Ooh Baby, Baby.

Is it just me or does it seem like everyone around me is pregnant? This is not surprising considering I'm a 22 year old married Mormon who associates with the likeness, but I'm amazed. Last night it seemed as though my facebook was bombarded with baby news. Don't get me wrong, I am thrilled for my friends and acquaintances because this wonderful news, but I'm a little jaded. 


Let's count them shall we? Three women I work with, one great friend from home, one old roommate, and one friend from class. I am being suffocated by all of this news. Where is the novelty? I suppose asking for novelty when it comes to childbearing is silly since its literally been happening since the beginning of mankind, but I don't want to be just another pregnant girl on my friends' news feed. 


This might make me sound disingenuous, but I'm promise I'm not. I greatly look forward to having children and do often wish that the time would come sooner rather than later, but Forrest and I want to spend time growing, traveling, and at least graduating college. Once you have a child you can never go back. This isn't a death sentence by any means, but I think there is truth to all of the advice that I am getting about waiting to have children. What am I in a rush for? I want to leave the continent of North America. I want to travel Europe with the love of my life. I want to see ancient ruins and see for my self what the world has to offer. I think doing this will make my life and my children's life better for it. 


I don't plan on waiting forever, because I know that I wouldn't make it that long. I wish to have a little bundle to exert all of my love and adoring on, but I know that patience is a virtue. I have a husband that I can and should be exerting that on because Lord knows, once a baby comes he or she will be what I live for.


I know that every couple needs to do what is right for them and they need to counsel with the Lord in this important decision and it is not my place to judge, which hopefully I don't. I just have a new found conviction about Forrest and I's decision to wait a couple more years. I know that when I have a baby it will be the most precious thing to happen to our little family and that's all that I can want, but I will also have lived a little before then. 

Here's to the hope that I don't eat my words and accidentally get pregnant!

Lake Powell: the happiest place on earth

Lake Powell is a wonderful tradition I was married into. Each year the Kennedy clan packs up and spends one week on a house boat afloat on Lake Powell. There's no make up, plenty of shorts, tanks and swimsuits, lots of food and lots of F.U.N! I'm going to be filling this post with an abundance of pictures, because I like to relive it. 

So what is there to do at LP? That's a silly question, it's a lake. 

there is swimming

there is tanning

there is hiking

and then there's the more adventurous stuff:

banana boating

wakesurfing

wakeboarding

extreme tubing (involving jumping from tube to tube)

kiddie cliff jumping

 just high enough cliff jumping

too high for my taste cliff jumping

and but not least, surely the most important: eating.

lots and lots of eating

feasts of kings and queens

As you can see we had a wonderful time. What's missing? Chuck and Bonnie :( Unfortunately they left the lake early because Chuck was ill, but surely we partied hard in their name!

we had some good times riding on the boat...

and then we had a great time at dangling rope!

 that's me sticking my toe into a mass of sucker fish. they showed their name-sake by sucking on my toe. as you can obviously see I was really brave about it.

this is our nephew wes. he is very trendy and cute.

this is a picture of the cute family (missing Chuck and Bonnie)

and this is Forrest playing with his bellybutton... awkward.

As you can see we had a fabulous time. Lake Powell is something I'm very grateful for because it's where I first got close with Forrest's family... you tend to do that when you look haggard all the time from the lack of makeup. I know Forrest will be counting down the days until we go again!

love is in the air

So, Forrest and I got married last April. It has been an amazing journey so far and I am loving every minute of it. The thing that has been blowing my mind lately is how after one friend gets married (me) everyone else gets engaged/married! (Alexa, Morgan, Kate, Jonnika). I have been a bridesmaid 3 times in the last year!

Honestly, I think attending weddings is a huge blessing. First of all, I am reminded of how great my big day was. For those of you who are married you might be able to agree that your wedding day goes by way too fast and you are too overwhelm to enjoy it let alone remember everything! When I see my friends get married I am reminded of how incredibly glorious my moment was, and it makes me so happy for my loved ones that they get to have that as well!

My friend from college, Alexa got married in October. Her wedding was in Oakland and it was beautiful. It was a temple wedding and it was so special for me to be able to experience that with her and our friends. I was only there for the weekend and only saw her for a total of 24 hours, but every moment was worth it to see my babygirl turn into a wifey!

Alexa & Ricky

  

This semester has been a little crazy however. Two of my great friends from Washington got married! It was nice to go home for break in April, Morgan's wedding in May, and then Kate's in June! I got to see my friends a lot, which always makes me happy.

May the Fourth be with you... Very clever, and very memorable. Morgan and Tyler got married on the Star Wars holiday, and let me tell ya, it's very fitting for these lovebirds! They got married at Cascade Gardens (same place my brother got married) and it was absolutely beautiful. Morgan is very dear to me. Her and Tyler have been amazing friends to Forrest and I. They came to Arizona to come and play with us, and they showed us an amazing time when we went to Seattle. I was so happy to be able to support them on their big day! 

Morgan & Tyler

Kate's was the most recent. It was June 22nd. Kate is my oldest friend. I have never cried at a wedding before, but one changed that. Mostly it was because Jesse was trying to not cry when she walked down the isle, but that neither here nor there. (sweetest thing I've ever seen, btw). This was a long weekend because I left for Seattle on Thursday morning.

First of all, I took Sean's car. Sean is the baby of The Kennedy clan, and that means he never got taught how to properly maintain a car. So to his, and my own fault the car broke down because the engine overheated and basically melted itself... woops! So that stressed me out since I was in Montana and in and out of service, but it all worked out and I got Stella (our 4runner) and was on my way! 12 hours later I was in Seattle. It was a long drive but it was worth it!

It was Kate's bachelorette party Thursday night and it was a blast. I got to meet her friends from SPU and honestly, I loved them! We went out on the town and had some fun. The next morning we got breakfast before it was time to head out to Cle Elum to start setting up for the main event. 

This was the best location I could ever imagine. Ever. I'm a PNW girl and I love trees and mountains, and this was perfect. The day went perfectly. All of our closets friends were there and it was just a huge party, because it always is when we get together. Unfortunately Forrest wasn't there, but I got to spend lots of time with new friends and old ones! I gave a toast, did my duties, and got to see my best friend get married to the love of her life. All in all it was a wonderful weekend!

Kate & Jesse

 

Pre-Fourth Fun

For all who may not know, the Fourth of July is pretty big in Idaho. Idaho Falls is said to have the best fireworks show west of the Mississippi. Until this last weekend I thought that was right; it's not.

Little did I know Driggs, a city an hour and a half away, nestled below the Tetons, has their own American celebration a week before the Idaho Falls festivities. We on a whim decided to check it out. 

Best. Decision. Ever.

First of all, the festival was massive. Driggs is a pretty small town, but there were thousands gathered here. Not to brag or anything, but the Beach Boys were there. I got to see the Beach Boys live (if you could even call it seeing; we were pretty far back). 

We waited for a while to get some delicious Kettle corn, but as luck would have it they were running low before we could get our hands on a huge $8 bag. We did however get a free little bag, which was enjoyable enough for the 45 minute wait we endured.

We got done waiting in the Kettle corn line just in time to make it back to our spot to watch the show begin. The Beach Boys wrapped it up and this cool intro about where America came from started. They talked about the revolutionary, civil, and other wars. And then the magic happened. The best fireworks I have ever seen exploded right in front of my eyes.

 

We were so close that they took up the entire sky... it was magical. 
Oh, and did I mention that in addition to seeing the Beach Boys we also saw the guy who sings 'Proud to be an American' live? Yeah. That magic happened.

It was an amazing show. When it was done we made our way back to the car. It was a nightmare trying to get out of there though! We waited at one point for 20 minutes in the same spot... but Forrest was entertaining himself...

Adventure Sunday

So, I'm all about keeping the Sabbath Day holy. I like to follow the commandments and whatnot, but there are some things that I will fudge on and feel just fine about it. In my mind keeping the Sabbath holy means to spend it with your family and keeping your focus on the Savior. A couple of weeks ago we went to Mesa Falls for the first time. It was a beautiful Sunday and we went to church before hand. 

See the thing about being newly married and in school is that you don't really have family with you (unless you count Sean, and sometimes Sean doesn't want to hang out with us). So basically right now our friends are our family. And Forrest my not 100% agree, but I think driving to the woods and taking a stroll and checking out a waterfall is the best way to check out the Lord's creations and appreciate the beautiful world we have been given; much better than watching secular movies anyhow. 

Here's how it went!

There was a pretty cool old train tunnel that we walked to close to the falls. We couldn't go inside because it was blocked off, but we made our way down to the Warm River and played there for a little while. It was such a fun day!