Crazy Summer!!!!!

Okay...okay...as many of you have pointed out it has once again been a super long time since we have made a post. We are sorry. Here is a quick recap of what we have been up to that has kept us from Blogging.

~PERU~
On June 28th (the same day Dave's parents returned from their three year mission to Mexico, don't worry we caught them on our layover in Houston) we were able to go to Peru with Mandi's family (Thanks Mandi's mom and dad!!). This was our 2nd trip to Peru. We had the chance to go last year with a group from Weber State and serve the people in the Northern Amazon Basin. This time we got to travel throughout villages in the Andes. It did not even feel like the same country as last year. The first time we were able to get by with our broken Spanish, but this year we had not prepared our Quechua (the native language of the Incas that many of the natives in the remote villages we visited still speak).
It was an absolutely amazing experience that we will never be able to express enough gratitude for. This trip once again reaffirmed for us how truly blessed we are. What made it even more amazing was to share that experience with more of the people we love!!
Some of the awesome Peru highlights:

~Two hour drives on steep, scary, dirt roads with hundreds of switchbacks.
~The Children!!!
~Brass Bands playing in your ears while you try to obtain a manual blood pressure.
~Playing soccer at 13,000 feet high
~Painting Faces
~Learning some Quechua (some is used very loosely there)
~Using the community toilets (if you can call them that)
~Free Echocardiograms (dave's ticker is lookin' good!)
~Trying to teach the children some english (Okey-Dokey)
~Broken Coccyx (stubborn Hemo!)
~Dallin, Estas Caliente? (Thank you Cammie, we will be eternally grateful!!)
~Homes with dirt floors and no running water, but a functioning TV and Stereo!!
~Listening to the flight of the Condor, again and again and again....
~Machu Picchu, Pisac, Ollantaytambo, "Sexy Womand" and all the other AMAZING Inca Ruins
~Alpacas!
~Peruvian Cuisine (Guinea Pig, Alpaca, nasty Ketchup and lots and lots of bologna sandwiches!)
~Mom calling all the Peruvian women "mamamama" and telling them to "escuchiscuchi"
~Mandi's "Spaznish" (Thank you ben) yo quiero una blanketa
~Convincing the children that Jessica was Barbie in the flesh
~Learning that 20 minutes peruvian time is really 3 hours
~Dave Winning the Pull up contest at the Ocean.
~The footless wonder climbing the steep rocky inca trails with the best of them (and showing many of them up!)
~Hours of Charades to pass the 18 hour day (Make sure Jenn is on your team!!)
~Trying to not get hit crossing the streets!

~Last, but not least...Barbie head.

Needless to say it was an amazing trip.

~The Move~

Soon after we got home from Peru we had to start saying our good-byes. Dave left his job at South Davis Hospital after 3 years of working as a Medic and Mandi left her (dream) job at Primary Children's Hospital (shout out to Same Day Surgery, Mandi loves and misses you all!!!!).

Two days after Mandi's last day at work, and the day after Dave's 30-mile trek with his brother Kenny we packed up and headed for Arizona.

So here we are. Dave has had his first week of lectures. Mandi started her new job at Phoenix Children's Surgical Center. We are living with Dave's super nice Uncle Chris and Aunt Pat while we wait for our house to close (looks like it will be the 12th, YEAH!!....To be continued on future posts). So far it has been a great experience. Of course we love and miss all you Utahns, but thanks to Dave's awesome family and our new friends, Arizona is starting to feel more like home.