Lake Powell

 We headed to LP over Memorial Day weekend.  Second time we've gone this weekend.  Hopefully it can become a tradition.  This year we did it a little differently.  We have way too much going on right now to even try to prep for LP camping.  It takes so, so much prep to camp.  So we decided to head to Page, Arizona and Wahweap.  We drove to our St George place Thursday night and then the rest of the way Friday morning.  This time we stayed in a hotel, which made the prep a million times easier.  Leading up to the trip I'd been working every day doing landscaping at the office.  I had zero time to do anything.  I got done working at the office at like 12:00 Thursday, and we left at 3:00.  So much better than the days and days of camping prep.  

Anyway, LP always has adventures, to put it nicely.  Everyone who's been there has multiple stories of things going wrong.  So you go and just hope that it's not too bad.  This trip we had quite a lot of adventures.  No one got hurt, and the boat didn't sink, so I guess we should call it a win.  These are the things you really remember down the road, right?

We got on the lake in the afternoon on Friday.  Everything seemed great.  Beautiful LP.  We made it!  Then we noticed that our bilge pump was draining water out of our boat a lot.  Like way more than it should.  There was obviously water coming into our boat somehow.  Never a good thing.  However, the pump was working great.  Seemed like we were doing ok.  So we decided to keep boating and hope for the best.  Right after the stressful moment of figuring out our boat was leaking, we got pulled over by the fish and game people.  Horrible timing.  I was driving, Jake was surfing, and Zack was sitting on the back platform of the boat working the rope.  That's why we got pulled over.  You're not supposed to sit there unless you're wakeless.  So they gave me a ticket.  Told me I should be able to call and pay it online.  Annoying, but not the end of the world.  Until I called to pay and they told me it's a misdemeanor and I have to appear in court.  What???  So I get to attend court, over zoom gratefully, later this month.  Triple ugh.

Saturday morning we got back on the water and Jake and Zack immediately set to work to try to figure out where we were taking on water.  They got it figured out, used their creative brains, and realized that Ace had the part they would need to fix it.  We decided since we didn't sink the day before we would enjoy the day on the lake and fix it that evening.  Saturday was probably the funnest day out.  So relaxing.  Everyone got to do everything they wanted, and it was beautiful and sunny.  We got off the lake, and Jake and Zack managed to fix the leak in the Ace parking lot.  Hallelujah.

Sunday we were excited not to have to fix anything on the boat.  Except we got in the water and the boat wouldn't start.  Nothing.  We checked everything we could think of and finally looked at the battery.  Somehow a wire had come off during the repairs the day before.  Hooked it back up and the boat was good to go.  Phew.  We had a nice day, but everyone was so worn out from all the water activity that we didn't even do that much.  Zack and Sage usually never want to stop being pulled behind the boat.  They'll do pretty much anything.  So if they won't go out you know they're really tired.  

We headed back to St George Sunday afternoon and pulled up to Dairy Queen for dinner at like 8:30pm.  Zack got out of the truck, looked down at the tire, and there was no tire.  At some point on the drive one of the tires on the trailer blew and we didn't notice it.  Still don't understand how that happened.  There was nothing left of the tire, just the hubcap.  The boys changed the tire, and we finally got back to the house.

We went home Monday.  Because of the holiday we decided to just risk driving home without a spare.  I mean, what are the chances we'd have two flats in one trip?  Good apparently.  We were 5 minutes outside of Beaver when the spare that we'd put on blew.  This time we felt it and pulled over.  There was literally nothing we could do without a spare tire.  We called and found that Big O Tires was open, so we turned on the hazards and headed in on the shoulder.  In holiday traffic on I-15.  Got to Big O and learned that although our tires looked good, they were like 15 years old.  That's why they kept blowing.  So we replaced all of our tires and got a new spare.  $900 later we were out the door.  With traffic and the tire it took us 7.5 hours to get home.  

So that was our trip.  And if you read this far you get a prize.  There were goods and bads of not camping.  We definitely missed the quiet nights and glass water of the early mornings.  However, we really enjoyed being able to clean up at night, go out and get food, and sleeping in a normal bed.  I told Jake I might be open to camping again eventually, but until things calm down it's not happening.  

Also need to give a shout out to Zack.  As much as his Jeep being broken really frustrates me, he's learned a lot about mechanics.  We couldn't have handled everything that went wrong without him.  He came up with great ideas and was the one in the tight spots, fixing things.  He definitely earned his keep on this trip.  New LP rule, no going without Zack...

We paid to launch at Antelope Point so that we didn't have to drive so far in the boat every day.  The launch ramp is pretty cool.

A really fun BBQ place we went to for dinner.

Finishing off the trip at Big O

May Happenings

 May was fairly low-key, which is odd for May.  Zack finished his first year at Utah State and moved home for a bit before he starts his internship.  He's so happy to be home.  Not really.  It's always so awkward to move back home once you moved out.  We're all trying to make it work.  Zack's been killing himself trying to fix his Jeep.  Sometimes I hate Jeeps.  They seem to mostly not work.  When they do work they're fun, but the moments seem brief.  

Kate and Sage finished school.  Sage survived middle school and is ready for high school.  I'm thrilled to be done with middle school.  Those years are rough.  Kate is officially a senior.  I'm not ready to let another kid leave me.  But I can't wait to see the fun things she'll get to do her senior year.

Everyone went all out for Mother's Day.  I told them this year will be hard to beat.  Jake and Kate worked hard on delicious fajitas.  They were so good.  Zack and Sage worked hard cleaning up.  Sage did her usual magic for special occasions with the nicest card, a video with pictures, peanut M&Ms, and she even wrote me a song on her guitar!  They all humored me with a long walk after dinner.  Best day ever.

We continue to kill ourselves trying to get the cursed office done.  It feels so close, yet still so far.  The latest craziness has been doing the landscaping.  We've been screening the dirt to get cobble rock to put in the front.  Jake dumps rock at the front and I spread it out.  I never want to touch a rock again.  However, my dad raised me for this job.  I was born for this (but I'm never doing it again).

It's always bitter sweet when another school year ends.  So nice to have a break, but always crazy how fast it goes.  My kids are growing up too fast!  Soon Sage will be the only one home (she's not looking forward to that by the way).  Now if my kids are getting on my nerves I remind myself that I'll soon be missing these moments.  Sometimes it helps.

Sage made me frosting for Mother's Day.  She knows the way to my heart.

Jake and Kate making me deliciousness.

Sage got braces!

April Happened

 April was busy, but fun.  The week after we got home from our epic spring break Kate got to go to prom.  Her date was super nice and cute.  The actual date was somewhat of a marathon.  Dates these days are so long.  For sure exhausting.  But she looked beautiful and got to wear her NY dress.

Jake and I got to go to Michigan for a builder group thing.  I was super excited to see this part of the country.  We went to Petoske, on the banks of Lake Michigan.  By the way, Lake Michigan is huge.  It was like looking at the ocean, but a lake.  So pretty.  I wish we'd been able to go in the fall because it was definitely shoulder season.  The weather didn't cooperate and the last couple of days were snowy and really cold.  We did manage to get in a mountain bike ride.  My first time on a trail outside of Utah.  We had fun, but it made me appreciate the amazing trails we have here.  Hard to beat those.

I obviously don't do food pictures much, but this may have been the best chocolate cake I've ever had.  So so good.

The lady from Michigan (Jamie) took me to the lake to look for Petoski rocks.  It was so fun.

On our way to dinner one night.

There were so many leaves on this trail we could hardly see where to go.  I mostly followed Jake.  

We barely fit the bikes in our rental car.

Trying to clean up from the longest winter ever.

Kate and her date, Daniel

We have a system down.  Sage does makeup, I do hair.  And good thing we're fast because we only had like 45 minutes.

Finished Off With St George

 We got home from New York at like midnight Thursday night.  And the next morning headed to St George.  This will go down as the most event-filled spring break ever.  Sage really wanted to do a mountain bike race that happened to be that Saturday.  For some reason I agreed to this crazy schedule.  The things we do...

Anyway, Jake and Sage both did the 6 hour Frog Hollow race.  Jake did it solo and Sage did it with her friend Avery.  It's a 14 mile course and you see how many laps you can do in 6 hours.  Jake did 4 laps, which is almost 60 miles.  Misery.  Sage did 2 laps, which is by far the furthest she's ever ridden.  She had a bit of a mishap her first lap.  I was waiting and waiting for her to come in, and she kept not coming.  (This is by far the worst part of having your kid race mountain bikes.  Wondering if they wrecked somewhere in the middle of nowhere).  When it was way past the time that she should have finished I finally called her.  She had somehow gotten off the trail really close to the finish.  She finally realized she'd ridden too many miles, and started seeing people riding towards her to start their lap.  One of our friends ended up riding out to bring her back, but she rode like 5 extra miles and her lap took a lot longer than it should have.  Poor thing.  I was grateful that Jake rode with her for her last lap.  Definitely a memorable experience.

We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing and enjoying the warmth.  That Sunday was Easter.  Needless to say, there wasn't much Easter celebrating this year.  It was an epic spring break.

Pre-race photo

Sage coming in after her extra long first lap

Still smiling!

Jake finishing

Sage finishing

They did it!

Sage was so tired, this is how she ate dinner.

Beautiful hike

Swimming at our friend's pool

New York Part 3 (last one)

 The whole reason I had the idea to take the girls to New York at this particular time is that my dad and Kathy are in Buffalo serving a mission.   I thought it would be fun to show the girls the city and then head to Buffalo to see where they're serving, Niagara Falls, and church history sites.  It was a great excuse to head that direction and I'm pretty sure this wouldn't happen any other time.  Jake isn't really interested in the city, and he's definitely not interested in church history.  I'm learning to be creative about still being able to see/do things even when he doesn't want to.  Like making it a girls trip!

Anyway, we had good fun in Buffalo.  It was great to see Dad and Kathy.  They're at the end of their mission, so it had been like 16 months since we saw them.  In person that is.  It was also fun to see the places they see every day.  Especially since they take no pictures so we've seen nothing their whole mission.  Before we went on our trip Sage asked me if Grandpa's personality would be different.  I think she was relieved that he was still the same grandpa as before.

Our first day there we went to Niagara Falls.  We were planning to go in the caves, maybe the boat.  You know, all the things that make it fun.  When we got there it seemed strangely not busy.  Figured it was just because it was a weekday and not the summer.  However, when we went to buy tickets to the caves we realized that everything was closed.  There were no closed signs, no workers, nothing.  Just everything shut down.  So we walked around and tried to see the falls.  Unfortunately, things were not in our favor and the wind was blowing the water from the falls right into our faces and making it so we could hardly see the water falls.  On our way out I finally saw an employee and asked why everything was closed.  Apparently the power had been out for like 5 days and they couldn't figure out why it was out, nor could they get it back on.  Every day they thought they would get things going again, and every day it was still out.  So we lucked out to go to Niagara Falls on one of the few days they've probably ever been closed.  Basically we went to Niagara Falls without really seeing Niagara Falls.  

The next day we were off to Palmyra and church history.  We'd decided before the trip that we would stop at the temple and do baptisms, so we all made sure to bring our recommends and dresses.  We pulled up to the temple and there were no cars in the parking lot.  Just like the falls, the temple was closed.  We can't win.  We didn't let that keep us down.  We headed to a most delicious burger and ice cream place.  The weather was beautiful so we sat outside and enjoyed every bite of our food.  From there we went to the Book of Mormon printing press.  Probably my favorite stop.  As we left the printing press it was starting to rain just a bit.  No worries, we can handle rain.  Next stop was to the Smith farm and the sacred grove.  As we left the visitor center we grabbed some umbrellas.  It was raining a bit harder, but again, nothing to slow us down.  We finally finished at the houses and headed into the sacred grove.   We were enjoying being outside, all the beautiful leafless trees, when the rain started coming down harder.  We picked up our pace and pretty soon we were mostly running because it was dumping rain on us.  Dumping.  We were probably only halfway back to the visitor center at this point.  Soon there were huge puddles of mud and little rivers we had to jump over.  By the time we made it to the car we were all soaked.  Like dripping soaked.  Apparently when it's raining that hard umbrellas don't do much.  Not to be deterred we continued on to the Hill Cumorah visitors center.  They were amazed at our level of wetness, but still allowed us in.  I was hopeful that during the tour the rain would let up so we could run to the top of the hill.  This did not happen.  Instead we ran to the car, admitted defeat, and headed home.  Of course there was lots of traffic, so we got to enjoy an extra long drive home in really wet clothes.  Basically we went to the Sacred Grove and Hill Cumorah without really seeing the Sacred Grove and Hill Cumorah.  Are you sensing a theme?

Kathy saved us with her yummy dinner that night and we played a rousing game of Tenzi.  The next morning started off with Grandpa's golden delectable pancakes.  In case anyone's worried, they were as good as ever.  Then we went on a tour of a battle ship and subway.  They were both kind of creepy.  Scary mannequins and weird music and smells.  The subway was especially terrifying and Sage led us out at an almost sprint because we were so terrified (Dad made the wise decision not to enter the subway).  We made one more stop for ice cream, and that brought us to the close of our Buffalo trip.  We were thwarted on every side, but not defeated.  Because luckily our main objective was seeing Grandpa and Grandma, and in that endeavor we were successful.  You can't beat us Buffalo!

We made it to their apartment!

Niagara Falls somewhere in the mist

Saw the outside of the temple.

This is when we were still having fun in the rain.  Soon after this it was every man for himself.

Can you tell how wet we are?  

Sage gunning down another ship.