Halloween 2017

 Monday evening (the night before Halloween) we carved our pumpkins.  It makes me so happy when it's warm enough to carve outside!  And the dogs are happy too because they get a lot the scraps!

 I think they turned out pretty good!

And to make things a little extra spooky the girls found a black widow on our porch...lovely.

This is the second black widow that we've had around this house since we moved in...the other was found in my laundry room years ago!!  Yes...pretty scary indeed!  They both met their death by being blasted with ant spray...and then squished for good measure.  Sorry spiders.

 This year we have: Lydia Deetz, a dark angel, Dorothy and a cute little witch.

And as for us: Tom Petty (it had to be done this year) and his super fan.

Hope everyone had a great Halloween!!

Hello October

I love summer...I hate to see it go...I really do.

But I have to admit, fall is beautiful around these parts!

It's peak season for fall colors, and we knew if we didn't get out this weekend it would be gone and we'd miss it!  So we devoted Sunday afternoon to driving through the mountains and soaking in some of this beauty.  Unfortunately, about a million other people had the same idea!  So we aborted our original plan of driving the Alpine Loop  (seriously, the road was backed up for miles!) and decided to go off the beaten path to Squaw Peak road.  This is a dirt road that follows the ridge of the mountain behind our house.  It was much quieter!

Squaw Peak Overlook.

It was stormy and pretty ominous for most of the day, but it made for some amazing views!

We drove the dirt road and got out at various places to walk around and check out the views.

It was quite chilly!!  The temperature sunk down into the 30's at one point!  We even saw a few snow flakes!

After our little walkabouts, admiring the views, we'd jump back in the car and turn the heat full blast to warm up again.  And then when we got home we all put on warm pj's and cozied up on the couch to watch some TV.  I don't think any of us are ready for the cold season yet!

Happy October!

Snow Canyon State Park

After our failed trip to Capital Reef, the kids were so bummed.  We told them we would make it up to them...they would get their camping trip, we promised!!

 So this last weekend, we hit the road again.  Except this time we went to Snow Canyon State Park in St. George.  We only had a reservation for Sunday night. Saturday night was completely booked, however, they have walk-in sites available if you get there early enough.  Soooooo, again, we took a gamble.  We left early Saturday morning and just crossed our fingers that they had a walk-in site available for Saturday night. 

 We made it to Snow Canyon by lunch time, and low and behold they had a campsite available!!!

In fact, they had several!!  We even got to chose the one we wanted, haleluja!!

We picked one that we've camped in before...it's pretty much our favorite spot.  It's kinda secluded off the road, and it's right up against the rock.  The kids can climb all over (not too high though...the ranger got after my kids for going to far up the rock...whoops) and they created all sorts of little trails and hide-outs.

 Haley and Morgan slept in their own tent tucked away.

They named their spot the Coyote Den.

 Sunday we went on a hike in the park to see the lava tubes.  The tubes are basically huge caves created from lava flowing underground from volcanoes dating back 27,000 years ago.  Some of the tubes collapsed but some are still in tact and people can walk through them.  

Having our picnic lunch outside one of the caves.

 The lookout point from the lava flow hike.

 We also hit up the sand dunes in the park that evening before dinner.

This is always a favorite with the kids...you can't visit Snow Canyon without hitting up the dunes!

Monday morning we went on a very short hike (more like a little walk) to see the pioneer names written on the canyon wall.  Pioneers would write their names with axle grease as they passed through the area.  Some  dated back to 1881!

And just for kicks I had Haley and Morgan pose in the same rock hole they peeked through years ago.

 They're so little!!!

 Hiking up to see all the pioneer names.

After the hike we headed back to camp, made a quick lunch and then we packed up to head home.

I'm so glad we planned this little weekend getaway.  It was perfect and just what we all needed.

And we all got our much needed s'mores fix!!

Capital Reef Fail

We've been wanting to hit up Capital Reef for some time now.  We have this goal to hit all the Mighty Five National Parks: Zion, Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, and Capital Reef.  We've only done Zion and Arches as a family so far...so we have some work to do!  Anyway, the downfall...the Capital Reef campground does not take reservations, it's only first come, first serve.  So we've been putting it off because I'm always worried we wouldn't get a spot because it seems everything is always crowded around here during the summer months!  We decided to wait until after Labor Day when travel/camping slows way down.  We left  on a Friday afternoon.

 The girls (Piper especially) had been counting down the days til we got to leave.

The drive was quite nice and surprisingly smooth.

We pulled into the park around around 6...and what do you know...campground full.  The girls pretty much burst into tears, and I wasn't close behind.  It's just so discouraging, especially with all the prep (food, gear, etc.) Ryan and I had to do before hand.  It's just such a let down.  The campground host directed us to some BLM land to camp at...but without water and bathrooms, those options were pretty much out. I would have taken one for the team and camped somewhere without a bathroom, but one kiddo was having a nervous breakdown with the thought of no toilet.  I was not going to turn this into a traumatic weekend, so after an hour or so of driving around we decided to book a hotel in the little nearby town.

And if things couldn't get any worse, turns out, there were no vacancies at a single hotel.

Unbelievable.

By this point, it was close to 8 and we were all starving.  Every eatery was packed or way out of our price point, so we opted to stop into a Subway inside a gas station...desperate times.

It was close to 9 by the time we finished eating and decided it was time to throw in the towel.  There wasn't much left to do but drive back home.  So, in the dark while the kiddos (kinda) slept, we drove the three hours back.

Sad day.

And what really boggles me, was that everyone told us how Capital Reef is the "quietest" of all the parks...what happened?!  There were people everywhere, people like us, scrambling, trying to find a place for the night.  And you know who were in the campground all comfortable...retired people.  I kid you not...not a single family I saw in that campground!  Come on baby boomers, camp during the week and give the spots to families on the weekend!!

Lame.

The only thing I could think of why it was so crowded was because of the Harvest Moon...but who really knows.

So Saturday, after our failed trip, we decided to make the best of our weekend home.

We loaded up the car and went hiking up in the canyon.  It was beautiful and the weather was perfect!

Just this year Haley hit a massive growth spurt and shot up.

Crazy.

Still when I look at her, I feel she's smaller than me.  It isn't until I see a photo of us that I'm shocked...she's so grown up looking!  Where did my baby go?!

 After our hike we drove up to Squaw Peak to gaze down onto the valley.

It's just so pretty this time of year!

 And to continue our weekend of fun, we hit up the last day of the Utah State Fair on Sunday.

So despite our failed camping trip the weekend turned out pretty nice.

As soon as we got home we made reservations at one of our favorite campgrounds in St. George for October.  We're taking the girls out of school and everything.

Camping will happen!!  

Just maybe not at Capital Reef.