Vacation!

As most of you know, we just spent about 2 weeks up in Utah on vacation with Eric's family.  (oh, and once again, my pics are all out of order)  The first pictures are of our camping trip up in Flaming Gorge.  I was a little worried about this trip because I have never camped with an 8-month-old baby before.  But everyone was so helpful it made it really fun (except at night when Maggie kept waking up!).  Poor little Maggie was so sick, coughing, boogers, conjunctivitis, etc.  She looked so miserable but was still happy as long as she was being held.  And there were plenty of arms to hold her!  My boys LOVED the camping.  We let them get dirty and explore--they thought they had died and gone to heaven.  Maggie seemed pretty content as well.  She did like driving mom's car...
On Tuesday and Thursday we went out on Craig and Cory's boats.  Craig has a big pontoon boat which was great because it didn't go crazy fast (I am not too into speed boats) and there was plenty of room for everyone.  It was really nice and warm on Tuesday.  We brought along a picnic lunch.  The boys had a blast on the boat--splashing in the water and stuff.  


Skip around a little--on Thursday morning, before the boat, a few of the guys went fishing (Eric was one, of course) and the rest of us went on a little 2-mile hike.  It was so beautiful!  Wildflowers, quaking aspens, pines, etc.  It was a great hike.  But Maggie did get heavy in the backpack.  I guess I just burned off some of the calories from all of our yummy food.
So here are a couple pics of the rafting.  This was our Wednesday activity.  The stretch of river we went on was pretty mild so my chicken boys loved it.  The water was pretty cold though.  It was mostly nice but did start to rain on us the last little bit of the ride.  Here is the other raft...
And here is our raft...
I know I look scary.  That's what a few days of camping does to me.  Maggie didn't get to ride--grandpa and grandma carried her in the backpack the whole 7 miles to the end!  Way to go gramps!  Maggie likes being in the backpack though.  So she was pretty good.

Eric brought up some rappelling stuff and let the kids try going down some little rock ledges by our camp.  The little kids couldn't do it because the harness was too big but the bigger kids did it...all except Tyler which I will get to in a minute.  Here is a great shot of Kaylee (the bravest of all) going down the bigger cliff--maybe 25 ft?  She did so good!  This shot looks like she is going off a 100 ft cliff!
For all my friends freaking out--we didn't let them lower themselves, Eric and Cory lowered them down.  All but Nate--he did it himself!

Before we left for Flaming Gorge my kids wanted to make a flag for the boat.  We let them design it, then Eric and I helped draw it.  It says "Swenson Skeletons" and has a picture of a skull and crossbones on it, a treasure chest and swords. It was so cute because every time we got on the boat Tyler wanted to hold it up so all the other boats could see.  He was so proud of it!
Craig and Sharee had brought along a water "Hot Dog" for the kids.  Tyler was scared to try it at first, but then after seeing how mild it was decided to give it a try.  Here is Jacob between his 2 cousins Ben and Sam.  They all had so much fun on it!  
We also stopped a few times to fish off the boat.  We didn't catch a dang thing, but it was fun to try.  Tyler wanted to fish a lot more.  I guess he will be just like his dad.
We all got in the water (me and Hillary got in compliments of Craig who pushed us in) on Tuesday.  The water is cold!  It takes your breath away at first.  You semi get used to it, but never fully.  Jacob and Tyler got in but Jacob stayed in only for a few minutes then was too cold, Tyler got in and started throwing a hissy fit and wanted to get right back out.  
Maggie was really good on the boats.  We brought her carseat along so she could sit in it.  We tried putting the life-jacket on her but she screamed bloody murder until we took it off.  Good thing the lake police didn't catch us!  She was happy as long as her daddy was holding her--what a daddy's girl!
Jacob even got to try driving the boat!

Now all the other kids rappelled and this is the saga of what happened when it was Tyler's turn.  He was all set to go, got harnessed up, but as soon as he had to start going over the edge he started freaking out...literally.  Eric and Uncle Jared were trying to get him in proper form and Tyler starts screaming about how it hurt.  He was screaming, sobbing, wailing, and in general throwing a fit.  We asked him where it hurts and he cries out, "It hurts everywhere!"  We cajoled, bribed, etc. but nothing worked so Eric unharnessed him and let him go.  He never tried it again that trip.  Hopefully next time he will work up a little more gumption.
And here is Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.  These two couldn't be separated.  (This is his cousin Ashley--Jacob calls her "Ash-uh-lee")  It was so cute to watch them play together.
Here is a bunch of the cousins...Jacob, Josh, Tyler, Kaylee and Ashley.
We borrow a 3 bedroom tent from Jessica.  It was first class camping!  Cory also brought along his family's super nice house trailer.  It had a bathroom, shower, stove, beds, tvs, microwave, etc.  We were really roughing it.  Here is the boys room in the tent...
It took them a while to fall asleep each night but they slept pretty well after the initial fight.  Tyler is a wild sleeper though.  We would wake up uncovered, sideways, on the tarp at the foot of the bed.  He is like that at home too.  I would love to watch a time-lapse video of him sleeping someday.  I asked him about it and he said it is because "what I do in my dreams I do in bed when I am asleep."  Must have some crazy dreams!

This next picture is proof of what I said earlier--that we let the kids be kids and explore and get dirty....
Back at the Swenson's house, Craig and Eric and Tyler went on a little horse ride.  Apparently Tyler is quite the horseman.  He was even commanding the reigns himself for a while.  Now he's scared of a little 10 foot cliff but not riding a horse?  
This is also before we left for Flaming Gorge.  The boys were catching bugs.  I had to get a shot because I thought it was so funny that Tyler wanted gloves to catch a potato bug.  Sheesh!
One morning while Eric went fishing and Craig was at work we went for a hike to "the Grotto".  It is a pretty short little hike but you have to cross a little stream a few times by balancing over fallen logs basically.  It is pretty easy if it is just you, but trying to balance with Maggie of my back was scary!  It was totally psychological, I know.  But still....
Maggie enjoyed it regardless of the "danger."
Up at the grotto, Jacob was going pee and saw a spider so started to pee on the spider.  His Aunt Katie asked him about it and he looked at her and said, very seriously, "My pee is a weapon."  Ha ha!  One night we were able to go out on Uncle Matt's family's 4-wheelers.  The boys loved it.  I swear, with all the cool things we were able to do they much think Utah is like a Utopia.  Tyler did tell me today he wants to live in Utah.  Jake was a little weirded out by the helmet...
But not Tyler.  Once again, he wasn't scared of riding a 4-wheeler.

Up at Matt's family's house there is an outdoor water spigot.  Jacob kept drinking out of it.  I just thought this pic was funny.  He was drenched!  I have to mention one gross thing that happened at church on Sunday.  I saw Jacob picking his nose during sacrament and when I looked back a second later he had his finger in his mouth.  (dry heave)  I pulled his hand away and said, "Don't eat your boogers!"  He started to cry--loudly-- and says, "But I'm hungry!  I'm hungry!"  EEEWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!  And that is not from my parenting--Tyler has NEVER picked his boogers like that, let along eat them.  It is nauseating!
Skip ahead to the very first day in Utah.  It was Tyler's birthday.  We had spent the previous night in St. George and finished the drive to Woodland Hills on his birthday.  We went out for breakfast and the waitress brought him out an ice cream and they all sang to him.  He had a look on his face that showed he thought he was about the coolest thing on 2 legs at that moment.  It was so sweet.  He was in 7th heaven.  One funny thing at the restaurant--the waitress said to Jacob, "You're a toe-head!"  Jacob, having never heard that term before, gives her the stink-eye and says back, "No, you're a toehead!"  In not a very nice tone.  It was pretty funny.  Anyway, we had a little party for Tyler up at the Swenson's house.  He had a Pokemon cake (no, I didn't make it).  He loved it!
Maggie loved all the attention from everyone.  My mom sent out a little teething feeder thing and she LOVES it!  Her favorite so far is bananas but she also like cut up grapes in it and watermelon.  
Jacob is still a destroyer--on the drive home they had some little toys from my mom.  Jacob was ripping them all apart.  I told him not to break them and he looked and said in his sweetest voice, "But I LIKE to break things apart."  What am I going to do with him?  Now skip way back to before we even left.  As you are well aware, the heat out where we live is crazy.  Well, I went out to get some sodas from the garage and found this...
All the cans had bowed on top and bottom and several had exploded open.  Ugh.  I guess we won't be keeping soda in the garage anymore.  And this next picture is of a cantaloupe from our garden!  It was so sweet and juicy!  We had several more growing but didn't want to bother anyone to come water it while we were gone so we let it die (all of our other plants were already dead anyway).  It is now a shriveled up brown thing.  Oh well.
One more funny thing before we left.  I was sitting at church on Sunday and Maggie was sitting on the floor next to a potted 7-foot ficus tree.  I looked over at her and thought, "I should move her so she doesn't knock the tree over.  Naw, she can't tip that thing."  Well what do you know but 2 minutes later...timber!  And I was sitting in the front row!  It was so embarassing!  Okay, I will have to end now--my hands are tired, Maggie is crying and life is beckoning.  Back to the daily grind!