Yellowstone National Park (part 2)

Saturday morning we got up and got dressed and packed up our stuff, loaded up the cars and then it was time to find some breakfast. Someone at the hotel made some recommendations and then we were off to drive around town to find something. We ended up eating at ‘Running Bear Restaurant’. And after, we made a stop at a local market to get some more sandwich fixings so that we could make our own lunch, since there really wasn’t anyplace to get food IN Yellowstone National Park. When Kyle got back in the car he mentioned that the t-shirt shops were going to be closing for the season in the next day or two and wondered if I wanted to go get the kids some shirts. So we went to do that. We left Alex and Sylvia to watch the kiddos while we went to check out the various shops that sold t-shirts and sweatshirts. We walked into one that had some nice looking shirts, walked around, asked about prices and went to check out another store. The funny thing is that while we were in the other store the SAME guy that was working at the other store was in the back room at this store. I think the back rooms for all of them are somehow connected, and they were all run by the same people. After picking out some cute shirts for the kids (and not really feeling like taking extra time to find shirts for us) we left and headed back to the vans. Then Kyle noticed the candy shop across the street that also sells ice cream and homemade fudge. So we decided to quickly go across the street and get some fudge and some treats for the kids. 😉 We got the kids some rock candy on sticks and we tried a few of their different fudges. The huckleberry fudge was really neat, not to mention that it was a lovely shade of purple. Upon inquiring after the fudge we learned that used real fruit juice in it, that it wasn’t just flavored and colored (so now I wonder how to make my own homemade fruit fudge 😛 ). After getting back to the vans and apologizing for being gone so long, we appeased the kids with rock candy and headed back to the entrance of Yellowstone National Park.

This time when we got to the split in the road, since we had gone south yesterday, we went north toward Mammoth Hot Springs. We made our first stop of the day at Gibbon falls:

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The kids spent more time running up and down the ramp at the view point than they did actually looking at the waterfall. But I guess they needed to get rid of some of that energy someway.

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Here is a picture of Ethan with the Gibbon River in the background. 🙂

After Gibbon falls on our way northward we spotted these bison taking a nap out in the prairie grass:

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The next stop we made was at “Artists Paintpots”. Here we got out and got to go for a short hike/nature walk through some trees:

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The boiling mud that we were there to look at was rather thick and really did look like different shades of paint. There was even a mudpot that looked like bubbling marshmallow creme! Here is a view from the top of the hike out on the valley:

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Do you see those white dots off to the right side of the picture? That’s where we left our vans. 😉

And just for future reference….”Artists Paintpots” is not a stroller friendly location:

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There were lots of stairs, and lots of uneven ground which made steering very difficult. Look at how cute Chloe is. She’s going through this phase where if I ask her to smile, she blinks several times really fast. 🙂

After the paintpots I decided to sit in the back with Ethan so he and I both could see the map. To work on one of the cub scout belt loops he had to show how to orient a map, so I pointed out where we were and we watched the signs so we could see where we were on the map. Also, sitting in the back meant I got to see this cute little face:

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She’s so happy to see me. 🙂

Our next stop was at the Mammoth Hot Springs Visitor center. There were elk EVERYWHERE. They were just right there munching the grass right next to the buildings!

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There were also a bunch of private houses all around the visitor center. Kyle and I wondered who could be so lucky to get to live in those cute houses with such beautiful surroundings. After we all used the bathroom we got back in the van and went to the parking lot near the hot springs so we could get out and check them out. This was to be our last stop of the day at Yellowstone. It was really windy, and we had to walk uphill to see everything we could. Also we had been told that there was no way for us to use strollers on this trail (hey at least they warned us).

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The formations that the hot water had carved out of the rock were very beautiful. The whole trip was fun. It was funny to hear the older kids whine and complain about not wanting to be there, and then in the end admit that they enjoyed the trip. Honestly the only thing could have made the trip better (in my opinion) is if everyone had stayed together. There were way too many times when our whole group was totally spread out and we weren’t really a group anymore. At one point Laurel and a whole bunch of the kids just totally ditched Kyle and myself. I was still unloading Lydia from the car into her stroller and noticed that I was alone. I didn’t think Kyle would leave me. In fact he didn’t, he was still at the bathrooms because Tyra and Dinah needed to relieve their bladders. When he got back to the van I had the lovely joy of telling him we had been ditched! It was really difficult to actually keep the group together, and by the end of the trip I was just getting annoyed at everyone wandering off. How were we to make sure that each of the kids were safe when we couldn’t see them all at all times?

After we saw the hot springs we went back to the car and passed out sandwiches, and grapes and then made our way out of the park, and back to the Adam’s again to spend the night. Some of us went to see the business that they own and run. Ethan and Tyra had a lot of fun watching a couple of the Adam’s boys make snow cones. We got back to the house pretty late and finished putting the kids that were still awake to bed.

We we were able to go to Yellowstone National Park, saw all kinds of things, Ethan and Lars got to work on some cub scout stuff, and we didn’t lose anybody, and HEY Kyle didn’t get into any kind of an accident while trying to save a child! So I consider the trip a success. Although I must say, I think Laurel has a problem driving the speed limit…I mean every time we were driving, we were consistently going a few over the speed limit and that still wasn’t fast enough for her. She was constantly getting in front of us and zooming off! And when we called her on it she had the nerve to tell us to drive faster! Like we wanted to risk getting a ticket for speeding. 😛

Feed the Birds

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In Yellowstone, every place we stopped to get out and walk around there was always a single raven in the parking lot. ALWAYS! After awhile we started to feel like it was just following us.

After we saw Old Faithful and our cub scouts finished talking to park rangers and everyone was done in the little shop inside the visitors center, we loaded up the kids and I passed out cookies. The kids were sitting in the car, while us adults decided what our plans for the rest of the day were, when we noticed the single raven in the parking lot again. Kyle tossed a bit of broken cookie at it and the next thing we knew there were two ravens. He tossed another piece and then there were three.

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Then tossed yet another piece of cookie and then there were four ravens. Laurel decided she wanted to see how comfortable these birds are with tourists, and so she knelt down with a piece of cookie in her hand, and held it out to the birds:

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I happened to snap this picture right before it actually took it straight from her hand. 🙂

Yellowstone National Park (part 1)

We had been planning on going to Yellowstone for several months. Originally we were thinking that we could go over Labor day weekend, but we decided we should push it back and go over the fall break in October.We invited Laurel’s family to come with us and planned a route for our trip. As we got closer to leaving Laurel started feeling doubtful as to whether we should go or not. She had talked to a bunch of friends and had been told that Yellowstone is a dangerous place, not a place to take little kids, and that the park is closed by this time of year. Then Karen emailed to say that she has had a couple of bad dreams about what happens to us in Yellowstone mainly that something dreadful was going to happen to Kyle as he tries to save one of our kids. Laurel tried to talk us into postponing our trip, yet again, and go in the summer. So I stopped preparing to leave so that Kyle and I could talk about what we should do, and we decided that the house is such a mess that we could just stay home and clean it up.

Thursday morning (the day we had planned to leave) Laurel called all excited. She had called the Old Faithful visitor center and talked to a park ranger and asked him a whole bunch of questions which made her feel so much better, so she called us to see if we still wanted to go. Of course we still wanted to go, so she asked how much time we needed to get ready and we planned on getting the car loaded up and calling back on our way into town. I had our whole family packed and all the stuff loaded up in the car in an hour and a half! We decided to stop by wal mart on our way to the freeway to pick up some umbrella strollers and sandwich fixings and a few other odds and ends, I ran in, while Kyle went to fill the mega van’s tank. Then we stopped by Target real fast since wal mart didn’t have something that was on my list. I ran in, while Kyle went to sonic for happy hour drinks. I guess he thought I was going to take forever or something, but I ended up finishing super fast at target, and then I walked over to sonic and got back in the car there. Then we were on our way to Laurel’s house to meet up.

At Laurel’s house we sat and waited in the car, while Laurel finished preparing to leave. I made the kids sandwiches for dinner, since it was about 5pm by this time. We had all the kids make another potty stop and we made sure diapers were fresh, and when Laurel and her kids finally got in the car we were all ready to go. Laurel still needed to fill up so we stopped at the Costco gas in American Fork, which made me wonder why we didn’t just meet there. Kyle and I were JUST over there! Then we got on the freeway heading north. 🙂 We drove and drove and drove and we reached Pocatello, Idaho around 9pm or so. We stopped at a Taco bell to grab a snack and make a potty stop, and then we hit the road again. We drove to Rexburg, Idaho and there we stayed the night with some of Laurel’s friends, the Adams.

As we unloaded the sleeping bags and suitcases from the mega van there were lots of kitties running around and jumping in the van to check things out. Turns out the Adams have 12 cats, and a couple of big dogs. So Chewy got to sleep in the house overnight instead of being forced to curl up in someone’s car seat in the car. Ethan and Lars, were instant buddies with the 10 year old boy, Matthew, in the Adam’s family. It was pretty funny to watch them hover over Matthew’s shoulder to watch as he played a video game. We hung out for a little bit to let the kids get their wiggles out before we went to bed.

First thing Friday morning, Laurel took Alex and Sylvia and one or two of the Adam’s kids to the Rexburg Temple to do baptisms for the dead. I woke up and started packing up our stuff so that we could get out of there right after breakfast. As soon as one of my kiddos was awake I was getting them dressed and rolling up their sleeping bag (or folding up the playpen in Lydia’s case). Maija-Liisa Adams (the mom) made pancakes for breakfast. The pancakes (some of which were plain others had banana slices in them and others had chocolate chips in them) were served with applesauce, homemade maple syrup and whipped cream. After Laurel and the older kids got back, changed, had breakfast and finished packing up their stuff we headed out and hit the road again. Kyle commented on how remarkably FLAT Idaho is:

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We drove towards West Yellowstone, Montana and we got to drive through the Targhee National Forest. I haven’t got to drive through a forest like that in about eleven years, and it was just BEAUTIFUL. Just to drive through those trees made me so happy. Once in West Yellowstone we drove around and found the hotel we were going to be spending the night at, and got our keys. Then we stopped at McDonalds for a potty break, and to pass out sandwiches (we did also get some fries to go with them 😛 ). Then to the Yellowstone National Park west entrance, we went. We drove east until we came to the dead end where we had to choose north or south and we went south. We pulled off the road and stopped as we saw things we thought we would like to get out and see. It was kind of nice going when the weather was so cool. Seeing the steam rise up off the ground was awesome.

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From left to right: Lars, Daniel, Ethan, Jeremy

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Dinah liked going down lots of stairs backwards.

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As we worked our way south we saw this bison that was munching grass right by the side of the road:

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At the Old Faithful visitor center we went inside for a potty break, and they had a short video about national parks and Yellowstone in particular so we watched that. Then as the video ended someone came over the microphone to announce that Old Faithful was active, and that was our cue to get outside!

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Old Faithful!

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After we watched Old Faithful blow, we decided that we had better work our way back out of the park before it got too dark. On our way back to the west entrance we saw a bunch of elk grazing by the river:

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We got back to West Yellowstone, Montana and started looking for a place to have dinner. After going into a couple of places and finding seriously long waits we found a little bbq restaurant called Buckaroo Bills that looked TOO little to actually seat our large group of 13. But looks can be misleading, they were able to seat us right away in a section of the restaurant that is quite hidden from the front. The tables in the back had canvas over them to make them look like covered wagons, and our ‘wagon’ was decorated with things related to “Kissin’ Kate Barlow”. It was really rather cute. After looking at the menu for a bit and really not wanting to deal with a whole bunch of kids meals I spotted an option that included two rotisserie chickens 2 full racks of ribs, 6 corn bread muffins and a couple of other sides for a rather decent price. We decided to go for that! Then everyone could have a little bit of everything and there was plenty of food for everyone. A couple of people also wanted to try an elk burger and a bison burger, so we got one of each of those so those that wanted to try them could have a piece of each. The food was good, and soon we had all these little tummies full and they were ready to go to bed.

On our way back to our vans Laurel decided to stop off in some of the t-shirt shops. I did not realize this until I was already all the way back to our van and had all of our kids loaded up. Laurel had Alex and Lars with her so we piled Sylvia and Daniel into our van as well, so they wouldn’t freeze standing outside. Then we went to park closer to where the t-shirt shops were. When Laurel got back she asked where Sylvia and Daniel were, so we told her that we had them. After they all got loaded up into their van we headed over to the Three Bears Hotel, where we had reserved a room that had 3 queen size beds. We got everyone settled and got to sleep. We did have a couple kiddos fall of their beds in the night. Dinah just fell off onto the floor and after that we just got her set up on a comforter on the floor for the rest of the night. Jeremy also fell off his bed, but I think that was because Lars was being a bed hog:

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He’s got close to half the bed over there!

Student of the Month

Apparently my kids don’t give me the notes that they receive at school, and I’m not very good about checking their backpacks either. Jeremy came home today with a ‘Student of the Month’ certificate, and a coupon to del taco for a free taco, AND the note inviting me to the school to see him receive the student of the month award. A little late for that, don’t you think? Oh well I still took a picture of him with his stuff. 🙂

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Going to the Circus

I saw on a friend’s blog that there was a circus coming to town and thought that it would be so much fun to take the kids. So I talked to Kyle about it and we decided to invite Debby and Jeff along for the fun. However I did not tell the kids WHERE we were going. Only that we were going somewhere. 🙂

We decided to go to dinner first, so that the kids wouldn’t be hungry through the show and constantly asking for us to buy snacks. So we went to a Carls Jr on the way and let the kids get their wiggles out on the play place. We haven’t actually gone to a play place in a really long time so they all had a blast.

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Chloe was a little too short to get up there by herself, but Ethan (and I think sometimes Jeremy) helped push her up to the next level so she could go down the slides. Then it was off to the circus!

We got there early because the tickets told us to do so, and we wanted to make sure we could find the place and find parking, and still get good seats. I guess the previous show got out late though and so as we were getting there, people began pouring out of the doors. So we went inside and waited for our turn to be admitted. Once we were finally inside we could just sit wherever we wanted to, so we found some seats and got situated.

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While we waited for the show to start they had a small petting zoo, where you could feed and pet some Llamas, and they had some ponies to ride, and they had a bounce house, and they were giving elephant rides. However each of these things cost extra money, of which I had brought none, so we just stayed in our seats and waited for the show to start.

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Jeff bought a large bag of cotton candy to share with the kids. So they munched on this while we waited.

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We weren’t actually allowed to take pictures of the show. I understand ‘no flash photography’, since that can be very distracting to the performers and to the people sitting around you. But NO photography whatsoever??? What’s wrong with me taking pictures with my flash off??? Whatever, I was a good girl and didn’t take any pictures of the show. But we saw a couple of guys ride a motorcycle in a ball shaped cage. They each took a turn by themselves, and then they both went in together. Looking at Ethan and Jeremy’s faces they really liked that. There was a pretty showgirl that juggled this spinning thing on a long string, and she would throw it up into the air and catch it. She did drop it once. Then she went on with juggling two of them and then three. There was a couple that roller skated on a circle platform and they did tricks, some of which kind of reminded me of figure skating. We watched a clown with a car do an act. The kids really liked the clown act where there was a lion in a cave. Actually it was a small dog dressed as a lion, but it was still pretty funny. There were also some musician clowns. I think Dinah really liked the elephant act. The boxing kangaroo I thought was kind of sad. The kangaroo just didn’t seem happy, and the small box that they kept it in before and after it’s part just seemed cruel to me. There was also an act where they put a girl into a cage (one half of the cage was covered) and they covered the whole cage, and spun it around a few times, and when they took the cloth off, the girl had turned into a tiger! Obviously it’s just a trick but the kids were talking about that one for awhile, wondering how they had done that. 🙂 It made me kind of sad though that they didn’t actually use the animals in the show (aside from the boxing kangaroo and the elephants). I’m sure they could have had the tiger do tricks. Or have the girls dance and do tricks as the ponies ran around the ring or something. The ponies were just there to collect money before and after the show and at intermission. Yes there was an intermission! The show was only supposed to be an hour and a half long. They started late (probably due to the pre-show money collecting) then there was an intermission! The kids had a really good time though. Obviously, I was kind of expecting more. Yes, these performers were talented at what they do, but they were also just silly tricks. It was after all, just a small one ring circus and for the kids first circus experience I think they had a great time. Maybe someday we’ll see what a different circus has to offer, but I’m very happy that we were able to take our kiddos to this one. 🙂