what i miss

the blog every day in my challenge topic for today is to talk about the things i miss. i got a little carried away looking through old pictures, and realize this list is pretty big! luckily, i can look forward to doing most of this stuff again soon!

 

camping with my dad. he is such an outdoorsman, and when he is out there in his element, he is the life of the party. i love being with my dad outside. all of my favorite childhood memories are camping, because of this guy. plus, for some reason, his cooking is WAY better when we're camping :)

 

this trip! last year for our anniversary, devin surprised me and took us to jackon hole and we spent 1 day horseback riding. it was the funnest afternoon and i can't wait to go back!

 

climbing in joe's! trips to joe's valley have very quickly become my favorite type of climbing trip, and i hope we spend a lot of time down there this summer.

 

grey's river. our favorite place in the whole entire world. we're going back in july and it can't come fast enough.

 

wearing my wedding ring! i still have about a week until i can put it back on ever since this happened

 

ski season! i know it just barely ended, but i miss it already. we had so much fun skiing this year and were able to get out a lot. i'm so glad it's something we both enjoy doing

 

nannying. this sweet girl and her brother changed my life. i learned so, so much from them, and being their nanny was the best job i've ever had. i think about them every day and i wish i could have been their nanny for longer!

 

camping and adventures with this guy. devin is a lot like my dad in that he sort of becomes a different person when we get outside. he is so much happier. you know he's exactly where he wants to be. i love that.

 

our truck! i miss this truck so bad. i'm glad we don't have it anymore, but i still miss it! he had so much fun with this thing!

  

this guy as a baby. he's only 9 months, so he's technically still a puppy, but he's almost full grown. we watched old videos of him as a puppy a few nights ago and i miss it so bad! he wasn't this small for very long, and i'd love to have baby cooper back for just a couple of minutes!

and lastly... unrelated, but important: happy mother's day to the most incredible woman. i am forever impressed by my mom. every quality she has is so admirable and i feel so blessed to have been raised by her. i am so proud to be her daughter! as i've gotten older, and i'm less of an annoying child, and less of a rebellious teenager, we have become so close. she gives the greatest advice, she is always willing to listen, and she's taught me everything i know! i love you, mom! happy mother's day!

what my childhood sounded like

As a child, it was very easy to identify my mother. Everyone who knew her knew her loves, and they have never changed in my entire life. I will forever know the things that make her undoubtedly happy:

my father, her high school sweetheart

m&m's

pepsi

birding

and Dan Fogelberg

I'm almost positive that a Dan Fogelberg song is probably the first song I ever heard. Though I'm sure my mother would never remember, it's a very educated guess. She had tapes upon tapes of Dan, and they were always, always on in the car. And during my childhood, without even realizing it, I memorized every single one of his songs.

This is literally no exaggeration. Play any Dan song, any time, and my mother and I could serenade you, word for word. Along with the rest of my siblings, and probably my Dad (he was also a fan of Dan, but had a bit broader music selection, as opposed to my mom's "variety" which was just different Dan albums).

Dan Fogelberg was always playing. Always. And nobody knew who he was. It is something I associate solely with my mother, because I've never heard of him from anyone else. You can imagine my surprise when we heard "Run For the Roses" playing in the mall one day when I was young. I didn't know what to think. How did this candle store know our Dan? You can imagine my surprise when I found a song by Dan on Devin's iPod when we were dating (red flag #1 that we were soul mates. or would that be a green flag?) We used to give my mom such a hard time about it. It was all she ever listened to, and we would tease her so endlessly, but now that I'm older and know how to appreciate good music, I can't say that I blame her. I'm on a Fogelberg kick now and I think I'll listen to him for days on end, too!

Dan is so, so incredibly talented. I can't believe that I still love his music after hearing almost nothing but it for most of my childhood years, but I do. When I hear a song by Dan, it puts me in a good place. It makes me feel happy, and I always think of my mother, and her love for him and his music.

My mom had gone to probably every single concert Dan ever played in Utah and all of it's surrounding states. She would make regular road trips with her sisters and friends to Denver for concerts, and she had a collection of mugs, t-shirts, autographs, guitar picks and drum sticks to prove her devotion. She would wait in line outside of concert halls for hours. She was like a Dan Fogelberg encyclopedia.

Obviously, as I grew older, I listened to Dan much, much less, and mom eventually realized she thought country music was okay, and even threw in a little Elton John to mix things up a bit every once in awhile. So now, when I come across a Dan song, it's more nostalgic than ever.

I remember in 2007 when he died. I think it was prostate cancer. I just remember being in the living room with my siblings and my dad came out of his bedroom, where he and my mom had been watching TV or something. He gathered us all together and briefed us. He told us that mom had just found out that Dan Fogelberg had died, and that we needed to be sensitive to her about it, and be extra obedient and get things done around the house. We watched her cry the next day. I remember thinking that she was taking it a little too seriously, but I also remember feeling awful for her. We all knew how much it meant to her. It was the end of an era. At the time, it made sense, but was also a little funny.

He was a huge, huge part of her life, and by association, a huge part of mine, too. I'm glad I was raised to the tunes of Dan, and I wouldn't have it any other way. I thought about maybe posting a video here of one of my favorite Dan songs, until I realized I don't have one. They are all just amazing. All of them. But for the sake of it, here's Leader of the Band. A true classic.

A Very Merry Throwback Thursday

Miss this girl and the rest of her family! Merry Christmas from A-rae!