The South Part of Utah

So this is way over due, but I still had to post it anyhow. The pictures are a little jumbled up, but I'm tired of trying to make it right. So this past summer Matt and I went on another epic trip to Southern Utah. We hit up Natural Bridges again, lots of cool Indian Ruins, and Canyon Lands.

This is at the Island in the Sky part of Canyon Lands. It was mostly just a bunch of really cool look outs.

Bear Tracks we found near the river we were playing in. Who would have known bears live in Southern Utah??

It was so so Hot! I don't know why we went to Southern Utah in August. We found a hidden river to play in though.

Cool Camp Spot in the Needles part of Canyon Lands.

The Needles

This picture was actually taken at night. That's not the sun, it's the Moon!

Another camp spot... at Hamburger Rock.

Hello, Lizard! He didn't move much.

Yep, it was kind of miserable during the day.

Indian Ruins

Natural Bridges.

Newspaper Rock

The main hike we did in the Needles was awesome! You can see why they call it the needles. We went on a 15 miles hike through the Needles to this little slot canyon and then to the coolest arch ever.

Little toads as small or smaller than my finger nails. One of my favorite parts of the trip. We saw a ton of them.

The Sweet Arch... I can't remember what it's called. Whoops.

More of the Island in the Sky

Day to Day

Although I have a few more large summer adventures I need to blog about... I just felt like blogging about some of the day to day things that have been going on as of late. Lately Matt and I have been slightly obsessed with watching Veronica Mars. It's a TV show that got canceled a little while ago. It's about a teenage girl who helps her dad solve crimes and mysteries. Her dad is a PI and she basically is too. It's highly entertaining! Oh and did I mention this is the 3rd time I have watched and it's still so good. We still need to watch season 3.

Also Matt GRADUATED!!! He finished up his last class in August. Yay! (He didn't walk so we don't have pictures).  Now we are trying to figure out our lives while we hang out it in Logan for this next year. Matt is looking for a job and hopefully will get one soon. He had a job interview yesterday. So keep your fingers crossed! Our goal is to pay off his small student loan and other small debt so we can start saving! Also during this year we hope to figure out what's next. Either Matt will go back to school and get his teaching certificate, we will do teach for america, or he will start grad program so he can be a professor. Or who knows maybe we will flee the country and go teach English somewhere. I'm kind of leaning towards the Teach for America thing, but we shall see. And for those that don't know what Teach for America is, it's a program where anyone with a bachelors degree can go to places  where they really need teachers and teach. They pay you a regular salary, give you $10,000 to pay off school loans or to go to more school, and you get a teachers certificate. I think it would be awesome to leave Utah for awhile and see what it's like somewhere else. Yes, some of the places they need help might not be exactly where we would want to go (Mississippi, Louisiana, etc.), but it would be an adventure. And there is the chance we could go to Hawaii!

Oh I ran a 5K last weekend to help support River Heights Post High, where I work. It was my first 5k and I did fairly well. I hadn't been running much at all so I was pleasantly surprised to have done it in 24 minutes. I think the whole race aspect kept me going even though I definitely wanted to stop and walk a few many times.

I also did a little painting this summer. This is a painting I made for my mom for mother's day. It's one of my favorites so far. I also did another one just recently for Matt's mom, but I haven't been able to give it to her yet so I don't want to post it quite yet.

About a month ago we took our dear Subaru in to get it checked. It had been making some not so good sounds and we were about to head out on a long adventure. We were surely disappointed to find out our car would cost 2000 dollars to fix. The car place told Matt that basically are car was so unsafe to drive he didn't think he could make it the 6 blocks back to our house. We then decided that we might as well just buy a new car, because it wasn't worth fixing, but not for a few months. We were able to borrow Matt's Grandpa's old truck, which has been nice and scary. It's a pretty old truck and it's a stick of course. So yes I have had a lovely time trying to drive this beast. It makes me nervous, but I have for the most part mastered the stick.Although whenever I have to drive with Matt in the car I some how kill it. (I guess he still makes me nervous :) I actually don't drive the truck to work though. I have become a biker! It's been pretty fun riding my bike around even with the hills of Logan. I really enjoy riding my bike to work in the early morning. It's just so fresh and crisp outside... fall is coming!!! Anyhow...back to the car stuff. Before putting our car up for sale we wanted to get it checked at another place. Matt told his friend all the things we needed fixed and he told  us that the most expensive thing we needed fixed wasn't really needed. So just like that our $2000 went down to about $1000. So that was good news. Then we took it in to another car place and welp... it looks like we will not be needing a new car! They told us that the only thing needed fixing was the ball joint, which is only $200 and Matt might fix it himself for a bit cheaper. The other things did have a few problems, but nothing to really worry about. It's kind of scary when you know nothing about cars. You can definitely get ripped off. Luckily we need some homework, well Matt did.

I got bangs! For those of you who have not seen me for awhile, I decided to get straight bangs. I was told by a couple hair people that they wouldn't look good on me, but I did it anyways. My hair is sort of at the medium length stage and I wanted something different without cutting my hair. So bangs it was. I wouldn't say they look way way good on me, but I think they look pretty good. I like them most of the time. I have felt like a new whole new wardrobe though. Some of my clothes don't really fit my hair if that makes sense. Some days I just look like a little girl again with those big ole' bangs. If only we had lots and lots of money.

Lately I have been reading. With one of my jobs I get lots of time to read. I just re-read The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale this week. I really like this book! So now I'm going to read the other books that go along with it: Enna Burning and River Secrets. I'm excited! I am also doing the 100 day challenge to read the Book of Mormon. That way I will finish it up before the year is over as long as I stay on top of it. So far so good!

Matt decided the other day that he wants to start getting into better shape, which is great. But to him getting into shape is only eating one meal a day and running. So I decided I wanted to start cooking more and I also bought more goodies. ha ha I just think he should eat so I got stuff and made stuff I knew he couldn't resist.  Matt loves rolls, well he loves all food. I decided to make my first ever homemade rolls last Sunday. Well they didn't quite work out how I had hoped. They didn't really look like rolls at all. I'm pretty sure I let them raise way way way too long. Anyhow, Matt ate them anyways. They actually didn't taste bad, they just had a weird texture. I also got him ice cream, which is his ultimate enemy. We also had crepes for dinner the other night, full of sugar and whipped cream and ice cream...and some fruit to make it healthy. I suppose this makes me sound in a way mean, but he really liked it and so did I. Although it's been fun to make these oh so delicious things, it's kind of been detrimental to my health as well. I guess this week I shall cook, but cook a little healthier. Well... after I make homemade butterfingers and chocolate chip banana bread. ha OH DEAR!

(yes these are rolls)

Flash! What can I say about my lovely bunny? Well she isn't so lovely for one thing. I really do love my little bunny. She is sooo cute, but oh so bad. She is a trouble maker for sure. When ever we let her out she goes straight to the places she likes to dig and chew. She in particular loves the carpet right under our bedroom door. Let's just say I did a little craft with super glue and carpet shards. Although she is a little monster at times, she is the cutest thing in the world! The way she will just flop over and start licking things. The way she yawns and stretches after a nice nap. The way she becomes interested in what you are doing and crawls up your back or sits on your lap. The way she cleans her face with her little paws. The way she looks when she knows she's in trouble. The way she hops and jumps when you know she is happy. We really do love Flash!

**And... MORE Summer**

Our Epic Canadian Adventure

(Sorry this post is HUGE!!)

We went to Canada this summer for 2 weeks! We went with Matt's family and his Grandpa. We started our trip by driving to Lethbridge, where we stayed with Matt's great Aunt Goldie. We did poorly at getting pictures during this part of the trip, but the one to the side at least shows a few of the relatives we met. They made me feel like a giant! The reason we stopped here is because this is where Matt's Grandma Wahlquist grew up. We were able to go to the farm where she lived. It was pretty crazy to think that a family of 11 could live in such a small home... and back then there home was even smaller. Matt's grandma had 7 sisters and 1 brother. All the girls slept together in one room and the lucky boy got his very own. It was fun to hear stories and to put faces together from the people we met. I really really loved the farm! They aren't really running it anymore though. They had a few horses, tons of stray cats, and a dog. I just loved the feel of it though. It made me want a farm... sort of. I don't think I would really enjoy living far away from everything, but the laid back feeling and all the animals, it just seems nice(although I know it would be hard work). Also I loved their thick Canadian accents! I tried to talk like them, but it just didn't work. 

Funny quick story about the horses. So I found the horses and decided well I wanted to pet them. So I hopped a few fences and started heading to them. I don't know too much about horses... Anyhow I start getting closer and they start slowly walking towards me. I stop and slowly start moving backwards. They start galloping towards me. I run! I ran until I was back over the fence. I don't think they would have hurt me or anything, but to see these 3 horses start coming after you was kind of scary. I did end up petting them and actually found out one of them wasn't broken..so it's probably a good thing I ran.

So we visited a lot with family. We got to go tubing and water skiing, which was awesome! I got to prove that I really do know how to water ski. I'm not really that good. I have only been a few times, but I stayed up longer than Matt. We also went frisbee golfing! I really enjoy Frolf, but it's been hard to go because they took the course down, here in Logan. It was fun, even with the crazy wind and accidentally throwing a few discs in the pond. Thank you brother Cameron for being our retriever. Oh and we also got to go see HARRRY POTTER 7 the day it came out! I was so excited, because I didn't think I would be able to see it till we got home. So that about sums up our time in Lethbridge. 

Overload of Nature is the next part of our Adventure. We then headed to Banff National Park! We stayed in a town called Canmore and ventured into the park everyday from there. We saw tons of beautiful lakes, waterfalls, mountains, glaciers, and GREEN! Oh and so many forest friends!

This is Lake Moraine! I think this was my favorite lake, because it's color is one of my favorites! It was just so turquoise and bright. I mean all the lakes were very pretty here, because of the glaciers, but this one takes the belt for me. It's actually been kind of disappointing seeing other water forms here in Utah - just not the same.

Then came the Bears - many many Bears! We saw a couple of grizzly bears and a ton of black bears on this trip. One night while we were in Jasper National Park we saw 7 bears! They were so cute, especially the babies!! All in all we ended up sing 10 big bears and 5 baby bears - that's 15 BEARS!! And the crazy thing was that most of them were just a few feet off of the road. My favorite was seeing a momma bear with her 3 little cubs. We didn't get good pictures of all of the bears we saw, but we did get some. Also way cool thing... we saw a bear swim across a river like it was nothing. We drove into the place we were staying in Jasper and right there be the cabins was a black bear. We kind of chased it, but in a safe way. It was crazy how fast it could swim the river and then bound up the mountain side. You definitely don't want to mess with bears - even if they look cute and cuddly. I really wanted to pet one. I bet they would like it, if they gave it a chance.

I don't really remember the names of some of the other hikes and things we did, but this was a fun one. It was really windy when we got up there, so it was nice to find this rock wall wind breakers.

Kate - Ryan - Matt - Cameron.... Kyle was taking the Picture. 

This was a beautiful picture that Matt took. He is becoming quite the photographer. He basically took every picture while on this trip. 

Some more forest friends! 

These guys were all over the road. They were licking it and what not. Kind of weird. 

Mr. Coyote. This was way cool. He was pretty close and staring right at us. I kept telling Matt to close the window, because I thought he would jump in. I think he really just wanted us to throw him some food, like the other car. 

We saw a pack of Wolves!! about 4-5 of them just prowling around. Luckily all of the wild life we encountered was while feeling safe in the car and not on a hike. 

Water Falls

A couple random hiking photos. 

This is Lake Louise. This was another way cool Lake surrounded by glacier mountains. We went on a hike here so we could get a closer look. There was a Tea House at the top where we got some bread and hot chocolate. I think all hikes should end with some delicious restaurant. Yes, that would be nice. And you may or may not believe this, but I'm pretty sure we saw a Wolverine! We saw a animal while on this hike and none of us knew what it was. Later we found out that Wolverines were in this area and its description fit what we saw. So kind of crazy if it really was one - pretty rare and luckily it didn't want to eat us.

We got to stand on top of a GLACIER! We got to go on a little bus ride to go on another bus ride, which then took us on top of the glacier. The 2nd bus had monster wheels so it wouldn't slip on the glacier.

To end our epic adventure we got to hang out with some of our friends - Warren and Kelsey. We almost weren't able to see them, but I'm glad we did. We went to lunch and got slurpees and cheap candy. We walked around a park and just hung out. This picture is absolutely the worst, but it's all that we got.

The End

P.S. Thank you Mom and Dad Wahlquist for making this a fun and cheap trip for us! I guess we didn't get a picture of them, but they were there. 

*More Summer*

Pinegar Family Reunion

Our next little trip we headed to the Homestead in Midway. We were able to visit with all my extended family on my Mom's side. I kind of forgot to take pictures, but it was lots of fun!  We had a delicious breakfast, we went on a little hike, we went swimming, we had a pizza party, we played lots of games/sports. We played a epic volleyball game. My team was lucky enough to have a pro though. My cousin plays on BYU-Hawaii's volleyball team. We played against 6 of my freakishly tall and skinny teenage guy cousins. They all took off their shirts and called themselves the mad dogs. It was pretty funny. They were barking and being weirdos.  And our team was 4 girls and 2 boys. Oh and we won of course!

You may be wondering what TTTOW stands for? This was our family reunion shirt. Each reunion we ever have, we have a theme. Some of the past ones were JBN - just be nice, IAL - i am loved, BRiTD - be righteous in the dark, and so forth. So this year our theme was TTTOW -The Temple is The Only Way. I think it's really cool that we have these themes and are able to talk about them and improve. I also like how simple each theme really is, but how profound and impactful they can really be. If we all knew that we are loved, if we all could just be nice, if we all were doing good things even if no one else is looking... wouldn't that be great?

Anyhow we had a great Reunion! My grandparents talked to us about the Temple and it's importance, it was really neat. I am so thankful for Temples and that I was able to be married in one. I'm so happy for the ability to have a eternal family, to be with the people I love forever and ever. So the motto/theme is true...
The Temple is The Only Way!! it really is.