Anthony's 26th Birthday

Saturday was Anthony's 26th Birthday. It's hard to believe my little brother is 26! We're getting old. Anthony decided he wanted to go for drinks and listen to Mariachi music. So Laura and him found a place online.

We all had a great time and over 20 people showed up.

We were pretty close to the stage and although it started an hour late it was a pretty good show. The Mariachi's were good but either a bit drunk or going for the comedic side of entertainment.

As the show went on the following acts got a bit riskier and riskier. It's a night we won't be forgetting for a while...

Happy Birthday Anthony!!!

The Griffin House

Today marks the two year anniversary of our house. I can remember going over to the house with a bottle of champagne and some finger foods and eating them on the floor of the living room. Our celebration party.

The house needed a lot of work but nothing a little man power couldn't handle. In fact, we are still working on it (We are giving the side gate a needed face-lift and hopefully getting a much needed front door in the next few weeks and I'm sure there will be more improvements to come).

Seeing the house two years later still amazes me. The fact that its ours and how much we have done to it is still shocking. At first it seemed like so much space to fill and now we are starting to fill the walls rather than empty rooms. It's more than anything we could have dreamed for.

So happy two year anniversary to our house.

4th of July

Sunday was 4th of July and we decided to have a bbq at our house and invite some of my family. It was a really nice day, cooler than last year but nice and sunny. We cooked hamburgers and hotdogs and had a really great time.

Here are all the adults at the "Adult Table."

Here are all the kids at the "Kids" table!

We decided to make cupcakes with strawberry and blueberry toppings. They were a big hit but something else stole the show this year...

My uncle Lionel had been shopping at an antique store in Orange when he came across this hat. He immediately thought of Jamie and decided to get it for him. When Jamie opened the gift he was shocked and couldn't believe that not only did he find it and buy it for him but it said Humberside! Lionel didn't know Humberside was the area that Jamie came from but was amazed when he found out.

And so the hat got passed around...

Aunt Nancy

Andy

Uncle Bob

Jon

Uncle Lionel

Ok, so even I joined in on the fun.

Once the sun went down we let off fireworks. The side gate really came out handy! Our neighborhood gets pretty crazy and slightly resembles a war zone. The park is packed with people, smoke and there are fireworks going off in all directions. It's great to watch =>

Morph has moved to California........

About a month ago I received a package in the post from my Mum. To my surprise I got a "build your own Morph kit". I have been a bit busy so it took a while to build him. Although I think I have some artistic skills, sculpture is certainly not one of them! Anyway, I had a fun time making him and the kit came with a dvd containing 15 episodes. I always remebered the episodes being short but they only last about 30 seconds!!!!

Can you tell which photo(s) is the genuine Morph???????????????????

Father's Day

Last Sunday was Father's Day and we celebrated with the family at our house. My parents, Anthony and Laura, Valerie and Milissa and Grandpa came over.

It was a really nice day and the weather was perfect to sit outside and enjoy the day. So we didn't bbq but had it catered instead. It was really nice since everyone got to sit and talk and Jamie and I didn't have to worry about getting the food ready. We had carnitas and steak fajitas which were pretty good =>

Dad and Grandpa got some great presents and enjoyed having their family with them.

Hope everyone else had a nice Father's Day as well.

World Cup

June 12th was a big day in the Griffin House. England and the U.S. played thier opening games of the world cup against each other.

We had a few people over and decided to decorate the house accordingly; just in case people had trouble finding our house. When Jamie went out side to put the flags out I made sure to remind him to have some American flags flying as well!

Jamie also made sure to decorate his car for the occasion! On his way to get ice for the cooler the car behind him made sure to honk and get his attention as he waved a full size American Flag out the drivers side window.

Here is the pre-game party before the rest of the guests arrived. It was a good game and we were all a little tense when England pulled ahead in the 4th minute (Well most of us, Jamie was pretty happy). But the U.S. got a lucky goal in the 40th minute and the game finished 1-1; peace was restored. Both teams have big games tomorrow and hopefully they can both can come out with wins :)

Zion National Park - Day 7 & 8

Day 7 - We had seen most of the park on Friday and didn't really want to do too much driving. So we decided to go to the town on the other side of the park to do some shopping and sight seeing. The only way to get there was to drive through the park, so we took our time and stopped a few times for pictures and viewpoints.

Here is a view of the windy road. I'm not sure if the road was stained this color on purpose or naturally but we really like it.

To go through the park you have to go through two tunnels that have been carved into the rock. This one was small but the second one is over a mile long. It's pretty impressive and really dark!

We did a short hike to a viewpoint of the canyon and luckily someone else was there to take our picture. It was a pretty impressive view.

Here's the view without us in the way. You can see the road cutting across the bottom of the canyon.


There were some really cool rock formations on the way.

We also found a ghost town to visit. The is the town of Grafton, an early Mormon settlement. It was established in 1859 but abandoned due to Native American attacks. The house on the right was lived in until the 40s or 50s by one descendant.

We also found this little gem, called Heritage House. Unfortunately, it was closed but it was a nice little house to look out from the outside.

Day 8 - We drove home on Sunday morning and got an early start. Again we had to drive through the Park to get onto the 15. As we were driving, the car in front of us started to slow down. I started looking up at the rock and all of a sudden I saw this.

Not a bad way to end our trip especially when this little guy showed up. We had an amazing time and took so many pictures, over 400! So it's been a challenge only choosing some of the best ones. We both can't wait for our next adventure.