I am sitting down to write a quick update, but I've already been interrupted twice (We have 5 places to sit in our living room, and only 3 boys sitting in there...yet, they have to sit in the same place I guess! Argh. At what age does one finally figure out it is easier to just give in and find a different spot?) Anyway, we'll see how far I get!
We went to the Payson Temple Open House. It was a lovely day and a beautiful experience. It was very crowded though -- next time I will make sure to get there before the last day of the event!
The week after school ended we went to Southern Utah and stayed at a condo in Brian Head (a ski resort) in Southern Utah. The Ski Resort is high up in the mountains and the boys felt a little nervous driving up the canyon -- Tanner kept calling out "Death of Fall!" when we were drove past steep parts of the canyon. Not sure where he got that phrase, but we all enjoyed it. :) It was very quiet at the condo and the kids enjoyed the pool.
On the drive there we stopped at Cove Fort -- this is a "fort" built back in 1867 to assist those who were traveling through the mostly desolate region -- it was a sort of way station where people could spend the night, eat, send telegram messages, etc. The fort itself is made of Lava Rock and Limestone and still stands solid today. It was a great tour and had we come prepared with a picnic, I would have liked to stay a little longer in the shade of the trees and enjoy some lunch.
Here you can see Tanner pretending to shoot through the holes of the fort -- they were there in case they had to defend themselves, but the missionaries told us that was never needed.
Before heading to Brian head we stopped in Cedar City for some groceries. We also went to "Discovery Park" where the older boys played soccer and Tanner enjoyed the playset.
One day we went down to a place near Parawon where there are some dinosaur tracks. Here Tanner has his hand on a track. Eric is pretending the track is a horn I think.
There are a bunch of Petroglyphs just past the place where we saw the dinosaur tracks (well, really we just found 1. I guess there are more, but we couldn't find them.) You can see some of them in the picture below on the rock just behind the boys....in person they are much more visible.
Brian has a Great Uncle who is buried in Parowan, so we stopped and aimlessly wandered around the cemetery. We didn't find the grave, so we went to the DUP (Daughters of the Utah Pioneers) Museum and found some very resourceful ladies there. They told us where to find the grave, plus took Brian over to see the house where his relative lived. A couple of the ladies had even had Brian's Great Uncle for a teacher in high school. You gotta love a small town!
We went to Bryce Canyon and enjoyed the amazing scenery there. There was forecast in the rain, but it rained very little while we were there. It was perfect weather for me because I really don't like the heat. The clouds were cool too.
Eric and Tanner were timid to get anywhere near the edge of the canyon. So here they are at a safe distance. They eventually felt comfortable enough to go up to the edge when there was a fence.
In addition to Bryce Canyon, we went to Cedar Breaks. It was really beautiful too. The younger boys, by then, were tired of the routine and not too excited to jump out and see more red rocks.
