Clawson Family VACATION!!!!

Day 1~ Driving to Utah.. see that beautiful Sunset?? It took us 10 hours to get to Mapleton, UT (including all our stops) We stopped in Las Vegas for Breakfast, The children saw people in the casinos, and it was a good teaching moment. They noticed how people were glued to slot machines.. "wasting their money"... We stopped only twice to get to Utah.. both times for gas and breakfast. The children were so excited that they did not go to sleep in the car when we woke them up at 4 30 am.

When we finally got there, I hurried and changed clothes and washed up a bit. I had a girls night out with some girlfriends.. We went to get pedicures and shopped a bit at the University Mall in Provo. We ate dinner at Los Hermanos...(Utahans don''t know how to make real mexican food!) We stayed in the restaurant chatted and laughed and cried..until they were about ready to kick us out at 11 pm! We then went to a lobby with couches and continued to chat, until a man walked by and said want some free ice cream? of course we all wanted free ice- cream! It was next door to the restaurant that we ate at. They were just opening for the first time and were giving free samples of their Italian ice cream- which I've got to say was delicious! I think we girls needed a girls night out. My first one since we moved to Southern CA. Here we are... all smiles in the garage parking lot. I forgot my camera but we had lots of fun! Jennifer in the middle and Katrina on the right...

Here's a cute picture of Emma with Joy, a cockatoo bird. April has 2 of them, it brought back so many memories of our family birds when I was growing up... I got Joy out almost everyday that I was at their house. I asked Andrew if I could bring Joy home, he remarked sarcastically " what for? so tigger can eat it?" sigh....

Day 2~ Sunday, We went to the Provo Deaf ward, then we went to Andrew's Grandma's house in SLC and spent all afternoon and evening with her. Different families came to see us.

Here's Luke in Grandma C's backyard having fun...

The kiddos with Great Grandma Clawson. These 3 were the ones she had never met! Now She can say she's met all of her great grandchildren!

Andrew's cousin's kids with our kids

Day 3~ After we left Grandma's house, we called different hotels and just decided to stop at one, in SLC, So we stopped at the Hampton's Inn A few blocks away from Temple Square which is where we spent most of our day.

It was a beautiful day! The weather was in our favor! we had so much fun and enjoyed going to all the sights and museums. I am proud of the kids, because we walked a lot that day....

In front of SLC Temple doors

Emma was getting a bit tired (understandably!)

The view from the top of the Conference Center.. It was mind bogglingly huge! ( I don't know if that's a real word! haha)

After we got tired of walking around Temple Square, we went to Lehi, and stayed with Karen and Sam, they fed us and let us sleep there. It was soo good to see them again. Thanks!


Day 4~ We went to a dinosaur museum I think it's called Xango, at Thanksgiving Point. We splurged a bit for this fun museum.. we spent all day there!! We left for lunch to meet Suzy, Doug and Jr, who was going into the MTC the following day. After lunch, we headed back and watched a 3D movie.. which was awesome but Luke took off his 3D glasses because he was too scared. Andrew and I both got headaches, I think our 3D glasses weren't working exactly right. Plus we were pretty tired. But you can see the children had a ton of fun!

Screaming in front of a dinosaur that they made in the kiddie section in the museum.

Digging for dinosaur bones

The kids made casts of different fossils, they had fun!

At the Old Spaghetti Factory with Suzy, Doug and Doug Jr.

After the museum, we went and stayed with Allen and April,

Day 5~ Andrew went fishing up in the canyons.. so I hung out at the Clawsons house until Suzy and Doug came to pick us up.. they took us to their favorite Mexican restaurant in Springville.. which was really tasty.. Thanks!! Then they took us to Costco to get discount tickets for 7 peaks. They took us to Karen and Sam's house. They put up with us again! Thanks!! Sam set up a movie projector outside and we watched "Night at the Museum", which was fun to watch. Andrew met us there after he was done fishing. It was fun to be with them and watch the children play.

Day 6~ After breakfast at the Smith's we headed out to Provo and went to 7 Peaks, where we spent our day! I slathered all of us in sunscreen and we ended up getting a little bit burned but not bad! We had so much fun there! Andrew and I went on the Freefall water slide, which looked a bit scary, but it was fun! I went airborne!!! Andrew took Luke on a tube ride called the "Cave in" and they flipped over! Andrew bonked his head Luke was underneath the tube, the tube was dragging Luke.. so Andrew somehow stopped in the middle of the ride and got the tube off of Luke who was probably freaking out at the time and let the tube go.. they finished the slide without the tube... they survived!! Andrew still has a bump on his head.. oh well!

We went to Allen and Aprils house after we were done, April had dinner ready for us when we got there. Thanks April! We were tired and hungry... we watched a movie in their theater room with a projector.. ( I want one of these!!)

Day 7~ We left to go camping a few miles away from the Clawsons house, we stayed at the Hobble Creek campgrounds. It was fun, and relaxing.. the kids played and played. Allen and 2 of his boys came by after he finished work and joined us for dinner. Nathan climbed up a very tall tree .. I was amazed at his climbing skills and am not looking forward to when my son starts climbing trees! My heart stopped a few times while watching him climb up and climbing down.

Day 8~ We decided to go home a day early, we were very tired and wanted one day to rest before Andrew started working again. We needed a vacation from our vacation! We packed up and stopped at Allen and April's and took showers, changed clothes and left.. (thanks for putting up with us!)

We met up with Allen and Jared at Cove Fort a historical fort built by some LDS... it was interesting to go and see. The one thing that stood out, was the guide was talking about how they had different irons for different purposes, including a special ruffle iron!!! I couldn't get that out of my head.. a Ruffle Iron!!!! you would think they would have better things to do than iron ruffles!!haha I rarely iron!! thought it was funny.. You can see the irons in the pictures that Emma took.. on the very last one on the right hand side is the ruffle iron, which still boggles my mind!

At Cove Fort

We stopped in Cedar City at an Iceberg.. Their shakes are hugmougous! WOW! We got home at 11:15 pm our time... It was so good to be home again. We found Tigger locked up in Luke's room, We don't know how long he had been stuck in there with no food, water or litter box. He seemed ok.. Anyway.. we had a good time and we rested a lot today, unpacked and did some laundry... Thanks to all who put up with us!