July 9-12, 2009
For the 2nd weekend in a row Erica and I found ourselves up in the White Mountains for the weekend. However this time our trip was actually planned. Erica and friends were throwing a baby shower for Katie at Erica’s parent’s house. My wife is amazing! (as i think these photos prove!)






We left Thursday evening and were able to spend Friday morning helping Erica’s dad install a new roof on their house. Truth is I am not sure we were very helpful, as it is a very large and labor intensive job. Friday evening I headed over to Pinetop to spend some time with my family while Erica and her mother began their baby show preparations. Saturday morning I understand that the shower went off without a hitch.


As for me, I helped my mother clean out the garage in Pinetop, did some tree trimming, and then headed up to the Sky High Cinder Pit to go shooting with my dad and brother Dallas. I finally got to fire off the AK-47 that my parents got me (truthfully I am sure my mother had no knowledge or part in buying me a gun) for Christmas. At Dallas’s request we also did some skeet shooting. He had spent a day with friends in Utah skeet shooting just before he moved back to AZ (about 2 weeks ago). Truthfully Dallas is a better skeet shooter than I am.








That evening Dallas and I played in the SHOW LOW ALUMNI SOCCER GAME 2009. Now most people reading probably know that Show Low is the cross town rival to Blue Ridge, the High School that my family attended. Well Show Low was putting on this game as a fund raiser and couldn’t quite fill two full teams. (11 players per team on the field at a time, thus they needed at least 22 players) Well it turns out there were actually 6 players (my brother and I included) from Blue Ridge to play in the game. Though the 6 of us were hoping that we would be allowed to play on the same team, they split us up 3 on one team, 3 on the other. As the age of players ranged from just graduated to this guy who was on Show Lows inaugural team of 1993, we played four 20 minute quarters (for those of you who do not know the beautiful, usually we play two 45 minute halves) just to give some of us older and out of shape guys a chance. The offense was on display, not so much the defense. Final score 10-6. My team lost, but the one bright spot. Of the 16 goals, 11 were by Blue Ridge players! GO BR!

4th of July in the Mtn's

We were not planning on going up the Mtn for the 4th, but when my little brother woke up Thursday morning with what we then and still think was a kidney stone, we figured driving him up to see the family doctor in Pinetop (my dad) was as good of an excuse as any to escape the heat, and get some good family time in.
Friday morning Erica, my mother, my sister, and I drove out near Alpine Arizona (not to be confused with Pine Arizona) and went for a little hike up Escadilla. It was amazing up there, surrounded by Aspen Trees. We did however, only make it about half way up the Mtn before we turned back. I was wearing barrowed tennis shoes and was getting a mean blister on my big toe. Then, not wanting to pass up the opportunity, we drove over to Alpine, mostly just to say we did. Then on our way back to Pinetop we drove into Greer, again mostly so we could say we had been there. At the far side of Greer we got out and walked around the creek a little. Again it was a very pretty place, and I am told that it is a very “cute” little town.

We followed up our Friday morning hike with a Friday Night game of Ultimate Frisbee. Erica and I play almost weekly with a group of friends in Tempe on Wed nights, and thought it might be fun to get some of my little brothers friends together to try it out in Pinetop. Somewhat to our surprise, my good friend Tyler and his wife Careena saw a Facebook post I made about the game and decided to join us. Well us 4 played together on 1 team with 2 or 3 of my brothers friends, versus an even number of pure high school athletes who are used to running around at an elevation of 7k feet. Much to my surprise, we ended up killing all those young ones by a score of 21 to 11. The most difficult part of playing in Pinetop was the lighting. We always play at night with a Frisbee that lights up, but in Tempe the field has enough street lights around it that you can tell who is on your team and who is not. In Pinetop, the town of…..5 stop lights, there was next to no lights on the field, but luckily we anticipated this. Just as luckily we found 50 light up glow sticks that could be connected and turned into bracelets, anklets, necklaces, or even just loops hooked to belt loops. All in all, the game went well and I think my little brothers friends actually enjoyed themselves, despite the fact that most of them had their butts handed to them by 2 old married couples.
Saturday we headed over to Erica’s parents house, before ending up at her brother Nathans house for a 4th of July BBQ with lots of friends and family.
Sunday we obviously headed to church, and again to my surprise one of my good friends, Jaron Watson and his wife Bethany were blessing their baby in that very sacrament meeting. They live the valley as well, but Bethany’s dad is the Bishop of the ward that my in-laws attend (in fact they live on the same street, about 150 yards away from each others) It was neat to be able to be part of little Jaylee R. Watson’s baby blessing and to see Jaron and his whole family. After a good steak and potato dinner, a nice nap, and a short walk, Erica and I headed back down the mtn to good old Mesa.