Final Utah Moments

The few weeks spent in Utah post-Tonga were kind of a whirlwind. We spent time with Mike's family and mine, went to San Francisco to pick out an apartment, and then went back to the Salt Lake and Provo areas to tie up some loose ends at BYU. I don't have many pictures from our time in Cedar City (Mike's mom takes the pictures there), but I do have pictures of the delicious homemade ice cream we made using some vanilla beans we brought back from Tonga. They are so rich and delicious they are hard to describe.

I love looking at all the tiny "specks" on the beans. They are sooooo yummy! In Cedar City we also went to the Shakespearean festival and saw Macbeth. It was truly amazing. We hike Kanarville Falls and had lots of fun spending time with Mike's family.

After finishing things up in Provo, we went to Fairview with my family. Above is a picture of the drug store my great grandfather owned.

Very near the drugstore is a super fun park that is way cooler than anything I played at as a kid. Natalie, Kristin, and I took Patten and Kimball to play there one morning.

Kimball loooooooves the swings!

We also did a little thing called moving. We loaded up this trusty Penske truck (Penske! Penske! Don't let Uhaul fool you!) with most of our belongings Saturday evening. It was nice to remember we have dishes and DVD's after not using them all summer.

(Adam also stored things in the storage unit. This is not only our stuff).

It didn't really hit me that we were leaving until we packed the Johnson Couch of Love in the van to take to the DI. It was such a good couch, I still can't believe that it's gone! But it was huge, and although we tried to find a loving owner for it, we couldn't. Hopefully someone will love it as much as my family did over the years. I have a feeling my mom is secretly thrilled to have it go...

Monday morning we left Utah and after a night in Sacramento, we arrived in San Francisco.
This is one of the first Google images that showed up when I typed in "Pacific Heights." It's absolutely beautiful here.

NYC Wedding (Shower)

Instead of unpacking more boxes, I decided to do a blog post. Mike and I arrived in San Francisco yesterday and things are coming together slowly but surely. We love our new apartment, have already been welcomed to the neighborhood by several kind people, and are so excited for this new adventure. In preparation for San Francisco, we had a few weeks in Utah. One of the highlights of that whirlwind was a bridal shower for the future Mrs. Perry (aka Rachel Price, Choco, Devil Baby, whatever you want to call her). My mom hosted and I helped along with Rachel's wonderful cousin Mrs. Lundquist (who is having a BABY!) Laura and I communicated via email while I was in Tonga and we decided we wanted to throw one with a New York flare since Rach & Bry met in NYC. Here are some highlights:

Decorating cookies with Karen right before the shower. They were decorated like subway lines--but I didn't have dark enough food coloring to show that they were purple and yellow. Oh well. They were clever.

A spread of food involving New York in the name or...idea.

SUBWAY sandwiches (/deli sandwiches which are fairly common).

Sleet. They have sleet in NY...get it?

GF goodness for me and Rach. And there are lots of gluten free restaurants in NYC so I think it fit. Besides, Rach is GF and she is in New York so technically...

Hersheys Kisses. Not New York, just Rach.

Hugs. Not NY either, but oh well.

High Fashion wedding dress for Rachel, created by US.

I also love how sincerely happy Rachel was to open each and every gift. She is so genuine, I love it.

Finally, a sweet shot of Rach and Karen.

We had lots of fun planning this little gig! It's always fun to catch up with old friends and celebrate LOVE. It was also fun to see Rachel before we moved...how ironic is it that we are literally on opposite ends of the country? It makes causing trouble a bit harder for us. Sigh.

Love you Rach! Congrats again!

PS - You can see more pictures on Rach's blog.

Secured.

This hip, school locker-esque shelving unit in light grey. Oh, how I love Craigslist.

A recent addiction.

I have always loved art and design.  But lately I've been completely addicted to decorating websites.  I love looking at the ways people transform space.  My current favorite is this website that features ideas from major cities all across the US.  The picture above is showing off a ceiling covered in egg cartons.  Crazy, but cool!  It's giving me great ideas for our new apartment...

FIJI {part one}

On our way to Tonga, Mike and I were lucky enough to spend a week in FIJI. We stayed at a private resort in the Wasawa Islands and it was the perfect reward for completing our semester from Hades. We absolutely loved it there--so much, in fact, that we ended up going back on our way home from Tonga (long story). Fiji was absolutely beautiful. The landscape looks like it comes straight out of a tourist book, and the colors of everything blew my mind. I kept thinking that I wanted to paint things, but I knew that I would never be able to get the colors right. I honestly believe that there are some things in nature that paintings and photographs can't do justice. But that doesn't mean I didn't take pictures and try to capture what I could...

Please excuse Mike's hair. This is in Nadi the night we arrived.

I was absolutely blown away by all the tropical plants and flowers. I had seen many pictures of flowers before I went to the South Pacific, but seeing them in person, in the wild, makes them that more amazing. Our camera was brand new at this point, so I made it a goal to get to know the features of it while we were gone. I think my picture making improved a lot as our trip progressed.
This is the view from our bure at low tide. We literally stepped onto the beach from our front porch, and if the tide was high, you could fall into the ocean if you lost your balance.

We saw some incredible sunsets, but we also saw scenes like this almost every single night.

Coconuts. Oh, how I love them. To eat, to drink, to cook with...

It's a little tricky to see, but there is a tiny yellow fish to the left of Mike's leg. He went out snorkeling fairly early one morning (while I slept of course), and the fish, later named Shercon, followed Mike all the way to the shore.

We were invited to attend a rugby/athletic match in a village on the other side of the island and I snapped some pictures of the area and locals while we watched.
Such a cute little girl! She was fascinated with my hair because it was long and straight. Most of the women there have incredibly tight curls (in an afro). Love it.

I was obsessed with this building for some reason or another. I love the look of worn paint.

Rugby. I have decided that I really like watching well-played rugby. And we definitely saw our fair share of it in Fiji and Tonga!

This funny dog followed Mike and I everywhere. One morning we found it in our bure at 4:00 am (we didn't close the doors because we liked the breeze). The dog continued following us all the time--even when we snorkeled.

Watching rugby. Mike and I did a hike one day that brought us down to the right of the rock they are sitting at.

Fiji just looks like this. All the time. This is from one of the higher points of one of our hikes.

Here's another view. It's so beautiful.

Looking down on the village from our hike.

We did plenty of snorkeling and swimming while we were there. Thanks to mom & dad Wallace for the snorkel gear! It was a great graduation present!

We spent so much time relaxing and reading on the hammocks. We decided that we will always own a hammock when we have room for it.

Our bure.

This is the day we left. And we were sad!

Mike throwing a huge blue starfish back into the ocean.

I have a cute husband. :)

The dog. We named him "Doggy."

This is a picture of the rain falling over Viti Levu--the main island--as we took the ferry back to catch our flight to Tonga.

We had lots of fun in Fiji. It was the perfect vacation and we loved going back as well! We actually ended up losing a fair amount of our pictures, but these give a good idea of what a great time we had on our second honeymoon!