4th and 5th

For the first time in forever Justin wasn't deer hunting during the kids' fall break so we went to Moab. Justin's brother and his family live there now so we stayed with them. We hadn't been to Moab with the kids ever so this trip was due.

We drove Thursday morning and got to our first stop, Dead Horse Point State Park at noon. This is also where Justin's parents met us. They drove down the night before.

Eating lunch in the bed of the truck in the parking lot of the visitor's center.

I had been here with my family when I was like 10 but didn't remember much other than thinking it wasn't that steep of a dropoff.

Legend has it some cowboys left a bunch of horses here to die.

It was pretty and cool. I remember it being really cold when I came as a kid and Justin remembers it being really windy when he came as a kid but this day was calm and sunny.

The littles completed their junior ranger booklets and got a pin. Justin also bought them compass bracelets.

Next stop was just a cliff over (but a 30 minute drive) at Canyonlands National Park. This is the 4th national park in Utah for my kids to visit. I don't know if I had ever been here before.  Canyonlands is huge and divided in 3 parts by the Colorado and Green rivers and we only went into one third of it and didn't see much of it at that. 

We mostly just drove to scenic overlooks but we did do one hike to Mesa arch that was just over a mile loop.

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The littles climb up every rock they find and it makes me so nervous every time. Justin thinks I'm paranoid but Erica and James have fallen hard (St. George and Goblin Valley, respectively) so I'm not paranoid.

When I took these photos I couldn't see the screen of my phone very well facing the sun and all so they're pretty funny to look at now.

In case you missed that....

This was our last stop and my favorite.

I kind of want to walk through this "doorway"

And this was where James dropped his waterbottle. Lucky for him it wasn't a complete drop off so Justin was able to walk around and rescue it.

From there we drove to Moab and ate dinner at the Moab Diner.

The boys took one of the spare bedrooms and the girls chose to sleep in the backyard in a tent. Erica loved it.

Friday morning we went to some mountain bike trails. I didn't take any pictures only videos but fun was had by all and no one got hurt.

That afternoon we hiked to Millcreek Falls. 

Justin is so good at selfies of us.

Thank you Corey for helping us out.

The water was freezing! We had to cross the stream a few times as we made our way up the canyon but the water at the falls was the coldest.

James got completely wet and wanted to head back down to sunshine right away. I yelled for him to wait and he thought I said go ahead so away he went barefoot and shivering in search of direct sunlight. Once I realized where he must have gone I took off after him. I found him quickly and we made our way to a sunny spot and waited for everyone to catch up.

That evening the men cooked some carne asada and it was delicious.

Saturday morning we woke up so early to get to Arches at 7 am. They have reserved entrance time and we got lucky and snagged the last one available but it was early for us. The kids were surprisingly pleasant about getting up at 6 and sneaking out of Braden's house in the dark.

We kind of forgot how tired we were when we saw this.

We got out of the car to hike a mile to the Delicate Arch overlook. We didn't feel up to the 3 mile hike to the arch itself. We'll save that for next time. It was 37 degrees.

We watched a rabbit in the brush on the way back to the truck. Then we had snacks.  Every time we stopped the kids had to have a snack.

Next stop. Don't remember what this arch was called. It was really windy.

Henry and Sarah always look for out of state license plates on trips. They spotted all 50 states except Arkansas, Rhode Island, and Hawaii plus a few Canadian provinces. Henry ran up and down all the parking lots. You know what state is surprisingly NOT hard to find? Florida. Those Floridians get out en masse.

This was my favorite arch, Pinetree Arch. It looks like an elephant as you approach it.

Then you get to walk right up to it, no scary climbs or cliffs.

Just a dead branch to sit under.

Then we continued on to Landscape Arch which should really be called Delicate Arch because it looks like it's going to completely crumble.

The trail continues on but we turned back. The kids were tired. Miraculously they got a burst of energy when they saw this sandy hill near the parking lot.

Ate more snacks, checked for more plates, used the restrooms then we went to a third and final area of the park.

We actually spent a long time in this area. There are a few arches on a short loop and when you think the kids are done, they find some hidey hole or something to explore.

There are over 2,000 arches in Arches. We saw like 20.

At this point and we were hot and dusty and tired so we headed out (it was only 2pm and 77 degrees) Now the kids can cross off all 5 of the National Parks in Utah, aka the Mighty Five. Thanks to Erica's 4th grade pass these last two were free. Pretty sure we saw the previous 3 for free too with Sarah's and Henry's passes.

On our way back to Braden's house we drove along the Colorado River up a canyon and then stopped at this bridge.

Erica did not like the bridge but she smiled long enough for this photo.

Then we went to Braden's house to pack up and we drove home and got there just in time to unload the car put the kids to bed. 

The weird, the cool, and the pretty

Conference weekend was a treat. Conference bingo held their attention for 1.89 sessions of conference.

Just in case you were wondering how gorgeous fall can be, here's a picture of our mountain.

One day while driving home from the store I thought my car got shot. It wasn't a bullet but a rock but my pulse didn't know the difference and I was shaking the rest of the way home. But how weird that it looks like a pumpkin.

October means one thing: Orchestra concerts. Sarah's was Tuesday evening. She's wearing the cute poodle skirt. She had a speaking part which she did not warn me about so I didn't get a video and barely snapped this photo.

Her teacher has them play their last song one more time and let's parents get a close up shot of them playing. 

Justin's step grandpa died. He was 89 and had cancer. He served in the military so he got all the cool military honors at his burial.

It was moving and beautiful and it started to rain just as we were mingling around. We joked it was Roy's way of keeping us on schedule. 

I talked James into wearing his raincoat on a rainy day. The discussions I have with this kid! I convinced him by saying if he had his rain jacket on he'd be invincible to the rain like some sort of superhero. It worked and he also had double hoods that day.

Look at this weird reverse fried egg.

So I should pretty much keep my DSLR camera in my car the entire month of October because my cell phone does not do the fall colors justice.

Or the sunsets! This was on the way to Henry's orchestra concert and I'm seriously wondering how I didn't crash into a ditch because I was pretty distracted.

We were all watching for angels or Simba or something.

Henry's concerts are always a good time. His orchestra teacher is pretty hilarious and keeps things short and entertaining. This was the first concert I could see Henry playing the entire time.

He nods his head to the beat and gets so into it. 

I found this frame at the thrift store for $6. It was a good quality frame but the color and print were lame.

So I spray painted it black and put a new picture inside. Not bad for $6.

Just another pretty mountain photo.

Eclipse day! This was a Saturday morning so all the kids were home from school. Sarah had a pair of eclipse glasses so we took turns watching the eclipse.

James didn't remember the 2019 eclipse (or was it 2018) so he was extra interested in what all the fuss was about.

My favorite part were the shadows.

Last mountain photo, I promise.

Now I better got get packing for our trip to Moab. We are going to see two national parks and one state park in this visit. I hope I bought enough snacks.