it looked like.

Oregon/ City of Rocks

A week and a half ago Paul and I were in Oregon! We went for Paul's cousin Keaton's Wedding to Sarah (the greatest girl) While there we climbed, baked in the car for hours, ate sushi, scrambled on rocks naked, went to a wedding, Slept in the creepiest motel of my life!, went to a clothing optional soaking tub, drove the coast, meditated on the beach, ate Mo's clam chowder with oysters, and...... Broke our sugar rule for VOODOO DONUTS. Us outside the Portland temple

With the Happy Couple

Paul being an action spy in down town Portland

Me in the beautiful forested beach area

Paul shore climbing on crumbly rock

I love the Rocky beaches of Oregon

Soo foggy that day

Paul standing on lava rocks in the back is two of the three sister peaks

Paul climbing Bloody Fingers a vicious 10a that I followed up very terrified

Me on a climb called Skyline in City of Rocks Idaho

This is the far away shot of the climb in the before picture

A VOODOO DONUT which I tried along with some other crazy donuts... sure enough a stomach ache followed, but hey BACON on a DONUT. I love bacon.

The Highest Point

At the end of July Paul and I went on a backpacking trip with most of Paul's family. King's Peak is the highest point in Utah and is located in the beautiful Uinta mountain range. The trail we took had us hiking 10 miles the first day, something like 7 miles the second day and 20 miles the 3rd day where you summit the peak, then you hike the same way back. It was a spiritual and cleansing journey. I can't wait to do something like that again! On summit day by a cool carin (not sure how that's spelled)

On the peak letting the Tibetan pray flags fly in the wind carrying the prays to all the world.

Atwood Lake

The Kiss on King's

Paul, Shelley and Me, Paul looks mad about something?

Everyone on the Peak

Laurie, Paul's sister, being a wild mountain woman

The Wedding Day

Here I am almost 8 months later and I am finally posting some of my wedding photos, Unfortunately I don't have copies of the temple photos yet, but here are some from that day. My lovely sister Meghan made it out to be the photographer, you can look at the temple pictures and more of her work at macaskillphotography.smugmug.com. So here they are some of my favorites from the big day! Paul telling everyone at the reception "you can dance if you want to, you can leave your friends behind, because if your friends don't dance and if they don't dance then they're no friends of mine".

Grandma Robertson so happy for us!

Paul and myself getting down wedding style.

My mother's dress which we altered only the sleeves for me to wear on my wedding day.

Aubree braids my hair as I stare lovingly into Paul's eyes

Paul makes us eggs for breakfast, some of the only food we had all day

Our reception decor, I was going for a woodsy vintage feel and that's totally what I got, Paul's sister shelley helped the whole room together with real trees, and wild flowers.

I adore this photo, Paul and I dancing alone before the reception starts and Reese, Rhianna and Avonlea came to play in my long princess dress.

Here these girls are again, being so adorable, one day they'll feel as beautiful as I did that day.

Three generations happily married

Shelley's flower arrangements, I loved the wild flowers mixed with traditional flowers in mason jars, made for a brilliant fleet foxes wedding

Pictures and story about our Kings Peak Adventure soon to come!