YELLOWSTONE!

Next to Disneyland, Yellowstone would fall into "The Happiest Place on Earth" category for me. Some of my favorite childhood memories come from being there with my family, and I loved sharing it with my own little rascals.

I mentioned in my previous post that this trip was completely last-minute. Like we had the idea Thursday morning to go and we were on the road by Thursday afternoon. Yeah, it was crazy, but awesome! Unfortunately, my dad, Greg, and Sean all had to work, so my mom, Em, and I took off with our 4 little girls and one little Garrett. Good times all around!

My Aunt Paula's family was already there. Some of my cousins knew we had decided to come, but we all decided not to tell Paula and just surprise her. It couldn't have been more perfect. We pulled into the campground and my mom honked her horn. Paula's back was to us and she whipped around to see who was honking and give them a nice glare for disturbing the peace of the campground. When she realized it was us, her jaw completely dropped and she literally screamed. Right there in the middle of the Bridge Bay campground--she screamed and threw her arms in the air. I will never forget it. So great!

Garrett was so excited to see a buffalo. We had to stop and take a picture of the first one we saw while Garrett and Abby squealed in the backseat. Garrett kept saying, "Wow!" and Abby would giggle and say, "Buffo, Buffo!"

Abby was thrilled when the car finally stopped and she could get out of her carseat and into the driver's seat.


We went for a drive out to Lamar Valley and stopped for a picnic lunch. The kids couldn't get enough of these chipmunks/squirrels/whatever cute little rodents they happen to be.

Looking for squirrels...

We were so excited to see a black bear. It was close enough to the road that even the kids could see it.
Shortly after the black bear sighting, we happened on this grizzly. (Don't worry--we were in the car and plenty far enough away to be safe. This picture makes it look closer than it really was.)

Terrible night picture from a moving vehicle, but this does prove we saw a bull elk and there are a few of them left in the Park. (Greg gets really riled up about Yellowstone and the Wolf Reintroduction and how it has gotten out of control and ruined the elk population. The elk herd population is down 70% since the wolves were brought in. Not good news for folks like us who are elk fans.)

On the way to Old Faithful we passed one of my favorite places in Yellowstone. Look at those lily pads!

We always love a good visit with Old Faithful. This one was especially great. We pulled in the parking lot at 12:21 and noticed a large crowd was gathered and a little steam coming out. My mom ran in and saw it was set to erupt around 12:26. In seriously less than 2 minutes, we had all 5 kids out of carseats and into strollers and on the way to watch the world's coolest geyser erupt. We even had time to spare and snapped a photo of the crew anxiously awaiting...

Baby Ella was especially excited!

A trip to Old Faithful wouldn't be complete without a little ice cream. (Sorry to the folks behind us in the ice cream line. Choosing ice cream flavors for 4 hungry little bears can take a few minutes...)

We headed back to the campground where the Andersons were staying and saw this buck right above their campsite. The kids loved it!

We built a campfire and had fun roasting hot dogs and making s'mores. Garrett looks amazing, I know.

Abby's hair is also pretty great...she wouldn't leave an elastic in it for more than 5 minutes and finally I just gave up. We're camping so anything goes, right?

These 3 bucks wandered down from the mountain and just hung out in the campground.

We went for a drive that night and Garrett was exhausted and onery. I didn't want to him to fall asleep in the car or else we would be burnt toast when it was time for bed in the cabin. I was doing everything I could to keep him awake and he was not a happy camper...literally. Finally, I pulled out my camera and started taking pictures of him and showing him how he looked on the screen.

He started giggling and the rest was history...

It's a good thing he perked up, because shortly after we came across a massive group of cars pulled off the side of the road in Hayden Valley. There was a buffalo carcass in the river (gross, I know) and there was a group of grizzly bears feeding on it. We stayed and watched it for awhile and saw 7 grizzly bears, 3 of which were a mother and her 2 cubs.

My pictures are far from great, but you get the idea. I had my own two little bears crawling all over me and trying to get my camera to focus on the zoom was pretty tough. You'll have to take my word that it was pretty sweet! (As sweet as grizzlies gnawing on a dead buffalo can be, I guess...)

There are 2 bears in this picture. One is pretty easy to see and the other is the dark spot just above it and to the right.

There are 3 bears in this picture. The obvious one is on the carcass, the 2nd one is right behind it in the water, and the 3rd one is just above it in the grass.

Here's the crew--minus Em the photographer in the little cabin we stayed in at the Lake Lodge. Things went remarkably well for having 3 adults and 5 kids sharing such little living quarters.

We saw these buffalo as we were leaving. Garrett loved the babies!

Our final sighting as we left Fishing Bridge: this lovely bobcat. You may already know that Garrett (and his little sister) kind of have a thing for tractors/"tactoos" and any other sort of heavy equipment. We had to pull over and look at it and Garrett insisted we take a picture of it.

We stopped in Rexburg on the way home for a much-needed lunch/playtime at the Golden Arches and drove by the new temple. Garrett also has a thing for the Angel Moroni and wanted a picture of the temple and then another picture of just Moroni. So here they are...my out-of-the-car-window picture taking skills are really improving!

We had to make another stop in Downey (traveling with kids is so fun) and my mom picked up these Tractor Trader free magazines for the kids. Money could not have bought anything more entertaining. They were captivated and spent most of the ride home totally engrossed in their "Tractor Books." Nice work, Susie Q!

This just about sums it all up...

It was such a fun vacation and a perfect end to the summer! I'm so glad my mom and Em were willing to go and the Andies let us crash their trip. Garrett loved it and asks me all the time when we are going back to Yellowstone. I'm always up for a quick trip--anybody want to join us? :)

I Hate Good-Byes...

***Greg is reading over my shoulder as I type this and just said, "I would have titled it 'Good Riddance." It's a good thing I do most (or all) of the blogging for our family.

The day we've been dreading all summer long came and my baby brother and his wife are gone. Sad, sad, sad. :( They moved to Connecticut where Brett will be attending school to become a Physical Therapist and Chelsea will work as a Marriage and Family Therapist.

Garrett and Abby adore Brett and Chelsea and are going to miss them so much. Abby points to their picture every day and says, "Bet...Sels." It's going to be a long 3 years.

My parents had a going-away BBQ for them. I always love the days when Greg gets the kids dressed...

Greg's baby sister, Mal Pal, also happened to be visiting from Virginia so she stopped by the party to give Brett and Chelsea a few tips about surviving life on the East Coast.

The entire Petersen crew...

A portion of the Falslev family...

Check out the static hair! Abby thinks she needs to either be in my dad's truck or on the tramp at all times when we are at my parents' house.

Greg's parents came up to visit and Brett gave Willy a nice going-away present--a lovely t-shirt commemorating Utah State's victory over BYU sometime in the 90s. It is even autographed by USU's quarterback. Willy was pretty excited. :)

The day before the big move, the kids and I went to SLC to have a farewell lunch with Mal and take her to the airport. I was so sad when we dropped her off. I got a huge pit in my stomach as we started pulling into the airport and I was afraid I was going to lose it and make her sad. Thankfully, Garrett was pretty excited to see the airplanes, so it was a nice distraction and we held it together, but I was just so sad to see her go. We miss her and Mike so much and now Brett and Chelsea have also left us. I can't take anymore of these departures!!!

We happened to be passing through Ogden right as Brett and Chelsea were loading their pod, so we stopped in to check things out. I won't even pretend like we were any sort of help, but we did enjoy being there. I still can't believe my dad and Chad fit all of their stuff into that one tiny pod. Somebody should make a reality TV show in which the contestants are given a big load of stuff to pack into a small space. I guarantee Sparky and Papa Chad would be millionaires.

They were determined to get this table in there, and sure enough, they did it! Chelsea kept telling them not to worry about it, but it was a lost cause. There was no way they were shutting that last door without the blasted table in there.

Greg was working out of town, so the kids and I stayed the night with Brett and Chelsea at my parents' house. We woke up early to bid them farewell and Susie cooked Brett his farewell breakfast request: french toast. Abby woke up and must have sensed they were leaving, because she wanted to be right in the middle of them. Thankfully, Garrett slept through it all, so he didn't have to watch them drive away.

And they're off!!!

Best of luck! We will miss you like crazy, but we really are excited for you and the adventures that lie ahead! You will do great.

Next blog post: Our spur-of-the-moment trip to YELLOWSTONE! My mom stayed in the house and couldn't bear to watch them drive away. I came back in and she was holding it together pretty well, but I could tell she was struggling. Greg was going to be gone for a few days and we were just going to be hanging out there, so I said to my mom, "Let's go to Yellowstone." She looked at me like I was crazy and then said, "Do you think we could get a room somewhere?" I got on the computer and made a few phone calls and had us a cabin booked about 15 minutes later. We called my sister and told her to pack her bags, and we were on our way that afternoon. Crazy, but seriously fun! I'll post the pictures soon.