Reminising about the good ole days ... High School

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Double Arch Alcove Hike in Kolob Canyon

On Saturday (the 18th) we had fun hiking the Double Arch Alcove hike in Kolob Canyon. Some of Nate's family joined us on the hike: Mike & family, Ryan & family, and Kim & family. As you can see from the pictures, it is beautiful. My pictures don't even do it justice. The hike roundtrip was 5.4 miles. Luckily my parents were able to watch Kylie and Jacey. They would not have made it!

Look at the cloud tornado. I didn't even realize it was there until after the picture was taken.

Nate's sister Kim and her family

Tyler and his cousin Caleb.

Nate's oldest brother Mike and part of his family

Tyler holding his hiking treasures: a butterfly(which he caught with his bare hands), a red leaf, and his hiking stick.

Nate's younger brother Ryan and his family.

Pride Rock!

The Double Arch Alcove!!! ( you can only see one of the arches in this picture...Sorry)

Grandpa Graf and Tyler.

The whole hiking CREW!!

Making Haunted Houses with Cousins

Okay, so I have the funnest sister-in-laws! I had so much fun hanging out with Barbara and Kim this weekend. On Friday we decided to let the kids make haunted houses (awesome idea Barbara)! They had so much fun. Grandma even poped in to see the good time. Thanks Heidi for all your help!

As you can see from the pictures... I didn't do anything to help... but I did take the pictures to document the fun occasion. Kim and Barbara had the hard part. The cousins got very creative as you can see.

The Pumpkin Patch & the First Day of Snow

So we are crazy! We knew it was supposed to snow, but we didn't care, we wanted to go have some fun. We went to Parowan, Utah. It is about 20 minutes north of Cedar City. We drove up there to go to the fall festival. It was supposed to go from 9 am to 6 pm. It was supposed to have a bounce house, over 75 vendors, kid games, face painting, food, etc. Well...when we got there around 2 pm there were snow flurries coming down. When we drove up, there were hardly any cars in the entire parking lot. I think all the cars were from the few vendors. There was no bounce house, everything was pretty much shut down. They were about to pack up all the kids games until we came. We spent $5 for Tyler, Lexi, and Kylie to play ALL of the games and get their face painted. They loved it. They would give them a ton of prizes. We about froze outside. We wandered inside the pavilion to get warm. I found some cute new flowers for Jacey's headbands and then we ventured back to the car. In the mean time, the kids games and face painting were all put away. Wow, we caught them just in time. So while we were out, we decided to go to Paragonah, Utah. It is about 5 minutes north of Parowan. We heard there was a big pumpkin patch. We hunted it down. It wasn't hard to find....

We spent about an hour picking out pumpkins. It was so bitter cold. The kids didn't care. They loved picking out the best pumpkin. We ending up getting four pumpkins: 1 giant family sized, Tyler's large, Kylie's normal size, Alexa's perfect size for her-small. The total weight was 55 lbs. The total cost was only $8.00. I couldn't believe it! I felt like I was stealing!! What a deal. In California I would have to pay $3-$4 dollars for each small to normal sized pumpkins. That made my whole day. Nate thought I was crazy. On the drive home, it started to SNOW!! And I mean snow. The kids loved it. They couldn't wait to get home to play in it. I just wanted to cry. I want to migrate to California for the winter. I'll come back in June again. Nate thinks I am kidding, but if I had a chance, I think I would take it....well I would think really hard about it anyway.

Family Night at Wood's Ranch

Tonight we went up the mountain to Wood's Ranch. We had so much fun. Lisa & Jay came with their two kids Jayme & Trey. Grandpa Graf came too. Grandpa got the fire started, while Lisa and Alisha got the food ready. We had quite the meal planned...hot dogs, chips,lemonade, and smores! You can't beat that!! Everyone had fun roasting hot dogs and marshmallows to their hearts content. Lisa & Jay brought awesome long metal poles (I don't know the real name) that they got when they got married, it made cooking the hot dogs and marshmallows way easy. See, wedding gifts are awesome! Trey brought along a friend that he had found...a big large WORM! So, you can imagine Tyler's delight! They went on a short hike up to the "kids pond". There, Trey & Tyler released the now dead worm back to the wild. It was very exciting. We then huddled by the fire to keep warm and had a family home evening. Lisa was very prepared and gave a great lesson from the Friend. They kids enjoyed it. But my favorite part was when we all sang "I Am A Child Of God" for the closing song. It was so peaceful singing in the mountains with our family. Jacey was great. She slept in the van almost the entire time. She was awake for maybe 30 minutes. We hurried and snapped a picture of her to prove to her that she was there. That was one of the funnest family nights we have had in a while. Thanks Lisa & Jay for inviting us along.

Can you guess who is missing?

The Mills Family: Jay, Lisa, Jayme, & Trey

the CREW!

Grandpa Graf & Tyler running down the mountain.

She woke up!

Trey & Tyler releasing the worm back into the wild.

Yummy hot dogs!