January birthdays group style with the Randalls

We enjoyed a great birthday celebration of all the Randall's January birthdays last Tuesday evening.  Paul, me, Grandma Kurtz and Supe drove up to enjoy it.  It was actually Brady's real birthday and Bryan and Afton had waited for their presents.  Dinner was Brady's favorite - pastrami burgers, home made French fries and salad...and cake of course.  The cakes were the traditional amazing creations.  Brady had a pirate ship complete with pilfered "gold nuggets" and blazing cannons.  Afton's was a "whoo whoo" (an owl). She is into "whoo whoos" right now. Bryan had already enjoyed his carrot cake earlier in the month. Bro. Rupe, a neighbor from across the street, joined the fun too.  He has been helping Bryan make a rocking horse for Afton since before Christmas.  It just lacks a few finishing touches to be done.  It is a beautifully done piece of workmanship.  It was fun to meet Bro. Rupe.  He is a real craftsman and so willing to share his time, talents and workshop.  Thanks for inviting us up to share the fun and food.  Happy Birthday to all of you!  We love you.

Grand times at Little Black Mountain Petroglyphs...again!

Since everyone was out of school and the sun was shining, I decided the grands needed a trip to the petroglyphs.  Juge and Lance were down, so we got to include them in the fun along with Lance's mom and grandma. Ferf and kids (and a couple of  cute Borrowman cousins) and Kaebri and Tasia came along too.  It was a really beautiful day and we all had a lot of fun.  The kids went wild taking out ahead on the trail and doing plenty of exploring on their own.  The petroglyphs are cool, but add the wind and water shaped rocks and it was terrific.  So glad we could all hang out on such a beautiful day in such a beautiful place!  (The only thing that could have made it a better day would have been having Paul along.  Too bad work just couldn't be gotten out of that day.)

15 Wendy's kiddie frosties made for the perfect end to a grand "edventure".

Little Black Mountain Petroglyphs, etc.

Saturday morning we had a little bit of free time between commitments and since the sun was shining we took a short, but round about drive out to see Little Black Mountain Petroglyph Site.  We thought we knew the way, but missed the turn off the first time, so we visited a little canyon first.  It had a cool boulder at the entrance that was just standing there held up by mud.  We walked-shinnied our way up it a little way until we ran out of canyon and then decided to go and look for our original goal.  

Don't know how we missed the sign the first time by, but we got there and it was so pretty with all of the crazy water and wind shaped rocks to enjoy along with the petroglyphs.  Too bad some people have to add their own markings and bullet holes to places like this.  Still, we loved getting out in the sun and rocks.  Paul's knee is some better and it was not too strenuous.  We didn't see all there was to see because we needed to get back, but we're going to head back out there soon.

Rock Trip #1 for 2013

Last Friday/Saturday Paul and I had a great time going on our first rock trip of the year.  It was great to just get out of town and we saw some magnificent scenery and enjoyed visiting and eating good food.  We stopped in at Jacob's Lake going and coming back and there were only a few other people there.  Luckily they only have three kinds of cookies in their off season.  That made it easier not to eat too many of them with our hot chocolate.  We spent the night in Flagstaff where it was 7 below, picked up our rock and headed back.  I love that drive.  It is full of amazing views.  Hope we need some more rock soon!

The first views were of the afternoon sun on Zion. 

The next day we saw views of the Vermillion Cliffs with and without snow (north and south exposures).

The Kaibab Forest in snow.

The afternoon sun on the mountains out by Colorado City (don't know the name of these cliffs).