Moab to California

Chris handled another busy week in the office and really loves learning from dad. Instead of just going on fun hikes by myself while he works, I started to get some pre-season work hours in at the river company's warehouse. We both had some long days, but it feels good to be working hard and saving up for school.

On Tuesday was Utah's republican caucus, and despite Moab's dominant liberal population, we had a good turnout. Chris mentioned it was almost like a church function because he saw so many people from the stake. With the way absentee ballots work, neither Chris nor I had ever been to caucus, so it felt good to participate in the election process.

The line was out the door!

Early in the week we went climbing on Wall Street and brought Jacob along. That boy slayed the routes! We were so impressed with his ability to complete intermediate climbs - especially since it was only his second time climbing. After a year of not consistently climbing, it also felt good for us to come back and do better than we thought we would.

Jacob toproping Lacto Mangulation - 5.10b

Much to Matthew's disappointment, both he and Olivia were too small to fit any of the climbing gear we own and therefore were unable to join us on the climbing adventure. We tried making it up to them by taking them out for a hike on Wednesday. Chris told us of this secret hike in Arches that goes out to a giant tunnel arch. It's an amazing hike, and barely anybody knows of it as it's not listed in any of the Arches pamphlets and doesn't even have a trail marker by the road. We spent hours hiking, and bushwhacking, as Chris lead the way on this hike he himself had only done once before about 6 years ago. Well, we never actually found this mysterious and secret tunnel arch. Nonetheless we still had a lot of fun hiking, and the kids absolutely loved the sand hills. Even though we never found our intended destination, we had a blast on our journey.

Matthew's bouquet for me - watch out ladies!

No joke - the piles of sand in Olivia's shoes.

Friday morning Chris and I woke up early and hit the road for a full day's drive to Fortuna, California - the start of our week long "Chris's Mission Tour/Meet Dani's Grandpa Adventure."

We spent Easter weekend with a couple that Chris had baptized three years ago (Saturday marked 3 years to the day!) that had moved north after their baptism. They have two of the sweetest girls we know. We had the greatest morning just chatting with all of them at their home as they got caught up with Chris and I got to know them better. In the afternoon we attempted to go out to the beach, but a storm a couple days earlier had gotten rid of all the parking spots and it started to rain. Instead they took us on a tour of the Redwoods and the Avenue of the Giants. Standing next to those giant trees is an easy way to feel small! The father had grown up in the area and he was the best tour guide we could have asked for. We had a nice evening with the family at home. On Sunday we went to church with them and stayed long enough to open Easter baskets with the girls (They even made Chris and I an AWESOME Easter basket). After that we hit the road to spend the next couple of nights with my grandpa in Rancho Cordova.

Our Easter Basket :)

Exploring an old railroad trestle 

See the fish up there? That was the high water mark from the 1964 flood that took out entire towns in Humbolt County.

Drive-thru Tree!

Remember to pray and remember to play,

Mr. & Mrs. Andrew

First Full Week in the Desert

After I trained at the doctor's office in Springville last Friday, Dani and I drove down to move to Moab to live for the summer. After settling into the guest bedroom at my parent's house, I had a full week ahead of me of training at the office. I'm working Monday through Friday, 8am-5pm. Dani took advantage of her free time to get out and enjoy the plentiful sunshine on some day-hikes in the area. She sent me PLENTY of pictures throughout the day just to make me jealous:

The Moab Valley from the top of the Rim trail.

Morning Glory Arch at the end of Negro Bill Canyon.

Dani's arm around an imaginary me while I'm at work.

Friday night we went on a short overnight trip to Culvert Canyon. We brought our tent, but the weather was so great that we decided to cowboy camp under the stars. We sure love the desert. After we hiked out of the canyon we stopped at the Moab dinosaur tracks and petroglyphs.

Sleepin' in in the morning sun.

Dino tracks!

Petroglyph panel at the Poison Spider Trailhead

Back in the Promised Land

As Tuesday rolled around we gave some big hugs, and sad "see you laters" to my family as we headed to the airport and flew back to the promised land. Upon landing in Utah we were both relieved with a feeling of "welcome home." Our plane landed around midnight and Naomi graciously let us stay at her apartment for the night so we didn't have to worry about traveling out of Salt Lake. We were grateful for the bed and Chris had a great night's rest while I spent all night bonding with Naomi's cat Simon, who felt that my face was the best place to tap with her paw and sleep on!

On Wednesday morning Naomi, who had spent the night at Grandma and Grandpa Hall's house, drove our truck up so that we could spend the day running errands. We enjoyed a great breakfast with her and then headed up to Logan. After switching out all of our Alaskan winter gear for Moab summer wear at our storage unit, we headed to the Logan Temple and did a session. This was our first time back to a temple since we moved to Alaska a year ago (no road access to a temple from Juneau) and it felt wonderful to be there. We were glad that we took the time to prioritize attending the temple even though we had a million other things to do that day. After our uplifting and much needed session we picked up Chris's sister Anna and headed over to Aunt Julie's house for family dinner. It was fun getting caught up with the family and we definitely felt the nostalgia for our time living in Logan when Julie and the kids would often have us over for dinner.

We spent the night with Grandpa and Grandma Hall, and Thursday morning we continued our temple tour by going to the Timpanogos Temple! We did initiatories for some family names my dad had given us while in Wisconsin. I always feel as though the veil is extra thin when doing the work for family members, and I was once again overwhelmed with gratitude for being close to temples so that I can help those who have been waiting so long for the blessings of the temple. We then spent the day shopping for scrubs and professional business clothes for Christopher (if you haven't heard, he will be working as a medical assistant/student intern at his dad's office, and I will spend the season river guiding). Late in the afternoon we went down to BYU and met up with my younger brother Jacob and his girlfriend Jill. We had a blast hiking the Y with them, enjoyed a good dinner, and played some Yahtzee before Jacob had to take off for work. The rest of the night we spent enjoying quality time with Grandma and Grandpa Hall.

Jill, Jacob, me and beardless Chris

Friday was Chris's first day of work, and he helped his dad out in the Springville office. Since we were still in Utah Valley I lucked out and was able to catch up with a few of my favorite former roommates, and enjoyed a most needed girls day. When Chris got off work at 8pm we had another late night as we drove down to Moab.

Saturday was spent relaxing, unpacking, and being with our family. It sure is great to be back in Utah!

Remember to pray and remember to play, 

Mr. & Mrs. Andrew

A Blustery Cold Wisconsin Vacay

For our last night in Alaska on Monday we met up with our best friends and went out to dinner. We've made wonderful friendships while in Alaska and really don't know how we are going to handle life without seeing the Langes and the Schlechters on a regular basis. Most of all we are going to miss little girl Liesel who has completely taken our hearts.

Ben, the talented pano-selfie taker, Liesel (in the carseat), Camille, us, Liz and Jonny

We woke up at an insane hour of the day Tuesday morning to travel out to Wisconsin and visit my family. Only my dad knew we were coming, and after a full day of traveling Chris and I were more than excited to surprise my mom and siblings. Once we got home Chris and I snuck through the garage and down a staircase into the basement. My dad told us when it was safe to come up and surprise everyone. Their reactions - priceless. My mom and the twins were the only ones home at the time, and none of them could believe we were actually there. Emily even broke into tears (she's totalllllly my mini-me because I am definitely the biggest cry baby around). After the initial surprise we tricked both Josh and Jessi into coming over so we could surprise them as well.

The whole week was packed with fun and memories. Instead of trying to explain it all, we're just gonna give you a bunch of pictures to scroll through.

While out in Green Bay for Grandpa's doctor appointment, we stopped by Lambeau Field (the Packers stadium).

Emily and I drew whiteboard portraits of each other.

Amy (the real artist) taught me how to paint.

The finished product. We painted this for our friend Sara's new baby Wyatt.

We babysat our nephew Skylar one day, and he absolutely loved getting out and exploring around Lake Michigan. His favorites were riding on Chris's shoulders and chasing the ducks.

Amy and Chris went swimming..... kinda.....

Wisconsin didn't have snow until the day we came in, and it melted right before we left. Needless to say it was taken advantage of while we were in town. The snowman is friendly, the countless snowball fights on the other hand... that's another story...

Twinning!

In my opinion, bowling and golf are very similar: the person with the lowest score wins. In other words I dominated this game.

We celebrated the twins 16th birthday a little late and went out to this fun Asian restaurant where they cook your food in front of you.

Chris loves being an uncle, and Zeke couldn't get enough of their guy time together. He taught Chris everything he needs to know about Pokemon and every superhero (including their arch-nemesis) he's never even heard of.

Our attempt at a family picture... Skylar wasn't having any of it. Josh, Mom, Dad, Emily, Amy, Skylar, Jessi, Zeke, Grandpa Brading, and us.

Sisters!

Josh, Chris, and Amy went shooting one day. Amy may not be pictured but she was the best shot with the pistol. That's my girl!

Shout out to Amy and Emily for making such a big appearance in this blog post - you can check that off your bucket list. ;-) Love you girls!

Remember to pray and remember to play,

Mr. & Mrs. Cheeseheads Andrew