Yellowstone With the Theurer's

This last weekend we had our annual Theurer vacation (since we lived in SF for the last three years this is the first one I have ever been able to go on). We rented two amazing cabins just outside Yellowstone and had a really great fun filled weekend.



We started out our trip with a 5 mile hike to the Lone Star Geyser. All the kids did so great! I am not even joking, Jaxson RAN at least 2.5 of the 5 miles.



The rest of the time he either rode in his cousins stroller, or we carried our little tank.




When he finally got tired of running it was like he hit a brick wall. He suddenly stopped and looked up at Danny and said, "Daddy,...shoulders". That was the first time I have EVER seen Jax run out of energy.




When we got to the geyser, it was about an hour until it went off again, so we went on walk to the stream to throw rocks in...



...and Jax wanted to get in to cool off after the long hike.

Lone Star Geyser

My superman.

Grandpa, Ellie, Grandma, and Luke.

All the kids that survived the hike.

When we got back to the car, Jaxson fell asleep before we even left the parking lot. He was one tired kid!

After the long hike we stopped in West Yellowstone to do some shopping, get ice-cream and pizza, then we headed back to the cabin to hang out.

Jax and Emily are a month apart and so much fun playing together.

Playing at the cabin

The next morning we woke up early and headed back to West Yellowstone to buy fishing licenses. While Danny was buying them, we went to the museum. They had these cool bison that were pained really neat.

Jaxson had fun finding all the bears on them.

They also had real pioneer wagons to look at.

Then we headed into the park. We stopped at Yellowstone Lake, it is SO beautiful!

We had a fast crazy lunch, filled with just about every kid having a meltdown.

Then continued down the road headed to go fishing. It was really fun searching for animals along the way. We saw lots of elk, white tail deer, bison, and even a bald eagle!

Luckily the bison herds were still in the valley and we were able to see them before they went up over the mountain.

He would get really excited when we came across bison.

There was a road closure that turned what should have been a 20 minute drive into a 3 hour drive. But Jax found lots of ways to stay entertained. Jax has pretty good rhythm if I do say so.

But we did stop for an ice-cream break to keep every one's spirits up.



We finally made it to our fishing spot and it was fun learning how to fly fish. This was the best way to fish with a 2 yr old.

My fly fisherman.

Sunday morning we woke up and went to Big Springs to feed the big fish. The water was so amazingly clear. I haven't ever seen water that clear.

The little cabin behind us was actually a little playhouse. How cute is that?!

It was sprinkling a little so Danny taught Jax how to catch the raindrops.

Then we headed to Mesa Falls. It was a little rainy, then humid from the waterfall. It made the air so refreshing. I loved it!

William, Jaxson, and Ellie

Click on this picture so you can see Jaxson's face. This is the face he makes when he hears or sees something cool (like the garbage man, airplanes, tractors...). It is so funny to me.

Jaxson LOVES "wa-fa's"

We had such a fun weekend. We can't wait until the next Theurer trip!

Cousins

My brother Matt, his wife Shari, and their sweet little girl Brooklyn just moved to New York yesterday. :( Matt is going to be coaching a swim team in Rochester and going to school to get his MBA for the next 3 years. I was just looking through pictures of the summer and found these of a day I babysat little Brooklyn. Man-o-man are we going to miss them!

Jax and Brooklyn with their blue suckers.

Blue tongues.

Jaxson loves Brooklyn so much, he asks to go to her house every day. I don't think he realizes that they moved, even though we try to explain it to him.

Good luck you guys! We will miss you so much and can't wait to come visit! Hopefully the next 3 years goes by as quickly as the last 3 years did!

Provo River

I just found some pictures of things I forgot to blog about. A few weeks back, Chris and Melisa VanLeeuwen invited us to float the Provo River with them. We bought a raft and were really excited!

If you have ever thought about doing this yourself (floating the river) here are some tips.
*DON'T take your 22 month old. It's too dangerous.
*DON'T go when it is raining.
*DO bring paddles.
*DON'T tie all of your groups tubes/rafts together, you will have no control of where you go.
*Be prepared to get smashed into rocks, bridges, and trees if you don't listen to the advice above.

We ended up getting out of the water after floating about 1/10 of the river after almost capsizing with Jaxson on board. We'll just chalk that one up to an adventure.

Dinosaur Museum

Today was $2 Tuesday at the Thanksgiving Point Dinosaur Museum and I thought it would be a great idea to take Jaxson. Great idea was the exact opposite of what it was. It was so crowded that the whole place was packed wall to wall with people, it was about 100 degrees inside, and since there were so many people I didn't feel comfortable putting Jaxson down.


My younger sister, Lacey, is a nanny and she brought the little boy she takes care of, Marcus. He is autistic so he didn't do too well in the crowds either.



Pretty much, we walked through as fast as we could only stopping when Jaxson got too heavy to carry. It would have been pretty cool, but we are just going to have to go again on another day.

Note to self: Free Day+Utah=Bad News

Galloway Reunion

On Sunday we were able to spend some time with Grandma Carol's family, the Galloway's. They were all in town from mostly Idaho. On Sunday morning most of the family attended The Spoken Word at the conference center then we all went on a tour of the Conference Center.



Grandpa and Grandma Theurer


The temple looked really pretty from the roof. It was cool being just as high up as the spires.



If you have ever been on the roof of the Conference Center then you know that there is water and fountains all over the place. It was nearly impossible to keep Jaxson out of all of them.



Maybe he was just hot...


but somehow we managed to end our tour with only wet socks and a wet shirt. I think that's pretty good considering how many times he tried to jump in face first.

It was fun meeting more our extended family. They are all great people and we hope to get to know them even better over the years.

This was so funny. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir was practicing while we were on our tour and Jax was trying to lead them. We didn't get the camera out in time to really catch him doing it. But the first of this video he is doing it really well. He even holds the high note and drops his hands at the right time. It was so cute!