Yellowstone

Well, we did it! We took the boys on their first camping trip (for 2 nights even!) and lived to tell about it. We went up to Yellowstone National Park and had a really great time. I was nervous about how they would do, but they loved it! I think we'll have to make camping a new summer family tradition!

On the way up to Yellowstone, we stopped in Rexburg. We moved from there 3 years ago after we graduated from BYUI and haven't been back since. It was great being back and brought back a ton of memories. It kind of stunk though because once we got there we realized that we forgot to bring long pants, and so we couldn't walk around campus (due to the honor code) which we had really been wanting to do. Oh well... we drove around campus a couple times, saw a few huge new apartment complexes that are going up right across the street, let Aidan play at Porter park, and ate lunch at Gator Jack's. Phil even got an alligator rice bowl at lunch. Who would've thought (especially with me being from FL) that we would've both eaten our first alligator in Rexburg, ID?! Pretty crazy. We were only in Rexburg for a couple hours, but it was still really fun and reminiscent being back. Then, back in the car and on to Yellowstone!

Some buffalo right outside our window. No zoom!

Helping Daddy set up the tent.

Asher fell asleep by the warmth of the campfire.

All snuggled up in the morning. We slept with our jackets over our jammies because it got so cold there at night.

Truthfully, we didn't really do many of the "touristy" things at Yellowstone this year. It's just hard when you have young kids and the drive between sites is so long. We did see Old Faithful though, and walked around the boardwalk to see the smaller geysers and hot springs in that area. Then we stopped at a picnic spot and made sandwiches for lunch, and then went back to our campsite and all took a nap. So nice!

At Old Faithful

We tried to get a pic of us all in our hats but the boys weren't having it.

Our campground was right across the street from Yellowstone Lake so then we walked over to have some fun wading in the water.

The view across the street from our campground.

Asher just enjoying being in the Ergo.

This is the closest I've been to a beach in a while.

Aidan digging his feet in the sand. I can't wait til we can take him to a real beach in FL someday.

He was having a blast throwing sand in the water.

That night we relaxed with another campfire and played with glow sticks, which gave us some pretty cool pictures!

The only real downside to the trip was that Aidan got sick on our last night there and threw up a few times. It was the strangest thing, one minute he was running around, laughing, and having the time of his life, and the next minute he's bent over puking. We're not really sure why, we're guessing he got some kind of food poisoning, but luckily none of the rest of us got it.

Though we didn't do or see many of the things that one does or sees at Yellowstone, we still had a great time relaxing and spending family time together. No cell service, no internet... Just me and my guys! That said, I sure am glad to be home now. I can only go so long without hot showers and my comfy bed ;)

A new tradition we're starting where whenever we go camping we find a rock from that area and write the place and year, and we'll keep all our camping rock momentos in a jar in our house.