THROUGH THE TRAVEL ARCHIVES

the other day i was looking through old photos that i have saved on my computer, most of which are from family vacations that we went on before i even had a blog. these trips are some of my favorite times and experiences. they helped shape me into who i am today & created my craving for travels & adventure. as i was looking at the pictures, i decided they needed to be shared. i love these pictures & the memories i have in each of these places. 

in 2005 my family traveled throughout italy & switzerland. one of our many stops was a small, waterfront town: bellagio (& yes, the las vegas hotel is named after this town). bellagio is a gorgeous, colorful town with the buildings right on the edge of the water, cobblestone paths, lush green hills & a lot of life. it's a quieter part of italy, not nearly as many tourists as other cities & it's so beautiful. i went back to bellagio when my friends & i traveled around europe in 2008 & i was happy that it was exactly as amazing as i had remembered it to be.

& a couple fun facts: george clooney owns a house here & the scene when princess padame tells darth vader that she is pregnant in star wars, was filmed here. 

A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT

for the entire first year of our marriage, austin was constantly going fishing. when we got married, i had no idea how much he loved fishing, though he tells me that he fished a lot while we were dating, i don't remember it at all. i just knew he loved to rock climb & snowboard, & that he had biked a lot, never do i remember him mentioning fishing. but i quickly learned after we were married how much he really loved fishing. & not just any kind of fishing, but fly fishing.

i wasn't really sure what the huge draw to fly fishing was. i mean, i could count on one hand how many times i had been fishing in my life, so i was not at all that interested in it, but he was constantly driving all over utah, sometimes in montana & idaho, to go fishing. he also would bring home fly fishing movies he took from his dad that we would watch, some of which were boring but a few of them really caught my attention. 

so this past spring i told him i wanted to go out with him & try my hand at fly fishing. i figured it must be pretty fun since he loved to go so much, & that it probably wasn't nearly as boring as i assumed it was. so we went out a couple times & i really began to like it.

fly fishing isn't boring in the slightest. i loved the constant motion of casting & learning how to do it. i loved watching for the fish to figure out where to cast & the first time i felt a fish go for my fly was surprisingly exciting. like all my hard work had paid off, even if i lost it in the end. i was still pumped. 

austin has been patiently teaching & helping me out, tying my flies on since i don't know how & now he gets to carry cedar in the ergo, so it's a real family affair. people seem to think your life ends when you have a baby, but we've decided that cedar joined our lives, so we aren't going to slow down.

i love that we have hobbies that we can share together,

it really is so fun. sadly i forgot to take a camera,

but we were able to get a few pictures on our phones!

DATE NIGHT

a lot of our date nights now consist of bathing, feeding & putting cedar to bed
& then cuddling up on the couch with ice cream or candy to either watch a movie or
whatever t.v. we've gotten hooked on.
sometimes it's hard to have any time alone with austin.
we're both so in love & obsessed with cedar that it's hard to get a whole lot done when he's awake,
wiggling, smiling & making noise, & we find ourselves doing chores or tasks while he's asleep
rather than taking the opportunity to enjoy our time together.
we have to try & remember to make time for ourselves.
so even if we don't go somewhere,
or don't have a babysitter,
we have started having stay-in dates.
where no phones, or computers allowed.
& they're sort of my favorite thing ever.

LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE

summers in utah are pretty cool. granted, we've been gone the majority of it, but we're living it up with what's left, while we can. during the summer the sundance festival shows old sundance movies at the red butte amphitheater for free & tonights movie was little miss sunshine. i forgot how much i love the movie, & i hadn't seen it forever, so i was pretty happy when i heard that it was the movie they were showing. we met a group of friends up there & watched the movie with a huge crowd of people all sitting on the grass. outdoor movies are truly the best idea, plus the weather was perfect. 

i think it's really important to remember it is your life.

live your life to make you happy, not someone else.

its easy to get caught up in doing what is expected of you

rather than what you want to do, what would make you happy.

just because you want to do something different,

doesn't make it wrong.

i think people forget that

happy weekend

YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN YOU'LL GET HIT

today i'm more grateful for my family & our safety than i ever have been. yesterday we got in a car accident, & it was the scariest day i've experienced since becoming a mom. 

austin, cedar, my mom & i were driving on pch when it happened. a couple of pedestrians decided to run across the road to the beach, like many of them do, causing the cars to slow down pretty quickly. we had slowed down & stopped & then boom. we were hit. the guy behind us must not have noticed everyone slowing down, because he came at us pretty quickly & hit us hard,

causing our car to crash into the car in front of us. it was kind of a reality shock & as soon as i realized what had happened my fear from being hit grew at the thought of tiny cedar in the car being hurt.

i instantly yelled asking austin, who was next to cedar, if cedar was alright & luckily he was. luckily for all of us none of us were hurt, just a little bit of whip lash.

but the guy who hit us totaled his car, crushing the front in & slammed his head against his dash, & the car in front of us was crushed in the back. my moms car looks like it hardly got hit compared to the others, & i am entirely grateful for that & that her car was able to take such a hit.

i guess what scared me the most are all the what-ifs. what if one of us didn't have our seat belts on, or if cedar wasn't strapped in, or wasn't strapped in tight enough... those kind of things. 

it definitely showed me how strong a car seat is & just how important it is to always strap him in, even though i know he'll cry for a second, because you never know what's going to happen or when.

i love my family & am so grateful for our safety. in the long run i know it wasn't a major accident, we are all ok. but the thought of one of us being hurt terrifies me. & i guess i get to be terrified for the rest of my life now that i'm a mom

LOLLAPALOOZA

every year chicago hosts lolla palooza, a music festival that i've been wanting to go to for a really long time & we conveniently were there for the first day! i was so excited to go. my mom so graciously watched cedar so that we could go. tons of bands played, but we got to see crystal castles, hot chip, lana del ray, imagine dragons, steve aoki & the killers. i was so excited to see crystal castles & hot chip & they were both awesome live. 

it was probably the most crowded thing i've ever been to, it was craaay cray. for reals. there were thousands & thousands of people & it was so incredibly fun.

INSTA.WEEK[S]

1. cedar celebrated his 2 month birthday!

2. eating my icecream cone while at lollapalooza

3. family photo in the willis/sears tower (it was terrifying)

4. cedar really loved his time at mt. rushmore

5. s'more s'more

6. cool guy cedar with his shades on

7. cedar aspiring to be a astronaut 

8. austin & i getting our tan on

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wings

i've been a long time fan of birdy & i just heard her new single & i love it.

CHICAGO pt. 2

while we were in the windy city, we took the boat architecture tour which was amazing in my opinion. i absolutely loved it. chicago has amazing architecture & it all blends together. the buildings all compliment each other, their locations & the surroundings. the city is really invested in their architecture & making sure that it adds to the cities beauty & doesn't take away from it.. which is really cool. i loved looking at all the buildings & learning interesting facts about all of them.

we also went to the navy pier. it has a lot of rides & food, kind of like a year round fair. & a cubs vs. dodgers baseball game, & ate a lot of popcorn, pizza & pastas

CHICAGO

the first day we were in chicago we hopped on one of those big red, stop & go bus tours. i love them. we rode it around the city all day & stopped off at the sears tower (now known as the willis tower) & grant park, with the big bean statue & just wandered around. 

the sears tower has these look out box/windows that are completely clear, floor, walls, ceiling that everyone goes in & looks down & has their pictures taken & what not. i was pretty terrified once i was in that little box.. i thought i wouldn't be, but i almost had a panic attack when austin pulled me to go in for our picture. i barely went out & was trying to get my mom to take the picture as fast as possible.. but i'll admit, it was worth the picture. anything for a good one, right? anyways.. you can tell by cedars picture just how much he loved it too.

afterwards we went over to grant park where the famous giant bean resides & i took a million pictures, but i've narrowed it down to just a few. chicago is truly one of the best cities i've ever been to.

a day to celebrate

yesterday was my 24 birthday. i'm almost dinosaur age. at least.. that's how it sounds to me. & i still feel like i'm only 17. how does that work out? anyways. my birthday was great, i loved it. i celebrated by getting a massage in the morning, going to lunch at my new fav in thousand oaks: stacked, seeing the way way back & having a bbq with some friends. it was pretty mellow & laid back, which is exactly what i was looking for.

24 for 24 years

1. i'm deathly afraid of unnatural heights. you might wonder what i mean by that. well, basically if its a man made structure & really tall, i hate being in it. but if it's a natural height, like a mountain, i have no qualm. i don't understand it so i don't expect you to.

2. i could live completely off of drinks. i'm a drink person. whether it be a smoothie, water, or soda, whatever it is.. i just love drinks & don't need food if i have a drink. my favorite go to snack is to get a good drink. it's weird.

3. since i was 11 i have traveled to 26 different countries

4. ever since i was little i've had an obsession for beautiful packaging, therefor i have quite the box/packaging collection

5. i would drink milk above any drink

6. i was afraid of fish for nearly my entire life & conquered the fear this year when i held one

7. i probably try at least 3 different outfits on each morning & then leave them in a pile on the ground & my husband hates it

8. i have been to 5 different continents

9. i have been skydiving & want to go again

10. my sense of humor is pretty sarcastic & slightly awkward.. not on purpose

11. sometimes when i'm bored i go to target for no reason what so ever

12. i want to collect every color of baby lips chapstick..i'm a little obsessed

13. i would love to paint my nails every day, but its a little impractical

14. bungee jumping was hands down the worst experience of my entire life

15. i have cousins that live on catalina island

16. when i was 9 years old i found my cat gracie walking in our backyard when she was just 2 weeks old. she's been with us ever since

17. every night austin asks me if i know any jokes & every night i have to let him down & say no. one day i'll have one for him though

18. when i was young i hated sleeping in my bedroom so i would sleep with my parents

19. i used to dream of being a wedding dress designer

20. for my 11 birthday i went to my first concert: britney spears

21. i volunteered in a preschool in peru for 5 weeks

22. i know just about every word to every song from the mama mia soundtrack

23. two weeks after i met austin i told him he had to marry me

24. i'm obsessed with glasses. i own 5 different pairs in an array of colors

MT. RUSHMORE

we went to mt. rushmore on monday && i was pretty excited to be there. i've wanted to see it ever since i saw richie rich back in the day, & it did not disappoint. i've heard a lot of people are let down once they see it in person, but i for one could not have been more pumped on it. austin & i are both into doing overly toursity things like seeing all the national monuments & taking a ton of pictures... so it works out. & luckily my mom also is, otherwise this trip to mt. rushmore would not have happened.

we got there early in the morning & it was already crowded, which is the issue with this tourist thing. we got there, took some pictures & walked along the path they've got going on to give different views of the carving. there is also some info on how they did it & all that jazz.

after staring at the monument some more, we made our way to the airport to go to chicago for the week.

why? there's really no reason. besides austin & i wanted to go & my mom thought it would be fun. & then my sister & her kids also thought it would be fun, so we decided to go. & i've got a lot of pictures from being here too, just you wait. we've gone all around this city, had some great food (a must on any vacation), saw the sites, went to museums, shopped (another must), & austin & i are going to lollapalooza! i. am. so. excited. summers really are the best

a slice of chicaaaago

this is what chicago looks like according to my phone

playl!st

so i thought i'd share some of my guilty pleasures in honor of my birthday month.. some of which i'm embarrassed to admit i love but i just can't help it.