Happy Birthday #9 to our Sweet Ellie!

I don't know if Ellie got any of her presents on the real day, but she seemed fine with getting some before and some after.  We were part of the after gang and went up for dinner/party. Next year she's into the double digits...growing up way too fast.  She got quite the variety of gifts - clothes, girl legos, cute little fuzzy animals, and a game.  She seemed quietly pleased with everything. Thanks for letting us join the fun Ellie.  We love you! 

Family Camp 2015 - the 10th year!

We had a GREAT family camp with Juge and Lance in charge this year.  We went over by Escalante, Utah and pretty much had the Blue Spruce Campground all to ourselves.  We went from Wednesday July 8th - Sat. afternoon July 11th.  Everyone made it this time except Bean.  As always the food was yummy and we had a lot of fun playing and visiting in camp.  The kids really enjoyed the little stream running by the camp and that kept them all pretty much entertained along with all of the other natural entertainments of the outdoors.  The men put up a swing that they enjoyed too and Bryan's hammock is always a hit, though it may have seen it's last days this time.  The Borrowmans had a bit of car trouble, but it worked out in the end thankfully.  My only complaint was our herniated airbed and the airbed we brought for Supe and Beacher that developed a major leak.  But we all survived and enjoyed ourselves anyway!  The weather was wonderful.  It was so green from recent rains and we had just a bit of rain here and there in the day and some at night to keep things cool and the campground was very shady.  It was actually a little too cool sometimes and I can't remember having any flies or mosquitoes to bug  us at all!

Our outing to Upper Calf Creek Falls was so much fun!  We saw beautiful scenery on the way there, had a tailgate lunch and then hiked down to the falls and played in the pools above it.  It was a pretty hot hike so the cold water was bearable.  We ended up with quite a few of us doing the cliff dive and slide after Supe checked it out for safety and showed us how it was done!  Then we hiked out and went over Hell's Back Bone Bridge on our way back to camp.  Being wet was great on the hike out and it wasn't nearly as hot then anyway!  Such a fun day!  Moss and Christie had to come late and they missed out on this part of the fun unfortunately.

On Friday we hiked Lower Box Hollow and found a place where some rappelling could be done.  We were short on time, but Brady, Eden and Tasia took the challenge and did a great job with Supe and Moss to help them.

Saturday morning Juge, Lance, Zion, Lou, Brynnli, Tavin and I did a quick hike at Upper Box Hollow.  It was really pretty and we found a couple of sweet waterfalls along the way!  Then we all ate leftovers for lunch and called it a camp out!  Thanks to Juge and Lance for being in charge this year!  Moss and Christie are up for next year's fun!

More fun times!

4th of July fun!

For the 4th of July we got up early and attended the ward flag raising ceremony and breakfast and then took off to see a place Lance had told us about - Red Creek Reservoir and a drive over the mountains to Panguitch.  It was a beautiful drive with showers to brighten everything up.  We lunched overlooking an awesome, deep canyon with a creek running down to fill the lake in Panguitch.  It was so pretty we ended up hiking down to get a closer look.  After that we stopped by Cedar Breaks and enjoyed the Wildflower Festival.  It was a glorious feast of color - impossible to capture in photos.  It was so pretty we decided to bring Anna Lou up the next evening to see it and to enjoy a picnic!  And then we came home to fireworks with the Borrowmans and the Smiths up on the hill!  A really fun day!

We weren't disappointed!  If anything, it was even prettier and almost no one was there since it was a bit rainy.  We came home through Parowan and saw the Jesse N. Smith home (a pioneer relative of Paul). 

Poulsen Reunion at the Brooks Cabin

After we left Supe and Beacher's we drove by Mt. Ranier and through some beautiful farm country to get to the Poulsen reunion at Janet and Tony's cabin in Washington.  Janet, Denny, Marilynne and I and our spouses and Denny's kids were there with Mom.  

Janet and Tony are wonderful hosts! Can't thank them enough for making it possible and comfortable for all of us.  And thanks to Marilynne for being our organizer!  It was great to be together and see how everyone is doing and enjoy time with Mom.  On our way home we spent the night with Jay and Brynn and the next day we stopped by Juge and Lance's for lunch and a visit.  This was a great trip for seeing lots of people we love to see!

To Oregon with the grand kids!

Paul and I and the three oldest grand kids - Brynnli, Tavin and Kaebri - made a trip to Oregon to see Supe and Beacher.  We had fun times along the way and a blast while we were there!  We took off early on Monday morning and made it to Ely, Nevada for lunch in the park and on to Klamath Falls, Oregon for bed.  It was a long day, but we did fine other than a ticket for Paul in Susanville, California.  We were enjoying the scenery and each other so much that we didn't quite keep track of the speed limit. On Tuesday we traveled on stopping by Crater Lake for a while to enjoy that beautiful place and other than the mosquitoes that mobbed us here and there, it was awesome!    

After that we visited a few waterfalls and traveled on seeing more green and trees than you can imagine and then arrived at Supe and Beacher's house in Astoria.

We took over the pallet couch cushions for sleeping quarters in the living room.  Paul and I loved the back porch.  Riding in the car with Supe is always a good time!  

Wednesday's outing with Supe (unfortunately Beacher had to work the whole time Paul and I were there) was to Indian Beach.  We hiked up to a beautiful overlook and visited an old military bunker en route.  Then it was back down to the beach to spend the day playing in the sand, seeing the sea creatures and climbing.  After that we checked out another beautiful overlook and then went home, cleaned up and went to dinner for my birthday!  What a fun 60th birthday!  I even put on some of those terrible climbing shoes and gave it a try.  Too fat to get very far, but it was fun while it lasted!

Brynnli thought the giant slugs were...interesting.  

Thursday we hit to road to Tillamook where we did another amazing hike through the forest to a beautiful overlook.  Then we went to the cheese factory and ate many samples and had ice cream. We bought cheese there and some cherries at the side of the road and made a picnic lunch of it with crackers at Short Sands Beach and then explored the beach.  Then it was back to the house where Supe made us the best chicken pot pie ever for dinner.

Friday Paul and I packed up for our trip to my family reunion at Janet and Tony's cabin in Washington.  The kids stayed on with Supe and Beacher for more fun.  The only thing that could have made our Oregon stay better would have been having Beacher be able to join us in our adventures.  Thanks to both of them for being such great hosts.

Father's Day, birthdays and the left over cookies!

Since we didn't celebrate for Moss and Derek's birthdays and Father's Day when we did mine we did we did it the following Sunday at Moss and Christie's house and had some of those left over cookies and other goodness for lunch. It was another fun time with people that we love!  Happy birthdays and Father's Day!  

A tricky #60!

They got me! I thought it was going to a combined June birthdays/Father's Day picnic/party at Oak Grove...but the connivers actually had a happy #60 party for me all set up!  It was such a fun, beautifully planned and decorated event!  They had it decorated with nearly all of the baby quilts - it was so pretty to see them all hanging out there in the forest.  They even found a way to find out what dinner I wanted - steak, sweet potatoes and yummy salads and watermelon!  And Brynn has connections and got recipes for every cookie from Jacob's Lake and every kind was available along with Lou and Bryan making home made ice cream - my favorite, lemon custard- and strawberry and chocolate!  It was a delicious feast!  Everyone did something to make it perfect!  So blessed to have such a wonderful, thoughtful family.  Makes me kind of weepy thinking about it.  For a final touch Weed illustrated and everyone contributed to a "60 Things We LOVE About MOM!" collection and then we played a guess Mom's favorite game.  Thanks to all of you for the giant effort you made to make this all come together and make me feel so loved and appreciated.  You are all the BEST, MOST WONDERFUL, family a mom/grandma/wife could ever hope to be blessed with.  

Fun with the Lillywhites

It was so fun to spend some time with Jay and Brynn and girls when they stayed in town a bit longer after their Tolman family reunion!  Some of the fun included time at the College art show where Paul had a couple of paintings displayed in the 12 x 12 show.  Essie especially enjoyed the wide open spaces to practice her new walking skills.  We also enjoyed swimming and snacking at the condo they were staying at!  And we had a fun day at Pine Valley picnicking and hiking!  

Rock Trip adventure

We finally got our big truck fixed and since we needed a small load of stone very quickly we decided to go and get it ourselves.  We left after work so we only made it as far as Jacob's Lake.  We camped 3  miles from it at a spot we have used before.  It was a perfect camp night.  In the morning we got everything put away and then the adventure began (6:30 am).  The truck wouldn't start.  It was something to do with the glow plug relay switch and we have had it happen before after a cool night in a higher elevation than we usually drive in.  We tried the regular fix and it wouldn't work.  So we went for a walk to give it time to set a bit.  Tried it again...no luck.  Even after a prayer.  So we thought to call the mechanic who worked on it and said if the fix we had already tried wouldn't do it, we would need some starter fluid.  So we decided to hitch a ride to Jacob's Lake and try to get some at the gas station there.  It was great when a nice guy from BC Canada picked us up pretty quickly. Gas station wasn't open yet, so we ate a great breakfast at the restaurant.  And the gas station didn't have any and neither did the mechanic shop at Jacob's Lake.  So the next option was to try to hitch to Fredonia and back and get some there.    We could call our kids, but that's a really long drive. So we tried hitching again...no luck.  A great day for walking with cool, overcast weather but 29 miles is too far to walk. Then we thought of our friends at Silver Arrow Stone in Fredonia!  They said they would send their helper to bring us some starter fluid.  We walked back to the turn off to our camp to wait and then some nice people did stop to see if we needed help, but help was already on the way.  It was pretty funny when the helper (a kid about 18 and his two friends) in a rattle trap pickup that kept dying (it finally just coasted to the spot) as we drove down to our truck got there to rescue us (answer to our prayers). Our truck started right up after a shot of the starter fluid, but then we were worried if their truck was going to start.  We wanted to stay to see if they would get going, but they weren't worried and said they had friends working in the forest service right there that would help them if they needed it and didn't want us to stay, so we gave them the cookies we had bought at Jacob's Lake the night before and headed on our way - about 11:30 am - finally. Now we needed to hurry to get to Ashfork before they closed.  We made it, got on our way and remembered that we needed one more piece of stone, went back for that and then got on the road once more.  We made it back to Jacob's Lake for a late dinner just before they were closing thank goodness.  It had rained quite a bit and there were flash flood warnings, so we opted to just head home rather than camp out again.  Got home late taking turns driving and were very glad to fall into bed!  It was a fun trip, but I hope we have a few less adventures on the next one!  

Our camp spot.  Saw a Kaibab squirrel on our walk - he wasn't standing still very well to get his picture taken!

Snow Canyon - love this bike ride!

One of our favorite things for a Saturday morning is to ride the West Canyon road in Snow Canyon.  Here are couple of my favorite views on the ride.