Last Travel Blog

For the two of you who are hanging in there and reading the blog - the travel portion is almost finished! Starting with Trent & Sandy's home in South Jordan, we spent a day with them hunting for geodes in the deserts outside of Tooelle ( hope I spelled that right Jen)! After getting lost and driving around in the desert for three hours on a dirt road, followed by a flat,tire followed by listening to some loud disagreements between the Jefferies' brothers, I was in deep breathing mode, but finally lost it and cried most of the way home to Trent's house. I know they felt bad and didn't mean for the trip to go like it did, and amazingly enough, the kids loved every minute of it. We have dozens of geodes now - I think we'll give them out as Christmas gifts. So we'll just "kumbaya" now and move on to Colorado, where we had a fun evening with Dad, Susan, Eric, and Hannah. Susan let me borrow her cool roadster bike, and Dad & I biked through Prospect and some other beautiful neighborhoods! I loved biking with dad. Dad and Susan's house is so pretty, and I gathered some decorating ideas again. We went to visit Eric at Dairy Queen, and left for Oklahoma the next morning!
We spent two days with Rhett Dad Chris and his wife Betty in their beautiful home off of a golf course. Rhett, Garrett, Livi and Chris golfed the next morning, and we went to visit the Chisholm Trail Education Center, where Chris was the first director to get the museum started. He is a very talented man, writing all the scripts for the movies and films at the center, and raising the millions needed to build such a tribute to the Chisholm Trail! After some authentic Mexican food at "La Fiesta", we hit a park for the kids to get all the juice out before our big drive the next day.
Next day - 22 hours in the car made it to Blacksburg, VA and a tropical storm. Rhett wanted to go the rest of the four hours home, but I begged to stop at a hotel, so we stopped, slept in our clothes, and made it the rest of the way home Saturday. So..... it's quieter at home, and I am holding Madison close to my heart, and life is going on. Rhett is looking for jobs, and lots of change is coming.

This is it for the travel blog folks (or the three people who read the blog). I'm making a blog book so am forging on!

Logan & Bear Lake

Attending Todd & Kimiko's sealing was really great, and making it even better was that Don Wood officiated as the Sealer. Todd and Kimi looked about has happy as two people can possibly look! Going to the Olive Garden for lunch afterward was a great idea - thanks Dad and Susan!

Later in the Day, we walked up to the Old Main building at Utah State and saw the campus - the first time for Rhett and I , and we were impressed! The Aggie members of the family gave us a tour, and we stopped to play frisbee on the Quad. We also had some wonderful ice cream.

I don't have many pictures of Bear Lake, mostly because I was swimming most of the time, or cooking, or dancing, or playing a pirate for Dad's Birthday skit. I thought the time we spent together was really wonderful. Rhett and I took Madison down to Logan on Saturday to check into the dorms. Most of her roommates were moving in Saturday morning, and we met most of the parents. Parents from India, Brazil, New Jersey, Australia, and Nebraska. We were all pretty surprised that only one small bathroom will service six girls, but at least they have a big common area with a vanity, and someone brought a microwave and fridge. Madison and I went to Wal-mart to get all the things she would need - laundry detergent, animal crackers, etc. Her room is very pink!

Oh yes, we rented Surrey bikes the last day! The kids and I biked while Rhett golfed, and we literally biked into the Oldroyd family - good friends from Colorado. These bikes are pretty fun!

Leaving Madison on Sunday was hard - we went to a family ward in the morning, and then left Madison at the dorm with lots of kisses and hugs. It felt like the first day of kindergarten all over again, only ten times worse. As we drove away headed for Salt Lake and all day, my eyes felt like they were stinging. We stopped for a few hours to visit Don and Wanda, and then drove to South Jordan to spend the night with Rhett's brother Trent.

The Parks

We hiked the south rim of the upper and lower falls at Yellowstone. Madison's best friend since childhood happened to be vacationing at the same time, and we were able to kidnap her for a day (another Jennay). She will be a freshman at BYU. Cecily led the way most of the hike, and we'll never forget those hundreds of stairs to get to the bottom of the falls and back.

The streets up to Mt Rushmore monument were lined on both sides with bikes.

Okay, Mt. Rushmore is smaller than we thought (at first).

Much better! Each person had their favorite face. Most of us liked Lincoln's best. One thing I didn't know about why they chose each president is to signify the birth (Washington), formation (Jefferson), expansion (Roosevelt), and preservation (Lincoln) of our nation. We also heard rumors that there is room for another face, and president Obama's is being considered. I always wondered why they chose those particular presidents for the monument.

I am seriously a Yellowstone freak, I could look at geysers and hot pools for days. I think my dream job would be to be a park ranger at Yellowstone. I didn't get near enough time seeing what I wanted to see, but the kids were amazingly patient.

Old Faithful, then Upper Falls view

Lower falls, I think...

Mesa falls is very close to Ashton, and incredibly scenic - less crowds. I was really tempted to see if I could dive in the bottom of this one, but only for a minute.

New Junior Rangers Livi and Becca take the oath of the Junior Ranger in both parks, and get a patch at each location. The rangers made it a really big deal, and the second ranger at Yellowstone asked it they would like to help with his ranger duty of taking down the flag. I thought this second ranger had such a cute sense of humor, and wanted to set him up with Madison - bad idea - I think he was about thirty.

The ribbon cutting ceremony christening "Gramberger Blvd" was the last thing we did before we gave mom hugs and headed for Logan. Mom and Jim cleared and paved a beautiful pathway through aspen trees and forest all the way down the hill. So much work, and very fun for us to use!

Headin down that dusty trail!

More from Ashton

The Snake river was just our speed for our kayak/raft float. Becca, Cecily and I had the hardest time not going in circles, but we tried. Finally Cecily had enough and went with Rhett.
Garrett enjoyed shooting targets off the deck.

Ashton (the first few days)

We had the best trip out west. We headed out about the same time ten thousand or so bikers heading the same direction - Sturgis and Mt. Rushmore. We felt pretty "bad" in our mini van full of kids! The first day we actually made it to Minneapolis, driving through Chicago right by a Yankees/White Sox baseball game. In Minneapolis, we stayed the night with our friends the Hansens who just adopted the cutest little chinese boy they named Mason. Then, on to Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone, and Ashton! Coming into Mom & Jim's home is a big sigh of relief - we sleep better, eat delicious food, and just relax. The kids love the "wilds" of the hill where Gramster lives. Mom presented Madison with the quilt she made - all bright browns and pinks with a travel theme. Madison was thrilled.





Gene's garage was the cave of "wonders". Gene also appeared on his four wheeler to give the kids a ride, and let the older kids give it a spin on their own.

Gene built this huge catapault just for shooting water balloons, which we used to have the shortest and most one sided balloon fight in history. Rhett and Garrett tried to rally by making their own sling shot in between the trees, but the catapault won out every time.

Gramster still had enough energy at the end of the day to arm wrestle any sassyness out of Madison, and then we made smores. More to come!