Fun Pictures

Here's a couple more fun pictures from our latest trip to Idaho.

Julie, Shanna, Kim.

It had been sooo long since I had seen Kim because she has been living in Hawaii. Thankfully she was in town so I could see her last weekend. It was great to spend some time with her and her two cute sons, Branson and Eli. She's got a third son on the way. Good luck, Kimmy!

Brad in the banana man suit after our race. He's gonna hate me for putting this picture on here. But it's just too funny and cute not to share! He was totally rockin' it up!

Fun Getaway

We spent the past weekend in Idaho. Brad had finished up the spring term and had a bit of a break. So I took some time off of work, and we took a trip. It was so much fun!! Here are some highlights from our trip:

• We stopped in Smithfield on our way to Idaho to visit with Brad's family for a bit.


• Brad, Ryan, and my Dad went golfing.


• We had a couple of fun BBQ's.


• We played some tennis.


• We got to see my cousin Kim who was visiting from Hawaii with her cute little boys.


• We ate at Johnny Carino's...YUM!!!


• We ran in the Scenic River Classic. Jule's and I ran the 10k and Brad ran the 5k. We had a blast! Jule's finished a few minutes before I did, but I expected that. She rocked it up! I was excited because I ran it a couple of minutes faster than my last/first 10k, which was my goal. Brad did awesome and felt great during his race. He forgot to look at the clock at the end, but I think he made good time. This was his first long distance race so I'm very proud of him for training and finishing the race without walking. Good job honey!


• We ate Jamba oatmeal (YUM!!) and fresh squeezed O.J. and Brad ran around in the banana man suit to encourage customers to come to an event they were having at Jamba. Put a costume on that boy and he becomes someone else! It was fun to see him running up and down 17th and Hitt, being all crazy. What a good sport!


• Brad and Ryan went 4-wheeling on Ryan and Julie's land. This was Brad's favorite part of the trip.


• Of course we found some time to do some fun shopping ;)


• We went and saw Angels and Demons, and we liked it!


• We enjoyed just hanging out and spending time with family and teasing our neices.


• We went to church with my parents.


• We had fun celebrating Father's Day.


• We drove home during a nasty storm, but lived to tell about it :)

Thanks for treating us to a fun weekend, Mom and Dad! And thanks to Julie, Ryan, and the girls for hanging out with us all weekend. Ya'll are so much fun and we loved every second!

Playing tennis after the BBQ. Girls vs. boys...mwah ha ha!

Not sure what's going on with my face, but Jule's looks cute:)

Brad took this fabulous pic of Ashlie. Isn't she a doll?!

Maylie, Brianna, Ashlie, Branson, and Eli splish-splashin' in the fun new kiddie pool. They loved it!
Jule's finishing up the race. She's my inspiration!

Just a couple of miles left. At least I'm still smiling:) That jacket was so hot! I'm not going to pin the bib on the jacket ever again. Oh well, another lesson learned.

Yeah...almost finished!

Sister shot. It was so fun running this race together.

Finally a pic of Brad. His race was at the same time as ours so we didn't get any action shots of him. Sorry Brad! This is after the race. Legs are feeling like jello.

We are so tough! No?

My Big Brother

My brother Brian is an attorney for the U.S. Air Force. He's currently in Iraq for a six month deployment. He's been gone for almost a month and, from what I hear, he's holding up alright. I know it's been hard for him to be away from his family. Thank goodness for technology that has allowed them to keep in touch. I just want to say that I'm proud to have a brother serving our country. I can't think of anyone better for the job. I'm in awe of the bravery, determination, and faith that he possesses, all of which will help him make it through this deployment. We all miss him, but we are comforted in knowing that he is doing the Lord's work in serving our country to his full capacity. He is a great example of strength and courage to all of us. Brian, our thoughts and prayers are with you. Know that we love you and we couldn't be more proud of you. Thanks for you service!

Here are some pictures that show part of his journey in the Air Force.

I should also acknowledge that this has been a sacrifice for his wife, Natalie, and his kids, Kennedy and Nathan. I'm proud of them for being strong and supporting their dad/husband in this endeavor. Aren't they such a cute little family?

Congratulations Alan, Colin, and Megan!!!

Brad and I want to give a shout out to Alan, Colin, and Megan because they are graduating from high school tonight (that's right, Brad's younger siblings are triplets!). Congratulations you guys! You made it! We are proud of all that you have accomplished and look forward to seeing great things from all three of you. Good luck with all of your future adventures. And enjoy your graduation tonight...don't trip:)

We got to go to Smithfield on Sunday to have a little family celebration for this event. We had dinner together and went to the triplets' seminary graduation. It was great to be there for that because Alan spoke and did a really great job. Then we went back to the house, took pictures, had dessert, watched some home videos from their younger years, and they opened gifts. It was a fun little get together. It's so nice that they now live close enough for us to come and be a part of these special occasions. It's been fun getting to know them better.

Here are some pictures from the evening:

Alan, Colin, and Megan

After seminary graduation

The Roper Family

(just missing Allison, Scott, and Madeline)

SHAD :)

Happy Birthday to Julie!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE BEST SISTER EVER!

I hope you have a fabulous day Jules. You deserve it!

Jules, you've accomplished a lot and touched so many lives in these last 27 years. Keep up the great work and don't forget that your little sister thinks that you're awesome and wants to be just like you:) I feel blessed to have a sister like you. Your fun, spontaneous, caring, selfless, charitable, beautiful, stylin', hard-working, friendly, energetic...the list could go on and on. I hope you enjoy this special day! I love you!

My First 10k

I ran my first 10k race on Saturday (6.2 miles). It was the Bridal Veil Falls 10k...we ran 3.1 miles up the trail and 3.1 miles down. It was a good experience and I'm glad I did it. I was nervous before it started, as I am with all firsts. But once I got running I felt better and my nerves calmed down. The challenge was figuring out how to pace myself. I think I did a fairly good job because I met my goal. I wanted to finish the race in 60 minutes and I did. Almost exactly, give or take 30 seconds. The official results aren't posted yet. Anyway, I think I could have gone a little faster had I not slowed down to grab a drink they were handing out after mile two. I grabbed gatorade before I realized they had water available. Bad idea. I guzzled it down and got rid of the cup and went on my way. It didn't sit well with me and slowed me down for the next couple of miles as it sloshed around in my tummy. When my stomach isn't feeling well it's hard for me to run fast. Oh well, I learned from that and I won't do it again. Anyway, I felt pretty good for mile 5, but during mile six I got this shooting pain in my back. I ran through it, but man that was tough. I sped up for the last quarter mile or so and finished strong. Boy was I happy to see that finish line! Brad came to watch me finish and took a couple of pictures of me. Thanks for coming and supporting me, honey!

I must admit that I don't love running. It's growing on me, though. I mostly do it because it's good exercise, I like the way I feel when I'm done, and it feels like I'm accomplishing something when I tackle each mile. It's been fun running outdoors the past couple of weeks and enjoying nature. I also run because I can. I never thought I'd be able to run this much due to my feet and knee issues. But thankfully, at this point in time, I've been running with minimal pain. As I was running the race, I couldn't help but think about what a blessing it is to be able to use my body to run through such beautiful scenery and to be able to push myself beyond limits I thought I was capable of. Our bodies really are amazing, with how they are able to heal and adapt over time. Especially when we pay attention to what our bodies need and give them proper rest.

So basically, it was a positive experience and I'm looking forward to my next race in less than three weeks. I want to improve my time by 2 minutes. It should be even more fun because I'll be running it with Brad and Julie, my sister. This is a fun new hobby and it will be fun to see how I improve over the next few years. Here are the pictures that we got from the race. As you can see, I was pretty focused at the end. I had to pass that girl!

The finish line is in sight!

So close...just a little longer...keep breathing!

My support! Thanks for coming!

I love long weekends!

Three day weekends are the best. It gives you time to get all the cleaning and chores and errands done, and still have some time to relax and have some fun. Some highlights from our weekend, in no particular order:

• Slept in
• Went on a couple of long runs in great running weather
• Played tennis together (got sunburned)
• Watched a couple of movies (yea for Redbox!)
• Watched a couple of shows we've been saving on our DVR
• Went to a family BBQ
• Ate some really good Bajio's Chicken Green Chile Quesadillas
• Cleaned our whole apartment
• Finished all the laundry
• Worked on a couple of home projects
• Went to church
• Went to the temple
• Took a long nap
• Enjoyed just spending time together

You know, these three day weekends don't come around often enough. One per month would be nice, don't you think? Well I hope all of you had a fun and relaxing Memorial Day weekend. We sure did.