Summer Summary

My oh my, has this Summer flown by. Obviously the wedding went well, and some of you know that already. Before the wedding, I had a great time rock climbing with Brett, Tony, and Joe, and Andrew joined us later as we watched Warren Miller flicks, ate pizza, and drank beer. After the wedding, we made our way to Kauai Island in Hawaii, which was an excellent time. I did manage to get sunburned really bad, but that's bound to happen. We had all sorts of fun eating Lappert's ice cream everyday and doing things like deep sea fishing, riding in a helicopter, hiking, snorkeling, eating fresh pineapple and apple bananas, taking a sunset cruise down the Na'Pali coast, and dining out at some really nice restaurants. It truly was a wonderful trip, and a great relief from the stress from all the wedding planning.

After Hawaii, it was back to reality. Allison started her Summer semester, which involved anatomy, which meant that she spent more time at school than home, but I knew I was marrying a hard worker. School just finished, and she's still waiting on her anatomy grade and fearing the worse, but I'm sure she did fine. She was able to come out with us a few times this Summer, which was pretty cool. So far, we've hiked La Plata Peak and Missouri Mountain, both of which are 14ers. We also did a backpacking trip through the Lost Creek Wilderness with our friend Peter. We just hiked in, setup camp, camped out, and hiked out. It was a good time. Brett and I tried climbing later that weekend, but got a little wet, and luckily didn't make it onto the rocks, or we would have been climbing in a storm, so we went bouldering in Boulder instead.

Al and I also added a kayak to the family this Summer, so we now have two. This means that I have someone to paddle with me! Yes! We went to Dillon Reservoir once, which was really cool, and I also got to go with Brett a couple weeks ago, which I'll discuss soon in further detail.

It's also been a very eventful Summer in terms of weddings and family visits. The son of my dad's good friend Gary got married in July, and my parents came out for that, which was really fun. Luckily, Allison had a slow weekend that allowed her to spend some time with us. Not long after that, a friend of mine from Miami University got married in Keystone. Brett found a 2 bedroom condo for us all in Frisco, so he and I headed up Friday night. We got to join them at the rehearsal BBQ and it was a great time. Lots of meat. Allison couldn't make it up until Saturday night though because she had finals the following week, so Brett and I got to hang out. We had a great time, and then we went kayaking the next day. It was a lot of fun although, we had to paddle into some intense wind at one point. The wedding was really cool, and we had to ride 2 ski gondolas to get to it. It was a beautiful place, and the reception was super fun.

So as I write this, Allison's mom, sister, and grandmother are still here in town, although they're leaving today. They came in for the weekend, and we all had a great time together. Her grandma got to see where we got married and had the reception, and she really seemed to enjoy getting away from lights of suburban Chicago. Jenna had fun playing Wii Bowling with me, and Allison's mom seemed happy to see Allison and her sister, Kathy, who lives out here. It seemed like there was an abundance of good meals this weekend, which makes me very happy:)

Anyhow that's pretty much our summer in a nutshell. It's felt super busy, and it has been, but it's also been nice to be done with wedding planning. Now that Allison is done with her anatomy labs and courses, it might get easier to see each other, but I'm not sure. Either way, it's nice when we're together, and that's all that matters. OK, well I gots to go. Take care all, and I hope you're doing well!