Yep, We Took A Side Trip To Utah

Someone said that my last post about our going to Utah was too short and there wasn’t any photos or description or anything. Ok then. Here you go. This one is going to be graphic intensive since you asked for it!  You might want to go get something to snack on while it loads. It might take a while.

We left on Thursday night after work. The kids were really excited to drive all night, although I am not really sure why. They really don’t sleep too much. Mostly they read and watch movies. They do get along better though when travelling through the night. 

I did snap this photo about 4 hours into the drive.

 

To me, most of the drive looked like this:

It seemed to go faster. I think maybe because you can’t see the vast nothingness since it’s so dark. As you see the dotted lines go by quickly, it seems like you are getting there quicker.

My eyes had to adjust when we came to the tunnel it was so bright:

We made it there in no time arriving around 5am Friday morning.

The weekend was spent with all of Shelley’s family for a family reunion and it was great. 

The kids love playing with the little cart.

Darin was so proud of this pic. He said it was his best attribute and his best side:

Grandma was having photo wars taking pics of everyone and everything:

Darin and Erick were about to get in a fight here over a little piddley insignificant thingy, but they worked it out before anyone got hurt:

One morning we went shooting and put a lot of holes in cans!

 

Here is Marissa experiencing the kickback:

On Saturday July 3, our family went to Stadium of Fire at BYU. This was their 30th year it’s been going, and we have never gone as a family. We usually watch the fireworks with the other ten thousand people sitting on hills around BYU.  But someone gave us tickets when Doug was sick early in the year, as they knew we were going back to Utah and wanted to give us a surprise. It was a surprise and we loved it!  Doug and Shelley saw two of their favorite co-workers (both BYU Police) providing security and it was really good to see them. 

Our seats were pretty high up, but not the highest!  We had a good view of the fireworks.  This year the headliner was Carrie Underwood and she performed a good concert. Of course it’s not called “Stadium of FIRE” for nothing.  It’s been said it’s the biggest fireworks display in the country each year with 50,000 people in the stadium and another 10,000+ outside waiting for the fireworks.

Videos:

We really had a great time there and are grateful for the tickets we were given!  Thank you anonymous giver!

Uncle Don was fixing up Grandpa’s 4-wheelers that hadn’t been started in over 2 years. Of course he got them running. Jacob really loved watching and helping!

Monday we dropped Meghan and Marissa off at BYU for EFY. Meghan had a random roomate and she ended up being a convert of just a few months and they had a great time!  Marissa went with her cuz Jessica (from Utah) and they partied it up every minute! 

Jessica brought her vest she made out of duck tape.  I think she made a new fashion statement with it.

We met up with our two of our other best co-workers from the BYU Police days.  Denise (no photo – she was photo shy) who now is a big wig (not her hair, just her status) in the HR department, and Christine, one of our dearest friends who is an enviable job at BYU Hosting.  She greets and meets and waters (not wines) and dines  all the dignitaries and ambassadors to other countries when they come to visit BYU. People like prophets, presidents of other countries, dignitaries, and even aliens from other planets.  She gave us a very special tour of BYU and we loved it!

We went out to Eagle Mountain to show the kids our old house that we miss.  It still is one of the best looking houses in the neighborhood.  It brought back memories.  We did a few geocaches in Eagle Mountain while we were at it.

 

We took Jacob and Hannah to the Discovery Kids Museum in Salt Lake City one day. They got to shoot balls all over the huge beehive, be newscasters on TV, explore a helicopter, and just have lots of fun. 

I told Jake he was too big for this little toy, but he said, “Na. It fits just fine.”

We played some mini golf and laser tag, Jake and Hannah got to drive some race cars…

Before we knew it, it was time to come home.  :-(  This time we drove all day, and it seemed to take longer.  The kids took more naps though then they did when we drove all night.    Weird….

This is what I got to see all day…..

and……

and…..

and…..

And then you get right across the border of Cali and Nevada, and you see……

TREES on the sides of the road!

We had a great time and were glad to see everyone.   Now they can come visit us if they want! 

It’s HOT!

With temps around 105 and 107, it’s hot!!  We were in Target the other day because they keep it so cool in there, and I saw a waterslide for only $4. 

Now I know these things are junk, but for $4 you can’t go wrong!  We had these when I was a little kid, so I got it and the kids did have fun.  The lawn underneath didn’t like it so much.

It’s been some time now and we still have the slide and the neighbor kids even came over and played and still no rips!!   We just have to move it around each time to give the lawn time to recover.

Oh Yeah, We Went To Utah Too

We took a little trip to Utah for 10 days over July 4 and had lots of fun

Celebrate America

Ok, so I am a little behind on the blogging thing….So I need to try and ketchup.

Back towards the end of June, Rocklin (a neighboring city) normally has it’s “Rocklin Bash” which is an all day event in the park, and ending with fireworks at night. Due to budget cuts, it was going to be cancelled this year.  A local church heard about it, and wanted to help, so it was rebranded as “Celebrate America” and the church along with the city of Rocklin put it on.  We did have to listen to a 15 min “sermon” by the paster and his wife, but it was worth it. It was very fun and very free! (Donations accepted)

We got there in early evening to get our spot on the lawn for the show, and it was already getting crowded.  We brought our picnic dinner and  lawn chairs and staked out our spot. It was announced later that there were 10,000 people there on the lawn! It was packed!

There were all kinds of booths to play games, buy food, and get free pens and water bottles and key chains. There was jump houses, water jump houses and other stuff to keep occupied. It was very hot that day and everyone had their umbrellas up to keep the sun off them.  As soon as the sun started going down, they made everyone put away their umbrellas so everyone could see the stage.   Here was our view:

They also had rock wall climbing, and a helicopter from the armed services.

It was pretty cool. The flag on the stage was actually a choir with people sitting in it. They sang, there were stage shows and pretty good entertainment. 

 

A bunch of balloons was let go (don’t tell the environmentalists). 

Can you still see the balloons?

Jacob is intently watching the show:

Finally at the end was the fireworks. And they were pretty good too!  They were synced up to the music, which made a huge difference. 

 

 

We had a great time and were very impressed with what the church/city were able to do. We will definitely go back next year!