Family Reunion- Day 1

Over the weekend, we (along with my sister and my brother and their families) visited my parents up at Heber Valley Camp (HVC), where they are currently serving an LDS mission.

We had a blast!

The first thing we did was harness everyone up for the GIANT SWING. 

Yep, I said Giant Swing!!!

 After getting hooked up to a cable, and after a pep-talk from Grandma,

 you sit back, hold on tight to a lift-rope, and allow 4-5 people to hoist you up.

 I'm not sure how high, but I'm guessing 15 feet or so.  I just know that it was really high.

 Then you let go of the rope

and fly!

 Even kids can do it.  For the little littles (even my one and a half year old nephew), two missionaries push them back and forth a few times.  I secretly think this is their favorite.  All the missionaries had so much fun playing with these little kids as they swung them back and forth.  It was really cute to watch.

For older kids, like this one here, they only raise them half to three-quarters of the way up before letting them go. 

 Then it was off to the lake.

 Half the fam canoed

 the other half chose to paddle boat. 

 My oldest had to work so Clint and he drove up later that night, just in time for our time on the lake.  This just might be one of the last "vacations" my family takes all together (waahhh), so I was glad everyone could make it.

It's so much fun to get together with family and laugh

 and visit

and play together.

We ended the night by roasting marshmallows around the campfire and playing Big Booty.

Missing

Last night for FHE, our family, along with some friends, took a picnic dinner up to the lake.

We ate, threw the ball around, hiked,

and some of the littles even collected stinky snail shells from the water.

Disappointed as they were, I would NOT let their collection come home with us.

We finished off the evening with a gorgeous orange painted sunset.

God is good.

 You may have noticed we were missing two. . . .

This cute girl is away at Girl's Camp.  She's serving as a Youth Camp Leader.  She'll be back Thursday, just in time to celebrate the 4th with us.

  She's having a blast with all these fun girls!

We were also missing this handsome guy, who was off  'working hard for the money'.

Sometimes I really hate the fact that my kids are growing up. *sniff, sniff*  I miss them when they're not around.

Did Someone Say Vacation?

Please Pardon the Photo Overload!

 This past August we vacationed with my family in beautiful Bear Lake.  We stayed in a cabin that had one of these outside on the patio.

 We spent a lot of time out here looking at the views like

 this

and this.  Isn't the lake gorgeous! I've heard it changes colors from blue to green depending on the weather and what season it is.

 We also played a lot of games.  Here is my Sister-in-law whipping my brother in a game of Speed.

 Clint had never played but is always up for a challenge. Clint was pretty good. So good in fact that here's my SIL telling Clint to get out, she wants to play my brother again.  Not really. . .

 The older folks thought Speed was a little too face-paced so they opted for this 24 piece puzzle instead. 

 They were thrilled that they actually completed it!

There was also this awesome theater room.  I need some couches like this!  They were heavenly.

 We also went four-wheeling a lot!  Since our vacation last year, my dad has gotten a little ATV happy.  We are glad because that means we had three four-wheelers to ride this year instead of one.  Yay!!!  Here are #4 and Kimberlee.  They started off together, but #4 must have had a premonition that Kim would hit a big rock and roll her wheeler, so he switched with #2.  Don't worry everyone was ok (just a black-eye and a few scratches).

 Here's Clint getting these lovely ladies all set.

 This is what my view looked like for the majority of the ride. . . lots of dust.

 Finally we made it onto a gravel road and that cut the dust down immensely.

 We rode all the way to Old Ephraim's Grave. Ephraim was a huge Grizzly bear, supposedly the last grizzly in Utah.  He weighed 1100 lbs. and was over 9 feet tall! 

 They say this rock monument is the same height as Old Ephraim. 

And for those of you who are dying to read what the monument says, here you go.  No problem.  You can thank me later.

Finally we headed back to the cabin.  We told my mom, who was watching the kiddos, that we'd be gone an hour or so.  I think we ended up being gone 4 hours.  Whoops!  Sorry mom, and thanks again for watching all the kids.

 We also went to the lake.

 We were at North Beach on the Idaho side.

 We rented this boat and this tube and a knee board. 

Yes, after 27 attempts, I finally was able to get up, thanks for asking.

 This is my Gram D.  She doesn't normally smile like this.  She was in the middle of saying something.

 We had a great day playing in the sand

 swimming, and boating

and unfortunately despite lathering on tons of sunscreen, my 3 older boys all got sunburned.  I think the sunscreen must have been bad.  I plan on writing a letter of complaint to Banana Boat when I get some time.

 Our last day in Bear Lake we again drove up to Idaho to take a tour of Minnetonka Cave.

Did you know that this cave has 444 stairs?  You go down 444 and then you hike back up 444. That's a grand total of  888!

My butt never looked so good!--  I wish!!!