October Happenings

This should really be more than one post, but it's not happening.  In addition to the epic hunt, we had fall break and halloween, with a lot of little things in between.  We spent fall break in St George because Zack had his final state mountain bike race there.  I'm so glad he decided to do mountain biking this year.  It's been really great.  I love watching the races, and this one did not disappoint.  I pre-rode the course with Jake and Zack the day before and it was hard!  I don't know how those kids ride technical stuff like that, really fast, with lots of people around.  I would die.  Or just stop and cry.  One of the two for sure.  Anyway, Zack did a great job.  I don't think he had a single race this year that wasn't really hot.  The heat alone would have killed me most of the time.  He said there was one hill on this course where he felt like he was in the back of a car, in the heat, with all of the windows rolled up and no air.  Ha! 

So we did Zack's race in St George.  And my birthday.  Let's just say birthdays aren't so fun when you're on vacation with lots of people.  Enough said.  The kids swam a ton as usual.  Not sure how because it really wasn't warm enough.  We rappelled off Dixie Rock, which was really cool and fun. 

Halloween was fine.  I've been so busy lately that I did absolutely nothing with my kids to celebrate.  Sage went to a maze thing and carved a pumpkin with a friend.  Zack and Kate finally carved pumpkins on actual halloween.  That's how on the ball I was.  I was feeling bad for my lack of celebration, so I made some healthy halloween treats for the kids after school.  I just couldn't bring myself to make a dessert treat knowing how much candy they would be eating.  Zack no longer trick-or-treats, so he hands out candy to all three people who come to our house.  Kate enjoyed her last year trick-or-treating as a nerd, and Sage embraced every bit of the holiday as usual dressed as Wonder Woman.  Everyone ended the night happy, so I'm calling it a win. 

Here are a million pictures.

Cool park in St George

Halloween carnival thing that we did purely for Sage

On top of Dixie Rock

Zack on his way down

Sage loved it and wanted to be the first one down

Awesome witchy-poo party

Making witches brew

The Halloween parade that was freezing!

Fingernails, ghosts, and pumpkins.  I outdid myself

Kate learned she really hates pumpkin slime.

Nerd and Wonder Woman

Sage with her friends

The Hunt

I have so much to catch up on.  October was crazy busy.  Jake and Zack started the month off with a bang, literally.  They drew out for the general bull elk hunt (I think that's how you say that).  Let's remember that last year they got some super rare awesome tag.  So last year they sighted their guns in, put cameras out, and spent a decent amount of time out trying to find an elk.  And nothing.  Didn't see anything.  This year was the opposite.  Jake's been so busy that they didn't have time to do a single thing.  So when he talked about going hunting I joked that they would at least have a nice walk in the mountains.  Definitely not what happened.

They took off early Saturday morning (like 5:30).  I figured I'd see them back like late morning.  3:00 rolled around and I hadn't heard a word.  They'd never been gone this long hunting before.  I was literally getting stuff ready with the girls to go find them when Jake called.  First thing he said was, "We got one."  They had just walked up and decided they were in a good spot to hunt when Jake turned and saw a bunch of elk.  Long story a little shorter, he shot a big bull elk.  Apparently he was so excited that he started jumping up and down.  This was a first for him.  Many pictures were taken.  There was much rejoicing.  And then they started doing whatever nasty stuff you do to get the elk off the mountain.  Basically cut it in pieces.  They started this at 8am and didn't finish until 3:00.  They were exhausted.  I had no idea this process could take that long.  Thank heavens I didn't have to participate.  When they finally got home they were beyond exhausted.  And they smelled soooo bad.  But they were so proud of themselves!  Picking up the elk meat this morning and praying hard that it's good because there's going to be a lot of it!  Oh mighty hunters!!

Happy Day

Happy Boy

Disgusting

Taxidermy

#40!!

Yes, I'm already 40.  But I'm finally not the only one.  Mel turned 40 (yes we're irish twins.  no clue how my mom survived us).  So for her birthday she invited her sisters to Seattle to party for 24 hours!  Best non-birthday I've ever celebrated.  And she kept telling us thanks for sacrificing to come.  Um - pretty sure it's no sacrifice to leave all of my responsibilities to play with my sisters.  So yes, one of the best days I've had in a long time.

April and Alicia and I flew out on the same flight, without managing to sit by each other (lame).  Mel picked us up and we headed straight to the Fremont Troll.  Super cool.  What I'll remember is the girl who was sitting on the troll to get her picture taken.  When she jumped down she totally fell and all of us Spjutes - who laugh when people get hurt (some weird genetic thing we can't help) - had to turn around and pretend we were looking at something else so she couldn't see us laughing.  We're so cool.  From there we went to a delicious burger place because no trip is complete without good food.

After dinner we finally made it to Mel's.  But we only stayed long enough to grab her birthday cheesecake and take it to her friends where we ate looking out on the lake.  Awesome.  (I would just like to say that only at Mel's would there be leftover birthday cheesecake.  Her kids don't know what they're missing out on).  Unfortunately, we were all too tired to stay up very late that night.  #40 is all I have to say for that.

Saturday morning we got up and went on a quick hike-a-walk.  I wish Utah wasn't a desert.  Then we went to this awesome little boutique Mel found where we were the only ones there.  They gave us orange juice and tried really hard to give us some fashion sense.  No easy task.  It was really fun to try on clothes and we all got cute stuff.  I got way too much stuff (translation spent way more than I should have), but Jake just smiled that I actually look cute and says he hopes I can go every year.  Now that's a good husband right there.  This is one of the first times I have ever kind of enjoyed shopping.  Apparently if you're in good company and you only have to go to one location, shopping can be fun.  Who knew?

From there we headed to Lake Union where Mel's friends took us out on their boat.  Yes, they're very nice friends.  We rode all over seeing the sights.  So beautiful.  Then we tied the boat to the dock while we went in to Dukes and had the best clam chowder ever.  It was so good it may have ruined all other clam chowders for me.  I'll never be the same. 

After the boat ride we were going to get on electric bikes and ride across a bridge.  Except we couldn't find any bikes.  And when we finally did their battery wasn't charged.  There were a million people riding on them and I seriously contemplated pushing some of them off.  After searching for a while we finally gave up and headed back to the car.  Which, of course, is when we found some.  But Mel's phone was dead which meant she couldn't get a bike.  But we weren't about to let that stop us.  She jumped on the back of my bike (where it says 'don't sit'), and we took off.  Best bike ride ever.  Everyone we passed was laughing at us.  We got some pretty funny looks.  I'm sure Linz was proud.  These are the things you get to do when you turn 40.  #40!!!!

We headed to one other quick park, took a picture, ate some yummy ice cream, and then it was time to go to the airport.  Best quick trip ever.  Such a sacrifice.  Mel, can we pretend you turn 40 every year??

Mt Rainier on the flight in.  Jake was so jealous.  So pretty!

Out on Lake Union!

Beautiful Seattle

I love these little floating houses.  I could handle living there

Duke's Deliciousness

How they store boats.  Cool I think.

How we spent a lot of our trip.  I got to sit in the front because #40!

Our awesome bike ride

Taking a break from looking for bikes

Proof that Spjutes can shop given the proper circumstances

The troll...with a super cool pose by Alicia;)

Yummy food

Hike-a-walk

Vernal: The Vacation Destination

Oh my word.  I have so many things to write about from September.  Well, I know there are lots of things, but now I can only remember one.  I hate it when that happens!  Oh well (this has become my motto lately - oh well - kind of works I think).

Anyway, the last couple months have seemed full of mountain biking.  Zack has had a race every other weekend since the middle of August.  I don't mind, it's been a lot of fun.  In the middle of September he had a race in Vernal.  Yes, such an exciting place to visit.  Jake and Sage ended up being gone, so I decided to make a weekend of it and camp with Kate and Zack.  We got up there in time for Zack to pre-ride the course, and then headed to our KOA camp spot.  Gotta love the KOA's.  We ate a quick dinner of nasty hot dogs and then went to an outdoor movie at the library that Vernal was doing for the bikers.  Like I said, party town.  Unfortunately, 15 minutes into the movie the projector died and they couldn't get it going again.  We decided to do a campfire and s'mores instead.  But I forgot to bring an ax so we could have kindling, so we ended up just producing huge amounts of smoke for all of our neighbors.  So we went to bed.

Zack's race didn't start until 4:00 on Saturday, so we decided to visit Dinosaurland.  It was pretty cool.  You get to see fossils that are still in the rock.  Then we went on an auto tour thing to pass some more time.  It was a cool place, but I'm glad I didn't drive out there just to see fossils.  Not my thing I guess.

Anyway, we headed out to the race course.  This course was in the middle of nowhere.  Zero trees.  Zero.  Lots of dust.  So much dust.  It was a super hot day, and as the day went on it kept getting hotter and windier.  Right before Zack raced the wind started gusting.  When it would gust there would just be huge clouds of dust with it.  So much that you couldn't see at all.  Awesome.  I felt so bad for the kids who had to race.  Good thing they're young and tough.  Zack did awesome racing.  He said there were parts where the wind was so bad that you were working hard just to move forward.  The poor kids were so dehydrated by the time they finished that they were dizzy and barely standing.  Again, awesome.  As we made our way to the car it was just one big cloud of dust everywhere.  We could hardly see.  My car was caked with dust on the outside, and there was even a ton of dust on the inside.  Jake insisted we must have rolled the windows down, but no, it was just that dusty.  So then we got to drive two hours covered in dust.  I've never been so dirty.  It was horrible.

So I'd like to give my review of Vernal, in case you were thinking of visiting.  There are some stores, fast food places, little houses, fossils, little campgrounds.  And dust.  So much dust.  And wind.  So much wind.  And so, so hot.  So if you like all of those things then you'll love Vernal!!  (I told Jake if Zack races there next year he's taking him)

dino land

The whole wall behind them is full of fossils

The femur bone of some kind of dinosaur

There are some pretty parts of Vernal

Riding through dust

Dusty parking lot.  Notice all the trees...

This picture does not do my dusty car justice.  The dust was stuck to the windows like snow

Then we got to drive through the smoke.  Normally you would see Strawberry Lake there

I edited this picture, but he was almost this dusty

A better picture of the wind and dust

Zack coming to the finish line