I stayed behind with Luke, William and Sherean. Hiking and backpacking overnight don't really jive with being this pregnant.
Once the troops were out the door and on their way, Sherean and I loaded up the kids and headed to the store.
We bought some swimming stuff, some snacks, and I bought our baby girl in utero her first few outfits! They are absolutely adorable and made me really, really excited to meet her.
Then, we headed off to a swimming pool.
There are not words to even describe how much fun Luke and William had there. It was awesome!
They went nuts in the splash park section. They ran all over the place, laughed their heads off and had a blast.
Then we went over to the pool where they jumped in and out of the water over, and over, and over, and over again. I couldn't get pictures of Luke in the pool, because I was too busy catching him and chasing him.
I did get a few pictures of William trying to swim.
When the pool closed, we walked next door to a park, to let them continue to play. Unfortunately, Luke pooped, and he was in a swim diaper, so it ran down both of his legs and into his shoes.
After a fast bath in the sink of a park bathroom, we wrapped him up in a towel and headed back to the house. The kids were tired by this point anyway, and so were the adults, so we called it a day.
We ate dinner, rested and played a while longer until bed time.
The next day was pretty low key for those of us at the house. My pregnant body was feeling the aches and pains of such a huge week and so much running around. I was beat! The kids were also tired and content to just rest and play with toys or watch shows. Luke began struggling from the long trip, so it was kind of a long day of trying to keep him happy.
The backpackers, on the other hand, were doing a big hike back down the mountain, fishing, and driving back.
They did a pretty hard hike the day before up to the camp, but according to Ben, Mary and Sam did it, and learned a lot along the way. They fished for their first time, and Sam caught one!
They played in the lake, ate yummy food, snuggled in the tent together, played with cousins, and made some really good memories.
They came back completely filthy, exhausted, and with grins on their faces. I am so glad they got to have this experience, and we have plans of lots of backpacking trips for our family in the future.
Within minutes of them arriving at the house, we rushed to get them all changed and somewhat clean, and blasted out the door to meet up with Tosh, Ben's best childhood friend, who was waiting to see us at a restaurant about an hour away.
We ate at a pizza place and talked with Tosh and his family. Mary and Sam were exhausted, and Luke and William were restless, so it was a bit of a juggle, but it was worth it. It was really neat to see Ben with such a close friend, and to watch them recall childhood memories and experiences.
After meeting with Tosh and his family, Ben drove us around his neighborhood where he grew up. We saw his old house, his school, the hills he caught lizards in, and a few other things. We grabbed some ice cream on the way out, and then headed back to the house.
We got back to the house really late, so we just crashed.
The next morning we got up, packed and started saying our goodbyes. It broke my heart to see the sad looks on my kids' faces as they said goodbye to their cousins, and to such a fun trip.
A few things happened to delay us getting out in good time, so ended up leaving pretty late. We finally arrived home in Heber at 2:30 this morning.
We had a wonderful trip, had great experiences and made unforgettable memories.
We plan on doing this trip every summer, and are already anxious to go back next year.
California or bust!
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