Arches

Okay, I thought I'd better show some pictures of our Sweeney Reunion to Arches. We had the best time! It was super windy, but still beautiful! The kids had a blast rock scrambling! Although it scared the parents and grandparents a little! Even Grandpa got up there! Go Grandpa!

Bryson caught a lizard! It was pretty big and bit him right away, but he still hung on till I could get the camera! The kid LOVES reptiles!

I was getting in the car one time and moved something on my seat and there was a lizard! In the car! I screamed so loud the entire campground had to have heard it!
Bryson got it out and kept it as a pet for awhile! It just hung onto his shirt!
We found a fun 4 wheel drive road to jeep out to. It was rough, but fun! Tiff did it in her Tahoe right behind us! She has no fear!
Here we are at the Arch that you have to hike to or we got to drive to with our 4 wheel drive vehicles! It is called Tunnel Arch, and is right over McKay's head!

Balance Rock, one of the coolest things to see! How does it balance?
Here is a slide show of the rest. We had too much fun!

An Adventure!

Wow, we just had an adventure! Bryce and I and my sister Tamara and her husband Brad decided to hike up to Horse Tail Falls. It is up Corner Canyon in Alpine. Well, we worried about the rain, but it had stopped so we decided to do it! It is 2 miles straight up! And, I mean straight up! We made it up in 1 hour and 5 minutes. It is an amazing site!

View from below the falls.
It is called Horse Tail Falls because in one spot the water sprays out just like a horses tail! There was so much water going over that it is hard to tell.
Enjoying the view!
A little better view of the "horse tail" just to the right of Bryce's elbow.

Now, for the adventure part! About 5 minutes after we started down it started raining. We had been jogging slowly, but that changed to an all out sprint! We were headed down very steep, rocky and now wet terrain! We were even joined with a stream running down the path that hadn't been there on the way up! To add to that fun, it was lightening and thundering! We even had a little hail! I had a "windbreaker" on that I thought naively was waterproof. Not so much! I was drenched to the bone! Everyone else had plastic ponchos, but I had thought we had two and we only had one, so since I was already soaked Bryce got it! Oh well, they all ended up pretty wet as well. As we ran water and mud splashed up and all over us! We were screaming when the lightening got close, but I was laughing too! It was fun! We made it down in 30 minutes! It was such a relief to sit in a car, semi safe from the lightening! As soon as we made it down to the car, Alyssa who was at Grandma's called and the first thing she said was, "Are you okay?" It was sweet. They couldn't see the mountains at all from where they were and they were worried! Well, here is our after picture!

Overall a great adventure!

Bear Lake

The day school got out we headed to Bear Lake with Bryce's family. We were able to bring the boat and had a blast! We had to leave a few days early to head to my families reunion in Arches National Park. Busy week! It is a shame all the vacations were lumped together in the first week of summer, but if couldn't be helped. I am sure we will manage a few weekend trips. Anyway, here are some pictures of Bear Lake. I will post about Arches next time!

McKay, Ty and Jake having a blast on the boat!

Bryce water skiing!

Me water skiing for the first time since I was a teenager! It took a few tries but I did it!
Beautiful scenery!
Libby saw me taking scenery pictures and said, "Smile, Smile". Which meant take my picture! What a cutie!

Fun with the tube. Dallin and Bryson
Audrey and Alyssa
Blake, Jake and McKay
Bryce and Blake learned how to "rip stick" while we were there! They still need practice!
Miniature Golfing- Ty and Alyssa. Look closely and you will see a red ball stuck in the teeth of the todem pole!
Nice Shot Alyssa!

Libby had fun climbing everywhere!
What a sweetie!
We had a great time! Thanks Mom and Dad Owen!

New Addition!

We got a boat! It was a deal we couldn't pass up, and thought it would be good for the family so we did it!
We took it out for the first time on Saturday. The kids loved it! Even Libby had a blast!

The kids were brave and jumped in!

Bryce even tried knee boarding and wake boarding! That meant I had to drive! Scary!

Libby got her feet wet and then wanted to be bundled up! Grandma Owen held her!
We are taking it to Bear Lake with Bryce's family this weekend. Brrrrrrrr, but hopefully we have fun!

Happenings

I have a few things to catch up on! First of all my baby is 2! I can't believe it! She is so much fun and is a little chatter box! We all love her so much!(ie. She is SPOILED!) She can get any of her siblings to do whatever she wants! It is great to see her and Bryson together. He is great with her and she chooses him over me sometimes! Here are a couple of pictures from her special day!

She loved opening her gifts! She really got into this year!

She loves shoes as many of you know, so of course we had to have flip flop cakes!


What a lucky girl!

Also, we had a great jeep trip over spring break and I thought I would share some of the pictures! We went with both sets of parents and Bryce's brother Blake's family.

There were amazing caves! Everyone is King of the Hill!

The muscle men moving rocks so we don't scratch my parents truck!

Jake, McKay and Ty
The kids had a blast climbing rocks at every stop!Alyssa "holding up" a cabin!

Bryson caught a lizard on our first stop!

Absolutely stunning views!
Ty posing in front of a mine! There were tons of these all over!

This is the view from our camp spot! We just pulled off the road and set up camp!
Amazing!
Cold, but still a wonderful trip!

Easter

I'm a week late, but here are pictures of my cute kids in their Easter Outfits! It was a little cold, but I still made them go outside for pictures!

They love decorating eggs!

We had a great Egg Hunt on Saturday, but because of the rain it was in a church! Good times!

Libby really got into it! "You actually want me to get as much candy as I want? Okay!"

Ty was a pro!

Bryson got red eyes from looking so hard for eggs!

Libby loves showing us her food! If you ask her what she is eating she instantly opens her mouth and shows you! Yummy egg!

Florida

So we have been home almost 2 weeks, but I thought I would finally sit down and update our blog! Bryce and I went to the Florida Keys for a week! It was amazing and wonderful! We rented a two bedroom apartment right by the beach and a nice park. It was a really nice place to be. The people lived upstairs and let us use their canoe. You walk a block and launch it into an inlet that leads through Mangrove Trees! Gorgeous. It was shallow water and clear, so just like taking a glass bottom boat ride! There were cool fish to see. After awhile we hit the ocean! That scared us a little so we turned around and headed back! The trip was spent exploring beaches and relaxing. We read a ton! I read 3 books and Bryce read 2, which is HIGHLY unusual for Bryce. We were also able to see and do some cool things. We drove up and down the Keys a lot, and the water color is incredible! You have the Gulf on one side and the Atlantic on the other! One day we drove up to the mainland and saw the Everglades! There were a ton of alligators and beautiful birds! The highlight was snorkeling at John Pennekamp State Park. They take you five miles off shore to a reef and drop you off to snorkel for 1 1/2 hours. The only other snorkeling we have done together was in Hanauma Bay in Hawaii. This is so much better. The reef was so close to the surface and alive and swaying to the ocean currents. The fish were so colorful and such a variety! There were a TON of Barracuda! At first we were freaked out that they would attack, but soon realized they weren't. We even saw an eel! That was creepy! Some others in the group saw a nurse shark resting on the ocean floor. I am VERY glad we didn't see that! I would have freaked out! It was just a wonderful time to be together and remember why we fell in love!