Daren and Dawsen Came to Visit!

This past week has definitely been our best week of the summer so far! Landon's dad--Daren and brother--Dawsen drove all the way from Texas to spend some time with us. We have had SO much fun and are so sad that they have to go back tomorrow. We definitely lived it up while they were here though! If you can read it through this whole post, you are my hero (sorry its going to be a long one!!!!)

They got into Provo late Friday night and we basically set up their beds and went to bed. We woke up Saturday morning and got all ready for our big camping excursion! Dawsen had never been camping before this, so I have been stressing for weeks trying to make this the best experience possible for him! After running around trying to get everything we needed, we met up with Daren's brothers and their families and went to the canyon and had pizza. Mmm! Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of this event...Dang!

Sunday morning we got the car all packed up and headed up to our campground, Timponeeke (pronounced Timpa-noo-key...I still have a hard time saying it right!!) We had a GREAT site right next to a little creek. Dawsen was basically in HEAVEN--he played in the creek for an hour or so while Daren and Landon set up the tents :) After setting up camp we decided to do a little "hike" and went to Cascade Springs. After that we made a camp fire (Dawsen's first one!) and roasted some hot dogs and marshmallows! It was so much fun seeing how excited Dawsen was for his first REAL s'more! After all that excitement we played some Killer Bunnies of course! :)





Monday was the big day! WE HIKED MT. TIMPANOGOS!!!! Get ready for a really long story.... I'm really glad I had NO idea what I was getting myself into, because if I would have known beforehand how hard it was going to be, I probably wouldn't have been so willing to do it! Looking back now I know we're all REALLY glad we did it...but let's just say it wasn't the most pleasant of experiences. We were supposed to be at the trail head at 8 in the morning, but we actually didn't make it there until 9. To make matters even worse, we hiked the wrong trail for 45 minutes!!! Setting us back not only on our time, but energy as well! Woops--I do NOT know how to read maps so they shouldn't have trusted me :) oh well. So we finally get on the REAL Mt. Timp trail head at 9:45! The hike was absolutely GORGEOUS! There was a stream that basically followed the trail for 2 hours or so, tons of gorgeous waterfalls, wildflowers everywhere that were SO bright and colorful, and such beautiful views! Most of the trail was very steep, so we had to take it pretty slow (stopping at pretty much every stream to drink some water and pour it down our backs!) By the time we actually made it to Emerald Lake (3/4 of the way up) we had been hiking for about 4 hours! This is when the hike started to take a turn for the worst.... After the lake there's a part where you reach the edge of a HUGE cliff and basically have to climb over all of these rocks and you are literally one foot away from the edge!!! Dawsen slipped twice and I honestly have never been so scared in my life. We were basically all really shaken up at this point, but continued the hike across a GLACIER (still pretty much on a cliff by the way) and then proceeded to CRAWL ON OUR HANDS AND KNEES up the steepest hill I have ever seen (still on a CLIFF!!!). I was literally SHAKING. By the time we made it to the Saddle (the peak just below the highest summit of Mt. Timp) we were all about ready to pass out from fear and exhaustion!!! Landon wouldn't even stand up to look at the view because he was scared a gust of wind would come and he'd be a goner (I've never seen him so scared--it was pretty cute actually! haha). We decided there was NO way we would go any further and pretty much scale our way on the edge of a cliff to reach the summit (plus there were some major thunder clouds heading our way). We said a quick prayer on the top of the mountain and headed back across the cliff just in time for the rain to start pouring down. Lets just say the 3 hour hike down the mountain was not too pleasant..... All in all, it was a very fun experience and looking back I'm glad we did it! We were all soaking wet and muddy so we decided to drive back down to Provo and shower before heading back up to our camp--which got SOAKED by rain. It was definitely a LONG night...



Thankfully, Tuesday was a much sunnier day! All of us were SO sore from hiking Timp but we were definitely not done hiking yet! We hiked to see the Timp Caves (my poor legs!!!) The hike is only about a mile and half, but its VERY steep (on top of having sore legs). The cave tour was really great and I loved seeing all the cool formations. Dawsen's favorite part was when the turn off all the lights and you are in complete darkness--kinda freaks me out!! After hiking the caves we went back to our site and took a NAP, made dinner, played some games, and then the dang RAIN came back at about 9 p.m., so we packed up camp in less than 30 minutes (in the dark!!!) and went home a night early!



Wednesday was a catch up day--laundry, cleaning, organizing. We also got to eat out at Red Lobster! mmmm!

Thursday we went to fly Landon's airplane and then spent the day up in SLC. We went to the Great Salt Lake, which actually isn't that great if you ask me! I got stuck in a mud hole and had gnats swarming me the whole time, plus it REEEEEKS! It was cool to see though. We then went and toured the Conference Center which was pretty neat because I had never been on the roof and the little old lady giving us the tour was SOOO cute (I almost adopted her). After the tour we went to the Joseph Smith building and saw the Joseph Smith movie--I literally BAWLED the whole way through! It is such a good movie!!! After that we went and ate dinner at the Italian Village in Murray and had pizza benders (which are SO amazing, its like a Calzone kind of but they are LOADED with cheese and are just amazing). Wheeler Farm is actually really close to the restaurant and we had some time to kill so we walked around there for a bit (and almost got attacked by a chicken!!) Then we took off to the Redwood Drive-in and saw Despicable Me and Karate Kid. Dawsen had never been to a drive-in so we definitely had a lot of fun!





Today we went to the Mt. Timp temple and did baptisms and now everyone is taking a nap! We have just had so much fun this week with Daren and Dawsen and wish they could just stay with us in Utah forever! :)