Our summer has flown by! We’ve been busy working and, of course, having a lot of fun.

•  We were gone almost the entire month of May on our motorcycle trip and got home just in time to drive to Sacramento to pick up Nicole whom was studying abroad in Costa Rica for nine months. She is back to work at the hospital and is starting her first semester of nursing school.
• A day later, Sam graduated from High School. She’s taking CNA class this summer and plans to continue her schooling to become a doctor of some sort. It keeps changing…

• June 9th, my best friend got married and I was lucky to stand by her side and watch her sign “I do” to her new best friend. They moved 8 hours away to the beach but that just means we’ll get to take more motorcycle trips to the coast. RJ jests that we’ll never see them again.

• We spent many of our summer days on the lake with the fam.  We all love our new boat and new surf boards (Thomas broke two of our boards because he’s so dang awesome so Dad had to order a couple more).  We camped at Whiskeytown Lake for a few nights with RJ’s family.  We got off the lake so late the first night by the time we got our campsite set up and the boat tied off it was too late to make supper.  Dad and RJ drove into town for food and we all ate In ‘N Out at 12:30 in the morning. (Follow Wake9 on Facebook and Instagram for more family wakesurfing pictures)

• RJ bought a dirt bike this summer so he’s been taking lots of rides on the logging trails behind our house. And jumping the driveway when he gets really bored.

• Our anniversary was August 8.  We’ve made it two years but not without a couple arguments, a few discussions on how long is too long to go without showering, and a lot of poop jokes along the way. We took Moty into town for an early morning date of coffee and donuts.  That evening, Dad G. invited us up for his famous mouth watering, drool enticing cowboy steaks. (Yes, they are that good)

• Three days later, RJ turned 22.  He worked most of the day coding and typing and making phone calls and stuff.  We’ve been doing a lot of work on our house lately so after he was done with actual work for the day, he set to work digging a trench for one of our cables.

• On Sunday, August 20, my first cousin Esther got married.  We had a great week full of family visiting, good food, late night (1:30am) sleepover with our little cousins and witnessing Esther say “I do” to her man.
• RJ and Ken, Whitney’s boyfriend, built stairs for our loft. Sam is moving up there and we needed a little something more than just a ladder. Ken is a contractor and just an amazing dude in general. We worked out a deal where I’d make them two quilts and Ken and Whit would build stairs with RJ. RJ found a cool space saving stair design that they ended up implementing. It took them about 2.5 full days of work. They did an amazing job!

• And now, some pictures of Scooter.

• Some more pictures from this summer:

Logging trails behind our house.

• We are getting ready to leave again on another motorcycle trip, this time for six weeks or so.  We are making our way to the New England States, wake surfing in Connecticut, taking in the sights in New York, getting proper pizza from NYC, deep dish from Chicago, and visiting RJ’s aunt and uncle in Indiana. Hoping we have good weather and it’s not too cold by the time we head for home.

Cheers!

     em and rj