Our Gypsy Summer

Since summer is almost over I thought I would share some of my favorite pictures from things we did/places we visited. It was a whirlwind of a summer and I loved every second of it. Eventually I will put links with some of these to more detailed posts about each one, but for now, enjoy this summary! Hope you all had a great summer as well!

We visited historic Kirtland, Ohio near the end of May, it was so amazing and so beautiful. Post here.

My beautiful little sister Nychea graduated High School in Nevada! Post here.

The Hopewell Mounds Chillicothe, Ohio. More pictures here.

Leaving Chillicothe. Once of my favorite pics/nights from the summer. Love this sweet husband of mine.

Falls Park in Sioux Falls, South Dakota was so beautiful. Such a cool place to visit. You can read more about it here.

The Capitol building in Pierre, South Dakota on our way to Rapid City from Sioux Falls.

Mount Rushmore!!!! Post here.

Bear Lake for Independence Day! Got to see my good friend Megan who I just love so much!

Floating the river!!

Family time (Samuel holding little Natalie--our youngest niece)!

Elitch Garden's!

Beautiful Denver night during the Kenny Chesney, No Shoes Nation concert!

Amazing performances by Kacey Musgraves, Eli Young Band, Eric Church, and Kenny Chesney!

Rockies game with our friend Devon. Love him!

Chalk Hulk at my Aunt's house Sam, my cousins, and I drew while babysitting over a weekend!

Checking out our friend Shawn's sweet cars!

Late Saturday morning breakfasts are my favorite and we had a lot of them this summer :)

Broncos' game! More photos in this post.

We visited Estes Park!

Samuel turns 25!

Also, I am going to be publishing a bunch of posts about our trip to South America last November, and a post about what we were up to between then & now. I got way behind keep a record of all the things we were up to, but I am determined to catch up and stay caught up! So look for those posts soon! :)

Kirtland, Ohio

After we initially moved out to Ohio the first thing we wanted to do was go visit Kirtland. There is so much history there for our church, and it was really special for us to be able to go. We ended up not being able to go until around the end of May. It was great though because it wasn't unbearably hot and humid yet, and it wasn't raining! The weather was literally perfect, and we had an amazing time.

When we arrived we went to the Visitor's Center, there we got paired up with some missionary tour guides who showed us around the little village of Kirtland. My favorite place was the Newel K. Whitney & Co. store. I loved all of the old artifacts that had been collected to furnish all these historic buildings. So beautiful.

It was a very special experience to be in this room. One of the missionaries guiding our tour asked Samuel to share is testimony with our group and it is a memory that I will always hold dear.

After we stopped at the Visitor's Center and the N.K. Whitney Store we headed over to the site of the Kirtland temple. The Communityof Christ owns this historic building, and so it is no longer an operating temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was awesome to see the very first temple that the members of that time had built though. I can't imagine all of the sacrifice they had to endure in order to complete such a building in that day and age. Amazing.

After we went and saw the old temple in downtown Kirtland, we headed out to the Johnson farm. It was about a 45 minute drive, but it was worth it. There was such a special feeling there, and the stories the missionaries told us of all the amazing things that took place in the rooms we walked through were so powerful. The church has done a really good job of preserving all of the old buildings out at the Johnson farm and furnishing them with furniture and wares from that time period. It was so interesting and such a cool experience to be able to go out there and visit, and it was a beautiful evening.

^This oil printed canvas rug was so beautiful!^