Fourth of July Weekend and Camping

Jono and I are loving summer right now! The weather is warm and we are planning our vacations and activities for the summer. I've been working on this post ever since we got back from our 4th of July vacation and it has taken me this long to add all the pictures from various cameras that were used by everyone.

On WEDNESDAY, June 31 Jono and I went to an Angel game with his coworker Jason and his girlfriend Allie. Jason got the tickets from his dad and they were amazing! The game is so much better when you are up close and can actually see the ball when it's hit. Our seats were closer to home on the first base side and were about 8 rows from the field. The Hoppies were sitting on the front row right in front of us. Unfortunately Jono ate a bad meatball sandwich for lunch and he ended up throwing it up in the bathroom at Angel stadium but was a champ and stuck it out until the end of the game, which we lost. He was sick the rest of the night too :(

THURSDAY we had planned on leaving for Utah but I had to go to the Santa Ana courthouse for JURY DUTY. After sitting and reading my book for 4 hours we got released because the defendant plead out. When we were told the whole room cheered, haha. So I hurried home and assisted my sick and weak husband and finished packing the car, grabbed some Jack in the Box and hopped on the 91 East. We got to Jono's brother's house around 12:30 am, talked for a little bit and then went to bed.

FRIDAY morning we slept in and Jono's sister, Sarah, came over and we got to meet baby Janie for the first time! She was adorable. Jono and Jer left to go golfing and Sarah and Janie left to meet up with the rest of her family at Hogle Zoo. I got ready and drove to Fashion Place mall and enjoyed some shopping. At 3 I met up with my Utah cousins and my sisters to get our nails done! We laughed and giggled while getting our feet scrubbed cause we are tickleish. And I swear my guy tickled me on purpose... :) Then I went shopping with my cousins DesiRee and DeAndre and we all got our rings cleaned at the jewelry store. After I picked up Jono and we met up with the whole entire family at a Thai restaurant for dinner. My sister Claire passed out really cute picture books of the many adventures of the cousins over the year, and it was very cute! I went home with my cousin Noelle and had a sleepover with cousin Erica and her baby Stella.

pedis at the mall

Reeve Family Dinner at the Thai Restaurant

Looking at the cute cousin books Claire made for everyone

SATURDAY morning at 9:30 all the cousins met at Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake. We enjoyed looking at the elephants, gorillas, birds, and monkeys. It was a lot of fun and since we went in the morning it wasn't too hot yet. After two hours we decided it was lunch time so we went back to my cousin LaRisse's in-law's house for a very delicious lunch of deli sandwiches, chips, and a spinach strawberry salad (and I don't usually like spinach salads but this was DELICIOUS!) some of the cousins sat and talked after lunch while others had to go and put their babies down for naps.

All the cousins (and the added kin) minus one at the zoo

Mama and Baby elephants

The previous elephant made noises that scared poor Jaxson

In the afternoon my sister Danielle, her son Connor, and cousin Noelle went on a hike up Mill Creek. The first 20 minutes was hard because it was all uphill and very steep, but once we got to the top the view at the end of the trail was so beautiful. Definitely worth the hard work to the top. When we got back to Noelle's house the rest of the cousins were there and we had a BBQ for dinner with hamburgers, hot dogs, salad and vegetables. After Jono and I went back to Jer's house and watched Batman Begins.

SUNDAY morning we woke up early to drive to Sundance for the Foundry Grill Brunch. It was fun to be back there again and see some familiar faces. The food was very good and we enjoyed spending time with family and friends. Then Jono and I visited with Sarah, Kevin, Simon and Janie. I took a little nap and then cuddled with Simon cause he wasn't feeling well.

Later in the evening Jono and I drove to my aunt's house in American Fork for a Carver family dinner. It was a yummy dinner and we ate outside and played with babies and my cousin's new puppy. Then we left to drive to Provo for Jono's cousin's family BBQ and we continued to eat lots of delicious food and desserts made by the Sweet Tooth Fairy herself. It was fun to see Jono's family and play games with them.

The Carver grandsons: Jaxson, Craig and Connor

Mom (Grandma) and Jaxson

Getting revenge on the puppy after he knocked Jaxson over.

Danielle, Connor and Ranger

Granda Carver and Connor

Dad, Jaxson and Jono

MONDAY I met up with Noelle, Claire, Erica, and Jason to attend an exercise session with Noelle's personal trainer. I must say I miss the drills from volleyball and softball in high school so I had a lot of fun! I think the best way for me to work out is when someone is there pushing me. I was sooo sore the next couple days, but it felt good. Later that day the whole Reeve side (my mothers siblings) got together at my Uncle Ross' house for another BBQ. It was good to hang out with family and just relax and enjoy the company. Uncle Ross made yummy hamburgers, hot dogs and salads and Uncle Doyle made homemade cherry, lemon and chocolate pies. Uncle Doyle's pies are the best! My Aunt Allene made all the girls adorable heart necklaces by hand and each girl got a different color.



TUESDAY afternoon I went to lunch with the fabulous Liese Rodger and we went to Kneaders, one of my Utah favorites! It was soo good to see her again and catch up on each others lives. After I went to BYU campus and walked around the Bookstore, one of my favorite things to do while I was there. And I also enjoy the craft and floral store in the downstairs of the Wilk. I had to constrain myself many times to not but anything...I then picked up Jono and took him to his Aunt's house in Orem where he took off with his cousin Kit to go fishing on the Provo River while I went to University Mall and did a little shopping :) After, I picked Jono back up and we headed back to Salt Lake. We picked up Wendy's and went over to cousin Noelle's house to eat it. Her husband Matt had just gotten back from Washington so it was fun to see him and we chatted and watched TV. After we went back to Jer's house and crashed.

WEDNESDAY morning we did a load of laundry, got everything pack up and went to lunch with Jer before we drove 4 hours to Bryce Canyon National Park. We got there around 7, picked out a lot and set up camp. We had dinner at a fast food lodge outside the park that was wayyy overpriced and then picked up some groceries from the store. We finished off the night reading in our two-man tent with a flashlight.

THURSDAY morning we woke up and left for the slot canyons in Escalante. Once we got to Escalante we had to drive about 29 miles on a dirt road. We didn't realize that it wasn't just a dirt road, but it was literally off-roading...and we were in the Camry! There were many times we thought we should go back, but we had made it so far to give up before we even got to experience the slot canyons, so we kept going. We finally reached the "parking lot" (not really a parking lot, just a place people parked their cars that was free of bushes) and packed our bag full of snacks and water and started our way. We hiked down a very steep ravine and then proceeded to walk a couple of miles in a dried up river bed so there was loose sand and rocks everywhere.

The only trail markers were stacked rocks that looked a little something like this...They came in all shapes and sizes. I made some of my own along the way as well.

This slot was too narrow for me to get through, so we had to turn back.

This reminded me of the burning bush :)

So after walking in the blazing sun and trying to stay in the shad we made it to the slot canyon! (Unfortunately we didn't follow close enough attention to the directions we were given so we didn't make it to the one we wanted to go to, but we were just excited to see something other than the river bed...) We met up with other people who had been ahead of us on the trail and they told us this was not a loop trail through the slot canyons. It was so neat walking through the slots and it was nice and cold because the sun doesn't shine in so it felt very good! I went ahead of Jono and we went exploring. After an extremely tight and dark passageway it opened up into a very cool cave-like hole. We explored around and then tried to go further into the slot canyon, but it got too narrow for us so we had to turn back.

Don't know how to change the video the right way. So just tilt your head to the left :)

I must admit at that point the thought of turning back and re-walking what we had just done did not sound fun to me. It was now around 2 in the afternoon and the sun was right above our heads so there was little shade and it was so so hot. At the end we had to ration our water and saw other people on the trail and our only focus was to get back to the car where we knew we had dozens of water bottles and it was sand-free. The hike back up the ravine was so hard and I kept thinking the car would be right at the top of the next hill, but it wasn't. I was so relieved when I finally saw the car....heaven. Our shoes were filled with sand and we were so sweaty and I told myself I would never ever do that again. We made it back to the camp site and I washed up a little in the bathrooms and we cooked up some hot dogs and Smores! Very delicious!

The next day we packed everything up and made one last stop at a hiking location in Bryce Canyon. When we parked and walked over to the start of the trail we were shocked at the view. We didn't know this was what Bryce Canyon looked like, it was so beautiful! We wanted to do the Navajo and Wall Street Loops, but Wall Street was closed due to fallen rocks on the trail. Instead we just hiked Navajo down to the bottom and then just came back up.

After we finished our hike we started our drive back to CA. We had borrowed my mom's GPS and apparently the "fastest route" took us right through Zion's National Park. I pulled up to the entrance booth and asked "Do we have to pay the $25 entrance fee if we are just trying to get to the 15?" He then asked me if I was from southern California. A little shocked, I replied yes. He said he could tell because I said "the" in front of 15. (Although it does distinguish us Southern Californian's from the rest of the world, I fail to see why it makes a difference...you understand what I am trying to say.) I gave a little chuckle (jerk) and he told us yes, we do have to pay. He then proceeded to give us different options of purchasing the nation-wide national park pass, not purchasing the pass and using our credit to then purchase a pass, or just pay the $25 to get to "the" 15. We decided we just wanted to get home. At this point we had been holding up the line for a couple of minutes so we quickly tried to fumble through wallets to collect the cash and as a result elbows were flying into heads (I will not say who clocked who, but let's just say I had a headache for the next couple of hours) and cash was going everywhere. We finally threw the money at him and zoomed off only to find a long line of cars waiting at a stop light. Ughhhh.....Here is what we did to entertain ourselves...

Who wouldn't want to go on a road trip with us after watching these??