Amber's wish comes true.

After all was said and done, We arrived in Provo.  It was a bit interesting. We got to town, around 5 pm, and found Amber's dorm, which was Heritage Hall Building #27.  Amber had a number to call when we got there, so she could put her stuff in the basement storage room, because she wasn't going to be able to get into her room until 7pm the next day.  We were unloading the car, and a couple of guys came over and started helping caring the boxes to the basement.  Amber was all smiles!  She was so excited to see that willingness to help from complete strangers!  She had no problems leaving us after that. It was dinner time, so we found a park up the canyon, and had a picnic dinner.  We let the kids play around a bit till around 9pm.  Then trying to find a hotel with a room with enough beds for all of us was turning out to be a bit difficult.  Finally we found one, but we would have to get to separate rooms.  So Bret, Keaton, and I shared a room, and Amber, Ben and Sam shared a room.  That's the first time we've ever had to do that. 

The next day we all got up and got Amber back to her building to put her last bit of stuff in the store room, said good bye,then off she went to Freshmen orientation, with out us. We walked back to the car, and the kids wanted to go to the bookstore, so we walked there, and we each got our BYU shirts and souvenirs, and headed back to the car.  We drove to Salt Lake, where we were meeting up with some old friends of Bret, Stephanie Collins, now Hanson, and they fed us lunch and took us on a tour of Temple Square.  A lot has changed down there since I was there in the late 80's!!!  It was amazing though and the boys enjoyed seeing the Salt Lake Temple in person, and seeing the outside and the inside of the Conference center.  Then it was time to head home.  With out one of my children.  But I'm excited for her and hope she has the time of her life!

moab

After we crossed over the border into Utah, we took the road going south to Moab, Utah.  It was a very cool drive, with lots of amazing red rock formations. It was also very hot, and very dry.  Gotta love the desert! 

Here we are getting ready to go on our hike of the Fiery Furnace, which is a trail that goes through some amazing slot canyons, and weird rock formations of domes and arches.  We took a lot of cool pictures, but for some reason I'm having trouble down loading them on this blog, so all of the rest of them are on Facebook.

This is in one of the slot canyons.  It was nice and cool in these where it was shaded from the sun.

The trail winds in and around these canyons so you have to have a permit to go in, and the hikes have to be with a guide, so you can get out safe.  We were with a group of about 20. It was a lot of fun!

We also drove around Arches National park and saw some pretty cool stuff.  Of which are all on Facebook.  We also went river rafting down the Colorado river, not to many rapids, the river is low for this time of year due to a lack of snow in the mountains last winter, and very little rainfall this spring.  But it was fun, and we got to actually get in the river and float along side the raft.  I recoment this trip to anybody!

Family vacation



Okay, Family vacation time is here again.  It came and went to soon.  We started out in the car once again, Amber and the boys in their regular positions, a full car and lots of food to snack on and make lunches.  We were a bit more loaded down than usual.  We had all of Amber's stuff for college tucked away in a car top carrier.  We were taking Amber to BYU and fitting in our family vacation at the same time.

As you can see, Ben is excited to get going. 

Our first stop was Denver, Colorado.  We had to stop at the home of the Denver Broncos!  I am a huge Payton Manning fan, and he has been traded to the Broncos.  So  I had to go and get a Broncos Payton Manning jersey.  Which they were sold out of.  I did get a shirt though.  Keaton is also a Broncos fan, and he got a few things as well.  It was fun!

We drove a bit farther out of Denver and stopped to have a picnic lunch.  Their was a trail to hike on through a small forest and a nice meadow.  We found lots of small wonders of nature.  We love hiking and discovering new things.

We found a trap door spider and his web.  Ben found a small grasshopper and put it in the web and we saw the spider come out and grab it!  It was cool.



Taking a rest on a nice bench.

We drove further across Colorado, and stopped in a little town called Rifle.  We stayed the night, and the next day we went up to Rifle falls.  They have a cool trail their for hiking, with cool caves and rock formations.  It was beautiful!

This is the bottom of the falls.

This was a cool cave.  It was huge!  The pictures don't do it justice.

Next stop Moab, Utah!