we were able to have the most amazing vacation this summer...earlier in the summer my good friend kris asked if we wanted to go in on a house boat with them on lake powell-not really thinking much about it, i said oh yeah! well i'm glad i didn't think to much about it because if i would have known the price tag right off the bat i probably would have said we couldn't afford it. but with a whole lot of work (thanks kent), we made it happen---and the adventure begins:
we had a rough start to our get up and go day...i woke up to find our well had a huge sink hole that had to be dealt with, $600 later we were on our way: way later than we wanted...i think we left at 4 for our 8 hour trip (so we thought). i think we arrived 12 hours later, after all the stops and a short mishap on some directions; i can't be sure since i slept almost the whole way (i am the worst traveler!) when we woke we were in a new world: beautiful lake powell...the kids were so excited to get on our house boat, we could see the marina from our hotel!
we loaded up all the gear and headed for the house boat, as we put all our stuff on the boat i started to get motion sick but i took a meclizine and one a day of those did the trick...i was so excited to feel fine the whole time. we found a cove to park our house boat in and the kids wasted no time in exploring, of course koy was off to catch a lizard...
kelsi was our mighty fisherman- she fished on the banks, in the rubber raft, off the boat: it was one of her favorite past times...
she was even successful too, so cute...
we ended up loving our little cove so much that we stayed there the entire time except to move across to the other side, we named it DYNAMITE COVE...after a song that we ended up listening to a lot there, named "dynamite", how cool is that...
the kids couldn't have been happier, i can't remember how many times a day i would here phrases like: "lake powell is totally awesome", "this is the best day ever", "i love lake powell", "can we stay here"...it was so fun! the kids could play in the sand and the water all day long and they pretty much did...
it was warm, in the 90's and the water was warm too and i thought it was perfect! warm enough for me to even get in the water (it's where we took our baths too)! we had a top deck on our boat and we put all the mats out and all slept outside under the stars, the first two nights were absolutely breathtaking- it was crystal clear and there were a ton of shooting stars, we all loved it except kelsi informed us of how annoying "did you see that one?" or "whoa, there's another one!" can be. she had to put in her ipod to tune us out- how annoying! and of course our deck served as a wonderful place to lounge and read, here's brooke and jenna catching some rays...
the kids loved to play on the slide too...
kris and i would try to get up each morning and take a little hike before it got too warm, i loved seeing how unique all the rocks were...
we found all kinds of fun areas to play around in, this was a perfect beach spot and we built a totally cool sand waterfall. the sand there was so powdery soft, it didn't scratch at all and you could make really neat tunnels...
we rented a ski boat from a guy kent knew at work and we had so much fun watching all the kids tube, ski, knee board and wake board. kelsi loved to wake board and got to be pretty good at it...
at one of our stops kent decided to get all the kids to cliff jump, i can't believe it- but they all did it and the pictures don't do it justice- it was really high! i had to show brooke jumping because i couldn't believe my cautious little brooke jumped. there she goes...
and kent, show off...
can you believe i went on vacation with that hot guy...woot wooo!
we had really high hopes of exploring all of lake powell but we quickly realized you probably couldn't do that in a life time, so we settled for one day trip to the defiance house ruins. we saw some hieroglyphics...
and toured a few cliff cave dwellings- it was super cool, i was amazed at how they just let you walk through everything. there is no rope offs or guide people, and i was so happy that other tourists had respected it so much that it wasn't trashed or written all over. look at that happy family (except koy, he was mad he couldn't roll big rocks down the cliff)...
we had a big day that day and did a lot of traveling in our ski boat and needed to fill up with gas to get back to the house boat, so we got to the dock gas station and we couldn't get gas because a storm was coming in, so we had to weather the storm in the boat. well, it ended up being a monsoon...literally. we could see a grey wall coming in and it started to get windy and i said, "really- how bad can it be, we're from rexburg" well i must have called down the wrath cause it was bad--- it went from 90 degrees to hailing pea size pellets on us. we were freezing and wet but after about 15 minutes it passed and then it warmed back up: we even got ice-cream treats from the dock, a luxury because the whole time there nothing stayed cold or frozen in our refrigerator/freezer...
and the storm was worth it because all that rain made for some terrific waterfalls off the cliffs, our ride back to the house boat was so pretty looking for all the waterfalls...
we did lose a few things in the wind storm and had very little dry bedding the last night but luckily it's warm there, even at night. we had so much fun---i get all smiley just looking at these pictures...so happy to spend time with good friends, eat good food, enjoy good scenery, go through
lots of sunscreen, laugh, dance, play, read, relax. I LOVE LAKE POWELL...
can't wait to do it again!
we also had a weekend of wonderful conference talks, we have been rewatching and listening to one a night for scriptures. brooke saw that me and kelsi were taking notes in a notebook and she also "took notes"...
i liked that day too! over potato harvest koy had to come up with a monster that he created, he decided to use all his tools from his metal collection---all my kids have gotten to make a monster for kindergarten and i think it's so cute to see what they come up with...
my pumpkins in my garden were miniature this year, so i told my kids we would go buy them-well i have never had to buy a pumpkin before and i didn't realize they were so expensive, so i asked if they would each just share a pumpkin and carve one side each...
we had very different pumpkin designs this year, no faces! each of the kids chose different signs? they were really into beyblade and wizard 101 this year. i do have to say when lit up the signs looked really cool...
one of my kids favorite halloween activities this year was riding in a giant shopping cart from a local grocer. these two boys look a little too happy behind bars, that's a little scary...
my kids are getting so big, i noticed this alot during this halloween...they went to all the carnival events with their friends (i tagged along or got found when they needed money), they each picked their costumes (not me), i sat in the car for trunk or treaters and they walked around without me. it's exciting to see them develop their own sense of self, i'm just glad they still let me tag along :)
