Minnetonka Cave

One of the main reasons for our Utah trip (and the sole reason we took said trip so late in my pregnancy) was Matt's family's "reunion" at Bear Lake.

The use of the term "reunion" regarding this annual event is a point of playful controversy between me and Matt. See, this event involves simply his parents, siblings, and their young children -- no extra cousins or crazy great aunts or any of the characters you might expect to find at a family reunion. In my mind, it doesn't count as a reunion unless there is someone in attendance whom you do not immediately recognize. Therefore, I maintain that it should be called a family vacation, party, trip, or something of that sort -- especially considering the fact that Matt's family gets together rather often throughout the year. (Besides, doesn't "vacation" or "party" sound so much more fun than "reunion" anyway?) Matt insists that because they are all together on these designated days, it qualifies as a "reunion." Naturally, that opens up the door for me to tease that any time spent with my siblings is a reunion as well. Agreed?

Anyway, whatever you want to call it, our Bear Lake adventure was a great time all around. Day 1 was spent setting up house, getting the boat in the water, enjoying delicious Dutch oven peach cobbler, and just hanging out. We kicked off Day 2 with a tour of the nearby Minnetonka Cave, which had low temperatures, lots of stairs and zero bats. The cave itself was pretty cool but the highlight for me was finally learning a good way to remember which is which between stalactites and stalagmites ("Stalactites hang tight to the ceiling!"). Yeah, apparently I missed that day in second grade science.

Matt and I asked Andy to take a picture of us and he did... just as the lights went out. So we tried again.

Side note: I used to giggle a bit when I'd see families wearing matching shirts in public on vacation. Then I married into one that does. Turns out, it's not so bad after all.

Home

Hello, loves! After a two-week trip "back home" in Utah, I'm finally home in California. Matt and I pulled into our garage at 2 a.m. last night and have a lot of recovering to do after so much fun (and time in the car)! Our Utah visit was full of family time and included exciting things like an incredible baby shower, kayaking in the canyon, roasting s'mores, game nights, outdoor symphonies, drive-in movies, exploring caves, and boating and hanging out at Bear Lake.

This was our last vacation before the baby comes so the final countdown is now officially on. We have just about a month and a half left and yes, that sounds crazy to me and Matt, too! Time has been flying for the two of us and we still have so much to do before our little guy's arrival. On top of an already-busy week, I now have a solid thousand pictures and two weeks of laundry to sort through in the next few days, but hopefully I'll get around to posting about our fun trip soon. In the meantime, though, here's a little sneak peak of the mini-maternity shoot we had with my sister Heidi before hitting the road yesterday (at 33 weeks & 2 days, for anyone keeping track):

Thanks again, sis!

A big oops

Alternate titles: "Oxi Clean is magic," "I still need my mom," or "Why you shouldn't paint the nursery during your third trimester."

See, painting while big and pregnant isn't exactly an easy task. Cutting the edges is the worst part by far -- climbing up and down stools to work on the ceiling edge is ten times more difficult and bending over with a baby belly to work on the baseboard edge is insanely uncomfortable. The edges took literally three times longer than they should have and left me with an achy back and limited patience. I was so excited to finally roll and get it over with! But just minutes into rolling, I was suddenly far too hot in the 72-degree room so I went to the hall to turn on the AC. The unthinkable happened when I walked back into the room:

I kicked over the nearly-full gallon of paint.

The paint spread rapidly all over the drop cloth... and the carpet. A solid two-thirds of a gallon had spilled out before I was able to stop the carnage. Did I mention that pregnancy makes you (me) extra clumsy? Yeah. Sure does. Luckily, 90% of the spilled paint landed on the drop cloth, but there was still a good 18-inch diameter circle of thick, fresh paint on our rental home's carpet. I could have died.

I was a bit too preoccupied to take a picture of my spill, but it was a little bigger than this one, spread out on the drop cloth and carpet. Yikes!

Matt was leading group PT at the time and was therefore unreachable, so I frantically called my mom while I tried to scoop as much paint off the carpet as possible. She immediately rattled off a potential solution and then googled directions just in case. Google agreed with my mom (she's a smart one), so I blotted up as much paint as possible, kept the carpet wet, sent Matt to the store to buy a wet/dry vacuum as soon as he got home, and then got to work. After six hours of pouring hot water, adding Oxi Clean on every other pour, and vacuuming it all up with our brand new wet vac, our carpet was in the clear. Thank goodness!

I finally thought of the camera on one of our final rounds of Oxi Clean. That stuff has magical powers, clearly.

Want to know the best part, though? We had to let the water soak for a few minutes each time before vacuuming, so I decided to make the most of those free moments. I grabbed the roller, used the pile of wet paint on the drop cloth as my paint tray, and continued to paint the room. And what do you know? With the little bit left in the paint can, we had just enough to finish the nursery. Three cheers for that.

A beachy weekend

What good would a 4-day weekend be without some quality time at the beach? Matt and I welcomed the first two days of July by soaking up some rays and playing in the water at two of our favorite SoCal beaches. It was heavenly! We spent all day Friday at Huntington Beach with our SoCal family, the Rozsas. A good amount of football, frisbee, boogie boarding, and plain ol' relaxing was involved.

Then, on Saturday, we spent the day with visiting family members--Matt's little brother Andy, his wife Kristen, and her brother Bucky--down in Laguna at Crescent Bay. It was the most crowded our secluded little beach has ever been, but that was expected with the holiday weekend and ideal beach weather (a perfect 80-degrees on the coast!).

The football saw plenty of action once again as did the aerobie, which was miraculously recovered after being lost at sea twice.

Thanks to some fantastic waves, the boogie boards were the highlight of the day for the boys. My pregnant self enjoyed the sand with Kristen and took way too many action shots.

When the boys needed a break, we took a walk down the beach to explore the tidepools and enjoy the view of the coastline.

I now officially need "help" when climbing over loose rocks. Pregnancy makes you rather clumsy!

After a long day in the sun, we were ready for food! We grabbed dinner and capped off the day in the best way--with Sprinkles Cupcakes. 

Pre-fireworks festivities

We woke up bright and early on the Fourth of July and loaded our day with festivities. Matt and I had hoped to participate in a 10K freedom run that morning, but my round ligaments started to bug me on any 4+ mile run just two weeks before so it didn't seem like such a smart idea. We substituted the race with a shorter, scenic run to the top of Turnbull Canyon and it was a beautiful start to our day.

We attempted a picture just as an entire community of gnats tried to relocate to my mouth. Yum!

Much better.

Oh, hello 30.5-week belly.

After a quick shower, we met up with the Rozsa kids at the boy scouts' 7 a.m. pancake breakfast--where we promptly canceled out any calories we might have burned on our morning run.

Then, it was off to the local parade! Always so entertaining.

Our day continued with a delicious lunchtime BBQ. Matt was happy to take over grilling duties.

That afternoon, we rested a bit while watching an edited version of The Patriot before heading off to the Queen Mary. Our bed was rather inviting after fireworks and LA traffic late that night!

Fireworks aboard the Queen Mary

I hope you all had a lovely Independence Day weekend! We love the Fourth of July and all that it stands for, and we had a fantastic time celebrating the holiday. This year, we sent it out with a bang by watching fireworks aboard the Queen Mary -- a former luxury oceanliner that saw combat during WWII and now lives in Long Beach Harbor.

Of course, we were ON the Queen Mary, so our view didn't include the actual boat. This picture is from their website.

We arrived at the Queen Mary late in the afternoon and spent the first couple hours exploring the inside of the ship. The engine room was probably our favorite, minus how hot it was inside. I can't even begin to imagine how unbearable the heat must have been when the ship was actually running!

Then, we walked along the outer decks for awhile, taking in views of the harbor and enjoying old war relics along the way.

When the light started to fade, we snagged a prime spot for the fireworks show and waited as the sun went down. Luckily, the ship had a live DJ for the event so we spent that "waiting" time dancing to fun music.

As it got darker, more and more yachts and boats made their way into the harbor and got into position to watch the fireworks. Now that would be a party!

At last, the fireworks began! I love watching fireworks over the water because it's like you get double the fireworks with their reflections -- so pretty.

The fireworks were synced to patriotic music on the ship and the show was fantastic. It was such a great date and the perfect final 4th as a couple!