Vacation and Firsts

We returned home from our week long vacation to Wyoming at 2:30 am on Sunday. It was a lot of great fun and full of several "firsts". I will TRY to share our experience without making this extremely long, but there are no promises. haha So here goes:

We arrived at Mom and Dad's early Friday evening and before long, we were already out the door with Dad and Kevin so that we could go caving with the branch's youth. Mom was so gracious as to watch Koen for us.

Though you can't tell by the photos, it was pitch black inside without our lights. There were a few spots where you had to crawl on your belly or squeeze through tight places in order to get though. We really enjoyed ourselves and had a blast.

Saturday was a busy day full of great events and fun celebration. We had a bbq to celebrate Kevin's high school graduation. Many people from their branch came too.

People just loved Koen. One lady was nice enough to let him chew and slobber on her finger.

Kevin entertained us all with his guitar and Koen loved it.

Sunday, (yes Sunday... weird) Kevin graduated from high school. It was the smallest high school graduation I've ever attended, I believe there were 37 in his graduating class. We were lucky enough to sit right behind the graduates, giving us a great view of the speakers. Kevin sang a song as part of the program too. Way to go Kevin!

On Monday, we went on a drive with Mom, Dad, Grandpa and Joyce up in the mountains to see if we could find any animals and just to enjoy the beautiful mountains. It truly was beautiful. We got to see a couple of moose that day. By the end of our vacation, we came across 16 moose!!!

We found some beautiful waterfalls along the way too.

On Tuesday, we left early in the morning with Mom and Dad to see Mt. Rushmore. This was not only Koen's first time to see Mt. Rushmore, but he also had his first nibbles of ice cream here.

We also went to Bear Country USA, which isn't very far from Mt. Rushmore. We saw several different animals. My personal favorite were the bear cubs.

We drove past Devil's Tower on our way back.

Wednesday we went 4-wheeling. It was also Koen's first time and I think he enjoyed it. He actually slept most of the time.

Thursday was Kevin's birthday. We went on a hike in the afternoon. (Another first for Koen.)

Koen really loved it but was exhausted by the end.

We played a game where you had to cut through flour that had a quarter on top.

If the flour collapsed after your turn, you had to pick the quarter up with your mouth.

Friday was our last full day at Mom and Dad's. We decided to do more 4-wheeling and cook up some delicious "Goojum" (I don't know if that's how one would spell it. But it is Dad's name for mixing a bunch of left overs together.) We had an awesome time.

Friday was also a day of a very big "First" for Koen. His very first tooth came through!!! Koen did extremely well too. We probably never would have known he was teething had we not seen or felt his tooth because he wasn't ever extra fussy or acting out of the norm. Way to go Koen!

Another first on Friday was Jon's. He shot his first animal. In Wyoming, anyone can shoot rock chucks, and thats what Jon got. Jon felt pretty proud of himself for getting it. But for the sake of others, I am not posting a picture.

Here's a few other photos from our time at Mom and Dad's:

We left early Saturday morning to go home. But we decided to spend most of our day in Yellowstone on our way back. We saw a total of 4 moose that day and a grand total of 7 bears in the park! Unfortunately, I couldn't get a picture of one of them, which was a tiny bear cub that had just ran back into the woods as I was coming. But it was neat to still see. The coolest one was the grizzly that I spotted on my own that had also crossed right in front of us. (Oh yeah, this was also Koen's first Yellowstone trip.)