Every summer our family travels out to Salt Lake City, UT. We have family and friends throughout Utah; our summer trips are the best opportunity to visit with those that we love. There is never enough time to pack everything and everyone in that we want to but we give it our best!

We began our 10 day visit with a family wedding. The ceremony was held in the new Provo City Center Temple.

We finished up the day with a beautiful reception.

Our older two participated in the annual Riverton Country Mile and 5K. Sophie came in 1st woman for the mile with a 5:55 and a personal best. Simon came in 2nd overall for the 5K with a 18:29 and a personal best. Not bad for running at elevation! We have participated in this race for the past four years and love it. It has become one of our favorite Riverton Town Days July 4th traditions.

We spent a fair amount of time at various water parks and pools during our stay. Honestly, this was the first Utah summer visit in ten years that didn’t feel horribly hot. Don’t get me wrong, Utah is beautiful in the summer but that sun is BRIGHT and the air is dry. We spent a large chunk of an afternoon at Cowabunga and it was super relaxing.

The kids were all old enough that they could run around without us and just hang out with their friends and cousins. For my college roomate MeKell (who was visiting from Las Vegas with her family) and I, it was bliss to just sit around for hours catching up and eating small buckets of french fries. Seriously. We ate multiple buckets of french fries. And SO much fry sauce. And large Cokes.

We spent A LOT of time finding and drinking fabulous sodas from Pop Shop and Sodalicious. My personal favorite is a Dirty Diet Coke. You can only get the best ones in Utah and specifically at Sodalicious. A Dirty Diet Coke is Diet Coke, easy ice, generous squeeze of fresh lime, sugar free coconut syrup and drumroll please…the magical SPECIAL ingredient…coconut creamer! I have no pictures of this amazing concoction that I drank almost every single day and sometimes TWICE a day. Just know it was fabulous.

Here is Sophie representing Pop Shop. They liked this photo so much that they used it on their Instagram feed 🙂

A visit to Utah is never complete without multiple stops to our favorite restaurants that we don’t have here in Northern California. We always hit Cafe Rio, Kneaders and Wingers. This time we added Cubby’s to the rotation and we were not disappointed. We have a built in “eating out” budget whenever we come to Utah so that we can get our fill. No shame on that one.

There was time with good friends…

And of course lots of time with family…

And of course this guy right here ^^^^^. He is the best.

We had a fantastic, FULL, fun trip. Thanks Utah for always giving us the best memories.