Trip to Utah

We took a trip to Utah and Idaho to visit with both Brady and my parents, plus both of Brady's Grandparents. We took Allana to Especially For Youth at BYU and while she was gone for the week we went sightseeing around the Salt Lake area. Places that we have wanted to go but never seemed to have time in the past. We were also able to visit with family and friends. I tried to take as many pictures as I could but seemed to forget to pull out the camera at times. SO...there are lots of pics but not pics of EVERYTHING.

Here we are with PapaShaw (Grandpa Burtenshaw) and Grandma Bonnie. They were super nice and let us stay with them for the night.

Here we are at This is the Place Park. If you haven't been lately and are in the SLC area, I would totally suggest taking a day for a visit. We had so much fun there and the kids just went from one exciting thing to the next.

Learning how to plow a field. We thought it was a beautiful day, Janessa even wore a light jacket for some of the day but we kept hearing from locals and the people working that it was the hottest day. I guess that is what we get for living in Phoenix, everyone elses "hot day" is our beautiful day :)

Panning for gold. They actually have a bunch of Iron Pyrite in the stream for the kids to find.

Robert pulling the handcart. This wasn't really part of the activities, we kinda did our own thing here. But now we know, if we need to, Robert can pull Janessa and Briella across the plains in a handcart (or maybe just across the yard).

On another day we went to the Gateway Children's Museum. We hadn't gone in a few years. Briella had a blast but Robert and Janessa weren't too thrilled. I guess I forgot that it was geared for the "under 8 years" set. The older ones did find a few things to keep them entertained.


We also went to the I-max, which made Robert and Janessa satisfied. The whole day wasn't just for Briella after all!

Here we are with Brady's parents, Bill and Bonita. They were nice enough to let us stay the week with them at their place. We took a little drive up Ogden canyon and found a fun little park for the kids to run around.

One of our days there we were able to hook up with our Sister in law, Lindsay and her boys while they were also in town. Brady's brother Logan wasn't able to come but the kids had a great time with their cousins.

We went to the Dinosaur park in Ogden. This is Briella and her cousin Benjamin. They are only a couple of months apart and are great buddies.

The lighting wasn't too great with this picture but I loved it anyway.

Here is Benjamin, Gabriel and Robert being silly.

We split up the kids in the two different cars and drove to Logan to see Grandma Ruth Skidmore. This is Allana, Grandma Ruth, Brady, Benjamin, Robert, Gabriel and Me.

We then went on to Idaho to visit with my parents. I have so many pics from then, I will just put them on their own post. So after Idaho we went back through Salt Lake and took a day to see Temple Square.

Salt Lake City temple

We made sure that each kid got to "touch the temple" just like the prophet said.

So after a whole day of walking, some of us just got tuckered out. At least she looks cute tired :)

Then, on the way back home we stopped in Manti to see the pageant. We stayed the night and had the famous BBQ Turkey at the tabernacle.

Manti temple

Here we are waiting for the pageant to start. Briella isn't asleep, even though she looks like it. They were all wiggly worms the entire time! We did get front row seats though. It was a pretty cool pageant with fire and everything.

After that, and a handful of hours in the car we were home for another couple of weeks. Until the next vacation...