From the best of my memory:July 11, 2009
Day 1:
We drove up to Island Park, Idaho. Island Park is located about 40 miles outside of Yellowstone National Forest and it is fabulously beautiful. Jeron and I spent our honeymoon here but probably haven't been back since. I know I've been a lot of pretty places, but it looked especially amazing this trip. Everything was green! We met with Jeron's sister, Amberly, and her brother, Jason, and their families. We all rented a cabin and except for the late nights with our boys, it was so fun. The first day we arrived, was a pretty relaxed day. We waited for everyone to arrive and cooked up some food and let the kids play with cousins.
Does it get any cuter? Macy was eating Redvine licorice.
Austin giving me the "stink-eye". He got Jeron's dark skin.
Me and Abby.
Jevyn getting ready to do some serious playing outside with cousins.
Austin & uncle Tyler.
Tyler was pretending to throw Austin over the balcony and he was terrified!
Amberly and Macy.
Snuggling: only happens on rare occasions
July 12
Day 2:
Yellowstone! The kids probably didn't realize we still had about an hour drive after leaving the cabin. We made sure we had snacks and the dvd player and we were on our way. Yellowstone was especially green and perfect!
Boys were in a good mood and ready to go!
The novelty soon wore off & fighting began & so did their first movie.
Our first view of the park.
We saw this bald eagle within a few minutes of being in Yellowstone.
There is a giant buffalo sitting in the trees.
Preciousness
On our way to see a "hot pot".
What all the fuss was about
1st cousins: my boys & Jevyn
Here we are on our way to see another attraction - some waterfalls...can't remember the name.
On our walk down this really steep path leading to the viewpoint for the falls.
It was a long hike back up the steep hill back to the parking lot. Here doing what they do the best - fighting
Austin kept insisting that he saw a buffalo in the trees and we kept blowing him off, thinking he was making things up. Sure enough, when we got to the car, there was a giant buffalo sitting within about 25 feet.
Spencer posing with magnet rocks that we bought in a little souvenir shop
1st bear spotted: In Yellowstone, you know there is some wildlife around when cars pulled off on the side of the road. Sometimes we would just follow the crowd and eventually we would spot the wildlife.
2nd bear spotted: grizzly (or as Spencer once said, frizzly) bear
3rd bear
Elk sitting in someone's yard
Some massive rock that looked really cool that produced some pretty colors, steam, & whatnot
Austin fell asleep in the car. We had to wake him up and he was NOT happy. He screamed and cried and I had to drag him out of the car. He refused to walk up the platform and I had to take a picture. It was very annoying at the time but really funny looking back.
I stayed behind with a screaming kid at the first viewpoint. Jeron shot this picture from above.
July 13
Day 3:
On our last day in Island Park we decided to hang around town and decided to float down the river. Jeron and I spent our honeymoon here and did this about 11 years prior. We heard about this cute little spot where you feed the fish so we took the kids before we started down the river. It was a chilly day!
Look at the size of the fish!
Spencer was very serious about catching a bird. He gave it a pretty good try.
We toured some little house that some guy built himself. This was too disgusting for me not to take a picture of it.
This was such a beautiful time of year. I had to take a picture of the wildflowers that randomly grew.
Later that day, each family floated down the river. Uncle Tyler promised to pay $1 to anyone who spotted a moose. Our floating trip had almost ended, when Spencer spotted a mother moose and her baby. Unfortunately, I did not take any pictures.
One of Spencer's favorite things to do at the cabin was look for some sort of fascinating creature. Occasionally, he would walk up carrying a snake in his hands looking for approval. Spencer knows everything about snakes (so he thinks) and it was next to impossible to convince him that he had to have an adult check first to make sure it was not poisonous. I was happy that he found a frog to entertain himself for a while.
When we had any down time at the cabin, the kids either played outside or upstairs with a gaming system (can't remember which one). This is not the clearest picture, but I thought it was hilarious when I found little Macy trying to hurry up and sneak some game time of her own when none of the other kids were around. She was frantically pushing buttons.
On our way out of town, we tried to stop and take the boys fishing. Here is Jeron trying to figure out how to work the new fishing pole.
We were unsuccessful. This was our last stop before home.
