Our Picnic Blanket Summer

A partial list of our wedding gifts: 5 crockpots, an electric can opener that never worked, crystal bowls of varying sizes, a sterling silver bon-bon dish, money envelopes, towels, sheets, kitchen utensils and accessories, cookbooks. And the quilt my Aunt Marba made for us - pink, green, orange, and red splashed across the front, a navy backing, all hand-tied with navy yarn.

The wedding money has long since been spent. The crystal bowls gather dust in my highest cabinet. The bon-bon dish requires silver polish, which I never have. We use a hand-operated can opener. Our original sheets & towels were eventually made into rags and finally discarded. Most of the kitchen utensils have been replaced over the years. But Our Picnic Blanket gets weekly - sometimes daily - use.

In fact, I just took the blanket out of my drier. The whole summer was on that blanket in the form of grass stains, sand, jelly smudges, remnants of roasted marshmallows, and sunscreen smears - all needing to be washed out. The Blanket will soon accumulate more stains - which will also wash out. But not the memories; they'll accumulate indefinitely and become part of our family's history. I look forward to laundering it for many years to come.

With Our Blanket in tow, we've had a fun, crazy-busy, memorable summer. Here are just a few highlights:
We've spent lots of time outdoors - particularly in the canyons. Dutch oven cooking rocks!
Rob spent his 12th birthday at Lagoon with his 2 best friends: Brother Seth & Cousin Josh.
Oquirrh Mountain temple open house - we consider ourselves lucky that we've been able to attend two temple open houses this year. Beautiful & inspiring!
Night out on the town with my mom & two sisters, Jenn & Rachelle. Sisters & moms rock!
Outdoors again - hiking to a beautiful waterfall close to our house.
Modern art at the BYU museum of art on free day - I'll go back to the museum, but NOT on free day! It was NUTS.
4th of July - Caleb was scared to death of the fireworks, Seth burned his finger on a sparkler.
Angerbauer Family Reunion at Bear Lake. We loved it!
My brother Dave, his wife Lisa, & their 6 kids hung out with us for a week. We had a blast. This is us at the Kennecott Copper Mine. Cousins Rock!
Conference Center in Downtown SLC.
Alpine slide in Park City. Words are inadequate to express my feelings of dread and absolute helplessness when I took this picture. The rest of us had been waiting for a full 10 minutes for Emma (age 6 1/2-front of the line) and Jen (my sis - right behind her) to get to the bottom. Fora split second I was reluctant to acknowledge Emma as my daughter, for fear of the wrath from that LONG line of people behind her. Turns out my sister heard a few choice words as some of those guys passed her while exiting. Lesson: Please please please have Emma share with an older person next time. It took me a few days to get over that one.

School begins on Wednesday. I thought I'd be ecstatic. I'm definitely happy to get a break from the all-kids-all-the-time schedule, but surprisingly, I'm a little bit sad. That blanket sure accumulated lots of happy memories this summer!