Martin's Cove, Wyoming

I was privileged to get to go with the youth from our church branch to Martin's Cove, Wyoming, to walk the path that our pioneer ancestors walked in that area while pulling handcarts. It was an amazing experience, and filled with beautiful country. We pulled handcarts loaded with our gear along the trails where the pioneers walked, got rained on, had tents blown down, flooded, and broken, and got to see the local wildlife. No, rattlesnakes were not the only wildlife we saw, but the only ones that got close enough to us to see well. The antelope kept their distance. The snake in the picture was almost stepped on by a boy from our pioneer "family."

This is the double rainbow we got to see the first night after we survived the first rain storm.
This is hill that is right next to the area before you go up into Martin's Cove. These two pictures are of Devil's Gate, the landmark that the pioneers looked for while crossing the plains. These are the girls and their father that I took from our branch. They were the only two, and no trouble at all, so it was like a mini vacation of sorts to be free from looking after kids.

These are some of the kids from our "family", along with our handcart.This is the dog that became our shadow while on our trek. His name is Oscar, and he hangs out at this place most of the summer. He attaches himself to the different handcart groups and goes with them everywhere until they leave, and then he finds a new group to follow. He spent the night at our campsite, barking at the coyotes as they started to howl. He was featured in the "Friend" magazine in July, and we heard some very neat stories about him from the missionaries at the visitor's center.

It was a totally amazing and spiritual experience, and I hope that one day I can take my children and Shane with me to experience the place with me.

Growin' in the Yard

I got back from my Martin's Cove trip in Wyoming, and had to get back to keeping the yard. As I was mowing, I found these.


These are mushrooms of some kind. Shane calls them "puffballs" cause they are just big, round, balls. We have had more than 10 different kinds of mushrooms growing in different places in the yard at different times of the year. It's kind of interesting to see how many different varieties we have had here.

I have also been neglecting my garden, having been gone for three weeks, and then another shortly after, but my giant sunflowers are doing pretty well without me. They are so big now that they can barely hold their heads up. I took the picture of the head standing underneath it and looking up.


We also had three pumpkin plants growing when I left for Idaho and Utah in June and July. When I came back, they had taken over my whole garden. It looks like I have a garden full of pumpkins now. We have found 8 different pumpkins growing, 7 of which have started turning orange. They kids are excited because they will be quite big in time for Halloween pumpkin carving.

Back to School

School has started again, and the kids are raring to go. Well, maybe their mother is just raring for them to go, but nevertheless, it is time. They started last Thursday with a half day, then full day on Friday. Kaitlin is in 7th grade this year, Josh is in 4th, Luke is in 2nd, and Tanner will be in preschool. Tanner was really wanting to go, too, but he doesn't start preschool until Aug 24th. I keep telling him that he gets to go on Dad's birthday, so each day he asks me if it's Dad's birthday yet.

Grandma's House

After our reunions, I got to go and spend time with my family in Idaho for a week and a half. It was so nice to be home. Even though we thought we might go crazy with 13 or 14 of Mom's 17 grandkids there, and all but one were 9 and under, it was a lot of fun to have the cousins play together. Dad and Nate gave motorcycle rides, and Grandpa took Parker and his cousin Maggie to see the horses quite a bit. The "fort" was very popular, it consisted of hollows under trees, a sandy cliffside, and a middle-of-the-creek, mosquito infested fun place that for a while was dominated by the girls, until they were forced to share. We also got to spend some fun time at a place called "Christiansen's Pond." The people who own it have put in a small waterslide, a zip line, and low and high dive, and a couple of docks. Probably the funnest thing at Grandmas's house is the "superbath." All the way to Grandma's I heard, "Will we get to take a superbath?" That is Mom and Dad's jetted tub, where the kids pile in to get clean after playing all over the place. We add the bubbles to the kids and they love it. As you can tell from the pictures, the kids had a ball. Thanks again, Mom and Dad, for letting us invade you for a while. We had a great time.

It's Time

Yes, it's time to get back to blogging. I've had a lovely 3 week vacation in the west, been home for two weeks now, and it's time to get back in the vein. We had a great time seeing both of our families. It was great to be able to fit both reunions on back to back weeks so that we could be to both. Thanks for working around us so that we could be there. As you can imagine, we took loads of pictures, so I'll just have to post a few here, and some others later.