In June we took a vacation to Utah to see our family there. It was great to see everybody again. It rained quite a few of the days we were there. The local news was calling Utah "Seattle South" because the rain had been so persistent for so long. But it did make everything very green. Utah may be a high desert, but it looked like a rainforest compared to AZ.

As has become tradition, we hiked the Lagoon Trail with all of the kids. It's a fun walk and it gets the kids nice and tired. They were able to see some of Lagoon's zoo animals. We ended up at Farmington pond where we were able to feed the ducks because Grandpa bought some crackers off of some kid who was there picnicking with his family.

We were able to go through the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. It is a really beautiful temple with a great view of the Salt Lake Valley. It is also really close to Lindsey and Shafer's new house, which we finally got to see in person. It is a really nice house with abundant and varied plantlife everywhere. It was a strong reminder that, as nice as AZ is, it is still the desert.

We visited BYU to see the art museum. They had a display of "I Spy" artwork that the kids had fun with. We also saw a lot of "trash" art, which the kids loved. These included giant sculptures made of black trash bags, balloons, and even duck sauce packets from a chinese restaurant. The hard part was preventing the kids from touching anything! It was also fun to show the kids their Dad's Alma Mater. We walked around the campus and showed them all of the buildings Dad used to go to class in. Then we ended up in the Wilkinson Center where we got them T-shirts and ice cream. Now they love BYU and are determined that it is the best school in the world and the only one they want to go to. They have invented a game called "BYU kids" which consists of running around yelling "BYU, BYU, BYU!" They have done this at the zoo, in stores, and all over the campground we visited a month later. They're even turning their unknowing AZ cousins into BYU fans.

We spent some time hanging out at Emily and Andrew's house. The kids went swimming in their pool and we all enjoyed cooking out and talking with everyone. We even watched a bunch of old home videos including Corinne's first visit to meet her future in-laws. We had made actual "movies" consisting of storylines, props, villains and heroes. It was incredibly silly, and I had actually forgotten that we had made them. But it was fun to see again.

We visited the Hogle Zoo and hiked around with the kids, looking at all of the animals. They loved the animals, but I think they had more fun at the playground right before we left.

Just before returning home to AZ we visited Grandma and Grandpa's in Bountiful. We sat out on the patio eating cake and talking. The girls were excited about a sparrow's nest made of mud that Grandma showed them. They were amazed that a bird could build a nest out of mud on the side of their Great Grandma's house. It was a great reminder to me of how exciting and new everything in the world is to these wonderful little kids.

Well, that was the trip. If you have more pictures or memories to add, send them to us or add a comment. Just remember to avoid using the kids' names or any email addresses or actual addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers, credit card information, etc. ;) You get the drift. Thanks.