Vacation to Arizona

We're back!! (A full day ahead of schedule because my uncle is REALLY sick.)
It was a full and eventful trip!
Day 1:
We left town early so that we could spend some time with Steve's parents and cousin. It was a fun day, although it did seem to last a lot longer than we had planned.

We got to see Jayden and how big he's gotten. He's 10 months old...isn't he cute?

After leaving Steve's parents, we took a quick side trip to Salt Lake City. Steve hadn't been on the roof of the Conference Center, so we took the tour so we could see the roof. As soon as we pulled into the parking lot, Jacob decided that he was STARVING to death, and so I got to nurse him in the really nice, cool mothers' lounge in the basement of the Conference Center. I was ALL alone with him and it was quite nice.
Then we took an abbreviated tour of Temple Square, seeing the reflection pool and the Christus statue.

That night we thought we were lost trying to find my aunt's house, but we stumbled across it. That's where we slept that night. (That night my parents discovered that the a/c in their motor home was NOT working, and tried to fix it themselves.)
Day 2:
My dad called the Fleetwood manufacturer to see what we could do to fix the motor home's a/c, and the nearest repair shop was in Las Vegas (many, MANY hours away from where we were!) So to get there before they closed we packed up as quickly as possible and left. We drove quickly and while on our way, my dad decided that even if we DID get to Vegas in time, they wouldn't be able to get the part anyway until the next day, so we should continue on with our plan to see Bryce Canyon. My mom called my uncle who lives where the reunion was and he told her that even though we were going to Arizona, the weather was cool and a/c wasn't NECESSARY. Mom and dad decided that they'd buy fans and try to get by. So we went to visit beautiful Bryce Canyon.

To get to Bryce, we drove through Red Canyon (which really lives up to it's name! But you can't see it in this picture!)

That night we camped in Kanab, Utah. And in the middle of the night I rolled on top of my glasses and broke off the ear piece... they're still wearable, but they're totally trashed! :(
Day 3:
The next day we drove and drove and drove to get to Show Low, Arizona. Half-way there, we stopped to gas up and so I could feed Jacob, and he'd blown through his diaper so bad that it was all over the car seat and him. He'd stuck his hand in it and wiped it on his face. YUCK! (This was the second time that he'd blown out while in the car seat!) We ended up moving him up ANOTHER size in diapers. My 2-month old baby now wears size THREE diapers!!! He's also had to move up to 3-6 month size clothes! He's getting SO big!!

hen we were driving down the highway to Show Low the sky was dark and full of lightning. It was so pretty! We had heard people tell us that we were nuts to be going to Arizona in August, but my aunt and uncle told us that it was actually a good time because it was monsoon season. I'd never thought that Arizona could GET monsoons...but now I KNOW they can!

We decided that we'd sleep in the double-wide building that was on the property. It was almost like a giant slumber party! Here's a picture of the beds piled around, but you can't QUITE get the full feel of it. The first night it was bed-to-bed! Then some family members moved out.

Day 4:

We spent the day relaxing. Cam spent time in the pond with cousins. I talked with aunts and cousins. Steve and Cameron went on a hike to see some petroglyphs. It was a day that some funny things happened.

My mom and I also did a TON of laundry. I'd done many errands for her as well. We took my car, and not her motor home (wouldn't that be something to see...) It didn't take us too much time to do the laundry, but we did meet a few interesting ladies! Laundromats are interesting places!
My cousin caught a duck. Yes, a DUCK! (I'm hoping he set it free, but knowing this family, they may have kept it.)

Cameron and another cousin caught some lizards, and when Cam showed me the lizard he was holding it in his open hand and I told him to hold it differently or it would jump out of his hand. Almost as soon as I'd said that, the lizard DID jump and it scared Cam almost to death! For the remainder of the trip, Cam REFUSED to touch any lizards!

Day 5:

The adults, who could, went to the Snowflake temple. The session was lovely, and the temple was gorgeous! We took some pictures, but not with our camera! (We'd left it in the diaper bag with the baby!) So these are from my aunt's camera.

As soon as we were done with the temple, we picked the kids up and took a day trip to the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert.

Now, when I'd heard we were going to the Petrified Forest I thought that it would be a forest of hard trees. (Like a regular forest, but rocks....) I didn't expect what it really was....a bunch of petrified logs lying around. It was interesting, but quite HOT! The petrified wood was really cool, full of all sorts of minerals and colors. The wind was blowing like crazy....and I thought I'd show you all what a bad-hair-day, inspired by the wind, looked like!

That night my uncle Scott put together a slide show of everyone's pictures from the reunion. We stayed up past midnight to watch them. I wish I could show you, but I don't have that kind of computer savvy-ness to do it! :P
Day 6:

We packed up and left the family reunion. It was a sad time, but also a time to get ready to do other things.

We spent the majority of THAT day driving to the Grand Canyon. When we reached Flagstaff we hit a HUGE monsoon. It was kinda freaky driving down the road and NOT seeing the road! This picture doesn't do it justice, but just IMAGINE! It was bad!!

When we finally got TO the Grand Canyon it was raining like crazy! I guess the monsoons followed us. We tried to do a little bit of sight-seeing, but eventually decided to find a campsite and try again the next day.

Day 7:
It wasn't raining!! So we all made our way into the park. We did a lot of walking around to see the canyon and took lots of pictures. But in the end we were overheated and decided to go back to camp. I figured most of the canyon looks the same anyway....

That night we took a quick walk across the street to the IMAX theater and watched their movie. It was amazing. Poor Steve though! My grandpa was there with us, and he had to go to the bathroom half-way through the movie, so Steve took him and missed about 10 minutes of the movie that we paid $15 to see.

That night my poor uncle was throwing up like crazy, but he'd been doing it the whole time...and we decided that it was enough for a vacation and decided to head home the next day.

Day 8:

We drove straight home from the Grand Canyon. We left the park at 9:30 their time (10:30 our time) and got home around 1:30 in the morning. It was SUCH a long day, but well worth the bed at the end!

I'm so glad I went. I hadn't planned on going after I found out that I'd have a 2-month old baby, but I'm glad I changed my mind. It was such a fun time and now I have a TON of wonderful (and not so wonderful) memories!