Mesa Verde/Arches

We got started early Friday morning and drove toward Cortez Colorado.  We drove by the Glen Canyon Damn where we took a quick potty break and let the kids see Lake Powell.

Then we took a little detour to see Horseshoe Bend.  It was 106 degrees- it was so hot that Kate refused to do the 1.2 mile round trip walk so she stayed in the shade by the van while the rest of us walked out to the view point.

Lily cried, complained, or moaned the entire way (note her grouchy face here) but inspite of that the stop was worth it because WOW- it was beautiful.

So incredible - but really really hot.

After that we had a horrible Sonic visit where they didn't have onion rings 😢 among other things - but for me it was all about the onion rings.  Then we got back on the road and drove through monument valley.  

It cost a pretty penny (charged per person rather than per vehicle) to drive to where we could take these pictures.  The rocks were pretty interesting but probably not worth the $.

Emmy and I were trying to mimic the rocks that looked like they were giving two thumbs ups.

Thursday night we realized four corners had opened up and we could go - hurrah!  I called them and they said they didn't close till 8:00 so we felt confident we could make it.  We arrived at 6:15 to find an offical looking truck parked across the entrance.  They were closed; there was much murmuring and nashing of teeth.  Luckily, our hotel was quite close so we got cosy while Greg brought our own Chinese buffet right to our room.  We had so much extra Greg took it to the hotel clerk who had recomended the restaurant.  While chatting with Greg the clerk said the guy at Four Corners probably just closed early because he was ready to go home 😩.  Such a bummer.

Saturday morning we woke up bright and early, filled our water bottles with ice and headed to Mesa Verde.

The drive in was beautiful- we saw a a deer and wild horses then arrived at the start of our long house tour.  Luckily our tour started early enough that it wasn't too hot.

And that little walk in the heat was so worth it!  I was amazed by the village built on the side of the cliff.  We learned that ranchers found the ruins in the 1880's.  So incredible.  We got to wander the ruins while rangers kept us on the right path, answered questions and taught us about the natives who build these amazing structures.

Built in 1200 - a similar time as Machu Pichu.  Our kids started calling it Wish Machu Pichu.

This isn't a window - it is a door.  The entries were very small; they assume it helped keep the heat in (smaller area to cover with pelts) as well as small children (a fall would be tragic).

There was a seep spring right into the back of the village where they could get fresh water.

Check out this four story house!  In many of the ruins you can see where ladders would have rested. 

After our walk was over we walked over to other pueblo ruins that showed the evolution of homes in the area and Mack spoted a green collared lizard.  Emily, Greg and I fought the heat and trekked over to the long house overlook.  It was cool to look across at the village we had just wandered.  The other kids had returned to the car so we booked it back to explore the rest of Mesa Verde and to escape the extreme heat.

We enjoyed PBand H in the car and took a quick look at spruce tree house.

It had this amazing tower and the best preserved walls that we saw all day.

We drove every open road in the park - from certain view points were able to see several ruins including the largest ruin, cliff palace.  It was all amazing.  Then we hit the road again in order to see Aches National Park.

It was hot - so so hot.  Over 105 all day long and dangerous to hike in so unfortunately, we didn't do much exploring.  We did a mile hike in order to see the famous delicate arch.  Can you spot it between Mack and I?

While we drove we tried to spot arches.  It amazed me how many we could spotted; there are over 2,000 arches in the park.  It is incredible to imagine how perfect all the elements must be to create so many arches.

We still had a few hours to drive and didn't want to drive it all in the dark but we still managed to cover every road in the park.  I think we will need to go back -still so many arches to see, but we are going when it is cooler next time.

On our way to the exit there was one more short hike that would get us up close to three arches.  The kids were done so Greg and I took the opportunity to take a quick hike together.  So amazing and so hot!

The boys watched a soccer game in Wendy's for dinner while I FaceTimed Natali (at home MTCing).  We made a late night arrival to our hotel in Parachute, Colorado but we pulled off an amazing day.

Mesquite Days

With the van filled will dozens of non-fiction books for the library challange and enough stuff to last us 16 days we drove to Utah and spent a quick enjoyable evening with the Petersens before waking early and driving to Cedar City for Dahlia's baptism.  It was fun to share my birthday with this awsome kid again.  Greg even made me this fabulous donut birthday cake with Krispy Kreme donuts, whipped cream and homemade chocolate sauce.  It was a hit.  

We enjoys cousin time and cahtting with Don and Teresa then drove off to Mesquite to enjoy a few days with Grandma and Papa.  After church I took Greg to the St. George airport and came home to find the girls playing games.  We got together for a fourth of July dinner with Petersens and Brad's family.  

We got home from Brad's to be welcomed by Teresa and her kids.  They just couldn't wait to spend more time together.  While Teresa was napping the kids packed their bags and were ready to go when she woke up so what could she say?!  My kids were thrilled.  We watched fireworks from Grandma's house and then had a hard time getting the littles to stop talking and just go to sleep.

The next morning the oldest 5 girls were up and ready to go to breakfast with papa by 5:45am unfortunately, Lily and Dahlia were up at 4:00 for no apparent reason.  When the big kids left I took the littles to find a bakery but everything but Smiths was closed.  They were still pretty thrilled with their donut holes.

Once they were dressed and ready Brad took the two littles and Emily down to Bunker pond to fish.  He spend over an hour with them.  They sure love him!

Let the swimming begin!  The girls swam for hours and hours.  I think Kate was out there for over 6 hours and she got a sunburn to prove it.  She reaplied sunscreen several times even.  Ava and the twins joined the party.  Grandma ordered pizza and brought it poolside so they didn't even have to get out for lunch.

The little girls came in earlier than the oldest kids so they had a dress up party with Brad.  He wore some fancy pants and even carried a pink piggy purse.  What a sport!  Lily just lights up whenever she sees him.  He is such a great uncle to these girls.

We said goodbye to Addy and Violet (they had summer school the next day) and said goodbye to the twins (off to girls camp) but Cecily and Dahlia got to stay with us and we enjoyed a Come Follow Me lesson about the three degrees of glory (represented by the squishmallows) from Emily and Cecily.  Do you see the creepy headed bear that represents perdition?  So fun.  Then we connected with Brad in order to take their dog, Aussie, to the dog park.  The girls actually loved the dog park- we stayed long enough that Grandma was in bed when we got home.

Our last day we cleaned up, packed up, then went to the splash pad park and the splash pad drink place.  Then a bit more swimming before we headed to Teresa's house.

The girls LOVED Teresa's house.  We had about 52 hours at their house and the girls never wanted to leave.  They played games, made waffle cookies, and the oldest three stayed up watching Hannah Montana till 1:00am.  But I can't be critical because I stayed up talking till 2.  

The next morning Violet and Addy skipped school.  The kids stayed busy playing video games, playing outside, enjoying Teresa's craft store basement, making snow cones, decorating shirts, and we enjoyed a stage production of Pirates of Penzance.  It was so fun.  

We all got our exercise with a late night Just Dance party.

The next day the girls went to school and we finished all of our crafts and maybe decorated more shirts.  Teresa's craft store selection and creative mind could solve any crafting delema.  

After school we met the girls and went to the park.  We waded in the little river, played badmitten and just enjoyed our last hours together.  We ended our time at an old fasioned soda fountain where we devoured our different treats.  Then we did a major clean up and said goodbye and drove to St. George where we checked into our hotel room.  I got the girls to bed then snuck away and picked up the boys - time fore phase two of this epic adventure.

 

Family Pics 2021

 Can you spot the photo bomber?  Luke ended spending the night the evening of family pictures so he came and entertained us while Heather took our photos down by the river right by her house.  Natali had been set apart the day before so the pictures were luckily right before she entered the MTC two days later.

We had a hard time getting Kate on Mack's back but this pic was worth all the trouble.

The silly pictures were some of my favorite ones this year.  Love these crazy kids.

Emmy was playing at being the model - cracked me up.