Utah Trip: Delta

Isaiah & I decided to make a family journey to Utah to visit family we have out there. The trip was awesome. Everyday was jammed packed with fun adventures. The kids traveled really well for how long of a drive it is (24 hours). We chose to drive through the night, so Melody would sleep a large portion of it. We also had installed a dvd player in the truck, but sad to say it only worked twice and then the rest of the trip we had to survive the old fashion way.

Leaving Missouri it was hot, but once we got into the Rockies it turned cold and stormy. We had to stop and do a wardrobe change. You can see the storm behind us. We spent the first few days in Delta with my family. Everyone landed at my sisters house, and we ended up with 32 people there. Lets just say every inch of floor space was taken. Of those 32 people, 10 were kids under the age of 8.

Isaiah took the three oldest kids hiking up Oak City Canyon by himself. They had a great time.

Carter pretending to touch the cactus.

They ended up hiking to the top of a mountain. What a beautiful view.

They also found this giant mushroom. We could barely fit two of them in a large garbage bag.


Everyone had brought four wheelers to go riding. The first day we went to an old volcano out on the desert. It was a lot of fun.

This is the trailer of bikes and quads Slade and March brought from Missouri. It was quite a sight to see.

Grandpa and Daxton getting ready to go riding.

On the back side of the volcano was this awesome lava flow. Isaiah and I with the kids hiked to the top of it. It was so a incredible thing to see.

It was hot out in the desert, so we had to have a watermelon brake. Melody and Elisa loved it.

At lunch time, everyone crammed under this little cedar tree to try and get some shade. Lets just say by the end of the day everyone was dirty from sitting in the sand and hot.

The next day everyone went up to Oak City Canyon and rode around. Benjamin got to ride with his best buddy Brooke on her little four wheeler. They were so cute together.

Anniversary: Hot Springs, AR

Isaiah and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary on June 2. It is crazy how fast time has flown by. Since Melody was old enough to leave over night, we decided to take a little trip to Hot Springs, Arkansas. Our dear friend Jeannie was kind enough to watch the kids for us. We ended up staying a really cute bed & breakfast. We had never stayed at one before and it was a lot of fun. It was really neat to have breakfast with the other guests and get to know them.

The only way to actually get into the hot springs water is to go through a bath house. So Isaiah and I got up and went to one at 7am one morning. The whole processes takes about 1.5 hours. You start by soaking in a bath tub, then you do a sitz bath. After that you do a steam room and then you get wrapped in hot towels. Last is a shower and then a massage. It was a very interesting experience.

This is one of the few places the hot springs water runs out and is open to the public. It comes out of the ground at 140 degrees, so you can hardly stand to touch it.

There were lots of hiking trails, so we spent one morning just hiking through the beautiful forest. We ended up hiking to this tower. The view from it was spectacular.

We had a great trip and the kids did really well for Jeannie.

St. Louis: animals, science & tornados

On our second day in St. Louis we went to the zoo during the morning. It threatened to rain on us all morning, but it didn't start raining until we were just leaving. The zoo wasn't very crowded, which made it really enjoyable to walk around with the kids.

They boys had so much fun goofing off. Isaiah ended up taking them to a 4-d dinosaur movie, which they loved.

Melody loved all the animals. She would get as close as she possible could, then she would make the animal noise over and over. She was really happy the whole time.

Amita wasn't her usually happy self this morning. She was really quite and gloomy. I couldn't get her to hardly smile.

After the zoo, we went to the Science Center. We were thinking it was going to be way better then the little one that is in Springfield. We were really disappointed with it. It was so crowded you could hardly let the kids just walk by themselves. All the exhibits had long lines. We ended up only staying about an hour and then we were ready to leave. The coolest thing there was the dinosaures that moved.

After the Science Center, we went back to the hotel and had a good rest. I decided that I wanted a coffee, so we walked around downtown and found a Starbucks. After we had gotten our coffee and were walking back to the hotel, the tornado sirens went off. We finished walking to the hotel and went up to our room were we turned on the TV. They were saying a tornado in east St. Louis had been reported. Our hotel room had a balcony, so we opened to door to it and watched the storm roll in. We never saw the tornado, but the rain poured so hard that we couldn't even see the hotel across the street. It was totally awesome and a great way to ended our trip.

St. Louis Trip: The Arch

We decided it was time to take the kids on a mini vacation to St. Louis. We love going to St. Louis because it is only a 4 hour drive and there is so much to do there that is free: the zoo, the science center, & the arch museum.

We headed out Friday morning and got to the city by afternoon. The older kids were really good on the drive. Melody, on the other hand, was good while she was a sleep, but cried most of the time when she was a wake. It ended up she had an upset stomach because she throw-up just as we were parking at the hotel.

We decided to spend the afternoon walking around The Arch. There is a beautiful park around it. The kids just ran and ran all over. There is also a museum at The Arch that is underground between the two legs. I thought the kids would love to go underground, so we took them. Isaiah decided to see how much it cost to go up to the top of The Arch. We know it would be expensive, but thought that maybe he could take Benjamin if it wasn't to bad. It turned out they were having a special, so we all got to go for just $25.

To get to the top of The Arch, you have to ride in a little capsule. It doesn't really have any windows or any thing. It is very small. Only 5 people can fit in it. I couldn't even sit up straight because my head would hit the ceiling. It reminded me of the inside of a dryer. We told the kids it was a spaceship, and we pretended to be going into outer space.

At the top there are little windows on both sides you can look out of. The kids had fun pretending that the people were ants and the cars were toys.

Here we are at the top enjoying the view.



This is the view looking at downtown St. Louis. It you look out the other side you look across the Mississippi River into Illinois.

When we were ready to go back down, Benjamin asked if he could take the stairs. He said it really loud and everyone around us heard and laughed at him.

The museum was fun too. Melody loved all the stuffed animals they had. There was a big stuffed brown bear and once she saw that the rest of the time she walked around growling like a bear.

To Be Continued...

Happy 5th Birthday Carter

Carter turned the big 5 on Friday. We did out usually small family party. He had decided on strawberry short cake for his birthday cake. I normally buy the number candles for the kids, but hadn't had time to get to the store. I ended up using some trick candles I had in the cupboard. It was so funny to watch Carter try and blow the candles out over and over again. Benjamin even tried to help. Finally, Dad jumped in and put them out by dipping them in the whip cream on the cake.

All the kids had a blast opening up presents. Even Melody wanted in on the action. Carter would just get one present open when she would start opening another for him.

In all Carter had a great birthday.

Cruising Around

The weather has been beautiful the last few weeks, so Isaiah has been able to take his motorcycle out. Well, of course the kids always beg to go with him. Here is a picture of how to get all those rides done at once. Don't worry he only cruises around the house with them.

Easter

Easter is one holiday you never know if it is going to be cold and miserable or nice. Well, this year we got lucky and it was a very beautiful day just a bit windy.

During the morning, Jeannie and the kids came over and they colored eggs. Jeannie's husband James had painted a basket for each kid.

They turned out really cute and the kids loved them. This was Melody's first real Easter and she loved it. She totally understood that she need to find the eggs, put them in her basket, open them, and eat the yummies inside.
James also made an egg for each kid. He painted a face and their name. I thought they were really cute.

Can you tell it is windy, very windy.

Melody's egg was of her crying and she was crying for the picture, so it matched perfect.

The kids had a great day and found lots of fun toys and treats. In this picture Melody is wanting to attack every one's basket and she can figure out why they wont let her.