The Proposal

APPOLOGIES:
I must take a quick second to say sorry to anyone out there that reads my blog and has suffered through my terrible spelling/grammer and other mistakes.
I dont have a ton of time to blog, so when I do I generally do a few posts at a time and have them scheduled to post in the upcoming weeks. By the time I get to 3+ posts I am burned out and I never check my spelling or reread anything. Ive skimmed over the last few posts and its embarrassing. So, I do appologize, and I promise I am not as dumb as I sound.
Onward!

Right now, we are a month out from the wedding! I am getting so excited, and have kept extremely busy planning the last couple of months.
But lets first start with the proposal!
If you dont know Russ, and if you havent gathered from reading my blog, Russ LOVES the outdoors. He's been a ski instructor, river guide, worked with troubled kids in survival camp in the middle of nowhere, and the guy hikes a ton!
On July 24th, we had been up to Heber helping my parents move a few things in my uncles home. My uncle passed away last year and they were getting ready to rent his place. Russ asked if we could do a quick hike while we were up there.
It was SO hot. And we had been moving things in a very hot house and I just wasnt in the mood, but said I would go.
Moving took longer then we thought and I inherited an AWESOME old fridge and had to go back down to the valley to take it home. What I didnt know, is Russ was planning on proposing to me up in the mountains! I had NO idea.
So we totally ruined his plans by me getting this fridge and having to go back down to the valley to get it from my brother in law who offered to take it down in his trailer.
We got back to my house and unloaded it and I could tell her really wanted to go for a hike still. I was hot, I was tired but he was pretty adamant and he had been so nice to help my family so I gave in.
Since we had been moving, and I had known he wanted to hike I was wearing the ugliest outfit. Ugh...why does that always happen? I was wearing shorts that were 4 sizes too big, my hair was in pigtails (I never wear my hair in pigtails), and I knew it was going to be a hot one, so last minute I grabbed Eckos leopard print bandana to use on my head. Regrets.
So on the way up, I fell into a coma from being hot all day and driving in a truck without AC.
In this picture, we had just gotten to the trail head and I had just woken up.
But I love it because you can see I am not wearing a ring!

We started the hike and I started waking up a little, and tried to change my attitude about being there so Russ could have fun, plus once we got up into the mountains it was cooler then the valley.



Russ and I had talked about getting married and even had gone ring shopping the week before. BUT, I didnt know for sure what I wanted. I had picked out a band but didnt know what shape of diamond I wanted and we only had about a half an hr to look. The whole next week after we had looked we had something every night. So half way up the hike Russ started telling me how he was looking up honeymoons. I told him I thought it was sweet, but dont you think we should start with a ring?
He said the ring shop was closed on Monday due to the Pioneer holiday and we could go on Tuesday. He started asking me what shape of diamond I wanted etc.
We continued our hike with intentions of making it to the top of the mountain to a lake. After about an hr of hiking we ran into snow!The end of July and trail was completely covered in snow. Russ, unbeknown to be, was planning on proposing at the lake. He already had planned to propose up in Heber, and that plan got ruined, so when his plan B wasnt working out either I could tell he really wanted to just hike in the snow.

We started to hike in the snow, and it was steep, slippery and cold!
I could hear water running under us at certain points, and just felt it wasnt safe.
I told him I thought we should turn around and I didnt really want to be playing in the snow in July!



We started to head down the mountain and decided to just call it day and hike straight to the car. Russ told me he needed to go to the bathroom, so he ran down the side of the mountain out of sight.
After a few minutes he came running back up and I noticed he didnt have his backback on. I told him he forgot his backpack and he said there was a beautiful waterfall down the mountain a ways and he wanted me to come see it.
So we started down the steep mountain side and we came across a grove of trees.
Attached to the trees were blown up pictures of the 2 of us.
Russ is a VERY thoughtful person and will suprise me with something (flowers at my house when I come home from work, notes left for me to find them etc).
He told me he wanted to do something sweet for me since he had been dragging his feet in getting me a ring and didnt want me to lose my patience with him. So at this point I just thought he was being sweet and still didnt have a clue he was proposing.
He had picked a bouquet of wild flowers and tied a ribbon around them. He handed them to me and grabbed my hand to walk me over to the trees.
We went through each picture and he told me these were just some of his favorite memories of us and the fun times we had. There was a picture of us from Thailand, a picture of us camping with Ecko, one from our most recent roadtrip and a few others.
Then there was a big blank white piece of paper. He said he left it blank so we could take a picture of the 2 of us on the hike to add to our collection.
He set up the camera on a timer (which we always do) and had me go stand with the waterfall to my back.
He took a picture and hurry and ran over!
He went back to the camera and said it wasnt a good one, lets do one more.
So he set it up, ran over again and...

I could NOT believe what was happening!!
He totally and completely shocked the heck out of me! He said the sweetest things in the world, and asked me to marry him :)
I love how thoughtful he was and how we have an actual picture of him proposing to me!
My ring, I love it! I wanted the petite band and he surprised me with the diamond.

I wish I had a better picture of all the trees with the hanging pictures, but here is the blank one he hung for the engagement picture, and you can see some of the others in the background.

I know this is a major no no, but right after we got engaged Russ carved our intials into the tree :)



I honestly feel so incredibly lucky to have found a guy like Russ.
He is one of the most positive, genuine, thoughtful, and FUNNEST guy I know.
Can not wait to be married to him.

Porcupine

We were loving the summer heat, and wanted to take a swim.
Russ talked about a place he used to go cliff jumping back in college.
We packed up the truck and Ecko and decided to go camp and swim up at Porcupine Reservoir!
Ecko loved getting out of the heat and taking a dip in the COLD water.

Russ brought his "Too cool lounge" which is basically like floating on the water in a blow up mattress.
I was so proud of Ecko! We got her to come on the lounge and float clear across the lake so Russ could impress the 100 people out there cliff jumping!
Ive said it once, Ill say it again..I have the coolest dog ever.

We paddled out to a really high rock with tons and tons of people. We watched everyone hesitate and finally jump off and Russ decided he wanted a turn.
He climbed the rock, and with out any hesitation did a beautiful dive off the top.
I wish I had a picture or a video, because not only was his dive amazing, but everyone up there was totally blown away so it was funny to hear their reaction.






After we got back to Russ's truck a few people came and told us someone hit his truck and ran.
Russ has an older truck that he doesnt care about so he was kind of bugged, but didnt care all that much...until we started to drive and couldnt turn left!!
So we had to take his truck apart so we could turn the wheel.
We called the cops and by a miracle and making an incredibly long story short...they caught the guy who did it. So that was lucky for us.
That night we had a fire next to the water, roasted some hot dogs and slept under the stars.
The next morning we went for a really quick dip in the water and headed back to the city!

Summer Lovin' had me a blast!

So sad to think the summer is over.
I feel we got robbed this year of a summer as far as weather.
We still enjoyed a lot of summer activities...
A few trips to the pool!
We finally got our mountain bikes up in the canyon!





Its so crazy to think we live in the city, but can be up and out of all the commotion and in a beautiful, quiet get away in 15 min.



A few rodeos with friends!
We did make it back to Strawberry Days this year with a few friends. I was horrible at taking pictures this summer.
Nothing like a cup (or 2 or 3) of strawberries in creme while watching a buckin bronco!

Russ grew up on a farm, riding horses and hunting!
So its a lot of fun to go camping with his family. I get to ride horses, which I never did growing up!
The setting on our camera was really bad almost this whole summer, and I didnt notice until I took all the pictures off.
So not the greatest pictures.


His dad has this great mule named Ingersol( I have absolutely no idea how to spell it). Anyway, his dad loves this mule, but he is nice enough to let me ride him every time I go riding with their family. Im obviously not an experienced rider (Im wearing Converse in the stirrups) so he lets me ride him because he is the most gentle of the group.


We saw a drive in drive in movie, did a few hikes, and went rock climbing twice.



The best part of this summer, we got engaged on July 24th! Yahoo! All the pictures from our engagement are on Russ's camera, so I hope to post pictures and story soon. Its a good one!

Proud to be an American!

I sure love the 4th. I love everything about it.
This year we did the same ol traditions as always...Parade, dinner, family sleepover and big breakfast!
Riverton Parade..
On the way to the parade (Cody still thinks he is in Taiwan)



After the parade we went over to a fundraiser carnival for dinner, games and a photobooth!

We went back to the ol parents and laid out the row of sleeping bags and surprisingly enough, had the best night of sleep ever on a family sleep over.
Thank you kiddos! If you look close, Russ and I are the only ones lucky enough to still be asleep!



My dad made his traditional Swedish thin breakfast!

Russ was preparing for this day for a long time. There is a record for most eaten Swedish thins years and years and years ago..like even before I was born for a total of 8 eaten. Russ went into breakfast ready to beat that record!
He did it!! 9 and a half Swedish thins. Makes me want to throw up thinking about it.
For the special occasion we played "For he's a jolly good fellow", made a fan tunnel for him to come out in

And the kids made some noise.



We celebrated little buddy's fist birthday!



Mei and I were getting our picture taken..

And K Bell wanted his picture with Russ(His favorite) by his new motorcycle :)

Because the 4th was on a Monday we had done the sleepover the first part of the weekend. That Monday, Russ and I had a good old fashioned 4th of July. We started early by getting up to run in my cities 5K...but 2 seconds into the run Russ had an injury to the ribs, so we went back to the park and had a fireman's breakfast and waited for the parade instead! Pancakes and bacon is way better then running anyway. After the parade was over, the firemen were doing a tug a war while spraying you down with their hose to make you let go of the rope. It looked so fun so Russ and I joined in and got SOAKED!Im sad I dont have any pictures of it, bu It was so much fun. Then they had another game where one team had one fire hose and a team across from you had another and you had to try and spray a bucket hanging in the air to the other side of the team. Im sure that makes no sense, but I dont know how else to explain it. Just picture a bunch of fun, in the middle of the park, and people getting soaked.
So we did that for a bit, went back to my house and got into some dry clothes and went back to the park to check out the booths. We got KFC (this is a rare occasion for me to eat KFC, but it was the 4th!) and had a picnic in the park.
It was so much fun riding my beach cruiser around in the park with my honey.
Then we decided to go swim! But when we got to the pool someone had pooped, so we scratched that. Why people dont put their kids in swim diapers is beyond me. This happened FOUR times to us this summer!
That night they had a really great concert in the park, so we went to the concert and watched a fantastic firework show.



Such a perfect 4th!

Sole Sisters!

Well, we did it!
The middle of June my sister Kaysie and & I completed the Bear Lake half marathon. Yahoo!
What a fun thing.
My family rented a condo and have a fun weekend get together for the occasion.
The morning of the race, my wonderful boyfriend (Now fiance) got up at the buttcrack of dawn to make us breakfast. Now if any of you know Russ, he HATES getting up early. So when he voluntarily woke up to make us breakfast I thought it was very sweet.
Getting ready to leave! Look at these super cute shirts my sister made us.

Our cute chef

Our wonderful mom also got up at early to wish us luck and take us to the buses.
I couldnt believe when we hopped on the bus and it kept driving, and driving and driving. I didnt train too well, and never did run a full 13 miles before the race. Sheesh, that is FAR!
The bus dropped us off and it had been raining the night before so it was a bit chilly.
Kays and I stayed together for almost the whole race. We were always close enough to see each other through the whole thing. The first 4 or 5 miles, I felt GREAT. I was running faster then I normally would, and then hit the dirt road we had to run for a mile. Because of the rain it was solid mud! After already running for 5 miles and then hitting mud, it was hard!
Running next to the lake was a beautiful thing though.
13.1 is a long way for a non runner. Just as I was about to the point I was feeling pretty exhausted, my amazing family and boyfriend drove by, honking, yelling and taking our pictures to push us along (We had about 3 miles left).






I had been running along with this other girl, and she would pass me, and then I would pass her, and we would always cheer each other on as the other would pass.
At one point we were running along side each other when my family passed, and she made mention of what great supporters they were.
The next 3 miles were the most brutal of them all. Take note, if you are ever going to run a half marathon, make the time to really train!
Just as I was FINALLY making the round to come to the finish line, you can hear the loudest crowd and see them all spread out..of course, the awesome fam!
I will brag and say my family was by far the loudest cheering squad there.

Crossing the finish line



I loved the cute signs the kids made.

Later, Kays and I were in line to get some fruit and the girl I had been running with said "I knew when you were crossing the line, because your family was the loudest!" haha, I thought that was funny.
Thanks for the support Fam.



Mei like my medal

Such a great time!

The rest of our weekend we had a delicious pizza, attempted to swim but it was still to early in the year so freezing, played a little Frisbee and had races down the streets of Bear Lake. My team killed it.





We literally were pedalling our hearts out. Most of the time you see families taking a leisurely stroll on those bikes, nope, not our family. We were tearing around the corners, cutting each other off, trying to hit all the water puddles. It was awesome.
These crazy cats even had matching bruises. Im sad I waited until the end of the weekend until Russ's was fading.

Great weekend, and good feeling of accomplishment. I guess I can cross that off the bucket list!