Into the Woods

Earlier this month my sister and I both had some free time on our hands and husbands who were very busy studying and working. So I dropped Riley off at his Grandma's house for a couple of days and Audra and I went on a backpacking trip to Grandaddy Basin in the High Uintas Wilderness Area.
For the most part, it was a lot of fun. I say for the most part because, well to be perfectly honest, I think backpacking in and of itself is a pretty stupid idea. You strap a monstrously heavy bag on your back and climb up and down steep hills for hours on end. But the chance to really be away from civilization and some of the most beautiful scenery on earth totally makes it worth it.
I'll be honest, all the seclusion and the no husbands around part of this adventure did get to me a bit. We were there two nights, and each night I could have sworn we were about to be eaten by a big fat bear. It must not have been a bear, because it didn't touch the enticing honey offering that we left on a stump to distract it away from our tent. I'm pretty sure it was some other big animal....but my imagination does tend to get away from me sometimes. Maybe it was a chipmunk on steroids.
On our way into the Basin, it started snowing and hailing. No, I'm not kidding. You can tell by the way Audra and I are dressed that we were ill-prepared for such an event. We broke all wilderness safety rules and huddled under a tree for about an hour with our one measly plastic poncho until the snow turned to rain.

Here's a photo of Grandaddy lake, the biggest in the Basin. Isn't the view beatiful? The lake and all that nature stuff looks pretty okay too (ha ha..i'm so dang funny)






For some reason, my sister was bound and determined that we catch a fish, clean it, and eat it. The only problem was that we weren't having any luck with the whole catching part. After casually observing some Scouts in the area who were catching fish one after the other, we figured we must be doing something wrong. So we went over and asked them if our pole set-up looked okay. Our first clue that we had done something wrong is when the Scouts started coughing to cover up their laughs. Apparently fish are smart enough to realize they shouldn't eat something if it's an inch away from a huge red and white plastic bobber. Go figure.
So, after we got some great advice from the Scouts and made a few adjustments, I caught a fish on the second cast. The next part was the hardest. I told Audra she had to kill it. She closed her eyes and hurled a rock at it's head a few times. Turns out its pretty hard to aim when your eyes are closed. Then we cleaned it, cooked it and ate it.
The meat itself tasted pretty good, but I could only manage to eat a few bites. This may sound a little hypocritical because I do like meat, but I've decided that I have to be far, far away from the actual killing process if I'm going to enjoy whatever it is I'm eating.
After that little adventure, we didn't fish anymore because we were too afraid that we would catch some poor little fish and not be able to figure out how to set it free.



All in all, it was a pretty great adventure.

Lake o' fun

We had the chance to go to Lake Powell again with my family this past week. Riley loved it, even more so this time than last now that he's walking. He got into everything, practiced steering the boat, swam, knocked down sandcastles, chewed on lots of sand and rocks from the beach and ate.... a lot. I'm amazed how much food that little guy's belly can hold when he finds something he likes. It was a ton of fun!

Rileyisms

Hey All!
Sorry it's been so long since i've posted. I'll try and get some new pics up here in a day or two. Life has been pretty crazy lately, what with moving out of our apartment, going on vacation and trying to figure out our new life plan. We've got the life plan thing narrowed down to opening a sunscreen stand on a beach somewhere or selling t-shirts on a street corner.
Riley has grown so much. He is now a pro walker with no more intentions of crawling ever again. Unless he's pretending to be a dog or other type of animal. His forehead seems to be a magnet for furniture and sharp corners. Now that he's walking, it's been pretty hazardous having almost everything that he could possibly hit his head into right at eye level. I think i'm going to buy that little guy a helmet and make him wear it 24-7.
I'd thought i'd take a minute or two to write about some of the cute things Riley's been doing. First of all, he definitely knows what no means. Anytime he is thinking about doing something he knows he's not supposed to, he starts shaking his head and saying, "Uh uh, uh uh." About 99 percent of the time he ends up doing whatever it is he wasn't supposed to be doing anyway, but the whole time he's doing it, he's shaking his head No.
His vocabularly has doubled--from three whole words to six. He now says Mama, Dada, Duda (Uncle Dustin), Odda (Aunt Audra), Hot, and Dis (This). While saying Dis, he also points frantically at whatever it is he wants at the moment.
He loves animals, and moos anytime someone says cow. Dogs are his favorite, and he sticks his tongue out and starts panting anytime he sees a dog. It's pretty darn cute.
Every day he's less and less like a baby and more and more like a little boy. It sure did happen fast.

I have tri-athlete's feet

Last weekend I ran my first triathlon in Roosevelt, Utah. I wish I could tell you something cool like I won first place and ran 30 miles without stopping. But neither of those are true, and as we've all heard over and over in church, lying is bad. The triathlon is a Sprint Triathlon, which actually means it's the smallest and wimpiest of all triathlons. It was a 1/3 mile swim, a 13 mile bike, and a 3.2 mile jog. I finished 12 minutes behind the women's leader. My dad ran it with me. That guy is in amazing shape.
Mostly, I decided to do this as an incentive to get fit. It kind of worked. I sure jogged and swam a lot more than I would have if I hadn't known I was about to embarrass myself in front of lots of people. I wasn't as ready as I should have been, but it was really fun, and best of all this race got me really excited about working out and trying to get in better shape.

Happy birthday to baby Riley!

Our big baby boy celebrated his first birthday on July 21st! I absolutely cannot believe he's already one. It's gone by so fast. I know everyone says this, but it really does seem like it was only yesterday that we got to see and hold him for the first time. Don't tell, but I actually woke up the morning of his birthday with some stray tears in my eyes. It's sad how fast babies grow and change, but at the same time, each new stage and period in Riley's life has been so fun for us to experience. He makes us smile and laugh each day, and we're so greatful to have him in our home.

Daddy setting up Riley's new toy.
Riley's first unlimited access to unrestricted sugar. As can be expected, he loved it (except for the few minutes when he got a huge ice cream headache from eating a bite the size of texas)
Riley and his baby friends at seven peaks water park. We went there for a couple of hours in the evening before his party to take advantage of the discount rates.
Presents, Presents everywhere
Riley with Aunt Alison and Uncle Ben

Heat Wave

Here's some funny cartoons I found online for all of you who are suffering in this mega-ginormic summer of hotness that never ends. Seriously, it's been sooo hot in Provo for the past few months. They think it will probably end up being the hottest summer on record for Utah County. I'm just glad we have air conditioning and the ability to keep it cranked up 24-7.


All of you McMurrys will relate to this one. For all of you non-McMurrys, I guess I should explain. That whole family is addicted to box fans. They sleep with them at night and lug them around the country when they go on vacation. At night, Sam sleeps with his nose about an inch away from a fan that's on full blast. And Sam,don't be mad, but I have to tell this story. It's just too funny. We had just moved to our apartment in Provo, and Sam's fan stopped working in the middle of the night. He rummaged around the room in a pacnic for a little bit, trying different plugs to see if that was the problem. Then, when that failed, he got up and drove to Wal-mart at 3 in the morning to buy a new one. Now that's dedication.

One-year photos

Hey guys! Here are some photos of Riley we had made at the mall. Just so you know, I was too cheap to buy any to send to friends and relatives, so don't be surprised when you don't get any. We had a coupon for one free 8 by 10 photo, and we picked the one of Riley standing against the ladder. Of course, they probably expected us to buy at least one lousy picture, but they didn't count on the power of an empty wallet to resist even the pushiest of salesmen.
Never fear though. We're going to have Amanda Dyer (Sam's cousin) take some more pictures of Riley. She's a great photographer! We'll send out copies of those pictures once they are made.
I will try to post some photos of Riley's birthday and video of him walking within the next couple of days.

Worst Music Video Ever!

A friend showed me this music video and I thought it was absolutely hilarous. Some Sweedish band made it in the '70s. What's really funny to me is that these people were absolutely serious. This wasn't a spoof--it actually played on MTV!



And here's a version that some BYU students made. You can tell it's a group of BYU students because there's a hymn book on the piano in the background.

Joke's on you, Chuckee

A few weeks ago, me and my friend Marie took our kids to Chuckee Cheese's. They have free rides every weekday for a few hours. Technically, you're probably supposed to buy their overpriced pizza while you're taking advantage of their free rides, but who cares about technicalities. Take that, Chuckee! That'll teach you to be generous and let kids use your toys for free.
Riley loved it! He absolutely loves anything with wheels, so a bunch of toy cars with at least one wheel apiece was his idea of heaven. He was a little scared of the electronic puppets that dance around stiffly and sing outdated songs, but who can blame him there?
On a side note, I'm glad my friend Marie and her little boy Hayden moved to Provo. The only kids Riley has to play with from our church are all girls. And he's a little...umm....rough with them. More like heathenistic. I was at a baby shower a while back, and there was a little girl a couple of months younger than him sitting on the floor. I sat him down and he crawled right over to the little girl I thought maybe they would play together quietly for awhile. But instead, he pushed her over.
>

Hooray for teething!

Yep, I'm serious. I'm greatful for teething. You want to know why? Because without it, i'd just have to admit that I have a fussy baby who still sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night and likes to throw major tantrums.
As it is, at least I have a scapegoat to blame everything on. What's that? Riley took one bite of his food and then spit it out all over the place? He must be teething. Riley woke up two times last night? Surely he's teething. Riley is rolling around on the floor, screaming at the top of his lungs because I got tired of carrying him around and put him down. Teething, teething, teething.
Seriously though...Riley has been sooooo soooo fussy these last couple of weeks. He was sick for a few days and had a high fever of 103 off and on. The doctor said it was just a virus. It was weird though, because he didn't have any other symptoms other than being really hot.
And I think teething is at least a small part of the problem. He has three teeth completely in now, and two more trying to pop their way through. I feel bad for the little guy. It must hurt. I'll be honest though---I mostly feel bad for myself! No one warned me that tantrums started at age 1. I thought that didn't happen until the terrible twos.
Good thing Riley is so cute. It makes it all worth it.

guys + hair fixin' = trouble

So awhile ago, Riley's uncle Dustin decided to fix his hair for him.
   After about a pound of hair gell, this lovely mohawk was the end result. Of course, this was done on purpose. But I still can't help but conclude that men don't usually have what it takes in the fixing-other-people's-hair department.
Which leads me to some painful memories from my childhood. My mom taught early morning seminary for years and years, so my dad had to get us ready for school. My sister and I would roll out of bed with unruly hair and dad would just stick a bow in it somewhere and send us off to the bus. We were so ashamed that we always wore a hood on the bus, even if it was burning hot outside.
As you might guess, this didn't do much for our reputation as one of only a few Latter-day Saint families in town. Everyone else on the bus thought we were in some weird kind of cult or something.
Luckily, my mom would always meet us in the school bathroom to fix our hair before sending us off to class. That helped kids like us even more--we not only wore hoods all the time, but we must have had some sort of weird disease because we spent half an hour in the bathroom every morning.

Kissin' Cousins

Last week, Riley's newest cousin was born. Her name is Graycie Lynne Leasy, and she sure is a cutie! It will be fun to have a new little baby around.
The new mom
She's a grandma...again.
"Hooray for babies!"

It's just not the same

So now that Riley is older an an extremely active little boy, I've noticed that I have a brand-new dilemma in my life. When in the world do mothers of almost-one-year-old boys use the bathroom?
Every time I look like I'm thinking about heading in the direction of our porcelin throne, Riley seems to know about it. I think he's a mindreader. It's a race to see who can get to the bathroom first, and Riley usually wins. Then, the next ten minutes consist of me trying to pry his strong little fingers off the door frame (or if I'm lucky off the toilet seat--thus lengthening the process because I have to disinfect his hands), picking him up and plucking him down at a safe distance from the bathroom. I run back as fast as I can so I can close the door without worrying about slamming his fingers.
From there, you would think that the process would be over and a person could use the bathroom in peace. But Riley has figured out that the latch on our bathroom door doesn't close tight, and if he pushes just right, he can get the door open. If that fails, he stands outside the door and yells and pounds on it at five-second intervals. Either that or lays down on the carpet and peers through the crack between the door and the floor.
It's quite a process, and I'm about to decide that it might be easier to just buy some giant diapers for myself and join Riley in his carefree attitude about the necessity of toilets. Then again, this whole process results in the only exercise I ever get, so maybe I should keep things as they are.

It's Funny Because It's true

My mom e-mailed me this video that I think is absolutely hilarious. For any of you who want to see it, click on the "It's Funny Because It's True" title and it will take you there.
I think all of us moms will relate to this. Guys have a tendency to freak out over dirty diapers. Maybe they just have a stronger gag reflex than women. Or maybe it's because they aren't around dirty diapers all day long like we are. Or maybe they're just wimps... I think I'm getting close to the real cause with that third guess.
Oh, and P.S. How do you load video from google or other places off the internet directly to your blog?

Baby Messes

Caught in the act!
Riley's favorite hiding place--Under the bar stool.

Above all else, Riley loves to make messes! He spent two hours today crawling from bookshelf to bookshelf and throwing all the books on the floor. I would have stopped him, but truthfully, it was really nice to have something capture his undivided attention for two hours. Luckily for him (and me), his baby mess-making is still cute at this point. It's kind of like when you hear a tone-deaf three-year-old singing in church. It sounds horrible, but it's adorable just the same. The other day, I was making dinner and I could hear that Riley had managed to open the cupboard underneath the entertainment center. I had raw chicken juice all over my hands, and figured he couldn't do too much damage in a couple of minutes. I was wrong. Before I knew what had happened, he had managed to dump out four boxes worth of game pieces and thrown our CD stack all over the place. It took me almost half an hour to clean up.

Powell Cont.

It took some getting used to for Riley to get used to his life jacket...As you can probably tell by the look on his face.

Riley and his great-grandma Morrill.. and their almost-matching hats.

Here's even more Powell picks for ya'll to peruse. Someone out there who knows what they're talking about, is there anyway to post more than five pics on the same entry? I can't figure it out...but that's really no surprise.

Lake Powell

Grandpa and Riley, the awesome fishermen. You can tell what Riley's thinking. "What the heck is this thing and can I eat it?"


We had the chance to go to Lake Powell with my family last week. We've been going there once a year since I was 12, and I have some great family vacation memories from that place. It was a fun trip...there isn't really any other place like Lake Powell. It's so beautiful.
Riley loved it...I don't think he'll ever be able to readjust to life in our boring old apartment again. There was just too much excitement! He's a smart little guy. He would pretend to drive the boat and make little motor boat sounds. He also learned how to quack when we were feeding the ducks. Any time after that when we saw ducks again, he'd start quacking.
If you ask me, he says three words already. "Mama, Dada, and Bye Bye." Sam disagrees with me. It's true Riley doesn't always use those words in the right context. He calls ducks "Mama" and boats "Dada" I know, I know. All of you critics are thinking this kid doesn't know what the heck he's saying. But he has also used those words enough in the right situations that it makes me wonder. One definite..He knows "Uhoh." He says it anytime he drops something. He's growing so fast! I can hardly believe how much he's changing.

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