exotic utah: week 2 - part a

our second week in utah was split between my family in payson and a family reunion (grant's mom's side) in heber. monday the 16th, we had a water party in the backyard, complete with a super steep slip 'n slide:

madi's expression is pretty priceless. hazel hesitated at the top while mary alice and madison went up and down, over and over again:

this is as close as hazel ever got to sliding down. there was also a kiddie pool, which lucy and avah slowly emptied one bucketful at a time (i didn't get any pictures of that, but you can see lucy's hat and the top of avah's head in the above pic). and my personal childhood favorite: a sprinkler under the trampoline:

 

the big kids just sat lazily in the shade, eating food and drinking soda (and making goofy faces):

eventually, the wee ones got overheated and headed over for some popsicles:

on tuesday, we headed up to bear lake. we stopped at the cabin so dad could show us the progress he's made. outside, hazel was flipping over rocks when she excitedly exclaimed, "daddy, wook! i found a dead crab!"

yeah. not a mostly dead crab but a somewhat alive scorpion. luckily, there were no stings and everyone made it to the beach in one piece:

we all jumped right into our usual beach activities: my younger (also part albino but still in denial about it) sisters slathered on some tanning oil: i stole my dad's hat, a towel (to hide my sunburn-inclined skin), my book and the most comfortable lounge chair (that was unfortunately positioned next to my talkative sister-in-law):

 

shaylee, as you can see, hit the oreos and other snacks; lucy got as muddy as she could by herself:

and then asked to be buried, hazel decided to join her:

hazel did not get hit by that bucket, so casually tossed by mary alice, but proceeded to collect sea shells:

wednesday has no visuals. grant went on a bike ride with his buddy, dan, while i went to breakfast with a high school friend. we then met up with grant's sister and made brownies for the reunion. and then it was back to payson, where we ditched the kids with my very lucky little sisters and went out to dinner with the "adults" of the family. 

thursday, grant, the girls and i said our good-byes and headed up to deer valley resort, where a very giddy grant picked up an uber fancy downhill bike and full-faced motorcycle helmet:

lucy was jealous....so:

hazel and hayden had a gay ol' time playing together:

and then the other crazies outdoorsmen came:

left to right: berkely, johnny, mike, carl, grant & sam

they hadn't been gone for much more than an hour when the weather turned:

we picked up our sopping wet, freezing cold boys and headed first to the outlet stores and then to heber for the fugal family reunion...

to be continued...

epic roadtrip 2010: return

we're halfway through our drive back to houston.

we left from a family reunion yesterday afternoon and made it to moab.

tonight we're sleeping in el paso. and that leaves a mere 10 hours of driving for tomorrow. . . hooray.

the kids are doing ok, but we're all very ready to be home again.

exotic utah: week 1

this week has been great. we've met up with friends and family. the girls have had a backyard to frolic in (and temperatures that won't immediately fry an egg on the sidewalk):

on friday, we went boating on utah lake with grandpa, cami, austin and aliyah:

lucy (sporting a buzz lightyear lifejacket. she walked around, happily exclaiming "b'ightyear!"), austin & hazel

cami, aliyah & grandpa

austin slept peacefully on the buoy.

while the girls all chilled on the cushions up front.

after lunch they broke out the tube. hazel was brave enough to try it.

lucy slept through all the excitement.

then austin had a go. he loved going over the choppy waves.

hazel's favorite part, by far, was driving the boat. she enjoyed making everyone seasick by doing constant 360's 

my favorite part was catching the droplet of drool in this picture of lucy.

saturday, grant and i ran in the lindon days 5k:

grandma and lucy were our cheerleaders

this is just after i finished (34:55). i told grant to do his best and he accordingly left me in the dust (23:00). 

hazel didn't have much fun on her fun run.

it took a lot of poking and prodding to get her to finish. she was dead last......by at least a minute.

we stuck around for the door prizes and were pleasantly surprised to find that grant placed second in his age division (30-34).

pretty exciting.

epic roadtrip 2010: day 4

8.9.10: dinosaur land (jensen & vernal, utah)

we spent the night in vernal and in the morning we headed to dinosaur national monument:

the best part (& the part i remember most from childhood) is closed down until next year. instead, they offer a fossil discovery trail for free. shuttles run back and forth between parking and the trail head:

it was a very sunny and hot day (but blessedly humidity-free):

on one fork of the trail there was a park ranger pointing out fossils and explaining why the quarry was closed. hazel was made much of by the ranger and got to pose by and touch the fossils:

lucy didn't care for anything except running downhill as fast as she could and stopping to smell the wild flowers:

hazel learned enough to become an official junior paleontologist:

 after that we headed for the utah field house of natural history:

it was very kid friendly (before the kids spot the gift shop, at least):

i've mentioned before how much the girls love dinosaur train on pbs. well, the gift shop had toys from the show and once lucy and hazel spotted tiny pteranodon, it was all over: