Wednesday Hiking Day

I've discovered that all the state parks are free on Wednesday. So I've designated Wednesday as our hiking day. Today we hiked Lynx Lake. It was a beautiful 2 mile trail around a lake. The trail was great and we hiked in the shade most of the time. We invited several families to join us. It was fun hiking with the Carpenters and Jex Families. We only have a few more Wednesdays left before the kids go back to school, but watch for us on the trail.

Hiking Thumb Butte

Vicki and her kids were able to come for a long weekend.  It was so wonderful to see them.  The cousins all had a great time playing together.  We enjoyed bike riding, swimming, playing tennis and hiking Thumb Butte.  

At the top of the trail

Look at the cute ducks we found at lunch!

Colton, Caleb, Nick, Jared, Lindsay and Natalie

Slide Rock

Slide Rock is natural water slides in Sedona, Arizona.  I wanted to enjoy and experience some of the state parks and trails before our summer was over, so on Wednesday we headed to Slide Rock.  This is our new favorite water slide park.  You just slide down a series of water slides into a deep pool of water.  The pool is 18 feet deep so they allow cliff jumping.  Colton and Caleb just took off and had a great time.  I just couldn't watch them cliff jump, it scares me just to watch.  Jared was much more reserved, and the flow of the water can be fast and scary for kids.  Jared and Lindsay would do smaller water slides and I would catch them and help them climb out and do the slide again.  It was a blast!  This is a picture of Colton going down one of the slides.  

The water is very cold, because it comes from snow melt off.  However, the red rocks were warm so when the kids would get to cold they would just lay on the red rocks to warm up.  My little lizards. 

Caleb, Justin and Dallin

Lindsay and Kami

Lindsay making sure to get the last chip!

Colton and Jared

Jared and Carston

70th Birthday Bash!

We enjoyed celebrating both Dad and Mom's 70th Birthday on Thursday. Their birthday's are only 9 days apart. So now Mom can't tease Dad that he is 70 and she is only 69! We started the day with swimming at Laurie's. We love being only 2 hours away from family. We woke up jumped in the car and were swimming just after 10. After swimming we enjoyed Pei Wei lunch and then the adults headed to the temple to do sealings. I was thinking about what I would want when I turn 70, and decided having your children in the temple with you would be one of the greatest gifts. I have never done sealings with my parents or siblings, so this was very fun.   David was a trooper and came to the temple after having hand surgery the day before.  Way to go David.

After the temple we had a fun family birthday celebration. The cousins had all been busy decorating birthday posters and the house with streamers.   But the kids were all super excited about the fabulous cake.

Laurie and the girls had made the most spectacular birthday cake. It was gorgeous! They use fondant and it look so professional and tasted awesome. Happy Birthday Dad and Mom. We Love You!

We enjoyed playing with Laurie's kids on Friday morning.  And then we headed to Arizona Mills for school shoes and some school shopping.  I can't believe we only have 3 weeks of summer vacation left.  Where has our summer break gone?

Carter Cousins Visit

We enjoyed having Rusty, Kelly, Kasey and Race visit. The cousins really enjoyed seeing each other. We had fun swimming, feeding the horses and picnicking at the town square. The adults had a fun evening out at Texas Roadhouse. Thanks for stopping and visiting!

Happy 70th Birthday Dad!

Wow, 70 years young. For dad's birthday we worked hard. My friend Lorna came over to help clear our weeds. We have thousands of them.  What a great friend! She brought 3 string mowers and we thought we would just mow the weeds. However, the weeds have gotten so big that we ended up just digging weeds out for a few hours. We filled up about 10 trash cans full of weeds. I hope to be able to work like my dad when I'm 70. I didn't want dad to spend his birthday weeding, but he loves to help and work hard.  After weeding we did cool off at the pool. Then we enjoyed dinner at Porky's. And then home to open presents and eat pie, dad's favorite dessert.  We love you Dad!

4th of July Fun

The day started with the Prescott parade. We had great seats and enjoyed watching the parade past. Everyone was dressed in red, white and blue. We even enjoyed RED lollypops! It was GREAT to have David and his family here for the holiday. Dad and Mom drove up after they helped with their ward pancake breakfast.












After an afternoon of swimming we headed to our neighborhood party. They had a pony for the kids to ride and horses for the adults to ride. The kids all loved riding the pony and several rode the horses. Lindsay and Tallie loved riding "Sister". We enjoyed a hay ride to the where dinner was set up. The kids had fun playing and catching frogs. Even Lindsay caught a frog and was sad when see had to let her "froggie" go so we could go watch the fireworks. It was a great day!

It's A Miracle

"It's A Miracle", this was what my kids said when they saw the rain today. We were out of town the last two times it rained in Las Vegas, which equates to the fact that my kids haven't seen rain in over a year! So to them it felt like a miracle. They danced in the rain until they were all wet.
Then they all got cups to catch the rain. And had fun having a HUGE water fight.
This is the beginning of the Monsoon season in Arizona, so I guess we will have afternoon rain most afternoons for the next two months. 

The rain is wonderful because it will drop from 80 degrees to 65 and we enjoy beautiful rainbows after. The boys like the rain because it means they don't have to haul water out to the 40 trees and plants that have no irrigation system yet. We are hopeful that the bucket watering system will help the boys learn to work.