San Francisco Trip

Justin and I went with my parents, grandmother, and youngest brother to San Francisco this last weekend. While we were there, we took a tour on a double-decker bus that tried to take out Alex, drove across the Bay Bridge, and visited Alcatraz. At Alcatraz, we were locked into an isolation cell (the picture of Alex with head phones on). It was dark, but cool. The tour was a recording (thus the head phones) enabling the listener to stop and play the tour at the listener's discretion. The picture of Justin was taken on the ferry out to Alcatraz with San Francisco in the background.

Another Family Reunion

In August, Justin's mother's family (did you follow all that?) held the annual Laub family reunion at the family farm. This year, Grandma Laub rented a bounce house and water slide for the kids. All of her children were there and almost all of her grandchildren were able to make it. Justin's dad and a few others were hitting golf balls out into the alfalfa fields. When lunch time rolled around, his mother wanted to go get them, so she jumped on behind Justin on Merril's three wheeler. She doesn't usually do this, so that's why I snapped the picture. We also went wheelin' while we were there with Kevin and Sara, Matt and Camille, Jared, and Justin's dad.

Photography Hobby

Ever since Justin and I bought our new camera, I've been snapping pictures of just about anything that will stand still long enough for me to push the button. These are a few of the pictures that I have taken in the last little while. The picture of the sun through the trees is my favorite.

Water, Water Everywhere... RUN!

As you may have heard in the news, Gunlock experienced a flash flood on the afternoon of August 1st. This has happened before, however this time, Justin and I were there. Actually, Sara and I were on one side of the bridge while our husbands happened to be on the other. I noticed that the river had risen very high on my way home from work and went over to Sara's to tell her that I was going down to the bridge to take some pictures (the video footage of the beginning of the flood is above). Sara decided to pack up the kids and go with me.
As I was filming, the first property began to flood and Sara had to yell to get my attention. I looked up to see the water starting to surround the first house and Sara telling me that she was going to run up to the door and tell them to get out or they would be stranded in their house. There was no way I was going to let her, a mother with three kids, risk her life to save the people in the house, so I told her I would do it. No one was home in the house, but when I turned around I was surrounded by thigh deep, muddy water. I had to jump the fence to get out of there.
Sara and I made it to safety, with her kids. No one was hurt and the entire community helped with the clean up. There was over 800 volunteers. If you were one of them, thank you so much and thank you to everyone who kept our community in your thoughts and prayers. Gunlock has strong citizens and we appreciate your support.

Rachel's Birthday

My birthday was on the third of August. Unfortunately, we were traveling that day and didn't get to celebrate it with anyone. When this was found out, a party was planned. Sara (our cousin whom we are renting from) made me this cute ladybug red velvet cake. It was her oldest daughter's (Samantha) idea. It was actually the second cake she made for me. She remembered that it had been my birthday and had a cake waiting for me when I got home from work on Monday. We had a lot of fun at the party even though only a few people were able to show up due to the unfortunate timing of having the party the same time as the demolition derby at the county fair.

Mark and Janet Family Reunion - Pine Valley

This is a picture of us outside the historic chapel in Pine Valley, Utah. Every year, Janet and Mark (Justin's parents) have a family reunion with their children at the cabin that Dixie State College owns. Janet works in the Computer Department there, thus allowing us to use the cabin. This year, the family reunion was in May. Usually, we have it later in the year, but this year, many of the other faculty members wanted the same weekends.
There is always a family picture at these reunions and this time, Janet arranged for the photographer to take individual family pictures for each of the children. Each family had a different color (to identify each family's members to people who don't know us) and our color was tan. Notice that my hair is strait in this picture. It took me an hour and a half to get it that way. Stephanie, our oldest niece, asked me what I was doing to my hair. She said I looked funny with half strait, half fuzzy hair. After I got it all fixed, though, she thought it looked okay.
On Memorial Day, we went to visit some family graves then went to a small, state park near Caliente, Nevada. We had a nice picnic lunch while the kids swam in a small wading pool there. Justin's younger sister, Megan also announced that she would be leaving to serve her LDS mission in Sweden on September 19th.