Summer Vacation

The first week of our summer vacation to visit our family we went camping & hiking in southern Utah with my parents and my oldest brother, Greg and his family. The kids had a so much fun playing with their cousins, although they were tired of hiking after the week was over since we went on a hike almost everyday. We enjoyed all of the beauty that was all around us. It is such an amazing area to hike and discover.


The first place we went was Zion National Park:

We went on 3 different hikes in the park. It was a very hot day. Luckily all of the hikes we went on had water at the end to play in.

We camped in Kanab, UT and close by were the Pink Coral Sand Dunes. The sand was so soft on our feet. The kids (and adults) had so much fun sliding, running, jumping down to the bottom of the hill. Some of them even went face first on their stomachs. We took Olivia down a couple of times and she loved it too and wanted to go more and more. The only problem is that when you get to the bottom you have to climb back up and that is not an easy thing to do. We all had sand everywhere. The kids pockets were full.

Next we went to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. It was so amazing and beautiful. It made the adults a little nervous when the kids would get too close to the side because of the HUGE drop off. I love this picture of Jonathan.

The last big hiking day was Bryce Canyon. This was my favorite place of the whole trip. We took the three mile hike down into the canyon and back out. It definitely earns the title of "The Worlds Most Beautiful 3-Mile Hike." We took so many pictures because around every turn there was another gorgeous view. I have never seen anything like it.

Alli and Jonathan with their cousins getting one last rest before starting the big hike.

This picture is out of order but I love it. This was another beautiful hike in Bryce Canyon.

The formations are called "Hoodoo's"

My dad, brother Greg, Olivia, and me

After our camping trip we went to my parent's house.

My dad plays and sings in a band and they practice at our house every week. They had a practice while we were there and Jonathan, who loves the guitar, went and found grandpa's little guitar, pulled a chair right close to grandpa and started strumming and singing along. He would even lean over to look at the music like he was following along. He was on cloud nine! It was the cutest thing ever. Thank goodness for cameras and video cameras to capture that priceless moment.

We had a family reunion with all of my brothers and sister and their families while we were there and we all went into the canyon to take pictures. Here is one of our family pictures.

This is all 12 of my parent's grandchildren. It was a challenge to get all of them to look at the camera at the same time and for the little ones to stand still, as you can see the arm of my brother-in-law off to the right. :)

All of the family.

Two of my sister-in-law's were pregnant in this picture and one of them just had their beautiful baby girl 2 days ago. Congrats, Clay and Candis!

At the reunion we all made tie-dyed shirts. This the back of Alli and Jonathan's. My sister was in charge of the reunion this year and taught us all how to make them. Aren't they cool? Thanks Cindy! Of course Jonathan had to have a guitar. I didn't get a picture of the front but Alli put a kitty-cat on the front and then the paw print on the back.

Next on our stop was Alan's parents.

Everyone ready for church.

The kids had so much fun with their cousin Cassidy. Lots of sleep overs and swimming. Oh, and we can't forget her little dog Cloe. She is a cutie.

We can't visit grandpa and grandma's without a "Model A" ride.....

a motorcycle ride...

and a fast car ride... so much fun.

We went to Bear World while we were there.

Isn't this the cutest family of bears you have ever seen?

Especially little baby bear.

We saw lots of bears which the kids loved. They took tons of pictures with their cameras.

They also had a few fun rides to go on. I was a fun day.

We had such a fun vacation. Thank you to everyone who helped to make our trip so great. The kids went through cousin withdrawls when they came home because they were so used playing all day and into the night. We took almost 1,000 pictures of all of the fun things we did and people we saw. It was so hard to decide which ones to put on here but we decided that everyone would thank us for not putting them all. :) We love you all!