st george!

I recently met up with a bunch of hooligans in salt lake city, Utah.

kara and I met up in concourse d,

headed to retrieve my luggage,

then hurried outside to meet up with megan, mom and dad.

we jumped into dad's car and headed immediately towards st. George.

dad and mom had a lot planned for us...

a month or so ago,

dad emailed us to say that he was thinking about having some matching shirts made.

I thought he was joking.

he wasn't.

and he surprised us with embroidered visors.

surprise!

perhaps he was concerned that we would find ourselves in an embarrassing situation of not recalling the names of our family members.

phew. 

disaster avoided!

thank goodness for those visors.

hee, hee.

four lovely ladies.

make that 4 lovely Guthrie girls!

so for the first evening's activities,

dad "suggested" we all wear our shirts and visors.

we wore them to dinner.

in public.

we wore them to see mary poppins.

in public.

I think lots of people were jealous of our shirts and visors.

I could tell

because they kept staring at us and smiling.

the next day we did a little shopping, cause we didn't have anymore matching shirts.

and we were heading out to another show.

starlight express.

it was fantastic!

and the theater, the tuacahn, was wonderful!

the tuacahn is an outdoor amphitheater set right in the bottom of the beautiful red rocks of southern Utah. 

one day we visited zions national park.

sure is perty.

we rode this bus to the hiking trails.

that's right.

we hiked.

here's proof.

we had a lovely time together.

lots of sunshine,

smiles,

shopping,

snacks,

souvenirs,

surprises,

and sweat.

the a/c in our condo was kaput.

but we didn't mind.

thank you for another memorable trip, mom and dad!

all about ry

it doesn't seem like ryan gets much facetime on the blog, so this post is all about him!

ryan has been traveling a lot for work.

we're sick of it.

but it's actually not that bad.

sometimes we see each other.

like when we're both passing through the same city.

like last week.

we had one hour in the salt lake city airport.

and we spent that hour together.

eating café rio!

ryan was flying home to buffalo, and I was flying into slc for a fun sisters (and parents) weekend.

and we did have a babysitter for the girls.

in case you were concerned.

we celebrated father's day with many gifts from the hearts of our girls.

painted rocks

handwritten coupons

a photo collage

original poetry

and of course our traditional card.

we always try to find a funny card that plays music,

or says something funny when you open it.

we always crack ourselves up!

i'm not sure we've ever topped the card with

larry, the cable guy.

"get 'er done!"

we also spent 2 sneezy afternoons cleaning out the dirty, dusty garage.

when it was all clean,

we found an empty little space

that would be perfect

for a mini fridge!

the girls and I loaded it up with ryan's favorites...

diet coke (of course)

bottled water

peanut m&ms

reese's pb cups

snickers bars

and even a milky way.

we are all (sneakily) enjoying it!

last night ryan and several others were honored for the patents they had filed throughout 2012.

ryan had 4 patents go through this year.

i think that brings his total to 7 U.S. patents! 

i might be wrong.

the photo above is of ryan and his boss/mentor, Akshay.

we are so sad that Akshay has taken another position within the company and will no longer be ryan's boss.

he is a wonderful and kind man, who has mentored and championed ryan over the past 3 years.

i told ryan to tell akshay

"you are betraying us by taking another job!"

"please don't go!"

he didn't.

akshay was presented with an award from the buffalo site last evening.

he was emotional as he accepted it.

i knew i liked him!

then while talking afterwards, he shared a story with ryan and i.

his daughter was given an amazing scholarship to Rutgers.

she wasn't sure she wanted to attend Rutgers.

the other school she was looking at would cost him $60,000/year.

after hearing the pitch from Rutgers and the other school, she decided to go with Rutgers.

on their way home, akshay saw the premium outlet mall in the near distance.

he pulled in.

they went to tory burch.

the daughter couldn't decide between two pairs of sandals.

akshay,

feeling joy and happiness,

at not having to pay a quarter of a million dollars for his daughters schooling,

said...

"get them both!"

that's when i knew i loved this guy!

 

almost done

"in the summer, the song sings itself."

-williams carlos Williams

 

I love summertime and can't wait for the end of this week!

School will officially be done!

It's been a great year, but we are all ready for some summer fun.

last week we had the 3rd grade picnic and ella's classmates had all signed a bag for the room moms.

inside the bag was a bar of delicious chocolate and a beautiful, red, stone heart from Kenya.

the kids studied japan, Australia and kenya this year.

i'm so glad to have been able to spend a little bit of time with ella's class this year.

now bring on the summer!

so many things...

we have been busy!

busy swimming...

busy trying out the Chinese buffet...

(not going back)

busy writing chalk messages to dad...

busy seeing grandpa...

busy finishing up girls on the run...

busy giving lectures on Leonardo da vinci...

and busy getting our feet scrubbed!