Fish Lake 2011... Finally!

After...

Many attempts to upload these stupid pictures

Max and I being sick with strep

and busy days...

We proudly present to you....

Our Fish Lake Trip 2011!

Whether it looks good or not!

On Friday the 24th of June, Marcus packed up the car and we headed to Fish Lake. It's a Kennedy tradition. We camped 3 nights with Marcus' Dad and family, Jenny, Johnny, and Brooklyn, Rachael and family, and a surprise guest appearance from Mike and fam.

Here are some highlights from our trip:

Max doesn't like the car, and so we listened to him whine and cry most of the way up because there was no room for me to sit by him. We stopped at Wendy's to eat and give Max a little time out of his carseat. There was this really nice old man sitting at a table near us. Max would take a bite of his food then turn and smile at this old man. Once he got done smiling, he'd turn back for more, and the turn and smile at the old guy. The old guy loved it! I felt kind of bad because Max just kept staring, but what can ya do?

We got to visit with all the family we hardly ever see. Once Marcus is out of school, we really need to go visit more often!

Brooklyn loved Max! She was always saying "Baby Max". She even helped feed him breakfast on our last morning.

Max and I took a nap together everyday! It was awesome. Max got more than 1 nap everyday.

We got to use our new tent for the first time. It was pretty nice.

Marcus got to use his new fishing gear. He caught a puny little fish that he had to throw back, but at least he didn't get skunked!

We had to walk 3-5 minutes just to use the bathroom. At least there was a bathroom right?

Max took a bath in a Max-size tub. It was the tub in Jenny's trailer. It was cute. Everything little is cute right?!

We took Jasmine (Jenny's dog) for a couple walks. It was nice being out in the fresh air!

Max hardly cried! He loves being outside and being held. There was absolutely no shortage of either of these 2 things up there, so he was in Heaven!

If there is anything else I missed, it will probably be in a picture below. I tried SEVERAL times to upload these dang pictures, and it just wouldn't work, so you get to see them in a slideshow. Sorry. Here they are...

New toys and bravery

We got Max's new exersaucer! We won this lovely toy from a giveaway online At Real Moms Real Views. I was so excited! He is slowly getting the hang of how to spin around and jump up and down.

Max is also getting braver. At first, sitting him in he swing and him going as low as possible, he would freak out. Now, he enjoys going higher. He giggles everytime you say Wee! while he is swinging. I love baby laughs! They totally make my day, so I thought I'd share this one with you.

As for our family, we are currently looking forward to the summer! Here are a few things we are impatiently waiting for:

Mcubed day: Every Monday

Abbott family get-together: June 18th

Kennedy family Fish Lake Trip: June 24th

Girls' Camp: July 6th (Max and I might be staying overnight...)

Grandma Nolan's visit: August 9th

Marcus' Graduation: August 12

Aunt Neisha visiting: July sometime?

Uncle Robby visiting: Maybe...

With all this excitement, there are sure to be good posts coming. Stay tuned!

I Need a Boost

I'm in a funk. I didn't want to get out of bed this morning, and definitely didn't want to come to work... I got to work, and my "funkiness" just got worse. I have been in this "funk" all day, and I really need something to make me happy. So, I'm going to try and see if what I did last time works this time. 10 things I'm grateful for...

1. Marcus Scott Kennedy
2. Having a place to call home
3. Knowing I get to see my Grandpa Abbott and (and everybody else that's in Heaven now) again
4: My Mom and best friend being the same person
5: Marcus getting into Pima
6: Having only 30 minutes of this awful work day left
7: Recognizing familiar friendly faces in strange places
8: My addiction back (Biggest Loser Ü)
9: Nieces and nephews that always seem excited to see me
10: Vacation time so we can visit family this weekend, and make this work week shorter.

4th of July Adventrue

Almost every year for the 4th, Marcus' family goes camping at Fish Lake. We were so excited to go and get away from the grind of every day Mesquite working life. We had 3 extras: Robby, Kameron, and Aniesha (Marcus' siblings), so we decided to borrow McKenzie's parent's truck and take it instead of the little Aveo. GOOD THING WE DID! It freaking hailed on us on the 4th of July!! That is so weird! Isn't it only supposed to snow and stuff in the winter? After the storm was over, it looked like it had snowed... And the guys were running around in shorts. CRAZIES!

We basically just relaxed and enjoyed being outside all day everyday,... until Saturday night. The crazy weather ruined that one for us. It broke our new tent.. It was only the 2nd time we had used it, and destroyed J&J's tent. My camera was a victim of the weather. It's currently out of commission, so I don't know if I'll get pictures on here anytime soon :(

The last night (Saturday) Marcus, McKenzie, Robby, and Kameron squished into Jenn and Johnny's trailer. Let me tell ya,... That was great fun. I couldn't stretch out all the way and poor Kameron was stuck in the little hole on the floor between ours and Robby's bed. It was quite the night. We are so thankful that J&J had the trailer, or our trip would have been cut shorter than it already was.

We had lots of fun seeing the family that we never get to. Thanks for cooking our corn for us Johnny, and for letting us borrow basically everything, because we're scatter brained and forgot about it. I am going to attempt to steal pictures off of Jenny's blog and post them here. If you see pictures, you can thank Jenny! And Super thanks to J&J for letting us crash in your trailer!

Quik Trip

On Friday, I worked until 1, then Marcus, Phoebe and I took off to Queen Creek, AZ to see Marcus' nephew, Zachary, be baptized. My co-worker gave me directions on how to get there the quickest, and I was very grateful for them. The GPS on our phones told us to go all the way down to Needles then turn on the 1o or something... Yeah, I heard it's the Long way. Thanks Sharon! We skipped going over the Dam on the way there because we were going that way on the way home. After Kingman, we were calling back and forth between Marcus' family and us and I swear that every time it was, "OK, you have 20 miles on this road" For a while, it felt like we were never going to get there, but eventually we made it.

Phoebe was excited to be out of the car, but not so excited to meet "The Beast" aka Thelma. She is a yellow lab, 2 years old, and the most tolerant dog you will EVER meet. Trust me. Phoebe had to show her who was boss. We would get them close, and P would FREAK OUT! She was growling, nipping, and just being a plain, flat-out, mean, old maid! So, both dogs got locked in their crates for the night, out of sight from each other. T didn't have any problems! She was just excited to have another dog to play with. P on the other hand wasn't having any of it!

So, the next morning, P is outside going to the bathroom, and T is inside. One of the little boys opened the door to come inside, and P launched herself in the house and started "attacking" T. I use quotations because honestly, what can a pug do to a lab?! I was screaming at Marcus trying to get him to come get the stupid dog. I wasn't going to grab her and get bit! Well, little did I know, Marcus and his brothers were all outside. So, here's McKenzie standing through the house at people who aren't even there! Natalie and g probably thought I was crazy! Then, all of a sudden, the fighting stopped, and P was actually tolerating. T. AMAZING! P finally proved she was the boss, and was civil enough to be in the same room as T. Needless to say, she isn't going on any more trips with us, that there is going to be an unfamiliar dog. She lost that privilege.

Zachary's baptism was really nice. I ended up playing the piano at the last minute, which was fine. We got to see Marcus' Dad and family for a little bit, which was nice. After the baptism, we went and ate yummy peanut butter cookies and a concoction of ice cream and fruit, which was amazing!

On the way home, Robby rode with us. It took about 3 HOURS to drive over Hoover Dam. Are you kidding me?! It was the longest drive of my life! I was having fun in the back seat with Phoebe though. I had my computer and was playing Plants vs. Aliens while Marcus and Robby were in the front complaining and complaining about being at a dead stop on the highway. I almost beat my game on that trip too, but not quite... That's how long it was.

Needless to say, we were REALLY happy to get home and not be stuck in the car. I think Phoebe was the most excited.

Yes, I spelled Quik wrong intentionally. Apparently this gas station, call "Quik Trip" is the greatest ever. I didn't go, but Marcus, Robby and Nate did. Nate is the one that says it's the best convenient store around. Also, it was a quick trip, but it was a lot of fun. Thanks for letting us invade your house for a couple of days N&N. We had lots of fun! Sorry for Phoebe bad behavior. She won't be accompanying us next time.

USA Travelers

Last Tuesday night (the 14th) M, m, and Branae (m's little sister) headed to Las Vegas at 8 PM to catch the 11:20 plane to Atlanta, got on another plane there, and landed in Norfolk, Virginia. We were greeted at the airport by M's Mom and little brother, Kameron. We hung out at their house for the day just visiting with the family, and about 3:30, we headed to Richmond to visit, m's Uncle Bruce. We had a hard time finding his house, and under estimated the time it took to get there, but we finally made it. We visited with him for a couple of hours and then headed back to Chesapeake. That night we crashed and slept very well.



Thursday we got up and headed to New York City. It took about 8 hours to get to Walter's Aunt Mary's house. When we got there, Walter ordered us pizza, because apparently, it's better in New York, but to m, it tasted the same. Aunt Mary (AKA the Queen) is hilarious. She is such a sweet lady, but pretends to not be. We visited with her and Joe, her husband, and played spoons. Mary made fun of that game. She said she knew we came from the country because all we could find to play with was spoons... Anyway, we had a lot of fun playing that, and went to bed.



Friday we woke up and got ready. M broke the shower head, and Aunt Mary only has 1 shower, yes 1. There were 11 of us in the house. Fun huh?! We went to NYC by way of train! It went under water, which was amazing to me. We rode the Staten Island Ferry over to,.. you guessed it, Staten Island. We rode it just so we could ride past the Statue of Liberty. It was 20 dollars to ride a boat to get on the same island as the statue, but the ferry was free, so we chose the cheap way. Then we walked around Battery Park. That had the nastiest bathroom we ever saw. We saw the torch and some ball from the Twin towers, walked over to the twin towers, Wall Street, one Catholic church, and rode the subway.



Saturday we rode the train back into NYC and went to the six story, block long, Macy's store, Conway's clothing store, another Catholic cathedral, They were having a WEDDING while people were touring the church, and the church had a gift shop. WEIRD!! We went to Build a Bear, the NBA store, NBC studios, Central Park, and to the top of the Empire State Building.



Sunday we traveled back to Chesapeake.



Monday we went to Virginia Beach... As soon as we stepped on the beach, it started pouring! Like seriously, it was like instantaneous. UGH! We didn't even get to play on the beach for too long. We stayed up talking and stuff with the family until 2 am. We had to wake up at 4 am in order to catch our plane. Yeah, I know, not smart, but it was worth it. The flight home was SO long, but we made it in one piece.



Sorry, this post is really lame, but I'm tired and don't want to be doing this. Maybe I'll post some more stories later, like how this gay guy (yes, we know for a fact he was gay) was checking out Marcus, or "anybody got a quarter?" Here is a slide show of pictures, and no, no comments. Maybe later.

Well, I was going to put pictures, but it won't let me... I'll figure it out and get them on here sometime.

We're off!

Tonight we start our vacation. FINALLY! YAY! We leave Mesquite a little after 8 (Gotta finish Biggest Loser!) and our plane doesn't leave until 11:20. We don't get to Virginia until 9 am their time, so we're not going to get much sleep.

This should be fun.

I don't know who the crazy person was that planned our trip, but they need to think it through a little more next time Ü We will be gone a few hours shy of a whole week. Can't miss Biggest Loser next week! Just kidding. I didn't plan our trip around Biggest Loser, but it worked out perfectly!

Wish us luck in getting there safely! We'll have lots of pictures from New York, Virginia, North Carolina and all the other things that we end up seeing there when we get back, so prepare yourselves now for the plethora!

Thanks for reading! -McKenzie

Anniversary Adventures

We made it one year! Can you believe it's been that long? We sure can't. It has flown. Before we got married, everybody (or so it seemed) said the 1st year was the hardest. We've decided if that's the case, we're going to have a GREAT eternity!

So, for our 1st anniversary, we headed to Salt Lake City to just get away. We haven't been on vacation alone since our honeymoon, so we decided now was the perfect time. We splurged and stayed at the Little America. No complaints there. It was well worth it! The guy at the counter convinced us to upgrade our room to double the size, and be in the tower part of the hotel for $20 extra dollars a night. They had a bigger bathtub. That was the clincher right there! Anytime I can get a bath in a nice tub, I jump on the chance. We don't have a tub in our apartment :(

Our hotel room. The nice king sized bed (apart of the upgrade and well worth it. The first night I dreamt twice I fell out of bed, if I was in a queen, I may have.)

The extra 300 feet of hotel we got. It was SO nice.

Our bathroom. The tub is behind those glass doors on the right. There was a vanity area this same size just outside that door. HUGE bathroom.

Saturday we woke up and went to Pleasant Grove to go to the Mt. Timpanogus Temple with Marcus Dad and Step-Mom to do sealings. I was thinking before this trip, that it would be tradition, and now we're positive we're going to do it every year. Our goal is to do sealings in a different temple every anniversary. Big goal, but it will be SO neat! We've got 2 down: St. George, and Mt. Timpanogus,.. only 120 something left to go... Man we're gonna be old then! I didn't think to take pictures at the temple, silly me... and today before we left, it was too freaking cold to go find the temple and get out to take a picture, so another time I'll get it.

Saturday night we went to the Jazz vs. Suns game. Marcus was SO excited. We were about 10 rows from the very top, but it was still so much fun... For the most part. Jazz had a 20 something point lead in the 1st half, and by the end of the 3rd quarter, they were LOSING! Then they finally pulled it off in overtime to win. I think they should have lost personally. They deserved it. How can you lose a 20 something point lead? HONESTLY! We almost got up and left to do some swimming after the 3rd quarter because I was not very happy, but we're glad we stuck it out and saw them win... Well, we left with 4 seconds left.

The view from our seats

We got dippin dots. It was EXPENSIVE, but worth it. This one's for you, Branae.

The score when we decided to leave.

Me trying to keep myself entertained on the walk back to the hotel. I never knew how many homeless people there were in SLC. They were scaring me. I was trying hard to not make contact, and Marcus wasn't allowed to let go of my hand. Isn't he just SO cute?!

Today we went to sacrament meeting with Marcus' family and ate taquitos (Marcus' choice... imagine that Ü) and tacos. And then we just got to visit for a while. I'm a flake and forgot to take pictures with them. One day I'll be good at this whole taking pictures thing. We even had to walk back to the hotel for the camera before the game, because I forgot.

This morning we were expecting nice weather in the mid 50s, but I looked outside and is was SNOWING! UGH!! It snowed all the way from Salt Lake to Cedar City. I made Marcus drive in the snow, but I now wish I would have switched him. I had the steering wheel turned about 45 degrees all the way home, just to stay on the road. Talk about scary! I was SO nervous. I held onto the steering wheel so hard, my hands hurt when we finally got to Mesquite. Here's the proof. The best part of our $20 upgrade was the underground parking. That was totally worth it for me. We didn't have to walk in the snow!!

The view out of hotel room window. Perfect start to our bad day.

We stopped to use the potty in Fillmore, and our doors were frozen shut! UGH!!

Trifecta Mini Vacation

This weekend we had 3 reasons to head up to the SLC area. We got to visit my niece and sister-in-law, Kairi and Liz, meet Marcus' niece for the first time, Brooklyn Mei, and see Marcus' mom, even if it was only for a few minutes.

Marcus, Pace, and I left Mesquite right after I got off work at 5. We stopped at In-n-Out in St. George, and I remember why I don't like it much. In order for the fries to be good, I have to eat them in like 3 minutes. Well, stupid me did that, and it made me sick. So I didn't feel good for most of the way up. We finally got to the meeting point and dropped Pace off and found our way to Jenny and Johnny's house (Thanks a TON guys!). Susan was so nice to wait up for us so we could visit. We didn't get to bed until like 1 or something, and only got 5 hours of sleep so we could visit with her again before she left back to Virginia. This is a very cute picture of Marcus & his Mom.The rest of Saturday was spent visiting Jenny, Johnny, Baby Brooklyn, and going to the Gateway with Pace, Liz, and Kairi.

I could have held baby Brooklyn all day. She is so cute. I'm jealous because she has pretty skin, and all my kids are doomed to have pasty white skin. I never heard her cry. She whined a little bit, but never cried. I hope my babies are as good as she was. She has this cute little squeak sound she makes. Ah! She was adorable. The rest of Marcus' family needs to get busy and have babies for us to hold Ü Brooklyn Mei Yee
Marcus was pretty excited to go see her. He held her a lot more than I expected.
I don't know why Blogger turned this picture, but Brooklyn does this cute thing. She stretches out and just sits there. She was sleeping and stretched her legs out straight as a board. I thought it was cute.

We tagged along with Pace and Liz to the Gateway Mall. We went to Build-a-Bear and Kairi made the cutest Elephant, named Ellie of course. Then we went and tried Thai food for the first time. It wasn't that great. I don't like spicy, and everybody's chicken was spicy, not to mention our waiter wasn't the greatest. After that, it was time to feed Kairi, so we found shade and hooked up the tubes.

The coolest part was going to the Discovery Museum. I've never been to anything like it. It was a big play place for kids. It was either 3 or 4 stories. I loved the little village inside. It has a house, farm, store, post office, construction site,.... and more. It was way cool. Kairi and I even dressed up as cows at the farm.Kairi's favorite thing was the flight for life helicopter. I think it was a real one that was re-done so people could sit in it and play and stuff. She was way excited to be the pilot.

The last adventure for the day was the Planetarium. It was so neat! They have a huge marble machine. It would entertain Marcus and I all day! Marcus found an Airzooka there, and had to buy it. it's pretty cool! After our adventure, we went back to Jenny's and attempted to watch Happy Valley. Well, it was a dumb movie in my opinion. It was a documentary about Utah and their drug problems. We turned it off not too far into it. Then the exhaustion hit me and I fell asleep in about 2 seconds.

On Sunday Marcus and I intended on going to church with Pace, Liz and Kairi, but both of us were reading the clock wrong, and missed it. So, we visited with Jenny and Johnny longer, and got to hold Brooklyn more. No complaints here! Then we headed to the hospital and visited Kairi and Liz before we headed home. As we were walking up to her room, we were stopped because a pack of Harley Davidson people were stompin' down the hall. Marcus leaned over to me and said, "I should have worn my leather jacket." We got to the room, and those guys were there giving toys to the kids in the hospital. Kairi got a spiffy Mr. Potato Head, Mr. Pop Corn and Mr. something Carrot. They were all Potato heads type of things. She was excited!

Marcus got us home in record time last night. We made it in less than 5 hours WITHOUT a pee break. That's a new one. I have never made it to or from Salt Lake without stopping. We had to stop for some gas though. Now we are back to our home sweet home!

Cali Baby!

Sorry. This is a long one.

On Saturday July 26th, Marcus, Branae, Travis Rushton, and I headed out for Costa Mesa, California at 7:30 in the morning. We met Marcus' Mom and the rest of his family from Virginia at the hotel, then headed out to see the beach for the first time. We headed to Newport Beach. There were SOO many people there. I couldn't figure out why they all loved it so much. They promised me that the Carlsbad beach, which is the one they usually go to, is not nearly as crowded. This was my first time ever seeing the beach and ocean. It is so cool how it looks like the Earth is flat, and how eventually you will fall off the edge. On the way back to the hotel, my Mom called me and told me the news about Kairi. That put a damper on our spirits, but we still kept a smile and tried to have fun. That night we played games in the hotel room with the teenagers.

Sunday we left at 10 in the morning to head down to Escondido. Susan has a condo down there that we all were going to stay in. We had a lot of time to kill, and it was Sunday, so we decided we would look at the Newport Beach Temple, San Diego Temple, and eat lunch at a park. The Newport Beach temple is the most unique I have ever seen. It's a seashell color, and very squatty looking. Marcus said it looked like a mosulem (A Jewish temple thingy. I probably butchered the spelling. We almost passed it, because it doesn't quite stand out like most of the other temples do. Then we headed to San Diego. They actually had people waiting outside the temple to greet people who were visiting it, because it didn't have a visitor's center. That is the prettiest temple! It looks like a castle. We walked around a little bit, and took pictures if front of it, then headed out to the park. We ate our sandwiches, but still had like an hour to kill, so we went and played on the playground toys. We had a lot of fun. Then we headed down to Escondido and met up with Mike, Chris, and Nate and get into the condos. Lucky us got to stay in the living room in the condo with Mike and Chris' families for the first two nights.

I only packed one pair of flip flops, because that's all I owned, so first thing Monday morning we went to a mall and found some shoes that would be good to walk around in. That night, we headed to the Carlsbad Beach. They were all right. There were FAR less people at this beach. This was the first time I had ever gotten into the ocean. It was crazy how one second the water would be at your hip, and the next it was so deep you couldn't touch.

Tuesday, we let Branae decide what to do. We ended up going to Sea World. It was a lot more fun than I anticipated. We watched Shamu first. We sat on the 3rd row, and the splash zone goes clear back to row 16. We were going to brave it without ponchos, but at the last second, I had Marcus run and buy us two. One for me and one for Branae. He didn't want one. He decided he did when he saw how much water was flying towards us. Mine was so big he hid behind it. After that we went to watch Cirque de... something. It was an acrobatic comedy thing. Those people were pretty amazing. *Side note* No, we did not feel the earthquake. We just walked around looking at all the animals and petting everything we could. It was a lot of fun! Marcus and I rode the Journey to Atlantis ride. We waited in line for what seemed like forever, then got on the ride, and it was over before we knew it. We definitely waited for longer than it was worth. Branae didn't wanna ride it, so we found her after that, and I think we were pretty much done. We headed back to the condo.

On Wednesday, Susan took us to La Jolla beach. If you have goggles and a snorkle, you would be able to see everthing on the bottom of the ocean. I decided to not get in this time because the water was yucky looking and there was TONS of seaweed. This night, we were sleeping in the other condo, and got a bedroom! Finally, I don't have to wake up to my brothers-in-law walking in and outta the living room. That was really awkward. We stayed up playing games with the teenagers and Nate that night.

Thursday, Marcus woke up early and went golfing with his brothers, Travis, and Grandpa. We watched them golf the hole right in our backyard, then headed to the gas light district. We got there anticipating a lot of fun little shops and stuff, but it was just expensive resturants and a few shops. We left early, and went swimming with all the nieces and nephews there. They had a fun slide, and splash pad that they liked a lot. Then we headed back and played games in the condo. We got a new game, Wits and Wagers. It's really fun if you have a lot of people! We stayed up pretty late playing different games.

Friday morning we went to the beach again. We were out pretty far in the water, and I got pelted by a wave. I dove under it, but apparently not far enough. It started spinning me around, and after that I had had enough. I went and laid down on a towel in the sun. Not the smartest thing I've ever done. I didn't think I'd get burned because I was only there for probably 30 minutes. now i have a nice towel line across my legs, showing where I had the towel, and what wasn't covered. This night we BBQ'd with all of Marcus' family that was there. It was yummy hamburgers, hotdogs, and chicken. Thanks Chris. They were good even if you put onions on them Ü After, everyone in the condo watched a movie, but I decided to finish my book that I have been reading for a long time, Bitten. I snuck into the room with Zach and Noah, and we all slept.

Saturday was really a do nothing day. We basically sat around the condo, packed, and headed back home. We got back to lovely Mesquite about 11, which is the same time my Dad was getting home from Salt Lake. We had a very good trip, and thank you very much to Susan for letting us go with you. It was a lot of fun. Can't wait to do it again.

And as soon as I figure out how to put a slideshow of pictures, on here, I'll share a few on the 250 i took Ü

* I figured it out! Cali Pictures are the next blog*

Cali Pictures