Favoite Picture Friday: June 24th, 2011

These pictures for Favorite Picture Friday are a bit late, but I still wanted to post something from what we were doing last Friday. Jason and I knew that finding an apartment would be a priority for us and would definitely help in the moving process, so we decided that we would take a long weekend to go down and look for one. We spent all day Friday looking at apartments and by the end we were exhausted! We had seen a few and some were clean and nice but too far away from Jason's law school, and some were close but not nearly nice enough. Finally we found an apartment that is just a 3 minute drive to Jason's law school and is in a really nice and safe neighborhood. Everything looked great there so Saturday morning we went and signed our lease to the place. I will have to post some pictures of it when we officially move down. We love the location and how neat the whole place is. It's just what I would imagine a California apartment would look like! With the apartment in place it has made the reality of us moving a bit closer.

Once we signed our lease Jason had an orientation and a meet 'n greet with some of the law school professors that afternoon. Jason is getting more and more excited about going to law school and I know he will be amazing at it.

Of course we needed to celebrate so we spent the rest of the day at Disneyland. Here are some pictures from there.

This first one is outside the newly renovated "Star Tours" ride. I remember the first time I went to Disneyland years and years ago and this ride was the newest and greatest thing. Having four older brothers and a family that loved Star Wars I remember waiting in line to ride this for hours! Eventually it became a classic ride but nothing to thrilling, even to the young kids. I was so excited to hear that they were going to update the ride, and man did they improve it! The new ride is in 3D but the coolest thing is that there are multiple rides so you can go on a different adventure each time. Thank goodness the ride has Fast Passes because the normal line was over a 60 minute wait time, so we only had to wait about 10 minutes to ride it twice. Each time we rode Star Tours it was different. We both loved it!

This picture is taken in the middle of Disneyland. We had just a few minutes of sunlight at the end of the day when we arrived at Disneyland and thought we would snap a quick picture before it got too dark. Even though we arrived late in the day we were still able to do a ton of fun things at Disneyland. We watched a few of the shows, rode a few rides, ate some snacks and called it a night. I really like not having to spend the whole day running around Disneyland and making yourself exhausted, but rather taking it slow and easy. It was delightful!

This last one isn't a great picture because it is a picture of a computer screen of a picture taken of us on "The Tower of Terror." This is probably one of my favorite rides in the whole world! The best part about it is if you time it just right you can hover out of your seat for a good part of the ride. This picture is taken right at the top right before you drop down several stories. Jason and I decided we wanted to both cover our eyes, but as you can tell I was anticipating the drop so much that I couldn't do it and had to reach down to brace myself. Jason was brave enough to do so. He is always so good about keeping his arms up on the rollercoaster rides and making faces at the cameras. I am always pulling my arms down to hold on for dear life and my face is usually the same fear-stricken expression in all of our pictures. But for some reason we keep going on them!

We had a great time in California and we keep getting really good feelings about moving down. We are so excited to move down and start a new adventure!

Favorie Picture Friday: June 17th, 2011

Where did we go?

For our anniversary last weekend Jason told me that he was stealing me away and that I couldn't know where we were going. With Jason's imagination and ability to travel the globe I really had NO CLUE where we were headed! The only clue I got was that it was going to have to do with the traditional present given on a 5th Anniversary: Wood. I still couldn't guess where we were going after that. Finally Friday afternoon on June 10th came around and we put our stuff in the car and took off. I knew we had a full tank of gas and Jason said we wouldn't need to stop so I started mapping areas nearby, and then when we started heading North I began guessing places nearby Cedar City. Finally I figured out that Jason was taking me to Brian Head, the ski resort just North of Cedar. Naturally that wouldn't be my forte since I fear the snow, but thank goodness it was mostly melted. Once we pulled up to where we were staying I immediately knew why Jason had brought me here, because Brian Head's "Grand Lodge" was a log cabin (wood)!



The next day we wanted to go over to Bryce Canyon since we don't get over that way enough with Zion's being so close. Here are some pictures from the view point.




Here in this picture you can see one of the gifts Jason gave to me this year. The traditional gift was wood but the modern gift for a 5 year anniversary was silverware. We both took some liberty on this one because we both ended up giving each other silver stuff. Jason made me this necklace where it has a little note in it from him that says "I Love You." It is such a neat keepsake that I will treasure forever!

Right in the middle of this picture is a famous hoodoo (pillar) called "Thor's Hammer." Can you see it?

We loved going on a favorite hike, Navajo Trail. Here are some pictures along the way.

Here is the top of the switchbacks on the hike. It's looks like you can just run down this hill but it is incredibly steep and on your way back up you just have to keep thinking that you are getting close to the top.

Here we are about halfway down of the trail and we still had a great view. This is right before we went deep into the canyons below.

At the bottom of the trail are a couple of trees that somehow have managed to survive at the base of a cliff in the desert. I'm always amazed at how tall they are and how they stand up against the walls of the canyons.

Here we are stopping to take a break.



The trail has to go through a few cutouts in the cliff.

We also stopped by Cedar Breaks on our way back to Brian Head.

It was such a fun getaway and I can't tell you how great Jason is when it comes to being wonderful and spontaneous! I am so excited to spend another 5 years and more with Jason!

Favorite Picture Friday: Anniversary Special!

It's true- Jason and I have been married for 5 wonderful years! On June 10th, 2006 we woke up and met each other at the St. George Temple to become husband and wife. I really can't believe that we have been married for 5 years, because it has gone by so fast. I guess it's true that good times go by fast. Really I couldn't imagine life without Jason. Here are a few pictures from our wedding.

In addition to celebrating our anniversary we also get to announce our "Song of 2011." Back when we first started dating we came up with a song that we loved and claimed it was our song. But then we just kept hearing good songs over the years so we decided that we would come up with a song every year and our deadline to decide would be our anniversary. We loved our 2010 song, "Hills and Valleys" by The Rocket Summer and were a little sad to see it go. We both came up with some options and here are the runner-ups:

"California Dreamin" by The Mamas and the Papas

"Wish upon a Star" from Pinocchio

"Faithfully" by Journey

"I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz

But finally we decided at the last minute that our official 2011 song is "I See the Light" from the movie Tangled. We decided on this song because it talks about waiting and dreaming to go see something but it wouldn't mean much unless you had someone you care about with you. Plus we like that it's a Disney song because with us moving down to Costa Mesa we will be right next to Disneyland and will be there all the time.

Venice March 2011-Full Story

Our final stop on our whirlwind adventure across Europe. By this point we were all overwhelmed with what we've seen and exhausted with how much we have walked. Venice was a stop that we kept debating whether we wanted to go there or not and finally we decided that while we were in Italy we should go and visit it at least once. After our short visit I think we all agreed that it was one of our favorite spots on the entire trip.

We arrived by train to Venice and we immediately found a water taxi to take us to our hotel. The water taxi could only drop us off at a stop and then we had to find our hotel from there. Venice is such an interesting city because there are no streets so no signs or any logical way to find your way around. We had very helpful and hilarious directions from the hotel on how to get there so we followed the directions, such "continue down the alley and then cross over the 2 bridges on your right..." It was so interesting because in the US we are always told to not go down alleys but in Venice that's the way you get around and they are very safe. We eventually found our hotel and loved it! This cute old guy was the landlord and has renovated his house to allow tourists to come stay there. It was a nice place that was so fun to stay there that we can't wait to go back and stay there again.

Once we unloaded our now loaded-down-with-souvenirs luggage we set off to search the city. We found the stop that took us to St. Mark's Square and wandered around there for a while.


Here is a picture of the bell tower in St. Mark's square and then pictures of Venice from the top of the tower.

Here is a picture of us on one of the many bridges in Venice. We walked across so many bridges because there are hundreds of tiny waterways that bridges are all over town. This particular bridge is one that led us to our hotel.

Some pictures by one of the gondola stops in Venice.

Here are some pictures in St. Mark's standing in front of the beautiful buildings.

We are standing in front of the Rialto Bridge. This is probably the most famous bridge in all of Venice.

Everyone refused to go and feed the pigeons in St. Mark's Square and I had some leftover bread from breakfast that morning so I decided that it was a tourists right of passage to feed them so here is a picture of them attacking me!

How can Venice be desribed? It is a city that defies logic with every step. It has an almost magical quality to it that makes you feel like you are walking around in a dream. We have had people ask us our favorite things we saw on our Europe trip, and we will list the big things in the other cities, but when it comes to Venice you can't pinpoint just one thing about Venice because every turn of the corner was a famous landmark. Out of all the places we visited this trip we couldn't stop talking about Venice.

Here is a video that we took that last night in Venice and the last night of the whole trip. What a bittersweet moment that was.

We hope you've enjoyed seeing our pictures and videos from out latest trip to Europe. As you have seen there were so many pictures and videos that it took so long to go through all of them. We loved going again to Europe and taking my parents with us. The greatest thing about traveling is that you can never have the same experience twice and these are memories that we get to keep forever! Thanks for reading!