The Mountains!

 

We decided it was about time for us to go camping, and so we loaded up our stuff and were off to the Big Horns!

This picture is so blurry, but it just goes to show the effort we make to have a pleasant ride!

 

He is just way to cool to get his picture taken!

 

As we were driving up the mountains we remembered that we forgot to get the ORV sticker for the 4-wheeler, so once we got to our camp ground we unhooked, unloaded and set off for Bear Lodge. As we were driving we saw the most vibrant purple and yellow flowers (they must have been blooming because we went up again a few weeks later and they were even close to being as bright) .

 

When we got to Bear Lodge we were surprised to see the Grandalen family there! It is so funny because we live 10 miles away from them and don’t see them around town, but when we drive an hour… that’s when we bump into them! It was so fun to catch up with them, and thanks to the long line of people getting there ORV stickers too, we had plenty of time to visit with the Grandalen’s!  After we got our sticker, we headed back to the camper, went for a 4-wheeler ride, the girls scoped out our camping spot, and then we were off to bed!

 

They did not stay like this for too long! In the middle of the night, I ended up moving Lauren with Erik and sleeping with the fussy Sawyer! But we did get some sleep J

The next morning we woke up and ate some cereal (I think that is cheating to eat cereal on the mountain – but it’s so much easier!) Lauren and Sawyer tried to help dad get everything ready! Then we set off to go fishing!  

 The fisherman!

 

It really isn’t that fun fishing with a 1 ½ year old! All she wants to do is throw rocks in the water, and that scares the fish away for a certain girl and a certain dad who are trying to fish! So Sawyer and I had to go try to scare fish away somewhere else!

 She didn't care where we had to go, she just had fun throwing rocks!

 So pretty!

 

We drove up the creek a ways and again, Sawyer and I had to make ourselves sparse! Motherhood is so incredible, at times looking at other Mothers and my own, I would see that they would have to stay back with a child – and I felt bad because they were missing out on the fun; but there is no missing out! In this case, Lauren was having an amazing time with her dad, and I was watching my little Sawyer having so much fun throwing rocks in the water – it’s the little things! You do it because it keeps your kids happy!

 

 Little Sawyer had to see what was going on too! This is her way to ride on the 4-wheeler!

 After fishing we came back to the camper for lunch and Erik and Lauren went back out to catch some fish! Nap time was calling Sawyer, so we stayed at the camper!

 After Erik and Lauren came back, we loaded up our stuff and before we could get to far we saw the Mickelson's and stopped to talk with them! Lauren and Libby had a blast together making concoctions of who knows what! And so our heading home at 3 pm ended up heading home at 7 pm!

I love having the Big Horns so close, they are the perfect get away!

Yellowstone - Part 3

Our next stop was the Lower Falls, isn't this gorgeous?!

 

 Triffen and Lauren enjoying the veiw!

My mom made up a little saying for the kids, when we get to Yellowstone we are going to get out walk around, get back in the car. Get out, walk around, get back in the car! That is exactly what we did (and what the kids really didn't enjoy most of the time!!)
So here we are... Getting out, Walking around..

Getting back in the car!

We then stopped at the Steam Boat Geyser!

 The crew taking a break (It was a nice hot day!)

 Someone always had to be on "Ben" duty! No telling what this boy might do!

 Walking back to the car! I was so grateful for all of the help with the kiddos!

 Then we stopped for some intentional swimming! Lila was such a good sport and got in with the kids and got here hair wet!

I stayed by the edge and helped the littles!

 

Not the most centered picture, but I just love her smile!

We were going to end our day after swimming and head back to West Yellowstone, but we were only about 15 miles from Old Faithful so we decided to hit up Old Faithful (just so we could see it twice on our trip!) As I slowly found out 15 miles does not mean 15 minutes away, going 45 mph and sometimes slower makes 15 miles drag on a bit!

The crew waiting for Old Faithful! We were pretty lucky and only had to wait about 20 minutes!
This is the only picture I got of Old Faithful! We were there TWICE and I didn't get one picture of it going off!
To the far left of Old Faithful there was another Geyser going off and it was pretty cool because it was going on for a good half hour (if not more) We kept thinking it would stop, but if we knew it was going to last as long as it did we probably would have gone over to it!

We didn't stay to look around because that was on our agenda for the next day. So we drove back to West Yellowstone to stay for the night. We were caught in 2 "traffic jams" on the way to West Yellowston just to see some stinkin elk!
When we got to our hotel Lila and Kandace went out to get us some food and the rest of us stayed and swam in the pool. We coaxed the kids out of the pool with some dinner and then we called it a night and went to bed!
The next day we loaded up and headed for Old Faithful again. We walked all around it (and with a 1.5 year old, a 2 year old, 2 4 year olds, a 9 year old, and 5 adults - you have to be creative, completely un-irritable, and ready for anything to make it through the day!) We had icecream and then headed out to find a place to eat some lunch!
Did I mention why I didn't have any pictures of the second day?! It might have been because of this little girl and another little boy who took 100+ pictures the first day! I have proof!

Anyways! We set out to find a place for lunch, but before lunch we stopped at a neat hotel (agian, I cannot remember the name for the life of me!) But Lila describeds it as looking like the hotel they had in Dirty Dancing!
After the Dirty Dancing hotel we drove and drove, and finally found the place we were looking for to eat our lunch! We let the kiddos burn off some energy and then it was back in the car to go home!
Awe, It feels so good to be home!

Yellowstone: Part 2 - Dragons and Buffalo

After lunch on Thursday we got back in the car and headed to our next destination.

We stopped by a place that had something to do with Dragons, (not so good at remember the names!) and it was pretty cool, and poor Triffen thought that there was a real dragon in the cave! It sounded like a dragon because the waves and/or the pressure echoed in the cave, sounding like a dragon and to top it off there was steam coming from the cave too!

Here is the "Dragon Cave"

So after we walked around, we got back in the car and kept moving! Still no sight of any wildlife (besides the deer than ran across the road in Cody!) And so we trucked on looking and hoping to see Buffalo! And as I so quickly learned when there is a line of cars going 15 mph it isn’t because road construction or anything like that it is because there is some sort of wildlife (possibly right next to the road, or even waaaayyy off the road that it is so tiny you’re not even sure it is anything!)  The first Buffalo we saw on the trip was HUGE so huge that I thought it was a statue at first!! Haha, and some people couldn’t get out of their car fast enough to take a picture! I was fine and dandy to stay in my van!

This is the first Buffalo we saw, and it was close to the road - and so big (in my mind I really thought it was a Hippo at first! haha!) This picture doesn't do any justice to how big it seemed in real life! You can't see his head in this one, and he is kind of hidden in the tree's.

Here is a very blurry picture of him! But it was exciting because he was the first bufallo we saw on our trip!





As we kept driving our eyes were pealed to see more Buffalo, and we sure did - way far away! So we let the kiddos stop to get a good look at them!

You can see them way out there, but like I said, these where the first ones we had seen!

As we came upon the next traffic jam or people looking at wildlife, we got to see these two guys!

It was pretty funny, because they were just eating along side the road and then all the sudden they came on to the highway, weaved through a couple of cars and then went back off to the side of the road! My moms sarcastic comment was " they weaved through those cars like someone had paid them to do it!" That is some of my Grandpa Asay's humor coming out in her!

Just taking their dear sweet time!

Then to our surprise as we drove a little farther we came upon a whole herd of Buffalo, probably somewhere in the range of 500 +

 This guy here was sleeping, and we heard him snort! It sounded more like a lion growl, but the kids thought it was pretty funny! Triffen was convinced there was a lion out there!

 We couldn't keep Triffen and Lauren in their seat! Good thing we had the van and plenty of room (and good thing traffic only let us go 15 miles per hour!)

Yellowstone: Part 1

A couple weeks ago my mom had mentioned something about going to Yellowstone and I agreed that would be fun (because I haven’t been to Yellowstone, only maybe once to drive through) and a couple days later she called saying that we would be going in a week and spending the night one night! Yippee! The crew was my mom, Lila, my girls, Kandace with her boys, and Dylan. So we started to Yellowstone on a Thursday and in our van we took Lauren, Triffen, Sawyer, and my Mom,  (with the iPod, and iPad of course!) We drove, and drove and the kids were very good, I suppose it was because we were stuffing their faces with Cheeto's!

When we got into Yellowstone we had to release some of the kiddos energy so we stopped by Yellowstone Lake and let the kids run around. The kids couldn’t help but get in water (under much protest by the adults!)

Triffen and Benson just itching to get into the water!

So happy to be out of the car!

Grandma giving in and taking off Benson's shoes so he can get in the water! Geez Grandma!!

Dylan and Jaxon showing off their rock skipping skills!

Me and my girls!

Dylan and Jaxon made it look so easy throwing the rocks out into the lake as far as they could, and us women found that it isn't as easy as it looks! haha! Here is an action shot of them trying the throw the rock the farthest!

Lila stayed strong and held her pose so that I could capture the moment!

We took Triffen's pants off because he had already soaked the legs, and to no surprize he got his underwear just as wet!! So what do ya do?!

Dylan and my Mom, Dylan was such a great help with the kiddos!

Sawyer enjoying the lake, she wouldn't even take time to look at me for a picture!!

After the lake we drove alittle farther trying to find a place to eat. We stopped at a place called Fishing Bridge (I think!)

Everyone chowing down on some sandwich's and watermelon!

*Due to overload of pictures I decided to break it up into 2 parts! Stay tuned for what comes next!