Next stop on our travels was Garland, Utah. We arrived at the Pierce homestead on July 19, 2011 also known as Father's Day/Sterling's birthday. Chris cooked up a Cajun style shrimp boil for the special occasion. There was a huge pile of shrimp, red potatoes and corn on the cob but the 12 of us quickly ate it all up. Poor Chris got some of the hot spice in his eye. It swelled up and took a good two days to look normal again! The sacrifices he makes for his loved ones tummies.
Ethan & Landon aka the Daddy Clones and Double the Trouble!
The next morning we loaded up and made our way to Island Park, Idaho where Natalie had reserved us a homey & cute cabin for our stay. I was so excited to finally make it to Idaho! Over the years we have had so many awesome friends from Idaho. I wanted to get out and take a picture in front of the Welcome to Idaho sign but Chris would not stop. BOO!!! After arriving we unloaded and then set off to do a little fishing. The boys repeatedly went fishing during our stay and much to Chris's dismay were unable to ever catch even one fish.
June 21, 2011 we started off our day at the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center. Here is Chris with all the kiddos. Notice the Weaver kids in pants and sweatshirts? Highs were in the low 70's so we Arizonans though we were freezing up there in Montana. There was still lots of snow on the mountains due to a long winter. We also added Montana to our list of states we have now visited!
Here we are at the West Yellowstone entrance to the park. Chris & I both love the outdoors, camping & hiking so we were super excited to be at Yellowstone for the first time! We were not expecting to get stuck in traffic but all those buffaloes like to cause traffic jams by using the roads as well. That was my only complaint too many people and traffic jams. I was just itching to ditch the kids and go back packing in the back country. I would love to just leave civilization behind for a few months and get lost in the wilderness.
Landon spent most of his time being packed around by Chris and the small miracle was that he LOVED it!!! I was pretty worried about him because so many of the hikes are on wooden walkways with boiling water & mud and fragile rock formations and such. He is gnawing on the rope handle something he seemed to enjoy throughout the park as well.
Yep, Landon on these walkways would not have been a good idea!
Yellowstone was fascinating and beautiful! I loved reading in the brochures about the history, geological forces and scientific explanations behind everything. I wish I had read some books about it beforehand.
Left to right: Natalie, Ethan, Marcus, Preston, Isaac and Sterling
Ashlyn is not an active child and was soon complaining she could not walk anymore so her Daddy pushed her around in a stroller even though she is close to 6 years old. Her Daddy is guilty of babying her a little too much!
Me and the kiddos in front of the Old Faithful geyser. We got pretty lucky and only waited about 25 minutes before she blew. The average interval between eruptions is 90 minutes.
The Prismatic Pool.
The kids wanted a picture of the sign with the warning about bears. We didn't see any bears on this hike but we did find bear fur.
I think this one was the Sapphire Pool.
Nat and Ethan admiring the view. Isn't Nat a cute pregnant lady?! After four boys and a surprise pregnancy the Pierce family is finally getting a Princess at their house! Chris painted her room pink while we were there. Ashlyn was green with envy and had a little meltdown...why is everyone getting a girl baby but us? Once again I had to play the but they don't have any girls at their house card.
Boys being boys...throwing rocks into the river. ( By the way that is steam not smoke that you see in many of the photos).
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