We just got back from a fun family reunion/vacation and it was a great time!! Lots of driving but the kids did great. I know this is a lot of pictures, but I chose from over 300!! Here is the 1st leg of the journey. We left last Thursday morning and 5 minutes into the drive, Caleb had fallen asleep! (shades and all)
1st night stop: Henry's lake. Great view of the mountains, but LOTS of mosquito's and a little rainy, but that didn't stop us!!
Can you see the dirt on her bottom AND mouth!!??
We went on a little walk in the rain and even saw a double rainbow :)
Staying out of the rain in the tent trailer |
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We arrived in Utah for Grandma Great's famous margaritas!! They were great!
Greeting everyone and ready for a fun weekend!
Getting measured for the 1st time on Papa and Grandma Great's door
Cousin fun
I love how Caleb was holding his hands
The next morning, we headed to my Aunt and Uncle's for some family pics (i didn't get one of the WHOLE family - that is on another camera *all 53 of us*) but here is one of all the great grand kids
Grand kids
Kids
Then, time for some fun in the water!! Grace loved these little chairs and carried them all over the lawn
Now time for the corn shucking contest - fun and a great way to shuck over 60 pieces of corn!! Also learned a great new way of cooking a huge amount of corn. Put it all in a cooler, boil water to cover the corn and pour in. Then just keep the cooler shut for about 1 hour and it's cooked!!
Even earned some great prizes for all the work!
Making a pyramid
Having fun in the big girl car!
This was Hayden's favorite thing to do...and he got pretty good at aiming!
Launching bottle rockets
Pinata time!
What are Mark and Tyler doing??
Being heckled by Uncle Turkey before the water balloon competition
Sleeping baby's....I love how they are in the same position!
Sleeping Anna??!!
Wii on the back deck
A little rain didn't stop us from doing our Minute to Win It games in the garage!
Junk in the trunk
Where are these little ones escaping to?
Dress-ups at Grandma Great's
Fun dinner celebrating 70 years of marriage and Grandma and Papa Great both turning 90 this year
Sisters
After the reunion, we took the rest of the week to travel! We started off at the dinosaur museum (a lot has changed in our family in 4 years! But the dinosaurs look the same :)
Wouldn't want to be stepped on by one of these!!
Then
Now
I love Caleb's face, looking up at the big skeleton!
Digging for fossils
We got Grace to stand still for 1 second to get this picture :)
Happy to be out of the stroller!
Then, we headed to Lava Hot Springs for some camping and swimming fun. I didn't get any pictures of the swimming, but Hayden and Lilly both went down the big slides by themselves several times and had a great time!
Then, onto Yellowstone. Here are the kids learning about different animals and getting to touch the furs.
The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. You can see in the background the falls....we hiked closer and closer and even hiked "Uncle Tom's trail" and went down AND then UP again 323 steps. We were proud of Hayden and Lilly who did it without help and even Caleb, who did most of the steps by himself!!
Taking a break along the trail
Getting closer!
Sweaty but we made it!! Now we have to climb back up???
We tried to find all 50 state license plates and were happy to find Rhode Island! We took a break right by here and it was funny to see how many people walked by and got excited about this license plate...they must have been doing the same thing! By the end of the trip, we still had 4 states we hadn't seen (Alaska, New Hampshire, Louisiana and Connecticut)
Can you spot the elk horns?
Boiling mud volcano...the picture doesn't do it justice!
Hayden's favorite - the Dragon's Mouth Cave - steam came out like a dragon was breathing it out of the cave. Pretty cool!
Working hard to earn junior ranger badges (Hayden was very serious about this and even wore his Glacier badge all vacation!)
Caleb had a sheet that you crossed off all the animals that you saw so he could earn is "junior junior badge sticker". So, anytime we saw an animal, Mark would say "guess we can cross that off the list". On our last day, we saw a lot of geysers going off as we were driving so Caleb said "hey dad, guess you can cross the steams off your list"!! He was our best sight seer and got really good at finding buffalo while we were driving.
Getting the badge!
Proud Junior Rangers!
Fun by the campfire!
Tired out after a long day of hiking!
Waiting and waiting and waiting for old faithful
This was the last picture I could take at Old Faithful....about 1 second later, the wind changed and we were sprayed!! It was a moment of chaos!! Caleb was screaming, all the people around us were running. Mark grabbed Lilly and Grace and ran for cover, but Hayden and Caleb tackled me, so we sat crumpled and being sprayed until would get get up without being trampled! In that split second, the fear of boiling acidic water covering us was not good, but then we realized the water was actually really cold and only just water :) So, although we never actually saw the geyser go off because of all the chaos, we can now say we've been soaked by Old Faithful and it was a high light of the trip! :)
We ate a lot of lunches like this
The Grand Prismatic Spring....so pretty and colorful!
Grace didn't care :)
We saw 100's of buffalo!
On our way out of Yellowstone - a whole herd of mule deer hanging out outside of the Mammoth clinic. I guess they liked the grass!!
It was a great trip! One of our favorite quotes from Lilly as we were leaving Yellowstone: "if you see a pet with no owner, then we know we are still in Yellowstone!!" Those are some BIG pets we saw!!
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