Round-up Part 3, or, Celebrating our 10th

As noted in an earlier post, Ron and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary in August. We'd been talking for a while about going away somewhere to mark the occasion....places like Hawaii, Cancun, Bahamas, and even Peru were mentioned. Alas, because we have the responsibility of young children that need to be cared for, those locales will be saved for a later time. :) So instead, we decided to take a quick weekend trip to California. We made our final destination San Diego when we found out that one of the touring companies of "Wicked" was playing there. I have been wanting to see "Wicked" for years, but it just hadn't happened, and when it was in SLC earlier this year, there were no tickets to be had.

We flew in Friday morning, picked up our car, and made our way to San Diego(we flew into Long Beach). We went to the Newport Beach Temple and walked around the grounds as it was closed for maintenance. We had a hotel in Old Town San Diego, so that evening we strolled around there. Went to where the new and improved remodeled Mormon Batallion visitors center is....now I need to plan another trip back down in January to check it out when it reopens! That night we saw Harry Potter 6......yeah, it takes us a while to see movies! The next day was our "Wicked" matinee. It was better than I ever could've dreamed! So well acted and sung by all the players. I never expected it to be so funny, and yet I (of course) cried at the end. I could have sat through another performance right then. :) Too bad they kicked us out! That night we enjoyed fabulous Old Town mexican food, and then walked along Mission Beach at sunset. Sunday was spent driving back up the coast as we had an early flight out on Monday morning. We stopped off at a couple of beaches and enjoyed the tide pools and waves. That evening was dinner at Bubba Gump Shrimp Company...I've never eaten so many shrimp in one sitting! The weekend was fabulous, so relaxing, and a wonderful way to reconnect with each other....we haven't spent that many days with just each other since our honeymoon, and it was so refreshing to just be able to talk to each other without the constant interruption of our (wonderful) kids.

Mission Beach



Aliso Beach

Round-up, Part 1.....

So yeah....it's been a month...

I've had all sorts of plans for posts to catch up the rest of our summer.....but, they obviously haven't materialized. So, I'm just going to throw everything together here in a big mish-mash post, or posts!

The rest of our days in Duck Creek (July....):

Along with lots and lots of 4-wheeling, we also went to Bryce one day. I had never been, although I'd heard much about the beauty found there, and wasn't disappointed.

I read the funniest thing on a sign at one of the overlooks. It was talking about the first settlers around that area. He was (not surprisingly) named Bryce, and was a Mormon settler that had his home and ranchlands at the eastern base of the canyons later named after him. There was a quote from him about the canyons that he lived near, and it was, "It's a hell of a place to lose a cow." I absolutely busted up! Maybe because it reminded me so much of what my ranching uncles and grandfathers would have said about it!

After being in the quiet of the mountains in Duck Creek though, the major busloads of crowds at Bryce were surprising. We went to a couple of overlooks, and did a hike down into the canyon on the Navajo Loop trail. Something I'll have to remember for next time I go....the beginning part of the hike is easy, with a lot of switchbacks all heading downhill.....it's the hiking of switchbacks UP to get back to the car that STINKS! I think we should get some of that government stimulus $$ to Bryce and install a ski lift or something to get you back up out of that hole! ;)

Top of the Trail....

The bottom of the trail....at the base of the very, very tall and tenacious Douglas Firs that grow in this quite small and almost constantly shaded slot canyon.

The 4wheeling at Duck Creek was fabulous. There were hardly any people there in the middle of the week, and the trails were a lot of ATV-only trails through the forest. OUR FAVORITE KIND! We saw so many deer(including adorable twin fawns), and beautiful scenery, and the smells of the ponderosa pines and douglas fir made my week. :) We took a long ride out to a cave that was created from a lava floe that was very cool to explore around. It is called Mammoth Cave. It was open to exploring when we were there, but in the Fall they close it up as it is the home of hibernating bats (including a couple of endangered species) in the winter. We also found a fun creek to ride through and see how high we could get the water up around us...always a favorite thing for the kids! We will definitely visit Duck Creek again.

Here's a video we took of our little creek crossing. You don't see Riley since she doesn't like to get wet and muddy....we like water crossings for that exact reason!

Duck Creek 1...the digs

We took our annual family 4-wheeling adventure the end of July. A little different from other years, as we didn't go to Colorado. *gasp*! We were sad about it as the time got closer, but had so much fun where we went, that it's all good!

We decided to stick a little closer to home this year, so after finding out that the Duck Creek area in Dixie National Forest had lots of ATV trails, we found and rented a cabin there for a week. It was a great choice! In Colorado, we are limited to a few trails (because of age restrictions and difficulty level) so we really just do the same ones when we are there. We usually put about 50 miles on our ATV's in a weeks time. At Duck Creek.....well, when I tell you that we put about 170 miles on the ATV's, does that tell you how many trails we found and how fun the riding was?! And we didn't even do 1/3 of the available trails! Most of it was our favorite type of riding as well, just ATV tracks through forest. :)





The cabin was beautiful. Ron was excited about the pool table there, but then we never ended up playing! Which is good, since he now realizes his wish of having one in our basement is certainly not needed. We had deer in the meadow behind us, including a doe and her little twin fawns, and lots of chipmunks, which were quite irritating by the end of the week. We had rain a couple of afternoons and evenings, which was perfect for cooling things down, wetting down the dust on the trails, and making the forest smell divine.







We went fishing, which the little kids hadn't done before. They had fun although we didn't manage to get even a bite. As we sat there with our fishing poles we watched the fish jumping for the bugs above the water....I guess the waterlogged earthworms and powerbait weren't as appetizing. We even moved over to where the fish were jumping....yeah, not a bite! The ducklings kept coming over to investigate though....so cute!

Now, on to picture overload:

The Beauty of Organization

I finally finished a very long put-off project this week...

For months, the kids basement playroom has been uninhabitable.

You could not see the floor. They could not use the toys. It was completely beyond the point of them being able to clean it up, and I didn't want to do it and avoided the chore for as long as I could. I planned on getting it done before summer break, but put it off.

Then it was summer break.

The kids were home 24-7.

Then the weather changed, and we had the rainiest June ever. So, not only were the kids home....they were stuck INSIDE! Amazing what a little motivation for peace will do to kickstart me!

After a major purging, many trips to DI and the ward nursery bin, and a number of full garbage bags, the playroom is clean, neat, organized, and beautiful. The kids have also been threatened to within an inch of their lives instructed that they need to do their very best to keep it that way.






To address any questions that may arise from these photos:

• Yes, I am aware that the kids still have too many toys.
• Ellie has been wearing dress-ups since she was allowed to access the dress-up box again. She may never wear normal clothes again.
• The mural? I started that thing when I was pregnant with Jared. It's still not completed. He'll be six in a month. I have a serious problem with follow-through.
  

Be back soon!

We're outta here! Off to enjoy some fun, sun, and Disney wonder for a few days. The kids are beside themselves with excitement, and I'm just hoping I get everything together in time for our flight in the morning. Until next week, adieu!

Gone 4wheeling! Be back soon!

We're off tomorrow for the beautiful state of Colorado! We can't wait to enjoy the quiet beauty, cool weather, and fun times.

Hope everyone has a great week! I'll be back for more fun the week of the 11th...I'll blog then if I can fit it in between dentist appointments, haircuts, and back to school stuff....whew, I need a vacation just thinking about it. :)

Spring Break Day 5-8 The End!

Thursday was a fun, fun day. First, it started out nice and early with a phone call from our neighbors back home. Our smoke alarms were going off. No visible smoke or flames, and they apparently had been going off for a while, so that was a little heartening that our house wasn't burning down...but still!

In our brilliance, we hadn't left a key with anyone...nor was there a key hidden anywhere...so Ron asked the neighbor to go break the glass in the back door to get in and check the house....of course in hindsight, we should have had him break the basement window that is already cracked and needs to be replaced. Even better, the same neighbor also told us after we got home that he probably could've just jimmied the door from the garage into house with a credit card. But no, we had him break the big tempered glass double-paned window in our back french door....little cubes of glass everywhere....and nothing wrong with the house except some confused smoke alarms. Then two neighbors came over and cleaned up all the glass. I am still embarrassed. My house wasn't clean, or even straightened up, and my two pine-sol clean neighbors were here to see the disaster of my house! But I am eternally grateful that the house wasn't on fire, and that I didn't have to walk into a huge glass covered mess when I got home.

So after all that fun....we went to the ZOO! Hooray! I LOVE the Phoenix Zoo. One of the best zoo's out there! The kids had a blast...look:


At "Sting Ray Bay", the kids got to get up close and personal with sting rays(with sting barbs removed) and sharks. Very cool! We even saw a couple jump up and catch air out of the water! Do you like Ellie's monkey backpack/leash? Best thing ever. She loves to wear it because it's cute, and I love it because if she's getting too adventurous and far from me, I just pull the little tail out of the pocket and can keep her from straying too far....and you don't get dirty looks from people for having your kid on a harness and leash like some of the other contraptions out there.

Nicole and I on "Josh" the camel. Jared chickened out, and Riley wasn't interested...or thought she was too cool to ride a camel!

Hmmmm...Right where she belongs! ;)

Everyone, take cover! There's a monkey escaped from his cage!!!! Just kidding...isn't he just cute?!


The favorite, by far. The petting zoo. Oh the joy of brushing the goats. I tried to get some cute shots of the kids, but would someone explain to me how to not only end up with pictures of their backs?! They were cruising so fast all over that pen that I hardly got their faces in any shots! Following them around to make sure they are safe and trying to take pictures at the same time just didn't work. :) I think in the last one Ellie is trying to determine what style of hairdo this goat would like.

Friday Ron went golfing, and we played on the slide a little more. Auntie Beth took Riley for a pedicure, and then that afternoon the kids, Beth, and I had a fun get-together at a park with my cousin's wife OneHM, Crazymama, and Jamie(private blogger). Too fun to meet up with them and meet their kiddos! And how dumb am I......didn't get the camera out.....thpppt! Oh well, it was still fun! That night, we roasted s'mores in Auntie Beth and Uncle Scott's firepit, and packed up.

Saturday and Sunday was driving.....we had a fun lunch in Tuba City....if you ever go, the only place there with grass to picnic on is at the LDS meeting house there in town! The closer we got to Utah, the worse the wind was. Monument Valley was pretty, but too windy and dusty to stop and record with pictures. Moab, where we planned to stay was full...very full. Any of the empty hotel rooms were taken up with campers who decided to escape the wind for the night...it was bad! So on to Green River, and I think we got the 2nd to last room there! (Spillover from Moab?!) The kids were happy though...three words...indoor heated pool. We got home Sunday. An hour before we got there, our neighbor called. Our alarms were going off, AGAIN!!!! So we stopped and got 12 new 9V batteries and replaced them all when we got home...no more problems since....weird!

Spring Break Day 3 & 4

So after two days of driving, we took it easy on Tuesday. Just hung out around my sister's! My brother and his wife live next door, and they had a fun giant blow-up waterslide that they put up, so the little kids went over and played with their cousin Grant on that...all but Ellie...she didn't want to get wet, so she just played with toys in her swimsuit all day! I am not sure what I was (or wasn't!) thinking, but I never took my camera over for the waterslide adventures! Probably subliminal worry that it would get wet and ruined....

That evening, my SIL Kennedy shared her babysitter with us (thank you!) and all the adults and older kids went out for delicious Mexican food....you can't get good Mexican food in Utah. (Cafe Rio is not Mexican food!) Oh, and we had In 'n' Out for lunch that day....and ran into my cousin Ginny there! I love Arizona!

Wednesday, we took the kiddos to "Horton Hears a Who". It was cute....although not cute enough that we'll buy it when it comes out on DVD! But the kids had fun, and were remarkably good. Then we played around the mall for a while...they had some fun playground and splash park stuff.

Got some fun pictures that evening....Arizona sunsets put off great light. too bad I didn't discover it until right at the end of the light or I would've gotten some more shots! Then the kids went to bed, since after 4 days of late bedtimes, no naps, hard playing, they were exhausted and way grumpy!

Ellie and Grant

Nicole, with an action added (Pioneer Woman's Lovely and Ethereal)

Spring Break--Day 1&2

While planning our road trip to AZ, we had decided to take a bit of a detour down through Moab, spend the night and do a little hiking....but the day before we left, we were worried that since we hadn't thought ahead and gotten a hotel room, that Moab might not work. So we decided to go to Page, AZ instead and look into renting a boat for a few hours and explore Lake Powell.

We had planned to leave bright and early Sunday morning, but due to being up late packing, the alarm was slept through and we got a later start than planned. Oh well, so goes life! Since we got to Page too late to rent the boat that day, we just did it Monday and got to my sister's late that night.

It was more fun to do it Monday anyway. That day was Ron's birthday, so it was a fun and different birthday activity...and at the amount of money we spent to rent the boat, not a birthday activity we'll repeat anytime too soon! Maybe he'll get the new BBQ grill for Father's Day...! :)

Happy Birthday Daddy!

We had the boat for 4 hours. We left Wahweap and went to the dam, and got as close as we could to that for a look, then we went to Navajo Canyon, which was a beautiful, twisting, high-walled canyon. We found a beach, had lunch, played in the sand, and then it was time to head back. On the way back we were driving through a marina at "wakeless speed" (extremely s..l..o..w) and passed a Coconino County Sheriff boat. They saw the kids wearing the life jackets and gave them a t-shirt for being safe! Goofy shirt, but fun anyway! :) New PJ's anyway!

Well, look at that...Riley does exist, AND we got a smile! :)

Ellie making a "snowman"...that's what she said anyway...

In Navajo Canyon...we pulled into this cavelike thing in the wall and tried to get some cool pictures of the water reflecting up on the wall...I like how the sun rays showed up in this shot. The kids also got to experiment with echoes and they thought that was pretty cool! We echoed the "Happy Birthday" song off the canyon walls!

Happy Monday.

What a great weekend! I love General Conference, even if my kids don't! Jared would cry every time a new session would come on. I still can't figure out why, since it wasn't like we made him sit there and watch it. I'm not doing that to my four year old! We had activities for all of them, options to go play in their rooms or playroom, but he'd still cry, and say, "Not again!" Maybe it was because he knew our attention would be on the speakers, and not on him? But he survived, and now it's over for six months!

I loved many of the talks, but my absolute favorite was Elder Ballard. I came away from that talk feeling like I'm doing okay as a mother, and with a new resolve to continue to do better. Thank you Elder Ballard! He really has become one of my favorites and this last talk really solidified that!

A better feeling than I had last October after another certain (un-named) talk was given and I came away feeling like a failure as a mother, and with a "why even try" attitude. Wrong, I know, but that is what happened. But after yesterday, I feel better about life!

To another subject....it's beginning to look less like Spring today..that tends to happen when two inches of snow falls and covers everything...grrr....good thing it's Spring Break next week and we are heading SOUTH! First to Moab, then further south down to ARIZONA!!!! Hooray! I'm gonna be WARM...HOT even!

Disney FUN!

I said I had pictures, and I wasn't kidding! I think I'll separate the pictures and post in three installments, according to what it's about!

So, installment 1, Disneyland:

We arrived Tuesday morning at 7:30 am, rented a car, and drove straight to the hotel and walked to the Magic Kingdom. That morning was a killer! We left our house at 4:15, that's AM folks, to catch our flight to CA. The kids loved the flight, it was Nicole and Jared's first airplane ride, but I was so tired I forgot to take any pictures on the plane...oops!

Disneyland was fun, but very crowded dang it! The park workers told us they were having record crowds for this time of year, and even extended the hours a couple nights. Perfect. We were there with half the state of Utah (I'm serious), and the rest of the people there were from AZ!

Riley liked all the big rides, Tower of Terror, California Screamin', etc.


Nicole was again the bravest 5 year old I know and went on EVERYTHING she could! She did Tower of Terror twice, and California Screamin', and all the roller coasters at Disneyland.


Jared was tall enough this year to start going on some of the bigger rides and roller coasters. He didn't like Space Mountain or the Matterhorn, but loved Thunder Mountain, Splash Mountain, Grizzly Rapids, and Star Tours. Both he and Nicole loved the "play area" in California Adventure, but the name escapes me....Something redwood?!?

Ellie loved Pirates of the Carribean, Small World, and was barely tall enough to go on the little roller coaster in Toon Town....so being the abusive parents we are, we took all 21+ months of her on it! I couldn't help but laugh at her face as we went down the first hill! Absolute terror! But by the end of the ride, she was laughing and having a grand time, so I guess she forgave us.

Ron and I did most of them. I hate Tower of Terror, so Ron did that, and Ron didn't want to get wet, so I went on Grizzly Rapids and got soaked....I even got wet the next day on Splash Mountain. I went on California Screamin' and thought I was going to die....I didn't feel the need to repeat that one! We were both sad that Indiana Jones was broken the whole time we were there...it's been 7 years since I've done that ride since the last 2 times I've been at Disneyland I've been pregnant. The Haunted Mansion was all done up for Halloween in a "Nightmare Before Christmas" theme, and it was fun.

All in all, a great trip! Although there are no pictures of Ron....he was there! He was behind the camera in all these.

Other California Fun....

Since you can only go to Disneyland so many times in one week.... ;)

We did spend one day seeing some other sights!

Balboa Island and the beach, and San Juan Capistrano. No swallows there, they had returned to Argentina for the winter, but the flowers and buildings were beautiful. We were even able to gt the kids interested in a bit of the history. Ron had fun taking pictures at Capistrano, and the shots would have really turned out fabulous if we had a "real" camera!

Here you go!












Isn't Riley just a sweetie with the rabbit ears on Jared?!























Jared didn't wait for us to change him into a swimsuit...he ran straight for the water, not realizing that the waves will come up, knock you down, and drench you head to toe. So he played in his clothes and changed into his dry swimsuit for the rest of the days activities!
















The Mission at San Juan Capistrano...told you it was pretty!





























When did I start looking so OLD?! ugh....I should delete that picture, but I had to prove Ron did go on vacation with us!































Hopefully all these pictures didn't cause this response in you: