Zion National Park: April 23- 25, 2010

We stayed in this cute cabin in Marysvale, UT. It is about 2 hours from Santaquin, and about 2 hours from Zion National Park. (I worked at Zions Bank for many years, and it is incredibly hard to just say Zion. With no "s".) It was nice to have a short drive, relax for the night, then wake up Saturday morning and drive out to Zion.
The kitchen was a little crowded, but it was nice and cozy.

At the entrance to Zion National Park. Jerry was there too, but someone had to take the picture.We hiked this first trail, but Jerry will be disappointed in me, because I can't remember what most of the trails, hikes, and rock monuments are called. This first hike was 1/2 mile to a lookout point, then you came back the way you had come before. Katie wanted to run the whole thing, but we tried to keep her mostly in check. Elayna walked half of it. That's a half mile for a 20 month old! I was really impressed that both of the girls did so well.

A lizard we saw on the first trail. We saw some deer later also. That was the extent of the wildlife.
Waiting for the shuttle that would take us to trails and monuments not accessible to public transportation.

The buses had 2 sections to them. We sat at the front of the 2nd section, so it looked like the girls were driving the shuttle. They had lots of fun with that.


Weeping Rock. (something like that) It was beautiful. You stand in this alcove, and look up. There is a constant "rain" coming off these rocks. Evidently the water is seeping through the entire rock until it comes out here.

Katie playing at Weeping Rock.



A very tall and impressive Waterfall.


Matthew gazing in awe at the Waterfall.

The waterfall turned into a river that the girls wanted to play in, even though it was freezing. We jumped onto this little island in the river, and they had fun throwing rocks into the water.

Then they started picking up dirt and throwing it in.


The aforementioned river.

Sunday morning was nice and relaxing. We had all gotten a good night's sleep, and we didn't need to leave until 11 or 12. Irma, Jerry, Matthew, Katie, and Elayna all went for a walk while Ryan rested (played on his computer) and I took a shower.
These pictures are from the walk, so I don't really know where they were, or what was happening. But the girls are sure cute!

This is a swing in front of the cabin.

Walking down the dirt road that led to our cabin.


Elayna laughing.


And then being "shy".


By a river....somewhere.



Sunday was mostly spent driving. Jerry wanted to wander through the old roads of Utah, to see new things.
This was the "Scenic View". This was about the best thing we saw. Not extremely impressive after Zion. Especially since it was really windy and cold. There were some really cool mountains that looked like they were old buildings made of rock rising out of a pile of sand. I didn't get a picture of that, although I'm sure Matthew or Jerry got a picture of them. They both took about 300 pictures each. And we were gone 2.5 days, total.

It was nice to wander along the roads though. A lot of talking, and wondering what people did, and why they lived out in the middle of nowhere.

Somewhere along the way, we saw these really strange ..mountains, I suppose you would call them. They looked man-made.
The columns were eroding faster than the top, plus there was a distinct line between 2 different types of rock, so it looked really odd.

Some of them were hollowed out . This is a picture inside one of them. Notice how the top of the area is a completely different looking rock than the sides?


A picture of Katie and Elayna in their matching pajamas. This was at the cabin.

We had so much fun. I'm grateful the Bowman's invited us to go with them.

Katie's 4th Birthday

Katie turned 4 years old on May 29. The Bowmans were going to be gone on her birthday, so they had a party for her on the 23rd. Katie got a Pink purse, with Pink sunglasses, a Pink gem as big as Katie's fist, some small perfume bottles, and some shells. Matthew also gave her some small glasses, that we use for special occasions and for tea parties.


Irma also embroidered a cute half sweater for her. And gave her some gloves to go with it.


Irma made a rabbit cake for Katie, decorated all cute.



Singing Happy Birthday to you:



Having fun blowing out the candles:


The morning of her birthday, Ryan and I put up some balloons,

and gave her a bike helmet with elbow pads,


and some dry-erase markers so she can practice in her "school book". (A book she can draw in, then erase, then draw more, etc.)


We had a cake and ice cream party with her cousins. (And other extended family, but she was mostly excited about the cousins, "who are also her friends")

The cake: (not nearly as impressive as a rabbit)

Singing Happy Birthday:

A Present from GG:


Beauty and the Beast DVD!


Elayna also had fun with her cousins:


Especially Gracie, Hannah, and Sadie. They all fought over the same vehicles, even though there were enough for them all to have their own.
Gracie and Elayna made a compromise for this one:


My parents came and gave Katie her present. Then they took her on their annual lunch date. They get to take each grandchild out to lunch for their birthday. I know the kids and the grandparents love it. Katie opted for Wendy's. She didn't each much, I hear, but she had fun.

The goods--> 2 incredibly cute outfits:

Katie's hair is down to her waist, her favorite things right now are pink things, small bottles, riding her "new purple bike", singing, telling jokes (especially ones that don't make any sense at all!), helping Mom, watching movies, swinging, playing at the park, playing anywhere besides home, and playing with Elayna (most of the time).

We love having Katie in our lives. She is such a sweetheart. She will come up in the middle of the day and say, "Guess what I did for you Mom!" Then she will show me the bathroom garbage can is emptied out. I will tell her Thank You, and she will say, "I did it because I love you Mom." So cute!

She is very well behaved, she has a wonderful sense of humor, she is very smart, and of course, ONE of the most beautiful girls I have ever seen!

We love you Katie!

More pictures

I love this picture of Katie. She is so cute, and the cap frames her face just right. Plus her hair looks gorgeous. I am amazed sometimes by how completely beautiful my little daughters are.


Ryan is currently on a "Transformers" kick. That means he started out by purchasing some Star Wars Transformers. In his words, "I won't collect Transformers though. That would get too complicated. I'll just get these Star Wars ones."

The next step is seeing some really cheap ones on clearance at Walmart. "It is such a good price, and I had one like this as a child". To be fair, it took 2 or 3 years to get to this point. He was distracted by different lines of toys until recently.

Next thing you know, he has 4 or 5 of the same figure (but they are painted different, you know), and more coming each week. He buys special fan produced trailers. (meaning the company didn't make a trailer for a truck. So Transformer fans got together. They designed, built, and hired a company in China to mass-produce a trailer so lots of people could have this special trailer. Lots of work.)

He spends time switching them from vehicles to robots. He watches movies of how to transform certain figures so he will know how to do it when the figure arrives. Of course the girls have noticed his small (ha!) fascination with these Transformers. They get excited for the boxes to come, and want to see each new piece he gets.

They really are pretty neat. It is amazing to see the process each figure goes through to change from a very realistic looking fighter plane (or vehicle or other mode) to a convincing robot. Each figure comes with complex instructions, just because the process is so complicated.

One day, he brought up a couple of cars and trucks. Ryan, Katie, and Elayna played with them for about 20 minutes while I just watched. It was really cute. Here is a picture that doesn't show how much fun they are actually having:


Sunday morning I was trying to get pictures of the girls in their new May Day dresses. I wanted a picture of all 3 of us together, but Ryan was at Choir Practice. I held the camera in front of us, and after about 5 tries, we got this shot. I really like it because you can see how different our eye colors are. I hadn't noticed it this abruptly before. Mine are blue, Elayna's are a deep brown, and Katie's are hazel green. Ryan's eyes are also a deep brown.

Easter Dresses

I really wanted to make some dresses for the girls for Easter. Well, I didn't quite make it for Easter. They were a little more complicated than I thought they would be. So we are calling them May Day dresses, since I finished them May 1st.

They were much harder and time consuming than I could have imagined. The pattern said "Fast and Easy" on it, but I haven't had tons of experience sewing. Plus the fabric is a satin look alike, so it was a little hard to sew with. It didn't want to iron flat, the fabric kept on unraveling, it was slippery, and there was the added pressure of me wanting to make them perfect.

After many, many hours of sewing, and unpicking seams, and calling my mom for help, and being so frustrated I couldn't even look at the fabric, this is what they look like:

Okay, it was totally worth it. They look adorable! Elayna's is pretty long, and Katie's is a little shorter than I would have liked, but I am actually really proud of the dresses. The seams all look good, the bodice has a lining, which is very presentable on the inside. The outside stitching on the zipper is straight, and the scallops (Oh, the scallops!) are actually pretty good, if I say so myself.

Of course they have matching shoes also. They loved wearing the dresses. When we went into church, (only slightly late) they both posed in front of Grandma Paula to show them off. Unfortunately, Katie colored and used stamps in her church class, so it got some marks on it. I got all but one spot off. Oh well, they will get dirty, no matter what I do. I just wish it wouldn't cause me physical pain when I see the dirt! ;)
After we got home from church, we told them to take off the dresses to have a snack and take naps. They were very upset about that. And when they woke up, that was one of the first things they asked for. To put the dresses back on.

Mom convinced me to put a removable ribbon on it instead of sewing it into the fabric. This way, when the ribbon wears out, or we feel like a change, we can just put new ribbon in there, and it will be really easy.

I feel like I learned a lot from this project. Hopefully I will sew again soon enough to remember and put into effect the things I learned. My poor Mother. I called her about the simplest (to her) things! Thankfully she is very understanding, patient, and able to explain the process in a way I can comprehend. Thanks Mom!

Catching up

March pictures:

Katie spilled some Root Beer on the table, and this is how she cleaned up the mess:


Elayna really loves Chex cereal. Here she is eating it off the floor. I really am a good mother. Really.


Happy Elayna:



Elayna has slept in her "big bed" at least 4 times since we put it up on March 22.

Elayna cut 3 canine teeth at the same time. She had a fever for a couple of days, and we think that might have been the cause. Poor thing, she was still a happy girl, even when she was sick.

Elayna is still wanting to sit on the potty, and she is fairly successful most of the time. Always a work in progress, I suppose.


April pictures:

This was April Fool's Day. Pretty good for Mother Nature to join in with a joke.



We finally got Katie a bike. This is a hand-me-down from her cousin Lexy, but it works great. She was so excited to finally get a "bike like Abby" and "all those kids". Every time she sees a bike she is happy that her bike is just like the person's bike she sees.



The girls playing on our swing set. They really have fun swinging. Elayna calls it "back and forth":