Rachel Goes to Kelowna B.C. with her bro and sis.

So, these pictures are backwards. 

While we were driving back to Alberta from Kelowna we stopped at this "ghost town" thing in the middle of the mountains. There was this cool house that was made out of bottles. Apparently it was a common thing way back when.

Cool. I think when I grow up I will make a house out of bottles.

So, for those who don't know about Kelowna, it is located in the interior of the rocky mountain range in a valley where there is a huge lake and a bajillion orchards and vineyards. Beautiful to say the least. 

Lauren and Nathan at the beach. Nathan doesn't like pictures.

Me. Tubing. But not really at this point.

Just a random of my aunties Sheron and Lynn and my uncle Paul and my uncle's brother. 

Me with the Happy Couple! Emily, Matt, and Me!

I remember that I tried to sign on and add some posts while I was in Ecuador, but it didn't work. So I almost forgot all about the blog. I just read through all of your posts and I loved hearing about your lives'. I haven't had much happen since I've been home, so you haven't missed much. But yesterday was my brother's wedding so I thought I'd post some pics! Sorry I've never actually posted on a blog. I just used the password and email that Rachel sent out with our blog to login so I hope that's ok!
Me and my Mom! (with Linds in the back)
Me with my sister, Sharla.
Me with all my nieces. My sister-in-law had a new baby girl, Lucy at the beginning of August. Carianne, Me, Lucy, and Natalie.

NaNa and Carebear. We all got to wait outside the temple. I watched my new niece Lucy, but she's just not in this pic.

Random

I love my parents soooo much! They are the best!
For a service project we helped weed my uncle's lawn. Nephi and I decided to tear down this tree my climbing up it and then pulling on it. It was very fun and we were successful!
Michael, Me, and Luke. The three musketeers reunited at last! We are all the same age and they both recently got off their missions. We hadn't all been together for 5 years or something crazy. It was a great reunion.
Some of my aunts were giving away clothes so I decided to model some....yep
Lydia and I modeling some more...
Sorry about all of the posts. A lot of things have happened and I have many pictures to share...

Family Vacation III

After Yellowstone and Wyoming we went to the farm in Nevada.
We played in a maze built by hay, went swimming, rode four wheelers, played volleyball and basketball, etc etc etc. (I just watched the King and I). Anyway, a very fun thing was when Marg, Ben, Bradley and I all fit on this very small four-wheeler. Very exciting.
Bradley wearing my boots. They were too heavy for him and I had to help him walk. haha so cute.
Me and Bradley. I just love my nephews so much. I am so glad I got to hang out with them so much.
water monster? This is the pond we always went swimming at. This is also where I also got a huge bruise on my leg that still hurts weeks later. I landed on a fin of a surfboard. awesome.

Family Vacation II

We saw many amazing and beautiful things at Yellowstone. We also saw bison, elk, moose, coyote, and many other animals. I loved it all!
The whole family. I also got to me my dad's family and they are all amazing!
All of my siblings plus my two nephews. Ben, Marg, Ashley, Me, Matt, Cameron, and Bradley.

haha. this is the night that I caught myself on fire. I didn't feel like taking pictures. That was a good night.

Family Vacation

Here are my two nephews: Bradley and Cameron (aka the brad man and cam-jam.) They are adorable and I got to bond with them!
My family went to Wyoming to see my Aunt and Uncle for a couple of days. They have a very cool old house that my Aunt has decorated very western. It was awesome!
This picture is on top of the world. Altitude around 10,000 feet! Crazy. It was very cold, but very beautiful.
My whole entire family went to Yellowstone and I had the time of my life! I love my family so much and was so glad to see everyone! We stayed at a cabin some friends let us borrow and it was so awesome! The whole trip completed me.
This is a random picture, but also funny. I fit into a very small suitcase. I look like a turtle.

Pageant!!!!!!!! :D

Being in the Pageant was an amazing experience! It was really cool to share it with my family! I love them!

This is my cast team S-6! I love them, we had a lot of fun together when we weren't in rehearsals. The lack of boys is because we were separated by age and most of the older 19 year olds are on missions :)

This is me at the top of the hill with the stage and the bowl (where the audience sits) in the background. Before there were 6,000 chairs set up.

Me in my first costume! It was awesome except it was kind of heavy so I was really hot by the time I changed after wearing it for 3 1/2-4 hours.

This is how they did my hair every night, well it looked similar, but it was never quite the same.

Dan is BACK!

He's back! Daniel, Anne (his sister) and I spent the afternoon at Temple Square. It was so much fun! We went to the visitors centers and watched the cheesy "family, isn't it about....time" commercials and then went over to the big statue of Christ and listened to the audio message that went along with it. Dan hasn't driven in the United States for two years (well, obviously!) so it was funny having him drive and Anne be a back seat driver. :D Good times!

The 4th of July with the Shallenbergers

In celebration of the 4th of July, I went with Daniel's little sister (Anne) and his dad to a gala. We didn't plan it but we sure looked patriotic! It was a blast!

Steph visits Jenessa

So, here is me and Steph! We went out to breakfast one morning when she was in Utah. AND we are in my new car. So ladies, you have seen the inside :D Everyone follow her example and come to Orem!

Rachel gets a dog and cuts her hair for the play.

This is my mission photo! Wahoo. So. My haircut. I went in to get my hair done for one of the plays one day and Janet, the lady who was doing my hair, said "you know, it would just be a lot easier if we could cut your hair." And since I always want to cut my hair anyways, I gave in, and she cut it, and now I have short hair. Hooray! I love short hair.

This is Ellie. She followed my room mate Bracken home from work last Sunday, and Bracken has such a big heart that she decided to rescue her. We are pretty sure she was just somebody's throw away stray dog. We both thought she was super cute for about the first day, and then she started pooping on our carpet and urinating on our linoleum and bringing dead birds into our house. Also biting me. After about four days of this I called the animal control guy in our town. But don't think I'm cruel, because he assured me that he has only put down 2 dogs in the last year, and that was because they were deathly ill. He promised he would find her a home.

Okay, this is an awful picture, but I just thought I would put it up anyways. This is one of my costumes for the play The Ark, in which I play Sariah. I am pregnant in this picture. And I look like a crazy person.

steph the swatherer...

This is just a random picture I thought I would throw in. Me and my cousin Nephi at a potluck after church.
Just the cutest Kale ever. He would press the phone up to his ear and pretend to talk to someone. Adorable.
Here I am swathing! Hooray for driving large machinery. I drove a swather for the first time today all by myself! It was lots of fun! I also went raking for the first time last night.
This is what I see when I swath...and now you can see. Just chopping down all of this alfalfa. It's the best, I love it.

Crazy little bear in the mountains

hahahaha so this picture is silly, but it represents how I go crazy when I am in the wilderness. My cousins and I went to the mountains and had tinfoil dinners and explored and checked out this cool old cabin. I soon discovered that when I am in the wilderness and around fires the crazy side of me that lives deep inside comes out and takes over. My cousins said I had this crazy look in my eyes while we sat around the fire. awesome
I just decided that I want to live in the wilderness and survive off the land. That would be so fantastic! I could sleep in that old cabin and have my horse there with me and then herd my cattle...best times ever! I could catch wild game and cook it over the fire. While we were in the mountains my cousin, Lydia, and I pretended we were indians and we crawled sneakily through the brush and tried to sneak up on our other cousins. It was a lot of fun. Then she ran into some stinging nettle and that was not so fun.
This is a picture of my cousin Lydia in the field with very tall thistles. While we were waiting for the rain to stop so we could start farming the alfalfa, a bunch of us went to one of the fields and pulled out the forest of thistles that had grown there. They are very spikey and very tall (some were taller than me). But I loved it.

Steph visits Utah

So this last week I was able to go to Utah and visit old friends. Some friends from Brooklyn were in town and we had lunch together and I hadn't seen them in like 5 years, I just love them. They also slept over and we had a party and caught up and chatted about the good old days. I also got to see my friend Cassi one last time, she is gone now and a graduated woman. Off to change the world! I will miss her dearly. Also in this picture we are standing in height order, but I had to crouch down a little to make it more dramatic...that's why I am standing weird.
While I was driving back to Nevada I looked out my rear view window and there was the most beautiful vibrant rainbow I had ever seen. You can't really tell in this picture but it was so bright and you could see all of the colors, it was awesome. I had to pull over and take a picture.
While in Utah I also got to see my dear sister Ashley and my awesome brother-in-law Jake and my adorable nephew Cameron. They are just the best and I love them so much! Cameron is so cute and always makes me laugh. I also went to a baby blessing for my cousin's new son, which was awesome. Life is good.