Seeing Cousins

While we were in Utah, we were able to see some cousins that we hadn't seen in awhile.  That was fun.

Will has a cousin named Greg that he hasn't seen in awhile.  But Greg and Adrianna moved to Utah and we wanted to go visit them.  We had a good long visit.  Will use to be Greg's roommate, so they were able to talk about some old buddies they knew.  They have such a nice family.

Megan got to play with their baby.  Aren't they adorable together?

Will's sister, Emily, and the Guptil family arrived in Utah Sunday evening.  My kids were immediately interested in their cousins.  

It was, miraculously, a nice evening.  So the girls went outside and everyone ran around playing.

It was so fun watching them interact.  I wish we could live closer together so we could hang out as cousins more often.

Getting everyone on the couch.  It was quite a feat.

This picture was messed up with our camera dysfunction.  But it still shows our other cousin we got to see in Utah.  We went over to my sister's house and played games and had dinner.  Baby Tessa watched everyone (and tried really hard to play our games).

Obviously not a cousin, but a funny picture.  Megan loves animals and got a little too close to Erin's cat.  The cat decided that was unacceptable and started to run away as soon as the picture snapped.  Oh well.

Thanks for letting us visit.  We had a great time in Utah.

Temples and Friends

This was definitely Utah.  There are beautiful temples everywhere.  We were fortunate enough to get tickets to take everyone to the Payson Utah temple open house.  I was really excited that my girls would be able to see inside a temple.

 

Obviously, you cannot take pictures inside the temple.  But here we are after watching the little intro movie, making our way to the beautiful temple.  Megan loved the 'water' in the baptismal font and said "water" over and over for the rest of the tour.  Whitney remembers that there are more stairs inside the temple than pictures of Jesus.  Hmm...maybe we will have to try to take another tour when they are a little older.

There was a 'visitors center' tent set up outside the temple.  We are watching a video of when temples started dotting the earth.

Here is our family sitting in front of the temple.  It was beautiful outside.

The next day we were able to go into Salt Lake and spend some time with my high school friend, Micah, and her family.  They just moved to Utah a couple of months ago.  We haven't seen each other in awhile, so that was fun.  The kids liked looking at the reflection of the temple in the pool.

We went to a Disney store that is in the mall in Salt Lake.  There was a castle for the girls to play princess.  Whitney and Rachel like playing princess, as I am sure all girls do.

Then we spent some time at the park together until it started to rain and we figured we better go home.  Funny story about the park.  Megan had fallen asleep on the way to the park and the other girls had eaten their nutella sandwiches.  So we put Megan in the stroller and I just put the sandwich on her lap while I watched the other girls playing.  Then I saw a couple of dogs and one of them went right up to her and grabbed the sandwich from her lap, while she slept.  We all had a good laugh.  I hope the dog didn't get sick from the nutella.

                                         

I am glad that we had time to see some temples and hang out with friends while we were in Utah.

The Gardens

There are beautiful gardens at Thanksgiving Point.  There are like thirteen themed gardens.  I cannot remember all the names of the gardens, but they were fun to see.  It was a good thing we had Grandma Keeler around to tell us what kind of flowers we were looking at.

We stopped to smell lots of things.  Looks can be deceiving; some of the prettiest flowers and trees had no scent at all.

This was the Waterfall Gardens.  It was obviously man made, but still serene and peaceful.  I enjoy watching waterfalls.

I don't remember what this garden was called.  But the flowers were growing inside a merry-go-round.  Maybe that would solve our poor soil problem.  

Entering into the Secret Garden.  

I don't remember much of the movie, but everyone else said it sort of resembled the garden in the movie.  The girls enjoyed touching the cool water and then making hand prints.

We were able to see some beautiful Japanese lanterns and we saw a really beautiful bird while we were here.

This was my favorite garden, called The Light of The World.  There were amazing statues of Jesus.  Here is one with Jesus as a 'hen gathereth her chicks'.

Megan liked petting the chickens.  Does she know it is a statue, I am not sure.

This was the biggest statue.  It portrayed Jesus walking on the waves of the water "It is I, be not afraid."  It was a really touching piece.  There were quite a few other statues as well portraying different moments of Jesus' life. 

The rose garden smelled the most beautiful.  It also attracted the most bees.  We didn't stay here long because the girls were getting pretty tired after all this walking.

This was the girls favorite spot - viewing the Koi fish.  There were hundreds of brightly colored fish that would swim right at the surface (because people could buy fish food and feed them).  Grandpa Keeler gave each girl some fish food.  It was amazing to watch the fish vie for the most food.  And they were just as beautiful as all the flowers in the garden.

Walking through the gardens reminded me to be grateful for the creation.  All those colors and smells.  It was wonderful.

The Dinosaur Museum

Will's parents bought a pass so we could see all the sites at Thanksgiving Point.  There are several museums and outdoor things that are really fun for kids.  Thanks Grandma and Grandpa Keeler for buying a pass.  We went to the Dinosaur Museum first.  The girls had never been there.

Of course, there were lots of dinosaur statues and dinosaur bones and fossils.  I thought that was pretty neat/ 

And a fish room.  Did you know there was an El Weirdo fish?  I learned a lot.  Megan liked this part too.

And being brave enough to touch the coral reef things.  They weren't real, but it was still fun to see.

Grandma Keeler helps Whitney design a dinosaur.  You could build a dinosaur out of foam blocks.

This water site was well loved by Whitney and Rachel.  The girls learned how excavators do their job.  I think it was about excavators, something like that.  There also was a digging in the dirt spot to uncover "dinosaur bones", but those pictures were messed up when our camera had issues.  Oh well. We still have the memories.

Figuring out which dinosaur piece went into which spot.

 Whitney and Rachel dressed up like a dinosaur and gave their best roaring noises.

And Megan crawling out of a tunnel.  I don't know how this relates to dinosaurs, but come on, it was a tunnel.

So that was a fun museum.  I think the girls got to learn a bit more about dinosaurs.   They were pretty awed by how big some of them were.

Going to Utah

We did so many fun things while in Utah this last week.  But the best part was being able to hang out with family.  We hadn't seen Will's parents in a long time.  I am glad we were able to spend a lot of time with them.  Here are some pictures from around the house.

Grandma Keeler got to read lots of books to the girls.  They all sat and listened to her better than to me.  Oh well.

And there were enough clipboards for each girl to use while coloring.  Here are some pretty pictures. 

Helping Grandma in the garden.  There was a lot of rain, so we had to plant during the dry times of the day.  All the girls got a turn putting a plant into a hole.

They have a fire pit in their backyard.  One night we decided to make s'mores after dinner.  The girls loved watching the fire grow and helping roast marshmallows.  They were delicious.

Grandma Keeler and Whitney made some homemade playdough.  Then we got out some cookie cutters and made some fun things.

This tree in the backyard has a lot of ladybugs.  I probably would have never noticed, but the girls did.  Here they are trying to coax the ladybugs onto their sticks.  Whitney had the most luck with this because she was the most patient.  Maybe it was the ladybugs that were the most patient with them.

There was a big box in the backyard.  It got colored on by three girls and became a house and sometimes a bus.

And these stairs were fun.  There was a basement with all kinds of treasures for three curious girls.  Megan liked following her sisters.  If they were up, so was she.  It was kind of fun watching her try to keep up.

Anyway, those were some fun times at the Keeler house.  Hopefully soon I can put up some pictures from the places we went.