Eubanks Visit Part 2

We got to our KOA site and waited for Gma and Gpa to show up ...and Uncle Andrew. 

That night we all sort of hung out and just enjoyed being toether. We ate nummy spaghetti...(apparently this is what people make when you have a lot of mouths to feed.)  I can't remember if we tried to play a game that night....

I think we were more focused on Smores.  Macey's sells these Campfire marshmellows that are 4 times the size of a regular mallow.  Most people decided after using them on their smores that they were too big...and messy...but I think that is the epitome of  smores eh? I like the extra gooey...mmm mmmm good.

Then the fun began.
The strangest thing happened with this group.  No one really had an agenda.  Meaning...everyone was cordial and didn't really care how things went.  They just enjoyed themselves and went with the flow.  We were discussing what time to get going for the first morning.  The decision: Dawn.  So we did it. We were up and going by 5. (I got up with Emmaus at 4 to make sure he was fed and changed and ready to go by the time everyone else was.)

We were going to do the upper loop first...to avoid Old Faithful until the 2nd day.  But the road to Norris was closed until 8...so south it was. It was really foggy still...kind of fun for pics..

We stopped at some geyers...

Derrick spotted some animals...he's really good at that...Saw a Bald Eagle.

..they saw some Bison and Coyote...we didn't see the coyote..but saw their pic of it.  We were just in time for OF...only had to wait a few minutes.  I don't think I actually saw OF with my naked eye cause I was so busy taking pics of it.  Typical.

We ate cereal on some picnic benches and headed off to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone Falls. Passing Lake Yellowstone first.

Lake Yellowstone is also quite a site. Being that we left so early, jake took a snooze in the car and missed the whole lake. I'm trying to remember what else we saw that day...

We weren't quite sure which direction to go, so we hiked towards the falls. It was pretty, and sooo big. and deep.  I didn't expect to see something like that in the Park.But first we were stopped by a herd of Buffalo. We got quite the show. Including 2 Bison that rammed eachother, charging and nearly colliding with an RV.  Fortunately they stopped shy of hitting anything. It was quite intimidating. We were only a few cars away from the action.It's not everyday that you have an aminal THIS size crossing the street in front of your car!

And then there was the waterfall:

(the umbrellas aren't from the falls, it startedd raining.)

OH YEAH: after the waterfall we were about to drive out of the parking lot, when I saw people congregating towards something called Artists Point.  I wanted to run down real quick, so the 2 cars parked again  and Jeannine and I ran over there to see what the view was like. It was beautiful.  It was the same waterfall we had hiked towards, but it had the view of the river coming out of it.  SOOO worth it.

and sooo croweded, but the pics were fantastic.  Yea for having the freedom to stop and not be in such a hurry that you can't.  That's one of my pet peeves on road trips.  When you are driving and you see something you'd like to check out or stop to take a pic, but you are in too big a hurry to look at it.  It happens too often...I think for our future trips, i want to add 2 hours onto our travel time for those kind of things.  It makes the journey as much fun as the destination..isn't that an important part of life? 

We hit a bit of construction..(can you believe it...construction in yellowstone..wow, you can never get away from it.)  on our way back to the KOA. We were all wasted from getting up so early. We tried to stop at a few turn offs, but either the signs weren't clear...or we missed it cause of the construction. 

(Mule deer.)

We got back for dinner. Jake and I were heating the wings on the campfire..it was slow going...and we wound up microwaving part of them for speed purposes.  Again an amazing day. Ended with birthday cupcakes...hostess style.

Eubanks Visit Part 1

Jake's sister and family drove out from Indiana to visit us here in Salt Lake.  We had a great visit.  I love it when you can not see someone for such a long time, and then when you get together, it's as if no time has passed. 

Family is awesome.

Jake fixed spaghetti for dinner and it was fun to have Emmaus sitting at the table with everyone.  It's funny how you don't realize things you need until...you need them, like short plastic cups for 3-5 year olds to drink out of.  The girls did just fine with our glass glasses, but ....We should probably get some plastic cups in the future, just to have on hand/for when Emmaus starts drinking from a cup.

Jake really wanted the girls to help pick some veggies from his garden to take up with us to Yellowstone.  So before we left for our hike, he took them out and let them pick some cucumbers and squash.  Sage grabbed at a squash and the whole root system came out. 

I wanted to show them what we do for fun around here...we only had one day so we went hiking.  We had planned on going up Little Cottonwood to Secret Lake, but as we were driving I got nervous and second guessed myself as to which canyon was Big/Little, so we turned up the first one...which in reality is Big Cottonwood. 

It worked out...we hiked up to Twin Lake near Brighton ski resort.  It was rocky and steep and hard, but we got to the top!  The younger girls were troopers...rather we all were...but they have much shorter legs than the rest of us.  Well done Eubanks.  Come to think of it, I don't think I remember Alyssa complaining at all either.   That says a lot for a teenager. 

This is at silver lake...you start here, then take the trail up.

Just about 3/4 of the  way up we changed Emmaus' diaper and decided to take him out of the hiking backpack.  I carried him for a ways...and he was sooo tired..he fell right to sleep on my shoulder.  It was hot and I was tired...but we made it up too...Jake kept asking if I wanted him to carry Emmaus, but I held out....until just about to the top..then I gave him back to Jake.  It was nice to see some water.  I don't like hiking just to hike, I like to hike to a point, some kind of designation and feel good about reaching that goal, then going down hill the whole way to the bottom.

I wasn't the only one who picked up some extra weight.I got a telephoto lens from a GREAT friend of mine...it was fun taking pics with it on the hike.  it's easier to get candids when you aren't right in people's faces.

We headed back to the house for some naps and baths.  I dropped Emmaus off with Grandma and the rest of us headed downtown for some Greek Souvlaki and Jake's Play!  I think anyone and everyone that comes to visit gets Greek.  It's just one of those staples that I think everyone needs.  So we ate nummy food, and dropped Jake at the theater. Then we walked up to Temple Square to give the Eubanks a visual...a short visual...we were running short on time.  We literally had less than 5 minutes to take a pic of them in front of the Temple then booked it back to the theater...JUST in time for the show to start. We got front row seats...it was a great audience, and I'd say the best show they've put on so for for HMS Pinafore.  

Jake and I hadn't packed for our Yellowstone trip, and jake agreed to bake the chicken wings we were bringing for one of our meals...so we stayed up and played a couple of games...monopoly card game and a scrabble card game....then I had to crash.  Jake stayed up till almost 2am getting the chicken cooked..He is...as I like to say, Amazing.  We woke up fairly early to get packed and loaded into our respective vehicles.  We didn't get ON the road to Yellowstone till 10am due to an explosive diaper, feeding time and a quick grocery stop. 

6 month shots.

TROOPER.

So I think it was more painful for the parents this time.

The doctors office took 30 minutes to get us into the room...weighed in, measured...then the chatty doctor took another 40 minutes to get into the room to look at Emmaus..who he said looked wonderful..a little thin but....so are his parents.

Plus we'll be starting him on solids this month, so that should help him get more meat on his bones, but the kid is so active, it's hard to keep him in one place.  Changing his diaper has become a crazy ordeal...currently we're using one of his bulb syringe to keep him happy, so far it's working (thanks andrea for the advice.)

So he weighed in at 16.8 (birth weight was 7.15)
length 27.5 (at birth 21)

he cried when the shots were happening, but by the time they had the bandaid on he was fine.  He was asleep by the time Jake dropped me off at work. 

What can I saw he's amazing...then again, I think I've said that before...once or twice.

I was looking at the pics from my last post and the kid already looks tons older than that. I need to take some more pics...guess it's a good thing jakes family is coming into town/our trip to yellowstone. More pics next week.

as always, thanks for reading.

(note: emmaus isn't just crawling now, he's crawling over things. He has such a grip..I introduced him to stairs the other day...he was very intersted, but not quite ready to tackle that obsticle yet.)

what's emmaus up to?

I have pics, but not exactly the time to load them up.

Emmaus will officially be 6 months old in 11 days.

He is already:

Sitting up (still falls over, but he's sturdy"

Crawling...(not completely on all 4's more of a worm crawl.)

Crawling over things...like this morning when he finished eating he decided he wanted to crawl over me.

Jumping (we bought a doorway bouncer thing..he loves it...such a cute giggle he gets.)

Eating (we haven't officially started solids yet, but monday we were out with a friend and jake offered emmaus his pickle spear....emmaus had about 1/2 of it eaten by the time jake got bored of holding it. We are planning on really starting when we get back from yellowstone mid august.)

Hair growing....it's still fuzzy, but it's filling in and getting longer and redder
Talking...nothing really clear or distinguishable really, but....he's getting the hang of it.
Singing...specially in the morning, and in the car.

Sleeping..(we put him down between 7-8:30 and then he sleeps till anywhere from 6-9am)

Teething...(we can see at least 2 teeth on the bottom coming in ..i think one or 2 on the top too.  He's dealing with it well. If he's fussy I bought some teething things...supposed to be homeopathic...they seem to do the trick.)
Being all around the best baby ever...(sorry for the prejudice.)
Grabbing his feet (for awhile now...not in the mouth yet, at least I haven't seen it...I think Jake has.)
Spitting...Raspberries
Clicking (my vickie mom taught him on her recent visit.)

I could go on.....but i'll leave it at that for now.

tootsie pop wrappers

Do you still look for the star on the wrapper?...You know that ones that "used to give you a free sucker?" I do.  Maybe that is where I found my love for stars....then again maybe not.

This is a cry out for comments.

If you are reading this, could you please comment, just so I know people are reading this...I don't always blog for others, sometimes I just do it for myself, but I am curious who is reading this. Please and thanks.