A Summer Trip Out West (Part 3): Yellowstone and the Black Hills

On our way home we stopped and saw Yellowstone and spent some time at the Black Hills in South Dakota.

We drove thru Bear Country:



We saw lots of bears. They would even come up to the front of our car and eat the bugs off of it.


We went to a program at Mt. Rushmore that told of the history of Rushmore and the background of the four presidents that are carved in the mountain. Then they lit it up at night. The kids really enjoyed it.


Before we stopped in the Black Hills we stayed in Yellowstone. We had a great time and saw lots of "cool" things. We saw bison, water falls, a bald eagle and we saw Old Faithful erupt:





Our summer trip out west was a great time. Now we are in the midst of back to school events. The calendar is quickly filling up and the summer days are beginning to fade into the distance!

A Summer Trip Out West (Part 2): Family Reunion

The kids had a great time at the Pollock Family Reunion in southern Utah. They camped outside in tents, sang songs by the campfire, the older kids hiked the Narrows (Lindsey was the winner and hiked the furthest with her dad and Uncle Jarom), the younger kids visited the sand dunes.

There were lots of games of NINJA???:





Horseback riding:



Zip Lining across the meadow (Uncle Jeff was the official ZipLine Guy):




Uncle John was Blake's buddy on this 3 week adventure. They started out a little rough but after Aunt Lisa told Uncle John he wasn't being fun he took Blake to Boondocks, spent three hours with him at Lagoon and was just Blake's pal while his dad was traveling for business:


Lindsey got the award for being Riley's cousin that took really good care of her:


Time was spent together with brothers:


And TJ had a blast for 5 weeks hanging out with his cousins. These three are good guys and they have a blast together:

A Summer Trip Out West (Part 1): Our visit with friends.

We had a great visit to Utah this summer. TJ went to EFY at BYU, Lindsey attended volleyball camp at BYU, we played with cousins, took a trip to Lagoon, Seven Peaks Water Park and saw lots of friends.

We had a great day at Liberty Park in SLC with friends from our Austin years. Most of them have moved to Utah so we had a reunion and the kids had a blast.


Ashley had a great time with friends Olivia and Reese:


Lindsey had fun hanging out with Bailee, Cate and Ava:


Blake found a fellow Star Wars friend in Josh:


I just love these ladies! They are truly the best! (We are missing a few that couldn't be there with us):


Jon had a few guys that took time off from work and joined us at the park:


These two were inseparable when we lived in Austin and they happened to be visiting their grandparents in Mesquite so we got to visit with our favorite people the Hyatts!!



The Cooks hosted us for part of our stay in UT! We had a blast at their house! Always a party at the Cooks!



These boys were buddies the first two years of their lives when their dads played football for BYU. It was so fun to get them together and see how old they are now.


We had a fun time at Lagoon with cousins:


Aunt Lisa and Uncle John have a cool backyard and even hosted a BBQ and swim party for us when we stayed with them: