The 4th of July

My kids love the 4th of July. Liam loves it because it's an excuse to go buy fireworks and each year we pray he doesn't blow himself up. Chloe and Kate love the parade-in fact, this year the parade was rerouted and it came in front of our house-now that's convenient. Also, some good friends of ours, the Milnes (who were visiting from Chicago) and the Schenks got together for a late breakfast at our house with all of the kids. Tyler brought about 497 breakfast burritos (slight exaggeration)already wrapped in tin foil, ready to eat. Here's a pre-parade shot of everyone.

Just before the parade begins

Here's the new student body for 8th grade: Eli, Casey (cousin) & Connor. They were required to be IN the parade-Eli is showing his excitement...it's hard to miss.

The candy is coming!!!

Here's a video clip of Liam with a Roman Candle style firework-it's pretty cool.

A visit to Camp Browning to see Clayton

We told Clayton we wanted to come visit him at camp and bring him a birthday cake for his 18th birthday (Heather and I are still in shock that we have an 18 year old kid). He's working at Camp Browning this summer here in Utah instead of the usual Holcomb Valley in California like he's done the past 3 summers (it was closed due to a very hard winter). We loaded up all the kids, packed some food to cook for the camp staff and headed on up. When we arrived Clayton told us that he had a cool hike to take us on. This is a picture of him "bouldering" on the hike.

The kids were pretty psyched to go on the hike...except Kate. She wanted me to carry her the whole time-not fun.

Yeah, Clayton decided to "bleach" his hair too-like the nice orangey color??? He tells us now that he tried to get it to go blonde but that didn't work so now he dyed it...black. Okey dokey.

The waterfall at the end of the hike was incredible-it looked like we were in Hawaii.

Clayton and Eli hiked down the middle of the waterfall among the rocks and stuff-We held our breath for a while but they said it looked more dangerous than it really was.

Clayton and Eli really wanted me to take a picture of them "controlling" the waters-it looks pretty cool.

Here's a pic of Kate during a very brief moment off of my shoulders.

Here we are preparing to cook for about 25 people.

Lighting up the birthday cake for Clayton.

Scout Camp at Capitol Reef

Our priest quorum went to Capitol Reef this year for our summer camp. We knew it was going to be a great trip when the first stop we made was IN-N-OUT burger in Lehi. What a cool place the camp was-the quorum loved it. We didn't love the fact it took 7 hours to get there but we soon got over it when we saw the scenery. This pic is of Sulfur Canyon-one of the coolest hikes I've been on. It was approx. 6 miles of shallow river bed with breath taking views of the canyon and cool waterfalls to hike down.

Here's some of the guys: Ryan, Blake, Royce & Kyle

The water felt great even though it was a cloudy day

Here's a waterfall/pool area we found to take a quick shower (that's me in the background under the waterfall)

One of the cool lookout points as we approach Capitol Reef

Look at this cool little dude who liked Braydon's Chuck Taylors

What is he doing you say? We dared Kyle to "lick" a cactus for a dollar. Several people pitched in and Kyle walked away 3 dollars richer and no long-lasting wounds to speak of.

Here's Blake and I. The slots at Peekaboo/Spooky Gulch were incredible

Here are most of the guys from our quorum starting the hike at "Peekaboo Gulch "

All of us made it home in one piece and we were all accounted for-amazing. All of the guys got

along so great and we enjoyed eachother's company so much. At night we would sit around the campfire, play Maffia and sing songs with my guitar after enjoying Matt Adams' amazing Iron Chef cooking-holy cow, that guy can cook some amazing meals. The theme of our camp was "Life is Good" and we had some incredible campfire discussions about what that meant to the boys. I was very impressed by the thoughts that were shared. Travis Herion, who has been a little inactive over the past few years, announced on the last day of camp that he was going on a mission and nothing could stop him. He said that he just felt like that's where he needed to be at this point in his life. He just kept saying over and over: "I'm ready". I remember that same feeling when I decided to go on a mission. We're so excited for him.