Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Summer Vacation


When I stood on a cliff looking over this view I felt my ribs unzip and my heart practically float away.

We're finally home from our summertime escapades. We've been gone for almost two weeks and had such a good time getting out of the city and back to nature. We went camping with Nic's clan in Duck Creek Utah first and then came home for one day...shook the dirt out of our shoes, washed the clothes and took off to do the whole small town fourth of July thing with my family back home at Pablo Canyon. I wanted to share some of the pictures.
Pablo Canyon
One of the main events back home is to load everyone up in a 4-Wheel drive vehicle and bounce up to Birch Creek where we have a cook-out and let the kids play in the creek. Then we drive all the way to the top of the mountain and go down the other side to Austin to play at the park, swim and eat at the Toiyabe Drive in Frosty.




Afton and Evan at Birch Creek


Evan sporting his new sheriff hat




Afton at Birch Creek cook out

Here's a video of our fist night at Pablo Canyon. This is the ranch where my parents live and Nic and I stayed in one of the empty rental trailers in the main yard. Everyone showed up to have a true country ho-down. We had a great time cooking up a big bunch of cowboy beans, corn on the cob and staying up late to tell ghost stories. Even Afton and her cousin Ellie got in on the action!

















MMM!!! One of my favorite back home meals...there's a cup of brown sugar in those bad boys!





My dad Frank and Nic at the very top of Birch Creek canyon. You can't really see that well because there was a haze from the California wildfires, but we were so high and could see for a hundred miles in every direction. It was windy and exhillerating up there!






My mom Sandy taking the kids for a quad ride up pablo road. Evan cared more about the motorcycles than eating. We had a scary moment when we lost him for about 15 minutes and we found he had wandered up the ranch and found a riding lawn-mower to "drive".


Here's the sweet 10 ft wide trailer Nic and I stayed in. The porch also doubled for our talent show stage. This is my dad telling red neck jokes. Ashley Stout and I performed a Tahitian hula and can I just say how completely heart-broken I am that my hubby didn't get it on video!? In case you don't know, one of my items on my life checklist was to learn and perform a real hula. Humph. Sigh. So sad. I am praying Ashley will put it on her blog. Nic played the guitar and we sang Allison Krauss's "You Say it Best When You Say Nothing At All". Afton did princess dancing with her cousins.





I love this uncertain expression on Afton' face as she greeted a surprise visitor.




Duck Creek




The Larkin crew including Papa Larkin


My favorite activity of the whole Duck Creek trip was our family hike to Cascade Waterfall. It was the perfect hike. Not to long for little kids, yet still makes you sweat...breathtaking views (the first picture on this post was during that hike), varied landscape, not all uphill, and an awesome destination. It was the perfect family hike and I want to do it every year now.





Cascade Waterfall...Nic and Evan testing the waters





Afton on her first real hike.





Local Wildlife






Can you say Velveeta CHEESE?!




Phew...this whole vacation has been so fun, but also so exhausting because Evan had diahreah (cha cha cha) the entire ten days and...I'm Pregnant!










14 comments:

i said...

Hip Hip Hooray...another baby Larkin on the way!!!

Karen said...

Looks like a really fun vacation and way to throw in the good news!! Congratulations!

i said...

And now that I read it all....Go check Ashley's blog...the answer to your prayers! All of the other stuff looks so fun too...especially the trailer stage...and the beloved tire swing!! Glad you had fun.:)

Stacie said...

Holy freakin' cow!! Congrats!! What a surprise ending to such a fantastic blog entry!

Your vacation looked just amazing and full of memorable experiences. Glad to have you back home!

Stacie said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lafantasma said...

Woohoo! Congratulations!!!!!! I'm glad you had a good time. We just spent the last few days in Ogden. It was a beautiful drive! Utah is sooooo much prettier than Nevada....

The San Diego Mills said...

Congrats on the baby news! I like how you ever so slyly added that in there at the very end. Looks like you guys had all kinds of fun on your vacation, very cool!

Gina Rochelle said...

Small town fourth of Julys are the best! I miss ours a the Ranch in Utah! Are you crazy, who wants three kids?! :) Congratulations!

Lynette said...

I too love small town celebrations. Looks like you had tons of fun. Congrats on number 3!!!

craigbergonzoni said...

That's great news! Congrats to you and Nic!

Anonymous said...

Congrats!! Sooo happy for all of you, another little sweet Larkin (totally in love with little Evan and Afton is adorable).. .told your sis, I need to be adopted & be a sis, too!!! You two have so much fun!!!
Hope the baby "sickness" will be over soon, just so happy you're having another!!!
Sending love, Josie

Anonymous said...

Congrats!! Sooo happy for all of you, another little sweet Larkin (totally in love with little Evan and Afton is adorable).. .told your sis, I need to be adopted & be a sis, too!!! You two have so much fun!!!
Hope the baby "sickness" will be over soon, just so happy you're having another!!!
Sending love, Josie

Christene said...

How exciting! Having three is the best ever! I love it. Your trips looked SO fun and full of downhome goodness. Glad you all had such a good time!

Anonymous said...

Just had to peek in and see if you had posted any new blogs.... love finding everyone from our FIRST ward on here!! Love all of you so much!!!
Little Evan is such a doll and Afton is so pretty.... your next one will be a knock out.... hope you feel better soon :-)
Love ya!!!