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Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Corn on the Cob

This week's Tueaday Tell-All is telling you all about my favorite summer treat. It took me all of 1/8th of 1 second to know exactly what I wanted to share with my friends. I think about and crave it all year long. It can only be purchased around the end of July through August. I am a fresh corn on the cob addict. And as such, I'm also very picky about my corn on the cob. I only buy fresh Utah corn from the little stands you see everywhere. In case you are unfamiliar, let me enlighten you: They pick the corn so fresh, like the morning of, and drive it up from the nearby farms by 10:00 every day. There's a nice lady or man who has the fabulous job of sitting by those stands all day waiting for people to buy their produce. I will admit, I almost always skip over the tasty peaches and watermelon. I have eyes for only one thing: my yummy Utah corn. I love the Utah corn because you don't even have to cook it. You could eat it right there at the produce stand if you wanted to. But you don't want to. You have to take it home and throw it in boiling water just long enough for it to get hot. And it has to be hot because the best part is rolling it in your butter dish. You roll it and roll it until it's coated with real butter. Then you get a napkin handy because you KNOW you're going to soon have melted butter dripping down to your elbows. Lean WAY over your plate (so as not to drip on your cute jeans) and bite in. The kernals begin popping in your mouth, squirting your tongue with sweet corn juice. And real butter. Mmmm, mleh. Now I'm drooling. Better run to the produce stand...

Our Camping Trip

Vince got a holiday from work for Pioneer Day. We decided we just haven't been camping enough yet this Summer, so we packed EVERYTHING up we could think of in the back of the truck and hauled it all up to the mountains. We originally wanted to try a little reservoir with campsites right by the water, but of course, being a State Holiday, there was no room left in any of the best campgrounds. We drove around a few minutes before deciding on a very cute little spot with lots of trees, and four, count them FOUR secret hiding spots for the kids (complete with secret passwords you had to repeat each time you entered their lairs). As an added bonus, the campsite was right next to a little stream the kids enjoyed immensely. We set up camp Thursday afternoon and relaxed with steak & potatoes and s'mores, of course.

Friday morning we loaded up and headed to the lake to try out the fishing. Here's a picture of the lake:


And the kids fishing:


But it was WWAAAYYY too crowded there, so we went to a more secluded spot for our picnic lunch:

After we got back to our campsite, we wandered back behind the campgrounds to try to find the river that we heard the night before. We tried fishing all along the way, and finally found one little successful spot:
Vince caught a little one:

And I caught TWO fish, right in a row! And they were the first fish I've ever caught all by myself. Trouble is, I'm the camera(wo)man, and was too caught up in the squirmy, wiggly fish at the end of my line to think about snapping a picture. So no pictures of my two first fishies. :( But rest assured, they were HUGE!! :)

Vince's sister, Shalon & her boyfriend, Skylar met us that night. On Saturday we went for a little hike (away from all the hordes of people) and got to this pretty little blue lake:


On our way out, we drove to the lake where we got our engagement picture taken:
And this is our funny attempt to recreate it! (My, we sure were a lot cleaner 8 years ago!)
And our cute kids on the same little rock:
Lastly, my scenery pictures of the blue lake. It was so pretty with the wildflowers. Enjoy!









Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Memories

I've seen this on several of my siblings' blogs, and it looks like such fun that I thought I'd give it a whirl:

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Hogge Reunion

I'm so slow. It's been TWO WEEKS since we've been back from our trip, and I'm just now finishing up this post. I don't have all the pictures I'd like; I didn't take any skiing pictures with my camera. So I'll post those when I get them from my in-laws. But at least for now I wanted you to see what fun we had in the GORGEOUS lake we got to play in.

Here I am (blue scarf) riding in the boat with my nephew, Trevor on my lap. Marjorie (my fabulous mother-in-law) and Alisa (Vince's sister) and her son Colten are behind me.

And here's Vince in the boat with the gorgeous lake behind him.
We rode the boat on Monday all together to start on the trail that goes up to The Falls above The Lake. It's a short, easy trail, so even the kids enjoy hiking up to the falls. And there was SO MUCH water this year--more than anyone had seen, and the Hogges have been coming to The Lake for, over 30 years? I don't even know how long. Generations, I guess we can say!

Vince & I with our kids and my niece Emma at the Falls. You can't see it in this picture, but we were up this close for just a few minutes, and came down DRENCHED--the spray was so intense. But it felt fabulous because it was such a hot day hiking up.

Vince & the kids at The Falls:

And me:

This is the view looking the opposite direction towards The Lake--gorgeous, no?
And of course, everyone has to pose with this beautiful scenery:

The whole Hogge clan hiking back down the trail:
Our children enjoying the traditional s'mores by the campfire:

I loved that Evan had one in each hand and was devouring his tasty treat:
The only bummers of The Lake were:

1. Mosquitos! Those nasty bugs were so vicious this year. We had to head to town after two days because we'd gone through about 4 cans of bug spray. We literally got out of our tent and had to spray immediately or we'd be eaten alive. Yucky!

2. The rain. We love skiing--sunrise to sunset. We got about 1 1/2 really good days, and then the other two we got half or full day of steady rain. Everything was wet by the time we got home. But those few days we had were well worth it!

For the rest of our stay, we went back to Vince's parents' house and ride the four-wheeler, the horses, lit fireworks, hiked, and went fishing. I'm not much of a fisherwoman. I had a negative fishing experience last summer that resulted in me paying a tremendous fine for dipping my son's "Lightning McQueen" fishing pole in a lake. But I decided to give it another try this year (legally, of couse--I did learn my lesson). Most of the experience was spent swatting more blood-thirsty bugs and stepping in muddy black swamp water. But it was worth it in the end because I got some darling pictures of my in-laws:

And the kids:

And the lovely scenery (this was the point at which I was bored):

But mostly because Vince is a good fisher:

And then we let him go. (He swam away VERY fast!):

But here are the pictures of the fish that got away:


Better luck next time!

It was a wonderful trip. Can't wait to go back again next year!!