Labor Day Weekend

Hope you are all recovered from your Labor Day weekend. Maybe you actually took the day off (as you should). We did not. It is Wednesday, and I am still recovering. Good thing I'm not working yet! ;)
I finally got the energy to start some craft projects (what took me so long-I know!) I have been wanting to decorate all our cheap bookshelves and finally found the inspiration I needed. Stenciling seems to be totally in right now so I found a stencil I liked and got to work. I saw another blogger used a gold sharpie to accent her bookshelf, and I LOVED IT!!

I got the top half stenciled in one afternoon. Now I am working on filling in the lines and will do the bottom half. I can't wait to show you the finished product!

Before we took off for the weekend, these two things came in the mail. I have an OT license, yipee!!!! And do I have the sweetest friend or what?! A cute congratulatory card AND Vera Bradley hairties. All on the same day! I have no idea how she planned that so perfectly!!

Saturday morning we "splurged" on some BoSa donuts. Matt had some at work and told me how good they were. He was right! I think we will be getting these again soon! 

While waiting for the Huskers to start, Matt even helped me with a bookshelf a little. Probably mostly because he wants it to be done. Currently, there are books covering most of the walking spaces in our apartment.

After a great Husker win we got ready for our trip. Sunday morning we headed up to Flagstaff. A lady at church had told me about these lava tubes that are really fun to hike in. So as usual, we took someone's advice didn't really look into it much and went for it. WE HAD A BLAST!!!! It was so cool! Our pictures do not do this thing justice, but take my word-it was amazing.

Here is the entrance to the cave. Lucky for us, everyone and their dog also decided to hike in the cave. Normally, I don't enjoy seeing a ton of other hikers, but when were are in an unfamiliar place that is pitch dark with a flashlight from 1992 we gladly welcomed other hikers!

This was hiking down in the cave. Some areas were not very tall! My legs got a nice little workout.



So I do not do so well with a flash in a dark place, but this gives you a pretty good idea of what the cave looked like.





Kinda creepy right?

Click HERE if you want to experience part of our walk through the cave.

We were in awe of how symmetrical the cave was since it was all natural. We got a little cold in our shorts, but we enjoyed the cooler weather for a change.
We headed back up, ate some lunch at a cute little Mexican place and headed north for some more sightseeing. Our first stop was at Wupatki National Monument. We took a look at all the pueblos from the Native Americans that used to live there.

It was kind of fun seeing the ruins of the past. Then we drove over to Sunset Crater. It is a volcano that erupted a little over 900 years ago. 

It was crazy to see all the lava rock and ash.

Do you see that huge crack?!?

That night we headed into downtown Flagstaff to grab some dinner. It was such a cute downtown area. We even saw a Rolls-Royce! I wasn't expecting it  to be so much like a ski-town. I would describe it as a mix between Breckenridge, CO and Lawrence, KS.

We ate at the Hotel Weatherford which ended up being this old hotel they had restored to its original glory. The first floor held the main part of the restaurant. The second and third floors had rooms you could actually stay in as well as more restaurant seating. The second floor was filled with a group playing Irish music. We headed up to the top floor where they had the original bar and a fun outdoor patio. We chose to eat inside since we did not pack for the weather. It was so cute!! We had a blast, plus they had free popcorn!

The next day was our big hike-the main reason for our trip. Matt's friend, Eric, who we would be hiking with us called and said he talked to a group that had just finish hiking and said it was really cold. So after dinner we went to go buy some warmer clothes. I am so thankful we did-I was cold! 

We met Eric, his uncle and nephew early Monday morning to start our hike up Humphrey's peak. It is the highest point in all of Arizona. 

Can you see that beast way up there!?

After an hour or so I was getting really tired. Check us out.

Do you like my Walmart special sweatshirt? I was still really cold at this point. And did you notice I wore my headband backwards-don't judge. I had to keep my ears warm somehow. They aren't selling headband ear warmers in stores yet.

We had to hike a while to get above the tree line for any good views.

But when we did, it was pretty spectacular.

I had heard a lot of people get altitude sickness because it gets pretty high. I was definitely feeling it!

Isn't my husband so nice to document this for me???

Altitude sickness or not, we made it!!!!

Check out these views!

We weren't too far below the clouds!

Kind of looks like we are in an airplane. But we weren't.

We enjoyed lunch at the top and headed back down.

We had such a good time. Apparently so did everyone else from Phoenix because we all decided to come home at the same time. Meaning we got to enjoy a nice little hour delay on the drive home. 

We decided if we could do it all over again we would have done undergrad at Northern Arizona University. How cool would it have been to go to college here? Hiking, skiing, 75 miles from the Grand Canyon, adorable little downtown? Oh well, Kearney was nice, too! Enjoy the rest of your week. I will be sure to update you all on my craft projects as I get them finished! :)