summer fun

we have had a great summer so far. lots of bbq's, outings, swimming, seven peaks, and friends. here is a little of what we've been up to.

boondocks: eric's old mission companion, cody and his wife carly, were in town from arizona so we hooked up with them and went to boondocks. we got the all inclusive pass where you can get unlimited everything. we did these cool little boats where you spray water at each other, laser tag, golf and games. we haven't seen cody and carly in forever so it was nice to catch up with them. i'm so bad at golf that i hit my ball in the water twice! since cody's friend is so tall, he was a good sport and fetched my ball for me.

american fork steel days: what i love most about summers in utah are all the city festivals. due to the crazy weather we have missed some of the festivals, like strawberry days. but we were able to make it to american fork steel days. because of erics new responsibilities at work (he is now a part of best buy for business), we were able to attend a bbq held by the american fork chamber of commerce, its been good networking for him. scott, melissa, and their cute little boy cole partied it up with us. i dont know how they crammed all those rides into a small park, but i loved it because the rides were nestled in between the trees.

scott stayed with cole while we went on this ride. we went up, down, sideways, upside down...i love this ride at great america but at a carnival it was a little nerve wrecking; it felt like it could break down at any moment. i don't usually get nauseous on rides but this ride made me sick and gave me the worst headache...don't try this ride at the traveling city carnival.

80's partay: next stop was the 80's party at eric's work. every couple months best buy will have a party at the store for all the employees and their family. we watch movies, play games, eat food...etc. the 80's party started because a girl at work had never watched back to the future, then they found out that half the store hadn't watched that movie (all the youngsters and high schoolers anyway, gosh, them not having watched it, let alone heard of it, makes me feel so old). so the store decided to have an 80's night where we watch back to the future and play old school nintendo. eric recently traded a tool box for a nintendo so we played with that baby all night.

trevor pretty much lives in the 80's and was part of an 80's cover band back home, so he was the most decked out 80's style. i just love his costume! because he was in charge of the party (it was a given), he couldn't win the best costume prize.

bonfires and roasting marshmallows are a must in the summer! we grabbed some KFC and headed up the canyon with chris and sepideh.

i need to take pictures of everything otherwise i forget (as with most people, i'm sure). so we took a group picture then decided we'd have fun with it. this was the first try.

chris and sepideh introduced us to a new game...think its called washers. you have 2 boxes and throw 4 rings into a box, the trick is actually getting in the box or the hole inside it. we played couple vs. couple. we won by a point...due to beginners luck! we wanted to buy the game and as luck would have it eric won it at work a couple days later. its blue and yellow for best buy colors.

so you think you can dance has come to an end this summer...i can't believe its already starting up again next month...we're so excited. eric loves watching the show with me, he'll get mad if i watch it without him :) since we are big fans we had to watch it with just as big fans, so we had a sytycd finale party at emily and dylan's with mckay and chelsey. we were ALL rooting for jeanine, except for mckay. he wanted evan to win. between dylan, emily, eric, and i we voted for jeanine about 350 times the night before. we were pretty stoked that she won. after the party dylan was raving about this place that had the best pieshakes; SAMMY'S. if you want a banana cream pie they actually put a slice of pie with ice cream and blend it. dylan got our palettes wet so we had to cruise down there and try this amazing place. we ordered the chocolate oreo cookie pie, pretty delicious if you ask me. i'm hooked and what i love about it the most is its a cute, quaint, artsy little place. on the wall there are polaroids of people at the restaurant. they have rad original artwork on the wall for sale, we were tempted to buy an awesome drawing of 2 polaroid cameras.

fantasticks: we love outdoor theater shows. uvu and sundance partnered together and put on a broadway show: the fantasticks. apparently none of the actors are uvu students...but we still enjoyed it. i love outdoor theaters because it not only makes it feel like summer, but its awesome being high up in the mountains surrounded by big trees and fresh air. it was chilly but chris and sepideh came to our rescue by bringing extra blankets. its still running so if you're interested check it out!

its been a great summer so far, i'm sad its almost over. there are still so many things we want to do, like float down to provo river, go camping, hiking, mountain biking, etc. hopefully this fall won't be too cold, but judging by the cooler summer it might be. its raining and storming right now. i love rain and the smell of rain; it makes me want to cuddle up on the couch and read a good book. we need the moisture but boy how it ruins summer plans like camping and swimming.

laguna beach

on the last day of our trip we went to laguna beach, the beauty needs no explanation. my aunt lorraine and her family live in orange county so we met up with them at the best place for a bbq: the beach. it was the best of both worlds having some family from my moms side and my dads side there...everyone could get by with the little english or spanish that they knew.

tia meri, johan (above) and some cousins (below).

my aunt lorraine wanted to cook some hot dogs, but my dad wanted to show her the real way we bbq (mexicans go all out). we had carne asada, tortillas, quesadillas, salsa, guacamole, and grilled sweet onions. here is liz starting on the salsas, along with my mom and tia meri's help. and the boys doing what they do best, grilling! mmm...i miss my dad's grilling...he knows how to make an awesome carne asada and showed eric how to, so now he is a pro. anyone want to try out erics grilling skills?

my cousins steve and stephanie.

cousins rob and erin, and her hubby.

ana and kelley.

me and stephanie. she just got home from her mission and is thinking about moving to utah (she now has a lot of mission friends here). i really hope she does, she says she can't handle the cold, but i got used to it, kinda.

i love beach days, especially with the fam and a lot of people. here are just the cousins in attendance. i love having a big family...and cousins everywhere!

legoland

this is way old now but i just need to finish blogging about our cali trip before i go onto the next thing (for my records mostly, who knows, maybe i'll print this one day).


so the next stop was legoland...where over 46.5 million lego bricks can be found in the park. we were all looking forward to legoland because none of us have been before, and legos are just so much fun. eric and i asked around and wanted to get the scoop on people's opinions regarding the park...we didn't get the best feedback (not like disneyland, everyone loves disneyland...its the most magical place on earth) but everyone said you need to go at least once....check! the only thing we were bummed about was that the rides at legoland are mostly geared towards kids and we love rides...but we had plenty of kids with us :)
here is the familia.
they had some awesome models made out of lego's of course. many took thousands of legos and some even months and months to build. the facts were the most interesting. here are some cool legoland facts:

1. There are more than 15,000 LEGO models in LEGOLAND California.
2. The largest model is a giant dinosaur named “Bronty” created out of more than two million LEGO bricks (i think he is the picture below but the dragon above is way cooler!).
3. The smallest model is a pigeon on a building in the Washington D.C. area of Miniland U.S.A. which is made out of a mere four LEGO bricks!
4. LEGOLAND California has more than 50 rides, shows and attractions including three rollercoasters.
5. The Freedom Tower is the tallest Miniland building ever built soaring 28-feet into the air. The spire alone is eight feet high and took three days to build.
6. In 2005 alone, more than 85,000 servings of LEGOLAND California’s signature dessert, Granny’s Apple Fries, were served to hungry guests.

...and let me tell you that those apple fries were delicious!

nice drink coaster, eric!

our favorite part of legoland were all the souvenirs...they had the coolest stuff ever,if you're into legos, which we are. we collect magnets everywhere we travel and we bought the coolest city people magnets...they are the real city people with a magnet on the back. we wanted to buy to whole store...it felt like we did: lego ice cube trays, lego cookie cutters, lego key chains, lego popsicle trays...

here is my sister and i with our favorite cousin marcos, who drove up all the way from mazatlan to hang out with us (the whole reason we went down to so cal in the first place).

my mom and dad.

this volvo was pretty cool, eric couldn't stop checking it out. it was built on a volvo chasis. it was built for the automotive show in detroit in 2004. its the only fixture in the park that is hollow and it still weighs over 3,000 pounds. every structure in the park is built out of normal lego bricks, none of them are specially designed. it took a team of 4 guys over 6 months to build this. they said if one person were to build this design, it would take over a year of working on it every day.

welcome to miniland...the place where Legoland recreated major cities in the world. my favorite was san francisco, seeing it felt like home...they did a good job. they even had the seals on fishermans wharf, great detail. they even had a crime scene with a cop and the "bad guy" with his hands up, it was pretty entertaining. the las vegas strip was also impressive, in fact, the walk way down the middle acted as las vegas blvd...all the hotels were in the right spots and everything.

overall we enjoyed legoland. the only other con (aside from the few adult rides) was that legoland isn't very clean, after coming from disneyland where they take pride in perfection and cleanliness, legoland looked filthy in comparison. most of the legos, models, and rides were covered in spiderwebs and dirt. it looked like it needed a deep cleaning, and since i am a bit of a germaphobe it bothered me just a tad. despite those little things we had a blast.