Yellowstone June 2016

When my mom was visiting in June, we went to Yellowstone National Park. My mom has talked about wanting to go to Yellowstone since I was a little girl and seeing how we live so close now we made a day trip out of it. We packed our lunches and picnic styled throughout the park. It couldn't have been a better day weather wise- it was beautiful and warm. Yellowstone is notorious for its crazy weather (I.E snow in July). So we packed the car with spare clothes, layers and coats just in case, but didn't end up needing a single thing. It was a pleasant surprise. We focused on the SW area of the park, but we made a huge loop to see other parts of the park as well. We saw countless buffalo, tons of geysers, hot pots, water falls and huge lakes. We ended the day with dinner in West Yellowstone, Montana and then made our way home.

The Summer of Six States, Stranger Things & Sprague Reunions

Summer 2016 was by far the busiest summer so far. We traveled in and through six states (all driving) in our good old Volkswagen, Wolfie.

-We hiked and camped our way through the middle of the Wyoming plains.
-Ten year high school reunion in Oregon (go Sprague Olympians!)
-Austin's mom's side of the family (the Sprague's) reunion in Sacramento, California.
-Day trip to San Francisco and Muir beach
-My mom came to visit for a couple weeks, which included Yellowstone, Gold Bug hot springs,
 Rexburg Rapids, Finding Dory etc.
-My Grandpa's birthday bash in Oregon (thankfully this worked out be be during the week of our  high school reunion so we killed two birds with one stone and saved our car a ton of miles haha).
-While in Oregon we blew through the entire season of "Stranger Things".
-Since my parents were in Oregon the same time for my Grandpa's birthday we had a day trip to  Enchanted Forest.
-Beach day at Neskowin
-East Idaho State Fair
-Tautphaus Zoo

I will make separate posts about some of the items listed above because I have TONS of photos!

Random iPhone photos from our various trips:

Roadtrip diva

Sacramento Reunion

Private bowling room with 75+ people

Maisie feeding her baby in Oregon haha!

Ellie passed out after Enchanted Forest

Cousin snuggles

Lunch in San Francisco at Rainforest Cafe

Entertaining the babe at my Grandpa's birthday

Not an iPhone photo but a professional photo from the family reunion in Sacramento. It was 105+ and beyond muggy in this photo, we were all miserable, but somehow the photo turned out:

Palisades Reservoir

Shortly after Maisie started her first summer break (the end of May 2016) we took a day trip to the Palisades. We had intentions of hiking the Upper Palisades, but ended up just exploring the Reservoir and buying fireworks in Wyoming (note to self: buy more lady bugs next time haha) instead. This little day trip is when we first became aware of Ellie's motion sickness and unfortunately hadn't stocked up on baby Dramamine yet. So after a quick stop to change her clothes and sanitize her carseat as best as possible, we continued with our day. I took a picture of Ellie post clean up and she looked so darling, even for a baby who just was sick all over herself just minutes prior. Need evidence? Here you go:

Need evidence that Idaho is incredibly beautiful and that our girls are cute (albeit crazy)?

Box Canyon Camping

Skeptically inflating our tent.

The babies of the families.

The view.

Tinfoil dinners and s'mores done right.

An intense round of Memory

Eating the chips the kids dropped in the dirt. Yummm

The weekend before Maisie started Kindergarten,we went camping with our good friends and their five kids. We decided that we would go for a more "real" camping experience and actually be further than 5 minutes from our houses. Sidenote: last year when we went camping we were literally a couple miles away from home, but I was 34 weeks pregnant, sooo yeah, better safe than sorry right? Anyway, we headed up to Island Park (about 45 minutes from Yellowstone) to find a camp site that could accommodate our large party. We ended up finding a nice spot in Box Canyon right above Henry's Fork river (world renowned for trout fishing and some of the best fly fishing in the states!) AKA hardcore bear territory-good thing we had bear spray! It turned out to be a great weekend to go because with all the forest fires plus wheat and hay harvest, the air where we live was thick with smoke and dust, so we got into the mountains just enough to get out of it. This trip we also decided to for-go our usual go-to camping food (hot dogs) and instead decided to do some tinfoil dinners and make use of some cast iron skillets and dutch ovens which was quite delicious. Breakfast turned out awesome too, we made pancakes and breakfast burritos. It turned out to be a really fun, albeit short, camping trip. Next year I want to camp at LEAST two nights. 

p.s don't trust an inflatable tent... ever! haha

Oregon Part 6 - iPhone Photos

Gas station fill up and bathroom break. This is Ellie after a good nursing session and exploring the front seat of the car.

Rest stop castle!

Sleeping in the car- Ellie's much appreciated talent.

Cousin bath! Ellie looks so tan haha!

I love how big Idaho's sky is, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss trees towering above me.


Pictures Aunt Lori took of the cousin's of cousins playing together.

They started out dry, but it was only a matter of time before...

They were soaked. P.s Maisie and Maggie could be twins- the Lloyd blood runs strong in them.

If I fits... I sits.

Cousin sleepover. Maisie's first ever sleepover... Emerson's too.

Emerson pestering Maisie.


Austin bought that salsa and when we tried it, it was crazy spicy. When we looked on the packaging it wasn't labeled as hot or anything so we were confused. Until we spotted that tiny circle on the top right of the packaging that reads: "could be considered HOT". Yeah... "could be" is putting it lightly. It was HOT though.

I know she's not in a carseat, but we were only going down the street. She wanted to try out her new headphones. She was listening to the lullabye setting on my sound machine app, so it was hilarious when I looked behind me to see her like that. She's not asleep... just "very very relaxed" haha

Arnie the greatest cat who lived and the only one I am not allergic to.

Shortcake

Maisie's parting gifts to Grams and Gramps.

Another masterpiece

Pit stop going home. Beep beep!