Hey ya’ll, how’s it going? Me? I’m barely recovering from a super crazy week. We had a family reunion with my family that turned out to be one of those trips to add on the list of “Remember when we went on that trip” kind of trip.

At the conclusion of this week we were reminisced over every other trip that had gone awry. Something always has to happen. Some kind of drama, some kind of accident or some kind of sickness. I’m not sure there has ever been the perfect family vacation. But I guess that is how memories are made. There is plenty to laugh over as we look back over the years. Neither side of the family is immune either. Things happen whether we are with my family or Jeremy’s.

Here is short list of the most recent disastrous but memorable trips.

2007

OBX- I jump off a second story deck into a pool, badly bruising my heal for 5 weeks.

Wyoming Ranch- Isaac aspirates a peanut and gets terrible sick. We leave a day early when he makes a turn for the worse. We drive to Evenston, WY where they have no clue what is wrong with him and they send us to the children’s hospital in an ambulance.

2008

Ashton- A stomach flu goes through the whole family, a huge family fight occurs but I’ll keep the details to myself.

Island Park- My grandma stops by for a visit, passes out and scares us to death. I call 911 just as she is coming to. My sister and I, both pregnant, spend a lot of time puking. Big sister makes enough oatmeal to feed an army, we flush half of it down the toilet, while she breaks down into hysterics.

2009

Bear Lake- Emma falls on her bike sending us to the emergency room for stitches. To this day she is still concerned about her scars… and camping.

OBX- This was probably a close to perfect trip but everyone was very careful to make it such. There was still a little cold bug that was passed around. We took family photos on the beach because everyone was present. There were 13 grandkids total, I had to photoshop a brother in law out of the photo because of an uncooperative child.

2010

Island Park- This year apparently was no different. We brought a stomach bug and shared it with everyone although some still are not ruling out the idea of drinking bad water or soaking in a contaminated hot tub. We listend to dad puking all night in our jack and jill bathroom. Our trip was cut in half for Jeremy’s Grandma’s funeral. We make an 8 hour round trip to attend.

So this year, like all the others, will go down in history as a trip to remember. We still rated the trip as a B+ even though my brother in law gave it a C. We weren’t as disappointed in the lack of ATV trails and didn’t spend a whole day in bed.

Here are the positive memories of our trip…

Isaac learned to ride the motorcycles.

We went on a beautiful hike.

Explored some awesome mountains.

Drove to the top of the world for a view of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

And played in a gorgeous river.

Yes, defiantly a trip to remember.

How about you? Does your family vacations always end up full of surprises?

I hope all of you Americans had a wonderful Independence Day! We celebrated all weekend long.

We started with a picnic up the canyon with family. Here is my cute little sister playing around with Emma and the camera. I have a whole series of pictures like this.

Had a neighborhood BBQ with lots of friends and fireworks. (I actually have no photo of that night but picture the circle full of hundreds of kids with fireworks going off everywhere. Yikes.)

Made it to the top of the world on a perfect summer day.

Then flew back down really fast.

Had a little visit in the doctors office for my sweet Leah. (Sorry the picture quality is soooo poor. She wouldn’t hold still for me.) I watched this awful rash spread by the hour and wanted answers.

Any guesses on the diagnosis? I guess that link gives it away but we had a heck of a time trying to figure it out.

And finally ended with more fireworks.

Happy Birthday USA!

I never know whether to put the photo captions before or after the photo. What do you do on your blog? How do you prefer to read it -photo or words first?

I just had a totally swell birthday. I can’t help but wish that I could have days like this more than once a year. I was complete bushed by the end of the day but it was so worth it.

The day started out my exploring some new mountain biking trails with my good friend Amy who has a birthday the day after mine.

The afternoon was spent mainly in the back yard hammock with a perfect blue sky and cool breeze and kids playing in the hose. No chores allowed on my birthday.

I planned a super evening with my sweet hubby and little sis and bro-in-law. I wanted to show them my new favorite climbing spot.

Here’s Sabra messing around on some pumpy overhangs.

The top of this climb is a major butt kick’n roof. It takes some super human power to get up and over. It was such a blast.

Here’s my bro-in-law contemplating an escape route.

Here’s me on an itty bitty finger holding climb. I kept telling Jeremy to hold off on the pictures until I pulled some awesome move. Ya, he doesn’t have that kind of patience.

We hiked out at dark and we got to see an awesome view of the city lights. There was an obliging fence that helped us capture this photo of the 4 of us.

We ended the night with cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory. Yum. Don’t tell any that I took a night off from my sugar detox.