travel: utah, wyoming, and montana

                   hi everyone! i hope you are all having a great week so far. reed and i are back to reality after an amazing vacation last week. we headed out west and flew into salt lake city, utah to then rent a car and start driving! we have really come to enjoy these trips as we did this same thing in california this past spring for our one year anniversary. i literally spend hours mapping every detail out and planning our route and so far i am doing pretty good with travel guides  ha! (reed seems to think so anyway)

                  i'm not kidding when i say, we would love to move to jackson, wyoming some day. wow! the views, the quietness, the small towns... i could go on forever. we absolutely loved this trip and it was just what we needed to unplug (we barely had service) and spend some time in the mountains just the two of us. it was beautiful!!! we loved how quiet it was and felt right at home. we stayed in jackson and enjoyed some shopping, good eats, and cold weather. we visited the best shop (i literally fell in love) called "made" and also their second store called "mountain dandy". the cutest shops ever!! we also had "persephone bakery" on our list as well and it definitely hit the spot for coffee and morning breakfast.

                we loved our lodge at the jackson hole lodge. it was filled with mountain details and a cozy fireplace! the weather was perfect! our perfect weather is anywhere in the 60's, 50's, and 40's with some snow and occasional temperatures in the 30's and thats exactly what we got!! we were so excited!!! most people take off to the beach in the fall, but we did the exact opposite and so glad that we did. after jackson for a few days, we spent some time driving through the teton national park and then to the yellowstone national park. we loved the drive through west yellowstone and really enjoyed the parks. there was so much to see and do, i was so glad we were able to fit it all in while finding time to slow down and relax as well.  we love the flexibility of going at our own pace and being able to hop in the car and find new places off our planned "route."

               after a full day at yellowstone one day, we decided to take this random road to see where it would lead and we ended up driving 2 hours out of the way and came upon an amazing lake with unbelievable views. we ran into small towns with beautiful houses on hilltops and large farms with rustic barns; it was literally the best drive ever. we couldn't stop saying "wow" and "oh my goodness" and "can we move here." like i said, it was pretty perfect! ha i wanted to share some photos of our vacation and some details in case any of you were planning a trip here and wanted some information. if you ever have questions about any trip or get-a-way, please feel free to ask :) i hope you all enjoy these photos as much as we do. have a great week and i will see you soon!! xo

p.s.... sorry for picture overload, there were too many good ones

he threw snowballs at me any chance he could get :) ha!

the geyser's were so interesting to learn about and see in person

more snowballs.... he was pretty serious about this