Seattle July 2008

McKay's older sister Marcia and her family live in Seattle so in July 2008 we went to visit them and do a little site seeing there. We loved spending time with them and seeing what Seattle is all about! Here are some picture highlights.

This is pretty fuzzy but we went on a tour of underground Seattle. The original city was below sea level or something and then they had to rebuild it but it was on top of it's self. It was kind of cool.

Snoquamlmie Falls.

Us at a Seattle Mariners game

McKay on top of something...not sure what it is but he looks pretty relaxed

At the base of the Space Needle

On a ferry on our way to Bainbridge. It's an island just off of Seattle. Cute little island and has an ice cream place that is to die for called Mora's

Still on the ferry with our niece Ady and Nephew Kaden

Still on the ferry with niece Emmy

While we were in town there was a food festival called the "Bite of Seattle" down town, this is us by a fountain while we were at that festival.

Mexico June 2008

In June 2008 we went to Cancun Mexico with our great friends Bob and Holly Foote. We had a great time and did a ton. Here are some of the picture highlights. (The captions are for the photo above it.)

This is McKay and Bob on a bull outside of the restaurant we ate called La Parrilla during our last night in Cancun.

McKay, Danielle and Holly enjoying the music inside La Parrilla


All 4 of us at La Parrilla

We toke a little ferry to a small island called Isle Mujeres and we rented a golf cart together to ride around the island.

Isle Mujeres

Eating Elote in Playa Del Carmen. This is the corn that venders sell on the street and they put cream and cheese and some seasonings on it and then put it on a stick. It's very good and I felt like I was just like Nacho Libre eating it.

Us at the base of Chichen Itza

Looking at some of the other ruins around Chichen Itza

At a nice little restaurant in Playa Del Carmen calld Ajua. They had decent food, good drinks and great music, entertainment and service.

Floating down the river at Xel Ha. This is a natural water park down there.

Us Kyaking at Xel Ha

In a water cave at Xel Ha.

At one of the Coba Ruins

At the base of the Coba Ruins. This was cool because it's the only one they let you climb.

At the top of Coba

Danielle, Bob and Holly riding bikes to the Coba Ruins

Kayaking somewhere near the Coba Ruins

McKay and Danielle getting ready to repel into a cenote

Hiking to that same cenote

Danielle repeling into the cenote

McKay zip linning over that same cenote

The 4 of us at a restaurant call El Fogón. This was a really good restaurant.
McKay, Bob and Holly outside El Fogón.
We visited the island Cozumel and rented scooters to ride around the island. This is us on our scooter with my trusty ninja turtles back pack.
Looking for sea shells at Cozumel. Bob, Danielle and Mckay
The pools at our Hilton hotel in Cancun
The 4 of us at Tulum
In front of the Tulum Ruins

The beach at Tulum

Family Reunion

Okay so I don't think it really counts as a vacation because we were still very very close to home...but we didn't sleep in our own bed so I am counting our family reunion this time. Sorry that there are no pictures now, they will be coming once I gather them from other family members, but I wanted to get the written stuff on here while it is still fresh in my memory.
We went up the the Heber Valley Camp in Heber Utah on Friday June 13. This place was so clean and so comfortable I felt more like we were at a motel 6 rather than camping. Friday night was pretty chill we just had tin foil dinners (which were great...thanks Marianne and James!) and then we hung out and had S'mores and roasted Starbursts over the fire. We laughed and talked and all got caught up on what people where up too and who was new to the family. On Saturday morning the fam decided to go on a hike, McKay, his brother Merrill and I were running a little late so we told them to go ahead an we would catch up to them. We figured we would catch up in no time since there were little kids and parents with babies and stuff. We ended up on a completely different trail than they did and we never caught up to them. Our hike was pretty nice, ended up on top of a mountain overlooking a few lakes, it was very nice. After the hiking we had lunch and then headed out to the lake for some canoe and paddle boat adventures. it was and refreshing and fun to get out there and be outside and playing. After that we kind of split up and some went to the camp some played volley ball and some played horse shoes. We then went to clean up our camp and passed the rigorous inspection Heber Valley Camp makes you go through before you can leave. We left around 5 and headed to Granny's on the way out. After enjoying a granny's shake we were approached by a man who asked us all to do him a big favor. He said that he was with a crew that was shooting a commercial for some water company that was local. He told us that they had lost a bunch of extras and they just needed bodies. He offered to pay us $50 each and told us it wouldn't last more than about 2 hours. We all thought that $25 an hour just to be a body in the background was a pretty good deal, so we piled in his van and he toke us to a meadow. We probably doubled the size of the group they had. He said that the commercial would run in about a month but that we would probably wouldn't be recognizable, which I'm actually pretty grateful for since we were all yucky and burned from camping. Saturday night we did sleep in our own bed and then Sunday we had many more family members join in. We all attended sacrament meeting together at our Aunt Merriley ( sorry I don't know how to spell it) and Uncle Greg's ward for their Mission farewell talks. We had pictures out side of the church and then headed to My in laws for food and games. We had some awesome Hawaiian haystacks for lunch (thanks Jonson's), watched some old videos and had some pretty crazy games of pounce...I came in last place with an outstanding score of -90 something...looks like I need some more practice. The rest of the fam is actually having lunch and playing games at a park in Provo right now while McKay and I have to work. :( Anyway all in all it's super fun. I think I even have all the names down of everyone who was in attendance!