A vacationing we will go, a vactioning we will go, high ho the merry oh, a vacationing we will go!

So these last couple of weeks have been full of joyous togetherness and fun . . . we actually had time to travel!

On Tuesday, May 6th we took Lily on her first camping trip to Dinosaur National Monument in Vernal, UT. It was the first time Lily was in the car for longer than an hour and she did . . . ok (we didn't keep very good time with her feedings - our bad). But once we got there she did great! Lily slept like a rock that night and so did Scott except for the times I woke him up freaked out by the animal sounds I was hearing - we even said a prayer of protection, which did help tremendously). Well, the animal was just a large elk walking very close to our tent eating the grass. Then at 5 am all the birds decided to wake up . . . fun stuff I tell you. The next day we went to the visitor's center and there Lily almost got eaten by a dinosaur!!! Ok, it was a plant eater's skull (but it was still pretty fun to pretend). Then we headed over to the Utah Field House of Natural History state park. There we toured around the museum and had a lot of fun looking at all the old Dino stuff, Lily loved it (I actually got yelled at by an automated voice telling me I was too close to the exhibit). We also looked at the life-sized models of some ancients like the Woolly Mammoth! My favorite character from Sesame Street - Snuffy! And we saw the Vernal Temple.Anyway, after that we thought it would be fun to do a hike and go see some fossilized Dino tracks . . .let's just say we didn't make it all the way (it was the hottest part of the day and the "trail" wasn't really a trail, just some sticks that told you which way would be best to go, also the trail was all sand!). So that was interesting. We then went back to the camp, however, the wind was really picking up and there were a lot of black clouds. So, we quickly ate dinner and packed up and made a very fast stop at the Petroglyphs and then drove home - we were all very tired.

The next day (Thursday), Scott did a sail boat race on Utah Lake where he won first place on both races and then we went to a BBQ for a friend's birthday as well as welcoming home her husband from Iraq (he was in a province with heavy fighting). Then on Friday we went to the temple as well as the BYU Creamery while Lily got babysat by our friends Ben and Beth Inouye(she did great with them). On Saturday we went to the end of a BYU baseball game and drove Ashley and her roomies back to their apartment.

So, after those few days we decided to head out on another excursion down to visit Uncle Dale in Kanab, UT.

We left for Kanab on Wednesday, May 14th. On our way down there, Lily needed to stop and eat (and so did we) so we stopped at Cove Fort. This took much longer then we thought because the wonderful missionary was generous with his explanations of the fort and the goings on there. But we enjoyed it . . .we even got a cool toy out of it. After Cove Fort we drove to Bryce Canyon for a wonderful hike on the Navajo Loop (we had fun with the French tourists that were there too!). We also made friends with a little chipmunk, a guy from Montreal and another couple.

We finally made it to Uncle Dale's in Kanab, where we ate some wonderful veggie stir fry and went to bed. The next day we slept in a bit and then went out to Zion National Park. We took a tour of the park in a bus and got off on one of the stops (saw an animal that has been fed people food - against the rules) to do a grand hike up to Angel's Landing. It was about a 5 mile round trip hike in - of course - the worst part of the day, but Lily did great and we saw a lot of lizards and chipmunks and some spectacular views of the park (we actually didn't go all the way to Angel's Landing but to Scout Lookout because the landing was very treacherous to take a 5 mth old on). After the hike we toured again on the bus while Lily ate and saw some other great sites (like some 80 year old stairs that were used for people to go up to a Sunrise Easter Service) and animals (a wild turkey). It was also a really neat drive down to the park because they have you go through about a 1 mile tunnel in the mountain dug by miners!

We again went home to Uncle Dale where he cooked up another fabulous meal of veggie stir-fry and went to bed. Friday we made our way to the Grand Canyon. There we had a refreshing time (since it wasn't very hard hiking, which was good because we were still very tired from the day before) where we saw the sites and met a famous donkey . . .also somewhere between the gift shop and the lodge, we lost Lily's hat - good thing we were done with being outside. After the Grand Canyon we went back to Uncle Dale's and got to spend some time with him. We visited with him, showed him pictures and videos (Scott dancing and my skating), and he gave us a tour of Kanab with all of Scott's ancestors (their graves and their homes they lived in). The next morning we packed up to head home and while Scott and I packed up Lily got to spend some one on one time with her Great-Uncle Dale! It was a great trip and vacation.

(Lily got a bath in a real bath tub instead of in a plastic bowl in a sink)

The Saturday we got back we went to a ward BBQ and had a wonderful evening because the weather was perfect. Now we're just taking a break and starting to get things ready for the big move to Charleston, South Carolina.