MONTICELLO TRIP (Part 2)

CANYONLANDS VISIT (The Falls)...

We took a day trip down into Canyonlands. We were so excited to go to "The Falls"...a popular hangout place for locals. At "The Falls," a river cascades down several small sandstone cliffs and makes several small pools for swimming in. Well...we got there and discovered that the "river" was not even trickling, let alone running....so all we found were a few stagnant pools of water. We were all pretty disappointed. But, the kids did have fun climbing around on the rocks for a while.

Above: Before we headed down to Canyonlands, we stopped at the rock right by the turnoff and the kids (w/Frank) checked out the little cave at the bottom of it...the one you always see and wonder about as you are driving to Moab. (Ashley, Donovan, PJ & Ashton)

Above: PJ getting a little climbing in on the way.

Above: Donovan...ya gotta love the red rocks.

Above: Not as big as I thought...but still cool.

Above: So, yeah...no water.

Above: I kept telling everyone (that had never been there)..."Can ya just envision how cool it WOULD be??" :-)

Above: My favorite sister, Samantha. Ok...she's my only sibling...but even if I had 10 others...I BET she would be my favorite ;-). Love ya, Sam!

Above: The kids "envisioning" the coolness of it all.

Above: Ashley on the other side of the "river."

Above: Megan.

Above: Sam and my mom.

Above: A good view of where the water WOULD be going if it were there.

Above: This is the direction the water comes FROM.

Above: Tristan, my dad ("Pard") and Frank....contemplating the water issue.

Above: Amazing!!! It rained and suddenly there was water!!

Just Kidding. This was taken not even a week later by our niece who was visiting the area (thanks, Christy). Crazy, huh? Maybe we were lucky that it wasn't running because it is running really fast and DIRTY! But it would've been more fun. Our theory is that someone upstream was probably irrigating...

Above: Christy and her awesome outdoorsy friends walking in the very dirty water above the falls.

Lunch at Newspaper Rock...

Above: We were all hungry by this time and decided to just stop at Newspaper Rock to have our lunch. We actually had wanted to stop in the campgrounds across the way...but they were by the river and they had been shut down due to "flood danger."

Above: Our motley lunch crew. Yep...that's my Favorite Niece, Tristan, being a ham in the middle. Of course, Heather...if you were there YOU would be my favorite... ;-). (inside joke)...

Above: Grandpa and Grandma Slade...they're awesome.

Above: The REAL Grandpa! :-)

Above: Aunt Sam and Dad.

Above: Cody showed up as we were having our very exciting parking lot lunch! We were all excited to see him. That's him on the left and his friend/college Roommate, Eric Engstrom (they've known each other for their whole lives, I think...back in the Vegas days). They had just gone to the Manti Pageant the night before and traveled down to party with us the next day.

Above: Frank and Donovan.

Above: Tristan and Megan just hangin'.

Above: We discovered (ok we were bored) that everyone but Donovan and Shayne could roll their tongues (it's a gene, you either have it or you don't). These girls had even more developed tongue talents.

Above: Some of the guys got adventuresome and hiked up to the top of the cliff. I'm quite certain that we got mooned by one of them...but it cannot be proved.

Above: Four of the suspects, er, I mean, hikers: Beano, Colton, Corey & Bronson. Corey is my sister's husband...and these are 3 of their 7 kids.

THE DRIVE BACK FROM CANYONLANDS....

Above: Right as we were finishing up our lunch and heading back to Monticello, the Engstrom family got there (Eric's family). These are good friends from Vegas who also went to the Manti Pageant last night (and took Liz with them) and then they drove back down to hang out for a couple more days with us. It was so great to see them all.

We went the "back way" home...up over the mountain...it was so beautiful. They have had lots of rain this year and everything is so nice and green. Behind us you can see out into Canyonlands.

Above: Liz with her good buddies Veronica (center) and Marika (right). Veronica is not technically part of the Engstrom family...but kind of is. They are taking Liz back with them so she can hang out in Vegas for a couple of weeks and see all of her "Vegas friends"...which were many...and then fly home.

Above: Megan and the Mountain. I wish you could tell the brilliance of the green from the photo...it was so amazingly beautiful. For those of you familiar with the area...Foy Lake is off to the right.

Above: It's so good to have Cody home!!!

Above: Frank

Above: That was one obstinant cow...it would not move.

Father's Day in Monticello...

Above: Grandma and Grandpa Slade...ready for church.

Above: Frank and Grandpa being ooohhed and aaahhed over before we headed to church.

Above: Frank trying out the neck pillow from PJ. Now he can sleep comfortably on the bus ride to work in the morning or on those long business trip flights.

Above: The whole family...ready for church. Can you believe PJ is taller than me (he's only 11)!??

Above: Our true character comes out.

Above: So...these guys were born 10 days apart. Beano, on the right, is the older of the 2. :-)

Above: Tristan, our little "Flower Child." :-) Or, what did Grandpa say, "bloomin' idiot" or something?? ;-)

Above: Corey and Ashton.

Above: Beano...the marksman...

Above: Colton...who says he never smiles??

Above: Do you love the awesome shirt? You might've seen them at Wal-Mart....what a great idea. We had a hard time fitting 7 hands on the front though.