September 2017

We had a fun September! It started with Mary's baptism. What a special day! We enjoyed seeing everyone who came.

For those who weren't there, Scott's Dad helped with the baptism since Scott was just two weeks out from his surgery.

 Scott's parents stayed for the weekend. We went to get dinner at Cafe Rio in the South Jordan City Center. We ate outside, and this man came and started playing and singing folk songs. It was really cool, and the weather was perfect. It was a really fun evening. We also took the kids to the splash pad one last time.

The kids were off-track for the first three weeks of September. We did a little vacation one of the weekends. We drove out to Dad's cabin and spent the night. Kathleen and Aunt Ann and Uncle Ken (For those who don't know, Ann and Ken are living with Kathleen for a little while.) drove from Heber to the cabin with us. Uncle Ken is not well, mostly non-communicative, but he loves to go for drives. They didn't stay long, but it was fun to visit with them.

Our night in the cabin was eventful. The kids were a little nervous sleeping away from home, and to add to the anxiety, there were mice sharing the cabin with us! We didn't get much sleep, but it was still fun. We really enjoyed being there again.

On Friday, it rained the whole day. We drove out to see Dad's other properties, but didn't spend much time, since it was pouring. Then we drove to Vernal and ate lunch in front of the temple, in the car. Then we went to the dinosaur museum there. The kids loved it.

Then we went to see the petroglyphs nearby that Dad and Sharon had told us about. It was so cool! They date back to about 80 AD - 1200 AD. It was a fun little hike along the cliffs, and every turn brought cool new images. It was still raining, but not as hard. Luckily, Scott made sure we all had ponchos.

That night, we got a room at a motel just outside of Vernal. The next morning, we drove out to Dinosaur National Monument. It was awesome. The story is that over a hundred years ago, this paleontologist discovered a few dinosaur fossils on the surface of the mountain. As he dug deeper, he found a whole river bed of jumbled up dinosaur fossils. They decided to just leave them in the mountain, and build a visitor's center around the find. For several years, they continued to uncover more fossils right there in the visitor's center. But in 1992, they decided to stop, in order to preserve what they had without causing damage. It is really cool to see. After we spent time there, we drove down by the Green River to have lunch. Then we drove to the Colorado side of the monument, so the kids could say they've been to Colorado. We didn't spend much time there because we needed to get home. It was such a fun trip.

Since Mary turned eight, she has loved going to Activity Days. At her first activity, they started planning a mother/daughter tea party, and she was sold. She LOVES tea parties. We had so much fun, dressing fancy, making headbands together, and enjoying the "tea". Mary was supposed to share a talent or something she and I enjoy doing together, so she drew a picture of us, and I colored it.  The next night we got to go to the Women's Conference together for the first time. I was so happy to not have to go alone anymore!