Summer Rafting

We have enjoyed our summer to the fullest this year.  I have loved just being in town and having nothing crazy planned for our summer.  We have been on a few rafting trips so far this season and look forward to having a few more before the summer is over.  The first raft trip we took with 10 couples in our ward.  We took 3 boats down the Main Payette and enjoyed a great afternoon in the sun with friends

Blake gave everyone a safety talk before we head down river

Allie always gets to hang back with grandparents or a babysitter when we head off rafting, so we promised her that we would take her on a trip this summer.  She was just thrilled at the idea of getting to come rafting.  We rounded up some friends for F.H.E and took the kids on a calm stretch of the Payette.  We put our boats in at Beehive Bend and traveled down to Horseshoe Bend.  It was such a fun trip; the kids had blast!!!  We will definitely be taking more family rafting trips

Allie, Cam, Brynn, and Macy ready to head down river

Jensen and Mark

Karina and Cherie-even the youngest of friends got to join us on our trip

Allie stealing a kiss from daddy as we headed down river

We stopped at two different beaches on our way down river.  The kids had a blast swimming around in the water, looking for fish, and playing on the sandy beaches

Allie and daddy wading in the water

At the first beach, the dad's took the kids out to look for fish

Allie just loved "riding the bull" where she got to sit up on the front end of the raft

Allie crawled over the boat and grabbed on to the rope to take a dip as we floated down the river; this girl just loved this trip and loved climbing out to take a dip as we floated along

Holly and Macy enjoyed cooling off 

The kids also thought the trip was great because we got to see "wildlife" on our way down.  We ran into these horses, some cows, as well as a golden eagle hobbling around on the ground

We ended up taking two boats down the river....Allie bounced between the blue boat with Blake and the Hoegers and the red boat with the Givens, Rawlings, and me

Brynn enjoying the rind of my apple

The next beach we stopped at the kids got down and dirty.  Allie jumped right out of the boat and started making "sand" angels

Allie burying her legs in the sand 

You can't forget to make sand castles in the sand

All the kids washing off their sandy bodies before hoping back in for the home stretch

Best of all, I got to hang with my hot hubby the whole way down