Memorial Day at the Dunes

(Since there were a whole bunch of us at Mom and Dad's house over the weekend, I hope to see many, many more photos posted- not just mine!)

We hadn't originally planned on going anywhere for Memorial Day, but after overhearing that my younger brothers and their wives were heading to my parents' house for the long weekend, we decided to crash the party and go, too.

Friday afternoon we took off and drove straight through to Utah, a total of about 12 hours in the car. (Totally worth it.) We got there at around 3 a.m. (I think), slept as long as we could, then Pyper and I headed off with my Mom, , Keith, Rachelle, Todd, Kristen, Jennifer and her friend Billy to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon while Aaron stayed home with the boys. Several of us had never been, so it was fun to be lead with our eyes closed to these giant windows inside a lodge that overlooked the canyon and then open our eyes on the count of 3.

I almost didn't even bother taking any pictures. I knew that I could never capture it, especially with my crappy photography skills and camera. But I tried.










The weather was gorgeous and the canyon was absolutely incredible, but the wind was utterly ridiculous, especially at the overlooks. It would easily knock you off balance and nevermind the havoc it wreaked on my hair. Why nobody told me to wear a ponytail, I'll never know. This is a short video I attempted to take at one of the overlooks. You might want to turn down the volume on your computer before you start it, though.



Despite the wind, it was a great trip. Definitely worth the loss of 1/3 of my hair when I brushed it later.

Sunday after church we presented Dad with an early Father's Day gift- a great card complete with a recording of Tom Hanks' voice delivering a line from "A League of Their Own", and a Kindle reader.



I think he liked it.
Afterwards we enjoyed a wonderful meal and a killer dessert, then just relaxed.


Monday before the Anderson boys had to leave, Mom and Dad took us on a hike to Peek-a-Boo slot canyon. Again, Aaron stayed home with the kids, which I initially felt guilty about, but later was very, very grateful for (and not just because of the cow carcass we discovered). We hiked almost 3 miles on a sandy trail, up and down inclines until we came to this huge slope. At the bottom was a wash that we followed to the canyon. (The people farthest away in the photo are less than halfway down the dune. That sucker was steep!)





We saw a few logs like this that had become wedged in the canyon after flood waters floated them in and then receded. This picture shows just how high the water can get in there.

At one point we came across these little notches that natives had once carved into the rock to help them reach their hidden food stores up above. They were pretty worn away, but we talked Keith into trying to climb them anyway.




This is about as far as he got. :)


End of the road.

Hiking in wasn't bad, but hiking back was brutal. We were going pretty much uphill constantly, and walking through soft sand made it much more difficult. The total length of our hike was around 9 miles or so, but it felt like 20. I was supremely grateful that Aaron and his bum ankle had stayed home, or else we might have had to hi-jack a guy that passed us on an ATV to get him out. We were pretty wasted by the time we got home, but I think it helped us all feel less guilty about the way we'd been eating that weekend. :)

Keith, Rachelle, Todd and Kristen left to go home that afternoon, so for dinner me and the kids and Mom drove to town to eat at the restaurant Jennifer works at then dropped in to see the one Kimberly works at.

Tuesday morning we packed up and made our way home to California. The only incident that occurred during the whole trip happened on our way back when a semi truck flung a rock at our windshield and cracked it instantly.


It wouldn't be so bad except that windshields for our car are crazy expensive, and we'd just gotten it replaced in December. *sigh*
What's that saying? 'Them's the breaks?'
Har-dee-har-har.

Anyway, we had such a great time and I'm really glad we were able to make the trip and see everyone. Bryce and Dena- we missed you guys a ton and cannot WAIT to see you in July!

Lego Artists

I give you- Lego Candy Poodle and its creators!

Last Easter

Right now I'm watching the Jelly Bean Showdown videos from last Easter. They still make me laugh just as hard now as they did then. I love my stupid, hilarious brothers. :)

Quick Trip

Last week, Mom got an extra day off, so we decided to make a quick trip to California to see Grandma and Sarah and Aaron. We left Wednesday night and drove as far as Primm, Nevada. We got a room at one of the casinos there and the price was right, but it took 40 minutes of waiting in line just to check in! But it was better than driving through the night or sleeping in the car at a rest area, so we didn't complain. We got to Grandma's about 5:00 on Thursday - just in time for a mini reunion. Grandma had invited Ryan and Jan, Janae's family, and Bart's family over for dinner, so we had a great time eating, talking and playing with the kids. Sadly, I think we forgot to take any pictures. The next morning, we took Grandma and made the drive out to Modesto (with Ryan and Jan following behind in their truck) and found Aaron and Sarah's new house. We got to surprise Hakan (Sarah hadn't told the kids we were coming), but Finn was asleep and Pyper still at school. But after a little visiting, we walked over to the grade school and got to surprise Pyper, too. We had brought kites for Pyper and Hakan so we went back over to the park by the school and got to fly them for a bit before the rain started in on us. I decided kite flying is a good activity for Hakan, because lots of running around can be a good thing when you're trying to keep a kite in the air. Sarah had a short honey-do list for me, so on Saturday morning, I moved a chandelier from the family room into the dining room (where it should have been in the first place) and installed a ceiling fan and light in the family room. They even worked when I got done! Finnley had a good time playing with his birthday present from us, when he could get it away from Pyper and Hakan.

We made a lunch stop at Panda Express and it was kind of fun watching Finn dealing with noodles. He's a pretty good little eater, though. Hard to believe he's 2 already.

. We had to leave Saturday night and get back to Grandma's so we could drive home Sunday morning. Like I said, it was a quick trip and not nearly long enough, but was lots of fun nevertheless. It's nice to be close enough to make the trip on a long weekend. Mom is getting her miles in this month. California last weekend, a trip to Salt Lake for Conference weekend coming up, and then a trip to Rexburg to get Kimberly when school lets out the weekend after that. She may be glad to stay home for a bit after all of that. Bye for now! Dad

Get ready for it.

Today was a good day for mail. Not only did I get my favorite letter yet from Elder Sly, but I also got a note from a certain little boy that I think we all know.

Yep. Get with it, people. The big day is comin up fast.

Festival of Colors!

We had a great adventure this weekend. Every year, the Sri Sri Radha Temple in Spanish Fork celebrates Holi, a traditional Indian festival of colors. We went down early to catch some of the action and it was a "B" to the LAST! They had some great food, and a band was playing the same song over and over again in a different style. It was great. So, the basic idea of the festival is to celebrate Spring, love your fellow man, and throw colored powder on anyone you may come across. Our lungs probably wont recover for weeks, but it was great fun.

This is how it all started...

Conversation with Hakan

Apparently he was talking to me about something important and I wasn't paying close enough attention.

Hakan: "Mom, why do you always say 'Oh, yeah?'"
Me: "I don't know. Should I stop?"
Hakan: "Yeah."
Me: "How come?"
Hakan: "It annoys me."
Me: "Oh. I'm sorry. I didn't know that. What should I say instead?"
Hakan: "How 'bout, 'Boo-ya!'"

That kid cracks me up.

I spy springtime...

If you know me, you know I'll be the first to say that Cedar City is one of the least fun places to be in the winter. Lately, it's been a little less sucky and a little more promising. Today I woke up to see that it was sunny, but it was wet outside. First instinct: "Ugh. Snow."

But I was so wrong! It was warm enough that it was actually raining outside! I only had to wear a cardigan when I went to take my test, and it felt so good to not have to wear a big jacket. Today was a day of sunshowers, and I am so very excited for springtime. (:

Ever Seen a Subaru with a Mohawk?

That's right. For a minute, we had a punk rocker car. The storm over the weekend gave us a little over a foot of snow, and in clearing the car off, it had an unusual haircut for a minute.
We cleared the first 4 or 5 inches off on Saturday, but on Sunday morning, this was back on top. The weather station up at the road shed on Cedar Mountain where we keep the snow cat is reporting 109 inches of snow on the ground! That's about as tall as 3 Hakan's. I may be ready for spring. Dad

Happy Valentine’s Day…

To ALL of My Sweethearts! You make my heart happy!!

And a Happy Valentine’s Day especially to my sweetheart of more than 30 years!

To love and be loved is everything—I am so blessed!
XOXOXO

Mom

"I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK..."

Greetings to one and all! Things seem to have slowed down a bit here on the family blog, so I thought I’d try and get things going again, if I can.
Things have been pretty quiet around here since we saw some of you at Christmas. We got a big storm just before Christmas that put down 5 1/2 inches of rain here at the park, but we got no snow out of it. There was another storm just after New Years that did give us about 8 inches of snow, but most of that is gone now. But up on Cedar Mountain, the big storm before Christmas turned into a disaster. They got about 5 feet of snow up there and more with the second storm. The first storm was so heavy and wet, it coated the trees with snow and ice and bent and broke a lot of them, especially around the Duck Creek area. Some of them were just columns of snow and ice.


Anyway, what that storm did to our snowmobile trails has to be seen to be believed! I have spent about 130 hours since then up on the mountain cutting and moving trees out of the trail system. Most of them fell during the big storm, so they are half buried in the trail. So we get to pull up to them in the snowcat, dig down to see what we’re dealing with, use the chainsaw to cut them in pieces, hook a chain or strap to them, pull them out with the ‘cat, and then either bulldoze them off the trail or move them off by hand.

Yes, this is our trail, with about 8 trees down in 30 feet of trail!

Some of the aspens didn’t break, but got folded over and have their tops buried in the middle of the trail, so we still have to cut them at the base, hook up the strap and pull the top out with the cat. All this while wading around in thigh deep snow. With all the lumberjack work, we’ve made a point of having two of us along on these trips, since wading through deep snow by yourself with a chainsaw in hand is usually considered a bad idea.

Sometimes it looks like a bomb has gone off. You just stand there and stare at it and it's still hard to believe.

Needless to say, it’s been wearing this old man right out. Add the fact that it takes me 4 – 5 hours in travel time just to get to the part of the trail where we are working, and it makes for some pretty long days – last Thursday was a 15 hour shift. But that is what I’ve been spending most of my time on since the new year started. We are getting close to getting the trees cleared and we should be able to get back to a normal grooming schedule soon – if it doesn’t pound us again before we are able to get them all cleared.

I try and remember to enjoy the nice scenery while I'm up there, though. This was taken at the top of the ski run at Brian Head.

Well, that's about it for me, I guess. I would like to encourage all of you to do a post now and again and keep us up to date on what's going on with all of you. I'm wondering if Facebook has kind of taken over our time and we aren't blogging as much as before. But for those of us who are "Faceless" (mainly me, I think), this blog is important in keeping up with everyone. So let us know what's new with you - it means a lot. Bye for now! Dad

I don't mean to brag...

...but we've gotten to spend the last two weekends with some of our family that in the past we've rarely gotten to see. It's been WONDERFUL! Last Sunday we drove over to San Lorenzo and spent the evening with Grandma Anderson and Nate and Janae's family. We had a lovely dinner together and the kids had a good old time playing. Next time we'll have to try and get there a little earlier because the visit seemed so short, but now that we're only a little over an hour away we can go and see them pretty often. I just wish I'd taken some pictures!

Then this Friday afternoon we loaded into the car and made our way to Ryan and Jan's house in Madera. It was nice to just hang out and relax.

Hakan was in heaven when he discovered their Lego collection and spent a lot of his time on the "Lego sheet" building and constructing and just playing contentedly.

Pyper liked air hockey the best, challenging anyone and everyone to a match. Try as I might, I could not get a photo of her that wasn't blurry. She's just too fast!



Finnley makes friends everywhere he goes, so no one was surprised when he formed an attachment to Ryan and Jan. He kept calling Ryan "Daddy", which I don't think he minded.

We spent Friday night there, and on Saturday we just hung out- the kids playing and hanging out in the spa with Ryan, then "helping" him plant some rose bushes for Jan while Aaron and I just lounged. They took such great care of us and as we piled back into the car to head home that afternoon we felt like we'd just had a vacation.
We weren't even out of their house before the kids were already asking when we could go visit them again.

Soon! Very soon!

We're awesome.

Huh... we fit right in.



Now blog, I say!

For Mom

Mom needed a picture of Kris and I for the Christmas card this year and Yahoo is being lame.  So the only thing I can figure out is to put them here and have you just drag them onto your desktop.  Sooooo...here ya go.