Expressive writing + photo sharing.

Ahhhhh.... finally a day without some crazy kind of project or schedule. A day to catch up and record the past {almost} month. It's a bit daunting, but also a bit freeing.

In my early morning perusal of facebook (I seriously need to curb the urge to look each morning), I read about the beneficial effects of expressive writing, especially about the challenges in our lives. "It involves writing continuously for 20 minutes about a particular issue; exploring your deepest thoughts and feelings around it. The goal is to get something down {on paper}, not to create a memoir-like masterpiece."

That's kind of why I like to take a few minutes (sometimes an hour or two haha), to reflect about what's going on in my life. Of course, I try to keep things in a positive light, which was also referred to in the article... "a technique called 'finding silver linings'... looking on the bright side..." which it stated needs to be practiced on a regular basis or the effects will wear off. 

I think it's why my early years of scrapbooking, and my later years of blog posting, have helped me mentally focus on the positive, sending the struggles and challenges and frustrations into the background. Love that. That's not to say I don't mention the negative (I know I have), but it still puts it into perspective... most of the time {wink}.

Enough philosophizing... on to the catch up.

June 9th.
We made the trek to Utah (again), this time with a mattress and box springs on the top of our car.
We heard {more than once} that we looked like the Beverly Hillbillies.
Who cares, I say.
We dropped them off first thing to Jase and Lex's place, happy that we didn't have any major incidents with a mattress and box springs flying off while traveling at high speeds along I-70.

Since it was Tay's b-day, we all gathered that evening at Austin and Britt's place for a little celebration. Grandma and Grandpa G made the long trek from Bountiful to join us.

A dad and his boy.

 Ahhhh... so sweet.

I love seeing these beautiful babes any time I can:

 After dinner, the girls all hung out and chatted while the boys went shooting guns.

 When they got back, we had cake and ice cream.

June 10th.
We attended Hunter and Courtney's wedding.

After the wedding, Robyn hosted a lovely luncheon.

 
Couldn't resist a Scarlett sandwich!!

We hung out at Jase and Lex's place waiting for the reception that evening.

Then we headed back to the church for the reception.

Cole is getting sooooo tall!

 Grandpa and Scarlett enjoyed a few dances...

 aaaaannnnddd I made these two pose for a dance pic, since it kind of seems like tradition.

 It was a beautiful wedding, a wonderful luncheon, and a lovely reception. We are so happy for these two!

The drive home was beautiful... one of the benefits of that long drive.

 Once we were back, we tackled home organization and improvement projects.
Ain't nobody got time to rest up a bit hahaha.

I had to throw in this snapchat exchange because it was just so cute.

June 13th.
We celebrated Shilo's 21st birthday quietly. She worked that day, so we called her around 11:20pm when she was done and sang to her. She was on her way to have cake with friends. I'm telling you, only college students keep those kinds of hours!! I stole these two snaps (?) that day:

Back to the home improvement projects.

We finally got knobs on the bathroom cabinets.

 Yes, as usual, that requires at least two sets of holes hahahahaha.

I got Mar's M hung. Proud moment.

Billy-my-hero actually didn't get upset when I asked him to remove the light fixtures he had installed only days earlier and replace them with some I liked better.

We jumped into a tiling project, because it will be nice {someday} to have an actual working shower in the master bathroom.

I am quite impressed with the results as this was our very first major tiling project.

We have had the shower area measured, and hope to have an actual working shower in the next few weeks. Such a LOOOONNNGGGG process. I'm not sure if I would take on a fixer upper again.

Father's Day.
Bill was HOME for a nice breakfast that Mar and I prepared.
Our ward made a little more of a to-do over Father's Day, thankfully.
The talks were on... fathers.
And they had pie after church.

Mar's adorable card:

My delicious dinner:
(okay, Bill grilled the steaks haha)

We called and talked to our dads, which is always a treat.


June 20th.
One of Mar's friends, Molly, had passed away the week prior, so we attended the funeral.
Molly had suffered from the debilitating effects of a disease she was born with (I'm not sure what exactly it was - her parent's called it ED, but upon googling, there are several syndromes and diseases that use that abbreviation). Her family had lived in our ward since Molly was about 5 years old. Prior to her passing, the youth of the Legend Ward had planned a surprise 16th birthday party for her, so we were all so sad that we were celebrating her life in a different way instead.

The funeral was also the week of girls camp, so the YCLs that attended left for camp immediately following.

Mar was in a unique situation this year for camp. She elected to attend with our old ward because camp with our new ward was occurring during our Call family reunion. Her YCL partner was a less active YW from another ward. They were supposed to have little devotionals and handouts prepared for the younger girls they would be leading, and Mar had a difficult time getting her partner to help. The day before camp, her YCL partner texted and said she would only be there 2 days, and when I caught up with Mar AFTER camp, her partner ended up not showing at all. Bummer. Mar said she combined with another group and all was well. I'm so grateful for her good attitude. AND her willingness to be a friend even when she does all the work.

She had searched Pinterest and found some darling handouts to make for her girls:

She said she had a great time.


June 21st.
Whilst Mar was off at girls camp, I went back to UT (because I just can't stay away haha).
The day I arrived, I suggested to Scarlett that we go to a park.
Britt gave me the its-a-95-degree-day-what-are-you-saying stare, so we thought we would try an indoor play place. Since Arctic Circle was fairly close, and I had also promised ice cream (because that's what grannys do), we decided to try there. It was 3:30ish, so we were surprised to find the play place PACKED, mainly with a large group of older kids (10? or older) running around madly, playing tag, etc. Poor Scarlett attempted the small slide once, only to be almost wiped out by a big girl running down the slide. I glanced around to see if there were any parents supervising, but any nearby were contentedly looking at their phones, oblivious to what the rowdy bunch of older kids (much taller than the height limit btw) were doing. We decided to grab an ice cream cone for Scarlett and find another place to play. Britt and I stopped by a shave ice place, then stopped at a nice little park that had nary a child in sight.

Scarlett played. And played. And ran. And jumped. And played some more. It was so so hot, but so fun to watch her so thoroughly enjoy herself.

 Britt and I survived the heat, and as a last hurrah as we were leaving, Scarlett took one more RUN down the hill.


June 22nd.
We played with playdoh the next morning,

 then cousin Evie came over (and Auntie Lo, but I didn't get any pics of her)!!

June 23rd.

We took a field trip to the farm at Thanksgiving Point.

Auntie Lo joined us again... with her crazy summer work schedule (M-F 4 to 11pm), at least we got to see her in the mornings/early afternoons.

Scarlett was so excited to ride a horse, and loved that she got this sweet blondie.

It was a little tricky keeping Evie out of the sun, but she was a trooper and seemed to enjoy our adventure to the farm.

This cow found Nae super delicious...

Hey, baby!

The horses that pull the wagon got a nice cool shower before their last ride around the farm for the afternoon.

Lucky us, we got on that last horse-drawn ride.

That night we attended Mic and Todd's pre-wedding dinner.

Shilo had finagled a couple hours off of work to attend... yay!!

 Beautiful CO girls, that's all I can say.

And some lovely Legend/Canterberry ladies, past and present.

Late that night I drove to the airport to pick up Mar.

Poor Bill had to stay home to take care of the dogs.
We really really need to make some dog-sitting friends here in Castle Rock... soon!


June 24th.
Mic's wedding day.

After the temple pictures (in Payson), Mar asked to drive to downtown SLC to meet up with her pal from EFY last year, who also happened to be in UT. Hmmmmm. I worried about her driving THAT far in UT traffic (seriously more aggressive than most places I've been) on the FREEWAY. We said a little prayer, then she went on her way. She made it there, found the parking, had a good time catching up with her friend, and returned safe and sound. Phew.

Meanwhile, Lex, Britt and I grabbed lunch at Red Robin (Shi joined us a little later), then Britt and I went shopping for some baby quilt fabric for Baby E. I can't wait to get started on it!

Then we headed to the reception.

 Such an adorable couple.

Jason... now you see him...

...now you don't.

I think somethin's going on with these two... excited to see what the future brings {wink}.

The girls... up close and personal during the cake cutting...

... the boys... removed and aloof hahaha.

Caught a smile, tho.

Chey is getting that bouquet, no doubt.

 I didn't catch the pic, but yep, Chey caught the bouquet.


Evie did great with the crowds and the noise. So many adventures, so little time.

The sparkler send off.
I'm so happy for Michaela and Todd!

Well, that's about it for now. Not so much expressive writing, but I'm still feeling good about those THOUSANDS of words spoken through the art act of photography haha.

It has been so crazy busy, but I wouldn't want to miss any of it.
I am still adjusting to the move. I love our location, am starting to love the house (as projects get finished and things get organized), and have felt amazingly free as I let go of so many things.

One of my favorite quotes:
Joy is not in things, it is in us. 
(Richard Wagner)

Now there is some expressive writing.