Farewell, O Summer (Part 2)

And we're back for part 2 (before I forget to post it)!

• From Albuquerque, we headed up to Salt Lake via Moab, which is a gorgeous way to be greeted by Utah. We got into Centerville in time to have dinner at Nielsen's Frozen Custard, which was delicious. On Sunday, we went to church with Mom and Dad and then got to see the whole family for dinner.

  

  This is my niece Maggie, with whom I fell thoroughly in love on this trip. She turns 1 this week.

• On Monday, we headed down south again, this time to go to Bryce Canyon, the Shakespeare Festival, Zion, and Tuacahn. Road tripping with my parents was fun, and I loved showing Eric around some of my favorite places in the world. I also got to check one more Shakespeare play off my list (Richard III) so I'm one step closer to my goal of seeing them all before I die.
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• When we got back, Eric and I went to a free Decemberists concert in Pioneer Park to celebrate our 7 month anniversary, and when we got home, Treb had arrived from New York. We also got to celebrate Pioneer Day, which meant a second chance at fireworks. We watched them from the back of my dad's truck while eating watermelon, and we played Catch Phrase while we waited for them to start. It was a much better seat than we had from Port Isabel on the 4th. The next day was my parents' 40th anniversary, so we made them breakfast (pecan pancakes shaped by Eric into bears, lighthouses, hearts, etc.) and lunch (tomato pie). 
• The next week we got to go to the Salt Lake temple with my parents and a couple of my brothers, and see a few friends and my aunt Helen, but the focal point was our reunion in Bear Lake. My parents went all out and rented cabins for the whole family. We bunked with Treb and his girlfriend (also Megan). There was a trip to Minnetonka Cave where I got to hold my nephew Jake's hand and hear all of his cave formation insights, a night of rock skipping, and a day at the lake with our dear friends, the Burninghams. We grew up going to their cabin every summer, and it was really great to be back. Eric also won over the hearts of my nieces and nephews, which I think made him feel good. Unfortunately, I did not personally take any pictures during this time, but I know my mom and sisters-in-law did, so I'm hoping I'll be able to steal some of theirs.
• With many tears (on the part of my mom and me) we left Monday morning and headed down to Flagstaff. It was fun staying in our honeymoon city again, even though I got weirdly car sick and we ended up just watching Doctor Who instead of doing anything too exciting. From their we drove through Oak Creek Canyon and Sedona, and then on to Tucson to see Eric's grandma, dad and Aunt Dawn. We got to show off our wedding pictures, and Aunt Dawn showed us her award-winning pine needle baskets, which were actually really neat. She says she'll make us one. :) 
• From Tucson we drove to Carlsbad, where we arrive just in time to see the bats fly out of the Caverns. It was a low year for bats because of the drought, but they were still pretty cool. We stayed there that night so that we could go through the caverns the next morning. There's something great about caverns that are so huge, you can build a bathroom and a cafe at the bottom. 
• From their we drove to Roswell (while listening to Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds musical), where we made a brief stop at the International UFO Research Center, which is every bit as awesome as it sounds. The museum is basically just full of newspaper clippings, affidavits and conjecture, plus this:
  
  and this:
  
  
  
  and this:
  
  
• We drove from Roswell to Lubbock that night so that we could pick up our hedgehog. We ended up deciding to just hang around the next morning so we could see the rest of the family again, so we stopped in San Antonio on the way back, went to the temple on Saturday morning, helped Eric's cousin move into his new apartment, and finally got back to San Benito (which was obscenely hot after the lovely temperatures in Utah) at about 7:30 that night.
  
• This last week has been less eventful. Eric had some trainings, the Young Women had a movie night and watched the Mormon version of Pride and Prejudice (oh MAN did I forget how great that is!) and we had some good times having a new family over to dinner, swimming with Debra and Seth and Sofie, and eating dinner at the Baileys' after Stake Conference.
  

Eric's back full time as of today, but it really was a great summer, so I'm trying not to be too sad about it.  I'm back on the job hunt and waiting for August to end so that the weather will be a little better for going outside. (Also, only 9 more months in the Rio Grande Valley!)

If you made it to the end of this, I salute you.