Loving Lily

While the boys are away, I have been enjoying this little one. It is nice to have some one on one time with my little girl. She is a sweetheart that loves to 'help' her mommy. She helped me do dishes, fold (or unfold) laundry, and she even helped make a meal for the two of us. She does not stop talking. She jibber-jabbers her way through whatever we are doing. I love her so much.

When I pull out the camera, she still pulls out her "snaggle-tooth pose"

Mmmmmm...

Randy took the boys to the father and sons camp out last night, so this is what I decided to do for my fun night to myself. I haven't ever tried roses before so I gave it a try. Some look better than others that's for sure.

It looks yummy doesn't it. Too bad I'm not eating sugar right now and can't try it myself.

Feel The Fear

All of these things freak me out. I am really afraid of all of these things. so, If by chance you read my blog for vengeance purposes, this is the post for you. all of these make me twinge with fear just a little bit.

Bees: I left my kids for dead at the park when a bee came over to see what we were having for lunch. Tyler loved how I screamed like a little girl and ran away. I try to be a good example, but sometimes bees are around. What can I do?

Paint balling and laser tag: I don't even like the thought of someone chasing me with the idea to do me harm. Even if it is a laser on the other end. I would probably pee my pants, cry and hide in a corner if I were to be involved in one or both of these activities.

Not to mention some other serious drawbacks.Belly buttons: I have to say that this one honestly does freak me out. Just the thought of someone sticking their finger in my belly button makes me sick to my stomach.

Needles: Most everyone knows I am terrified of needles. I can barely look at these pictures. Heck, I had my babies "naturally" to avoid a VERY large needle entering my spine. I have had countless nightmares where I keep getting needles stuck in me and I can't get them out. I shudder at the thought.

Crocodiles: So very scary. Forget about sharks; Crocs can go on land AND water. and they are just plain creepy looking.
Public Speaking: of course everyone knows about this one. It is so frightening I don't even really want to talk about it.

So...If you are looking for a good prank and you never want me to talk to you ever again...you have your ammunition.

Family Pictures

While we were in Minnesota for the reunion, we had our family pictures taken. It wasn't an easy task either considering there were about 35 of us. Here are some of the pictures she took. You can see the other families and their pictures at www.hawkeyephoto.blogspot.com.

Let me know what you think.
Here is our family
Rick and Eileen with their kids and spousesThe whole group

The whole group again. you have to click on it and look at my face...awesome.

And last but not least, Randy and his family.

Road Trip Day 11 (finally)

We Stayed the night in Billings MT. We packed up the car to head home to Utah and got out of the hotel by 9:00AM. We stayed at the Boothill Inn. Very Awesome. Good breakfast. I recommend it.

On our way from the hotel to the freeway I noticed we weren't going the right way and I asked Randy where we were going. He stalled and I asked him again. I finally "guessed" (about 20 questions) that he had decided to go see the temple. It ended up being a little bit further away than we thought though. It took us an extra 45 minutes. And we didn't even stop when we got there. Crazy. We kept driving though, We drove through Wyoming, into Yellowstone National park. We we took this amazing scenic drive and it was well worth it. We kept driving up and up and up the mountain until we hit about 10,000 feet. On the way up, one of our water bottles"popped" because of the altitude change and just as it did, a black bear ran into the road right in front of our car. I didn't have the camera handy at the moment so I didn't get a picture. He got scared and ran away, but not before we got a really good up close look at him. It was awesome.Jake and Ty almost at the summit.

Randy and the boys. It was so pretty up there...and cold.

Randy at the top.
When we technically got into Yellowstone park, we saw a ton of Bison. Here is one that crossed the road in front of our car.

We spotted another black bear by the side of the road.
I have been to Yellowstone a lot, but I have never seen bears there. We were driving some more and we spotted a grizzly bear! Yeah crazy! But it wasn't just a grizzly, it was a grizzly bear with two baby cubs!

you can see that the bear was pretty far away, but sure enough, she was right there. I never got a good view of the cubs though.

We tried our hardest to drive quickly through Yellowstone without making stops, but with the animals to see and stupid Junior Ranger programs to buy...yeah I said buy. It costs $5 here and it isn't worth it. They recommend you spend about 4 days in Yellowstone to complete the program, but we only had about an hour, so it was kind of hard. we had to sit through a ranger talk, do a hike and fill out five sheets of paper to get it signed off. I wish I had known what I was getting into before we did it.

We also had a traffic problem. Randy and I decided to head out of West Yellowstone so we could make it home faster, but we didn't' really plan on all the construction we would have to go through. We finally got the Ranger stuff done and was headed toward exiting the park when we came to a stop and a construction worker told us it would be about 30-45 minutes of waiting and to "please stay in your car". Great. We waited 45 minutes and then we finally got to move again. When we finally got out of the park, it was after 5:00 PM and we had to wait, yet again, for construction. This time it was only about 20 minutes of waiting, but we wanted to get home so it was that much harder. We drove and drove and drove into the night. we didn't stop unless someone had to go to the bathroom or we needed to drive through to get dinner.The kids had had it. We made it home after Midnight...and the unpacking began.

Road Trip day 9-10

We stayed the night in Keystone, SD in a little motel. at the base of Mt. Rushmore. So we got up in the morning and headed there. We ate breakfast in the cafeteria, looked in the museum and hiked.
Randy and the kids in front of the flags

Lily and I waited for the boys to hike the "presidential hike" she wasn't cooperating with my photo shoot. This is the best I got.

Me and lily bean.

Me and the kiddos.

One of the tunnels we drove through in the black hills

Jake and Ty. you can barely see Mt. Rushmore in the background.

We were driving around the black hills and we saw a sign that said there was a hike to a waterfall so we stopped and started hiking. It was a little bit longer than we had planned to hike, but it was a lot of fun albeit a little more difficult because Jake a Lily couldn't hike very well so we had to carry both of them the whole way.Lily at the falls

Randy and Jacob and Lily at the end of the hike.

Lily wanted only Tyler to hold her hand while she walked. She loves that boy.

Day 10
We stayed the night in Spearfish and Drove to Devils tower, WY the next morning.

the kids look super excited

Randy with the boys in front of Devils tower.
We hiked around the whole tower and filled in the boys' Junior Ranger pamphlet so they could earn a badge. It was slow going, but we hiked the whole thing.

The family. Hot and sweaty. Makes you want to get in a car together and drive. :)

We drove a little bit out of our way and went to Little Bighorn Battlefield National monument. It is in Montana; 149 miles out of the way to be exact. But it was really fun and interesting to hear the story and see actual places where real people had fallen in the battle. I found it interesting to hear more of the Indian side of the story than Custer's. He sounded like an idiot. you really feel bad for the Indians and what they had to go through. They won the battle but lost the war.

Me and the kids again.Lily and Jake out by the Tepee

The boys excited to get their Junior Ranger badges and certificates to go along with the one from Devils tower. We had to work a lot harder for this one though. We drove some more and spent the night in Billings MT.

Road Trip day 8

We awoke on Wednesday morning and ate some breakfast

Lily prefers Marshmallow Mateys.Jake would rather sleep in

We left Austin, MN and headed in the direction of home. We decided to take it a little slower on the way back and stop at a few national parks and touristy spots. Thanks Lisa for the national parks pass! Because our trip consisted of a whole lot of rest stops, I took a few pictures when we made it to South Dakota and stopped for lunch.

Lily, hamming it up for the camera

We finished lunch and headed back on the road again. Lily stole Jacob's blanket and he was screaming. But look at the smile on her face. You can cause a lot of trouble when you are strapped in a car-seat.Jake fell asleep like this and we couldn't stop laughing. In all fairness we may have been car-delusional at this point.

We finally made it to the badlands

The boys checking out some fossils.

After checking out the Badlands and National Grasslands, we stopped at Wall Drug. We weren't going to stop, but we were glad we did because the kids LOVED it. So silly really. We couldn't pull them away when it was time to go.
Jacob and Tyler both loved the giant Jackal-ope. Who wouldn't? Tyler being a goofJust plain awesome.

Giddy up cowboy!In the WagonRandy hasn't seen her for 7 years! They really missed each other.Jake looks especially glad to meet her.