School Days!

James started First Grade on August 24. Crazy that I have a first grader now!

It took a little while to get use to an all day school schedule and I think we're all loving it now, even though James comes home a bit grumpy most days. The year also started out a bit rough for James. He had a bit of a bully problem. It seems to be worked out now which is good.

I love seeing how much James has grown up from his first day of kindergarten. He is right where he should be in most areas of academics. He is also making great progress in Occupational Therapy and Speech Therapy. I'm amazed at the type of person he is becoming; always kind, loving and caring. I'm mostly amazed at how hard he works at over coming his struggles physically.

Look at world this stud is taking on first grade and beyond!

Summer Vacation #2

I'm finally getting around to posting about our second summer vacation. Hopefully I'll remember everything about it.

We of course made a long drive across Nevada. It's seriously the best... totally being sarcastic. However we did get hit by a little rain and a rainbow graced the sky. Making the trip a bit better.

Our first order of business was spending a few days in Provo. Tracy attended the Fair Mormon Conference with his parents. I played with the kids. I did get to spend one afternoon at the conference and Tracy's mom took the kids so that was nice of her to let me have her spot for a few hours. I also very much enjoyed the talks and gained some new insights.

One of the days in Provo I took the kids to meet my sister at a splash pad in Highland? Alpine? I don't remember which one. Charles was a little nervous at first but soon he couldn't get enough. James is a splash pad enthusiast as long as he doesn't get too wet. lol 

We also took a walk along the river trail, since our hotel was right by the river.

After Provo we spent the weekend at Tracy's parent's house. We celebrated our 10th anniversary by going to the Manti Temple. I convinced my little sister to be our third wheel since she had never been to that temple before. It was fun to spend time with her and visit the place we were married 10 years prior.

We thought it would be fun to try to recreate our wedding picture. Just not in our wedding attire. 

This humming bird posed for some pictures too.

I just love the beauty of the temple surrounded by farmland. Amazing that the saints built this out there pretty much in the middle of no where. 

The next order of business was our annual Thomson/White Moab trip. It was a blast as always.

Tracy and James collecting water at the spring.

 Our first trail the Steelbender. (I'll try not to post too many Jeep pictures.) It was just us four that went on this trail. My sister and her family had yet to arrive. They were taking the long route through Capitol Reef before coming to Moab. Tracy's cousin and family wanted to settle in some more after arriving.

I think we found some mud.

The next day we went on the Hell's Revenge trial, again. We had done it last year. Tracy liked it so much he wanted to go again. This time we made sure to check out the dinosaur tracks.

Charles was more interested in the view

Tracy took Charles and my sister's family in our Jeep. James and I rode in Tracy's cousin's Jeep. It was fun to ride in the newer car and see how it handled the trails.

At some point along the way James took my phone and started snapping pictures.

So excited!

Capturing his brother who loved off roading as much as he does.

James asked for a picture of him and his 2nd cousin.

He took a lot of pictures like this of our Jeep.

 After Hell's Revenge everyone except myself and Charles went on a little drive/hike to some pools. Because we had 1 extra person than seats in the two Jeeps some one had to stay behind when we did anything off road. My brother in law stayed behind for Hell's Revenge. I stayed behind for the hike/water. I kept Charles with me so Tracy only had to keep an eye on one kid.

The next day we all took a drive to Gemini Bridges.

We hung around the condo most of the rest of the day. Cooked up some good food and got a little better organized to leave the next day. My sister's family went out to Canyonlands. My nephew has the 4th grader park pass, so they wanted to see as much as possible.

When we were getting everything packed up the following morning. I came across all the kids in our room reading together. Love the bond that they all have.

 Before leaving Moab we visited the new dinosaur museum. We just toured the outdoor area, but the inside exhibits also sounded amazing. I had fun quizzing Tracy on all the dinosaur replicas before he read the signage. He of course got 100% or at least identified them close enough to count.

This swing in the play area was pretty cool.

 After Moab we spent a couple of days in St. George before I made the drive with the kids and Tracy's mom back to Davis.

Charles' crazy bed head on morning.

James loved his new book so much he pretty much did it the whole way home.

Summer Vacation #1

Guess it is time to write about our summer vacations. We took two separate trips to Utah; one in July and one in August. This post will be about our first trip and then I'll do another one about our second trip.

We decided to make a trip to Utah in July for a family reunion on Tracy's side. One of his cousins who lives outside of the U.S. was going to be there so it was an opportunity to see her and her family.

This time out we took Highway 50 across Nevada. A little less boring, with fun little towns and more scenery, but still very long drive. Charles doesn't do long car rides very well. So I tried to have some fun new and old things to play with in the car. He cycled through his stuff every 5 minutes. James barely touch his things. He just loves to watch out the window and see the world.

James did really love this chalk board I got. 

 Once in Utah we stayed at Joe's parents' house for a few days. We covered our Jeep to get it ready for our Moab trip in August. And just relaxed enjoying Tracy's official start of summer since he had been working up to our trip.

All ready for Moab!

The day of the family reunion we met some of my family in Salt Lake for lunch at Blue Lemon. We played a bit at City Creek and then went to the reunion. It was a lot of fun spending so much time with family. It was especially fun to see a lot of Tracy's cousins many of whom we hadn't seen for a couple of years. I didn't take any pictures at the reunion, but there was family group pictures taken. So I'm sure someday we'll get copies.

After the reunion we spent the rest of the trip in St. George. Tracy did some work at Zion NP. We just love Zion. Such a beautiful place!

Playing with chalk at our favorite place to stay in St. George.

James sat and looked at this map in the museum for hours.
Pretty much the entire 2-3 hours Tracy was doing his work in the museum collections.

Having snacks outside the museum.
The only time I was able to pull James away from the map.

James asked to have his picture taken with the tall mountains.

We help James earn a Jr. ranger badge.
This was us taking a short hike to the place
where they had one of the ranger activities required to earn the badge.

 On the way home we took a two day trip so we could see Death Valley and Yosemite and the research center Tracy worked at prior to our trip.
It was sooo hot in Death Valley, we only left the car to see the visitor center and immediately regretted it.

The thermometer says it all. Misery with a capital M.

Can't even look at the camera it was sooo hot. 

Yosemite was very much more enjoyable than Death Valley. We'll just have to go back in the fall/winter when not so hot. 

In Yosemite we also because of the distance and time to get home we just mostly drove through. Stopped by the river to play and have lunch. Another beautiful place on earth. We're considering a winter trip there over Christmas break.