Water, Rock, and Sand

Now that Blake and I finally have our tank and stand we were ready to fill it with water, sand, and rocks. But first we had to try it out with regular water, to make sure the plumbing and tank didn't leak at all. Let me tell you, it is a lot easier to fill up a 30 gallon tank with a hose, outside on the grass than it is to fill a 90 gallon tank, in a condo with a handful of 5 gallon buckets and two bath tubs. 

Basically, I would have two buckets filling up at the same time in the two different bathrooms, and I would run to one, replace it with an empty bucket, run to the other one, replace that with an empty bucket, and drop the full buckets off in the middle where the tank was, while on my way. It was quite the work out. Blake did an awesome job with all the pipes he made, everything worked like a charm!

Draining the tank was a little easier. We just siphoned the water back into the buckets.

Since the tank was tested and passed with flying colors, we were ready to start actually fill it with sand. 

It took us a while to arrange the rocks, but eventually after a long long time, (or so it seemed because it was really late) we placed them together it the perfect way! I really wanted an arch and Blake tried really hard to make that happen. I think he did a really good job.

It looks so amazing! Everything combined looks beautiful! I can't wait for the tank to cycle so we can start putting in fish and our corals. 

The Loveland Living Planet Aquarium

THE LOVELAND LIVING PLANET AQUARIUM!! That's right I said it! It has officially opened! Okay, I might be a little late on this. The new location opened in Draper in March. During that time Blake and I were a little busy, being newly weds, moving into our new home, you know that kind of stuff. Anyways, back to the aquarium. . .

Blake and I finally hit our 6 month anniversary last Monday. Since it was a Monday I work till 8 so we didn't really have any time to celebrate. We decided to celebrate our anniversary the following weekend! You guessed it, we went to the Living Planet Aquarium. It was absolutely amazing!

When we first arrived at the aquarium we went to the 4D movie, The Last Reef. It was so fun! If you are not familiar with 4D movies, you get air and or water sprayed on you at certain times in the movie. Along with that it is a 3D movie! It was a great film all about reefs and how we can help them survive. 

Blake and I had a blast looking at all the different types of animals they had. (Isn't he attractive)

Some of my favorite animals were the yellow dart frogs and the four eyed fish. The fish with four eyes have two that look above the surface and two that look below. They are pretty funny looking!

The Jelly Fish, are always my person favorites as well. 

Around the time that Blake and I started dating my friend Jonny showed me a documentary on Cuttle Fish. It was absolutely mind blowing. I had to show Blake and I believe he really enjoyed it. If you have the time I would 100% recommend this amazing wonder. We have often joked about getting a Cuttle Fish, because they are so cool!!! I have never actually seen one in person until this day. Here is a picture, it kind of blends in the rock but still it is the coolest fish hands down. 

The aquarium was such a blast. I love spending every moment of my free time with this guy. I can't believe that I found someone I have so much in common with. The first 6 months of my eternity with this guy could not have been more perfect! 

New Tank Stand

When Blake and I first set up our 30 gallon aquarium, while we were dating it was such a fun thing to do. We both love aquariums and it gave us a long list of things to do together. We had always talked about how ideally in the future we would get a larger tank. 30 gallons (what we currently have) is big, but you basically max out after 5 fish. After we bought our home we immediately started making plans for a larger tank in our living room. 

We were trying to decide between a few different sizes 90, 110, and 120 gallons. Blake was sort of worried about the weight of the tank on our floor, since we live on the second story of our building. We decided on a 90 gallon. Which is one of the smaller sizes, but is still triple the size of our original tank. That way our neighbors beneath us won't wake up one morning with our aquarium in their living room. 

We spent weeks scouring pinterst in search of the perfect aquarium stand. After narrowing it down to a select few, we finally chose the picture that would be our inspiration. We decided to just do it flat against the ground without the legs, to better distribute the weight. 

Blake's father Steele graciously volunteered his time, skills, and tools to help us achieve our dream of the perfect stand. I can take absolutely no credit in building the stand it was 100% Blake and Steele. I wasn't even present for most of the construction. I told Blake to take a lot of pictures so I apologize in advance for the picture over load. 

When it was completed it looked amazing! I was blown away at how good the stain looked! I couldn't wait for Blake to bring it home from Bountiful. When Blake arrived with it in the car we hauled it up the stairs to our Condo! Honestly it was lighter than the actual glass fish tank, so that was a plus, but it was still crazy heavy and awkward to carry!

Right when we put it against the wall I was so in love with it! I am beyond thrilled with how it turned out. Thank you, thank you, a million times to Blake and Steele for creating my dream aquarium stand. 

Wasatch National Forest

For quite a while Blake and a couple of his co-workers have talked about going camping. You know those times when you and someone else always say you are going to do something but no one really follows through. Well, this was NOT one of those times.

 We had talked about going to the Uinta's, in the Ruth Lake area. Since Blake and I went camping there last year and it was beyond beautiful, we were all for it! Unfortunately, the temperatures at night this time of the year drop below zero, and the day temps are in the low 50's. Not an option for comfortable camping, in all of our opinions so we decided to camp a lot closer to home. 

We ended up going camping up American Fork Canyon in the Wasatch National Forest.  Luckily we got there before the sun set and snagged an amazing spot! Amazing wouldn't even begin to describe the view from where we set up out tents.

The camping crew was John Thuet, his wife Carly, Stephanie, Blake, and I.  Oh and how could I forget, the Thuet's dog Nyx. She is the most playful and adorable Old English Bull Dog. We have gone climbing a couple times with the Thuet family and I was so excited to spend more time with them. I had never actually spent time with Stephanie before, but since the end of the trip I now know her as the sweetest girl around. Stephanie hadn't camped much so it was fun to have her there.

It got pretty chilly as we were setting up camp and getting dinner ready. Thuet, and Carly lit a blazing fire that warmed us up immediatley.  While around the fire we played a game of Catch Phrase.  I usually am terrible at that game, and true to my past record, we lost miserably to the Thuet's. They have been married for four years, and practically can read each others minds, so they obviously dominated. With Blake and my 6 month anniversary next week, we have a lot of catching up to do if we want to be on their Catch Phrase level.

Another thing that I want to remember from that night was that Blake kept saying "dat" and "doe".  In the context that hip teenagers these days are saying it. I don't even know if I am spelling it correct since I am not a teenager and I am not hip. Some examples: "Dat fire doe" "Dat tent doe". It was so, indescribably annoying, but I couldn't help but laugh. Luckily this has stopped since we have been home so I am keeping my fingers crossed he doesn't make a habit of it. 

After dinner John even introduced us to the most delicious treat (I can't remember what it is called, I am the worst). First you take the mallow, you cover it in crescent roll dough, cook it in the fire till golden brown, and then roll it in butter, cinnamon, and sugar. Even though I wasn't the most talented at cooking it, it was delicious! 

I was a little nervous about being cold while sleeping, but it seriously was the perfect temperature at night. I slept so well and woke up in the morning well rested and refreshed. The view in the morning was awe-inspiring. It is amazing how beautiful nature is. I absolutely love the fall, not for the temperature change, but because the leaves are breathtaking when they turn various shades of yellow, red, and orange. Fall is almost officially here. :) 

After we packed up camp, we drove back to American Fork Canyon. I introduced everyone to a new wall in the area called Serenity.  We just decided to do a couple of the easiest routes on the wall. Carly is pregnant so she sat this one out (Shout out to her for being patient and a good sport). It was Stephanie's second time climbing I do believe, and on her second attempt on one of the climbs she made it all the way to the top! I was very impressed with her dedication.  The walls at Serenity are abnormally tall and really help you to build up your endurance.

I haven't been climbing hardly at all lately which really bums me out, but the climbs today felt really good to me, and weren't that much of a challenge. Which really got me psyched. I am counting down the days till the Lehi climbing gym opens and I can build up me strength again! 

We left the canyon before late afternoon, and while driving home I felt euphoric and exhausted. It is so fun to get out and do stuff, but it definitely can wear you out. :)

Also, if you haven't read my last blog post, I am attempting to visit every State Park, National Monument, National Park, and National Forest, in Utah and I have a life time to complete it. Thanks to this lovely camping trip I was able to check Wasatch National Forest off our to-do list. Imagine me doing a heel click out of pure happiness.

Utah Lake State Park

The other day while aimlessly browsing the world wide web I came across a list of all the state parks, national parks, national forests, and national monuments in Utah. I know this is kind of nerdy but from the moment I viewed that list I couldn't wait to visit every single one of them. I told Blake of my plan and he was 100% behind it. There are so many places to see in Utah, and some of them are right in our backyard, why not go on an adventure!

First stop on the Utah State tour, and only five miles aways from our humble abode, is Utah Lake Stake Park! 

I can't believe that for the last three years I have lived right next to this colossal, beautiful lake and never been there. I guess that is a lie, Blake and I took some of our engagements out on the frozen lake. But, not counting that romantic cold day, I have spent no time there.

Labor Day morning Blake and I put on our swim suits, lathered up on sunscreen, and loaded the car. There are five harbors located in different towns all around the lake, Spanish Fork, Lindon, American Fork, Saratoga Springs, and Provo. The Marina in Saratoga Springs is much closer to us but we decided to go to the Lindon Marina because they are more developed and rent paddle boards, kayaks, and canoes. 

We ended up renting two paddle boards. I was nervous about not being able to keep my balance but it was actually pretty easy, since the boards are so huge!

 The friendly rental guy told us the deepest the lake gets during this season is 4-6 feet deep. That is mind blowing! That means I could probably touch the bottom at most parts of the lake. 

We paddled out of the marina and around the lake, it was so fun. Blake and I started to play a game where we would try and do a 360 on our boards. Just spin in a little circle without falling in, I feel like I ended up looking like a penguin waddling in a circle. After several spins on the board, Blake was winning by a lot. The last time we did it I spun to fast, lost my balance and fell in. Remember how I thought it was awesome that the lake was so shallow? It really isn't that awesome because below the 4 feet of water is really deep thick mud. It was kind of gross. :)

It was so nice to get some sun, and honestly my arms got quite a work out paddling around. It was a relaxing wonderful holiday spent with the love of my life.

California 2014

DISCLAIMER: This trip was a one fun filled blur and I hope I am doing everything in chronological order, but there is a good chance some of it isn't.

Every year the Larson family, which I am now apart of, makes a trip down to California to visit the Davis side of the family. We had been planning this years trip for the whole summer since we all needed to make sure we got work off. As the vacation dates drew closer I got more and more excited. Mainly becuase I don't actually remember the last time I went to California. I know when I was a little kid, younger than I can remember, we went to California to visit my Grandparents and went to Disneyland. That was so long ago though, so the anticipation for the trip was constantly building as the months passed. The day it finally arrived I thought I was going to burst with excitment.

Since there were so many of us we had to take two cars. In the van was (Big) Steele, Nancy, Nick, Tess, Sean, Blake, and I. In the other car was BreAnna/Norman, Bryan, (Little) Steele, and Charles. We left on a Saturday and drove all day.  I slept so much that even though it was a 10-11 hour drive it seemed like a lot quicker. I also finally had enough free time that I was able to finish reading the Book Thief and started reading Insurgent, the second book in the Divergent book series. I absolutely loved the Book Thief and would recommend it to anyone.

Blake's Aunt and Uncle, Bob and BJ, were generous enough to let us spend the week in their house while they went on vacation to New York. Which we were so grateful for. It was awesome to stay in their beautiful home. They have a stunning backyard with a pool. What more could you ask for!?

The next day on Sunday, we all woke up and miraculously with three kids ages five and under made it on time to Grandma Davis's ward in Long beach. We even beat Grandma, Steele, and Nancy ;). It is always interesting to go to someone else's ward outside of Utah. It just proves the church is true everywhere you go. The speakers did an amazing job, and I got to spend some quality time with my cute nephew Steele playing some quite church games. After we snagged a couple pictures outside the church while we were waiting for everyone.

Grandma Davis's house is right on the Virginia Country Club's golf course, in Long Beach, CA. Grandma Davis and her since passed husband have been members of the country club for a really long time (I don't know how long since when I asked blake he didn't have an answer for me). After church she wanted to take us all to the Country Club for lunch. The Club house was beautiful and the food was even better.

Blake's Grandfather Jonathan Lamont Davis passed away in 2007. We went and visited his grave after lunch to pay our respects. It was in a beautiful cemetery with a large duck pond and some fountains. I never knew Grandpa Davis, but from what I have heard, he was an amazing man.  Blake was actually named after him. Surprise, Jonathan Blake Larson's first name isn't actually Blake, how's that for a story twist.

The next day, Monday, was a relaxing pool day. We spent a lot of time swimming. The kids Steele, Tessa, and Charles, were so fun to play with in the pool. I definitely got a work out swimming all around with them. Bob and BJ have a lot of diving toys that sink straight to the bottom. One of my favorite things that me and Blake did would drop as many as we could in the deep end and then race to see who could get the most at the same time. It was very entertaining. 

I also spent a lot of time reading in the backyard while drying off in the sun. I ended up finishing Insurgent, and made Blake promise we could stop by a book store since I didn't anticipate needing very many books and knew I needed something for the drive home.

Later in the afternoon Blake and I went an a bike ride around the neighborhood. It had been a long time since I rode a beach cruiser. It was so fun and refreshing.

On Tuesday we woke up fairly early, packed the car, and drove to….. I know the suspense is killing you…. LEGOLAND!

Since the kids wanted to do age appropriate things Blake, Sean, and I broke off from the group and went to find some rides. Lego Land really only has about three adult rides, and one that was our favorite in particular was the Green Dragon. By the end of the night I am sure we rode that ride at least 10 times, it was awesome.

There were a lot of things to do and see in Lego Land. We watched a short interactive 3D movie, and walked through the many different lego cities, New York and Las Vegas were really cool. Here is a picture of Washington D.C.. It just blows my mind how long it would take to build the cities out of legos.

They also had a whole lego star wars section. With many battle scenes and all that good stuff.

There was even the real set from the Lego Movie. Blake and I have seen the Lego Movie enough times for me to be very excited to see this. If you have not seen it yet go and watch it right now. 

Right next to Lego Land, is the Lego Land Water Park, which technically is a different park. We didn't buy passes to that, but there was a part of Lego Land called Pirate Reef that had a few water rides. We didn't bring our swim suits, but Blake, Sean, and I decided we would go on one of the water rides. When we were in line we noticed everyone in front of us taking off their shirts and shoes. That's when we realized how wet we were going to get. I took a video of the ride but I was to lazy to post it on youtube and upload it to the blog, so I just took a few screenshots so you would get an idea of how wet you get on the ride.

So basically not one inch of you was dry after the ride. It turned out being nice since it was a fairly hot day and we dried out pretty quick. 

By the end of the day I was pretty tired so I was sitting on a bench, and Blake was just standing 20 or 30 feet away, and kept asking me to come stand by him.

Turns out he was standing on one of the water streams and thought it would be funny to try and get me wet. He wanted to get me to go stand by him and then he would step off of it. Luckily I was smart enough to not fall for his evil plan.

We ended up staying till the park closed, then made our way out. It was a very fun, very exhausting day.

On Wednesday, Blake, Sean, and I decided we wanted to go climbing at one of the local climbing gyms. Sean was put in charge of finding a gym and he decided we would go to Hanger 18. It was weird having to rent gear since none of us brought our own. Rental gear is not comfortable at all and the shoes make climbing a lot more difficult but it was still a blast. It was a really cool atmosphere and everyone climbing was very friendly. Also, the walls there were really cool, and they even had holds all over the celling. 

Since I have not been climbing as much it was really hard, but Sean and Blake did a really good job. 

The next day, Thursday, Nick, Bryan, and BreAnna, took their kids Steele, Charles, and Tessa back to Lego Land to do the water park portion. Blake, Sean, their parents Steele & Nancy, and I went to the Aquarium of the Pacific. I LOVED IT!!! I don't know what it is about  creatures of the sea, but they are amazing. Especially ever since Blake and I got a salt water tank it has made my love for sea animals that much greater. The aquarium was gigantic. There were so many cool exhibits. 

One of my favorite was the shark tank.

I didn't really take many pictures at the aquarium, but next to the shark tank there was a pool where you could pet little sharks and sting rays. It was so interesting, they feel weird! In the little shark pool there were a bunch of tropical fish. We were instructed not to touch the tropical fish because many of them have little knife type things on their tails that they use when they are threatened. But rules are there to be broken aren't they? There was a little yellow tang that loved to be touched. Blake would pet it, and it would kind of drift away, and then swim right back to his hand and rub against it. That fish loved to be stroked. I didn't get a picture or video of the fish, but later in the aquarium I took a picture of a yellow tang that looked just like it. 

Later that night we went back to Grandma Davis's for dinner. On our way to her home, we stopped by the country club and picked up some golf carts.  This is a couple pictures of the golf carts parked in Grandma Davis's back yard.

Sean epic photo bombed our picture.

 We drove around the golf course and attempted to feed ducks at the duck pond. Unfortunately there were no ducks on the duck pond, just one goose. It was pretty cool though this goose just swam up and ate the bread right out of our hands. We fed it so much that it got to full and just swam away. After the goose was gone there was not anything to feed so we drove around the golf course.

 While we were driving back we came across a field of geese. Once they found out we had bread they flocked around us .

On Friday we went to Seal Beach. It was beautiful. The water was freezing, so Blake and I just walked up and down the shore line, and played in the sand.

That night we went and ate dinner at Blake's cousin Johnny's house. Dinner was delicious, and when everyone started getting in their pool Blake and I decided to make a small trip to the closest Barns & Noble to pick up a book for me.

The last day Saturday Bryan, BreAnna, Steele, and Charles drove home. Steele started Kindergarten the Monday after they got home so they wanted a day to relax and prepare for that. Since we were staying till Sunday we just spent all day relaxing a hanging around the pool at Bob and BJ's. It really was a much needed rest day. 

That night we also cleaned the house so it was in as good of shape as when Bob and BJ left it, and stayed the night at Grandma Davis's home. 

Sunday  morning we woke up bright and early drove home. It really was such a fun vacation! I can't wait till next year. :)