So I lied

I may have said in a post six or so months ago that spring is my favorite. If this was indeed my word choice, I have to come clean and tell you that fall is, in fact, my favorite. Don't get me wrong--I love the seasons generally, and that's a big part of why we live in Utah--but I love love love fall. I was trying to explain to one of my young women the other day how I love the way that the leaves smell after they've changed color and they're falling off the trees, but she looked at me like I was weird. And when I was running today, I ran by a corn field where the stalks were still standing but had turned yellow, and it smelled awesome! I'm telling you, if I could figure out how to capture smells, I would definitely do fresh-cut hay (the best smell ever) and the way that fall smells. Not together, just those are two of my favorite smells. But let's be honest, candle companies and essential oil people can't figure out how to do nature smells. How often have you smelled a 'rain' scented candle that actually smelled like rain and not some old woman or a weird detergent? And the same goes for lilac or any other flower-scented candle. One of my favorite things about spring is the smell of lilac bushes and other sundry blossoms, but none of the candles or oils that I've smelled even come close. I guess that's part of the beauty of nature, that you can't bottle it up. It is a little sad, but it makes you appreciate it in the moment instead of saving it for later. So next time you crunch through the leaves, breathe in and savor the smell of the seasons changing. Or raise your eyebrows and wonder what I'm talking about, like my beehives do.

And I've been meaning to post some pictures for quite a while. I was looking in my pictures folder tonight and I wait so long to take the pictures off my camera that the last time I did, I put them all in a folder that I titled 'summer 09.' Now this might be appropriate if said folder only contained pictures of things that happened in the summer, but apparently my summer goes from about March to September. I'm giving it a liberal definition. So I decided to put up a new one of me and Blair-o. I picked that one because it epitomizes our life--we like to laugh and we do it a lot. But I also need to post a little sampling of our summer. So here you go.
This was on our Moab trip at the beginning of the summer after the hike where we almost died. So my smile is fake. I was still really mad about almost dying, as it turns out.
We hiked part of the way up Spanish Fork Peak, which is directly east of our house, in June, and the scenery was awesome. Also, this is a preview to the fall pics that I took on the same hike when Liz and I hiked it a couple weeks ago. Prepare yourself.
This is at the Ute Stampede, the best rodeo ever! My friend Tara, who I work with, is on the Ute Stampede committee and got us awesome seats in the new box seats in the new bleachers. It was fantastic. I didn't mean for it to be a nose shot, it just happened that way. Sorry.
After the Speedy Spaniard 10k run in Spanish Fork, at which I got my fastest time yet! It's not fast, so don't be impressed, but it was my fastest, so I was pleased.
There was a great fireworks show after the Fiesta Days rodeo. I got some decent looking pictures with a special fireworks setting on my camera.
We hiked the peak with Dylan, Clemente, and Aimee in August, and I think it was a little more than most of us initially thought. This was when we got to the top, and we decided to give an enthusiastic thumbs up.
My parents have been remodeling their front yard, and Blair really wanted to drive this giant loader. Apparently my dad likes him, so he let him. I had to get a picture, obviously.
This is kind of a _____ (fill in the blank with the adjective of your choice) picture, but it's us in the same swing at Red Butte Garden where Blair proposed almost 6 years ago exactly.
We took some pretty great pictures while we were at Red Butte, and Blair was particularly pleased with my photo-taking abilities on this one.
I got some really great flower pics while we were there. This is probably the least cool, but I'm saving them for later, so I thought I could at least put this one.

So there's a quick snapshot of our summer in less than a dozen pictures. I told you I would post pictures eventually, and I did, see. As soon as I get the fall ones from Spanish Fork Peak off my camera, I will put some of them because they are even better than these. Hard to believe, I know, but just wait.