Thursday, July 16, 2015

Forty Two Years!!

Mike and I recently celebrated 42 years of marriage.  Usually, we would say 42 loooooong years.  But, mostly we have been saying, how did 42 years fly by so quickly??  

Evan went to Camp Kelley Creek again this year and it happened to fall over our anniversary.  Catalina Island seemed like a fun place to go, so that is where we headed.  We had been there six years ago and had fun.  The only problem was the place we stayed.  The hotel was up in a canyon, and our room was dark and felt like a cave.  This time we researched vacation homes.  We found a cute little apartment on VRBO that was right on Avalon Bay, with a balcony that overlooked EVERYTHING!!  
I am an early bird, so I loved to get up and take pictures of the sunrise.

It was fun to sit outside and eat our meals, watch the sunrise, sunset or just people watch!  

View from the side balcony of the town of Avalon. 

On our anniversary we decided to hike the Garden to the Sky trail, with a trail guide from the Catalina Island Conservancy.  We ended up being the only two on the hike and had a great time with Colin, our guide.  He was patient and walked slow, as the hike was steep for me.  We learned a lot about the island and the view when we reached the top was incredible!!  
The start of the trail.


Not looking too bad, when we reached the top!!


Our evening activity was the Sundown Isthumus Cruise to Two Harbors.  This boat, The Blanche W, takes people from Avalon to the other end of the island at Two Harbors.  We had dinner in Two Harbors and hiked again at the isthumus, which is the narrowest part of the island, at half a mile.  The widest part is eight miles.  On the way back to Avalon we watched the sunset and viewed the flying fish!!  It was a fun evening!
You had to walk on the correct dirt road. 
The Pacific Ocean side of Catalina Island, opposite San Pedro Channel

This is the view back towards, San Pedro Channel. 

Two Harbors


Sun setting over the ocean, it was getting a little choppy. 

On Wednesday, we kayaked on the ocean for the first time!  We did this with a guide also.  He took us to Frog Rock, we walked on the rocky beach there and collected seashells.  It was very peaceful out on the ocean.  

It takes good teamwork to row a tandem kayak. 




Frog Rock



Rowing back to Descanso Beach was harder than going to Frog Rock. 

Mike had to take up my slack!  


A different view of Frog Rock looks more like a gorilla!!




We walked around a lot, as there are few cars on the island (not enough parking space).  This was the view from on hill we climbed.


Sunrise on our final morning.  



I am so grateful for my wonderful husband and his unconditional love.  We have survived lots of ups and downs together.  Just like many families.  I can't think of anyone else that I would want to be with for eternity.  Thank you for 42 wonderful years, Mike.













Monday, July 13, 2015

Price Family Reunion 2015



This year we decided that Zion National Park would be a great place for a family reunion, with it's awe inspiring landscape.



Katie, Joshua, Aunt Delma, Kyle, Mike and Derek.  And that is Daniel in the back who is Susan's grandson.  
Mike, Evan and I decided to spend a few days first in Las Vegas to visit Aunt Delma.  She is such a delightful lady to visit.  She loves to feel needed and serve others.  She made us an awesome breakfast of pancakes, sausage and bacon.


 Then we went for a drive to Red Canyon State Park.




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It was so nice to get away from the busyness of the Las Vegas and see some beautiful country.







We spent the weekend in St. George, and stayed in the newly renovated Temple apartments right across the street from the St. George Temple.   The apartments were awesome and it was so fun to wake up in the morning, look out the window and see the Temple.



Can you see the moon?  




I Love To See The Temple, especially at night.  






 Rachel and Joey came for the weekend too, and we got to spend some time with their little foster daughters.







Joey is in there somewhere.


I love her sweet smile!!
Monday after lunch we headed out to Zion National Ponderosa Ranch, were we would stay for the next four nights in one large vacation home with all 27 of our family members.  That is six children, five in-laws, 14 grandchildren!!  The adults were going to outnumbered.


The drive over offered beautiful vistas!!


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Evan enjoying Checkerboard Mesa.  


I am amazed how big our family has grown in such a short amount of time.




The Whole Wild Bunch!!
Back - NW, Matteo, Amy, John, Katie, Derek, Brad
Middle-Joey, Rachel, Joshua, April, Mike, Cindy, Corbin, Daniel, David, Sariah, Joanna
Front- Evan, NT, Aiden, Callan, Thomas, Kyle, Andrew, Leah, Spencer


Our picture kept getting photo bombed.  Those pesky kids!!!




Siblings!!
David's Family
Andrew, Daniel, Leah, David, Joanna, Sariah, and Spencer


April's Family
Matteo and April
Corbin and Thomas
John's Family
John and Amy
Callan and Aiden


Katie's Family
Katie, Brad, Derek
Kyle and Joshua


Rachel's Family
Rachel and Joey
with their foster girls


This was best with all the grandkids.  It's near impossible to get a good picture!!

The home we stayed in was a lot of fun.  It was big and had fun play equipment outside.  Check out this airplane.






Grandma and Andrew

Brad brought a homemade giant jinga set that was a lot of fun for big and little people.



Joanna sneaking off with some blocks. 




The deck had some great views.  



Little Daniel liked the space under this table to hide. 



Thomas and Joshua





The weather was great to eat outdoors. 



 Every day we enjoyed seeing the beauties of Zion.





I especially loved all the flowers that bloom even in the heat of the summer.














This little robin tried to beg for some food, but he seemed pretty fat already.
















 One of the highlights of the reunion was a family talent show.  However, there was some sneakiness going on the evening before.




Here was the finished project!  It was pretty funny and the kids loved the surprise of Olaf and bubbles and silly string!!




Kyle told some knock-knock jokes.  He obviously doesn't understand knock-knock jokes yet, but he had a lot of fun!





Spencer has disappearing thumbs.





 Joshua sings a great version of "Wheels on the Bus".





 Evan, Mike and I did a parody of "Home, Home on the Range", we called in "Home, Home on the Hill", because we live on a hill.  It was a big hit too.





Here are the words.  We spent about three hours one night, just laughing and have fun coming up with the verses.  Evan's music teacher, Victoria, put together music so Evan could accompany us on the Q-Chord.  It was great to see his big smile through the whole song! 



Oh, give me a house, with a kind, loving spouse.  
Where children and grandchildren play
Everyone dreams, of a bowl of ice cream.
And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey. 

(Chorus) Home, home on the hill,
Where children and grandchildren play
Everyone dreams, of a bowl of ice cream.
And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey.  

Oh, tell me a pun, we will have lots of fun. 
We will trick Daddy every single day. 
Now and hereafter, the house fills with laughter
And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey.

Home, home on the hill,
Where children and grandchildren play
Everyone dreams, of a bowl of ice cream.
And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey.  

Grandma sings us a song, we will all sing along. 
We will help with the chores every day. 
Try to be lazy, you’ll drive poor mom crazy. 
And then all of her hair will be gray. 

Home, home on the hill,
Where children and grandchildren play
Everyone dreams, of a bowl of ice cream.
And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey.

Oh, give me a place, with heavenly grace
And the Sabbath day we will observe. 
We’ll pray with much love, to our Father above
Our neighbors and loved ones we’ll serve.

Home, home on the hill,
Where children and grandchildren play
Everyone dreams, of a bowl of ice cream.


And, Grandpa’s hair will never go grey.


We had a Wild, Wild West day.  The kids had fun with stick horses, and dressing up western!










Joanna loved her horsey. 




These girls may look sweet, but, they pretended to be sheriffs and arrested people! 



Sheriff Leah!



Kyle enjoyed his horse too!!




Even some big people got in the fun!!








Of course Rachel had a purple outfit. 





Yummy food.  The girls loved the little picnic table. 




Evan was a trooper!



Taking a break along the River Trail. 




Spencer is taller than me, and he built a tower taller than himself. 


Callan was happy laying in the warm sand.  




Yummy food



The older kids had fun playing Fooz Ball in the garage. 



Peek-A-Boo little Elf

Daniel loves Cheetos

Thomas was the first one to loose a tooth at our reunion.  We had two visits from the tooth fairy!!



Sometimes getting dressed was a challenge.  Little Daniel learned the hard way, two legs don't go in the same pant leg.  




Kyle had fun horseback riding, I loved his YeeHaw!! 


Kyle also enjoyed trampoline bunging jumping. 




Leah horseback riding

Joanna Horseback riding.






The sunrise from our deck on our last morning. 

More beautiful rocks to see on the way home. 


We certainly enjoyed being with our family and spending time in Heavenly Father's creations.  We felt really blessed that everyone arrived safely there and back home.  Our trip home, however, was not without incident.  Somewhere in the middle of the hot desert between Las Vegas and Baker we heard a noise and thought we had run over something.  A little while later, the tire pressure warning light lit up.  We stopped and one tire looked a little low.  We decide to continue on, and heard another noise and it felt like we had a flat tire.  We stopped again, the tire was still low, but not flat.  We continued on to Baker to put more air in the tire and have it checked out.  We were shocked to find out that a big chunk had come off our tire.  Steel and thread was exposed.  This could have easily been a tire that blew and we could have been in a very serious accident.  We were able to get a new tire and continue on our way.  So, grateful for Heavenly Father's watchful care over our family.  


A big chunk out of our tire. 




We felt like our family reunion was a success.  It was fun to watch the cousins interact with each other.  And, to see our children happy to spend time together again.  We are all spread out over the West know, so it's hard to get together.  We look forward to another reunion in two years.  


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