A visit underground

We even went and visited a cave while we were in the Rapid City area.
And then a free little dinosaur park.

Finally... Mt. Rushmore

What a majestic site. Seeing Mt. Rushmore is such a great reminder of what can be accomplished with effort and hard work. Also it is a great reminder of the many wonderful people who have done so much for this country.

Mammoths from the long gone past

We went and saw a Mammoth dig that was about an hour south of Mt. Rushmore. It is amazing the size of those animals. It would really be something to see one of them alive!

Story Book Island in Rapid City

We spent an afternoon at Story Book Island in Rapid City. It is a free park with all kinds of cool things for kids to play on.
Savannah and Olivia had tons of fun and did not want to leave!

A day in Rapid City, SD - Reptile Gardens

Our first day in the Mt. Rushmore area was spent in Rapid City. During our stay in the area we camped at a KOA in Custer, SD. It was about 45 minutes from Rapid City. On the way from the camp site up to Rapid City we passed the Crazy Horse Monument. It is pretty impressive.The first place we went in Rapid City was to Reptile Gardens. We all enjoyed our time there. Savannah and Olivia really liked the turtle.We all enjoyed watching a guy wrestle an alligator. After the alligator show the man brought around a two year old alligator. Savannah gave it a kiss on the lips. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of that.
We also were able to pet some really old Giant Tortoises. The oldest, Methuselah, had just had his 118th birthday, if I remember correctly.This is our midget family photo, taken with in front of a funny mirror.

Onward to Mt. Rushmore

After a great time in Yellowstone our vacation then continued with a long drive to Mt. Rushmore. We ended up pitching our tent at 11 PM. We were that late because we stopped at the Battle of Little Bighorn for a few hours. That site was pretty neat to see. It was good to hear the reports of how that battle went. It makes me wonder how things would have gone for the Native Americans if they had not decided to plunder the soldiers after the battle. Sitting Bull apparently claimed to have a vision that they would be able to conquer the white man, but that they should not plunder any of their stuff.
This is a monument that was placed just above the hill where Custer and many others fell.There is a national cemetery their just like the Arlington cometary that is in Washington DC.

Yellowstone

After the family reunion we went to Yellowstone. We had some pretty good luck while in Yellowstone; we were able to see many things that we have wanted to see in the past, but have not had the opportunity to see. The first neat thing we saw was the erruption of Grand Geyser. It is found in the same area as Old Faithful, but isn't as famous as Old Faithful because it only erupts about every 7-15 hours.
The neat thing about Grand Geyser is that it is the tallest predictable geyser in the world. We also saw 9 bears one evening as we were driving around! That was awesome, we have always wanted to see a bear up there, but have had no luck in the past. This time we saw quite a bunch of them. We also saw mountain goats, bighorn sheep, and either a wolf or coyote. We have never seen the mountain goats, bighorn sheep, or a wolf before either.
This is the first bear that we saw, a nice big grizzly. It was really near to the road as well.
This is a cub that we saw up in a tree. The mother was down below in the grass on the ground.
We had a lot of fun together in Yellowstone, and that was just the first part of our vacation. Our vacation was definitely off to a good start.

Reunion

Well looks like it has been forever since we posted anything. There are probably tons of things I could post. So I guess I will just start with the reunion, and hopefully slowly work my way up from there. Below is a picture of the cabin we stayed in. Other than getting kids to bed at night with all of the excitement, it was great. It is a good thing we were in a cabin up there, because the mosquito were terrible, (As you can see from a picture of Savannah). It looks like she bonked her head in this picture, but actually it is mosquito bites. Aren't Savannah and Olivia so cute!Hey! Look at all of that hair Olivia has!! ...Okay, so she really still doesn't have much at all, but if you look at the pictures from her one year birthday party, it is a lot more hair than she had back then! And it has gotten curly, definitely taking after Elise for that.

Olivia's 1st Birthday!!!

This last Sunday we celebrated Olivia's 1st Birthday. I know, it is amazing that she is old enough to be having her 1st birthday. Above, Olivia is just relaxing waiting for her party to start (not that she really knows what is going on).



Olivia did end up opening a few presents by herself, with some encouragement from mom, dad, and Savannah. We were just lucky that Grandpa Larsen brought some skittles, so Savannah would let Olivia try and open some of her gifts.

Here is Olivia after eating a little bit of her cake. Not too messy. Grandma Petroff and mom are putting ribbons in her hair.

Here is Olivia's Birthday cake. This is before it started to melt.