July was full of just as many adventure as June for our family. The beginning of the month we took a road trip to visit Dave's family up at their cabin in Zion's National Park, UT. On the way we stopped in Rifle, CO to stay the night and we hiked to a waterfall nearby before going on. It was a fun way to break up the drive and see some more of beautiful Colorado.
Happy 60th Birthday, Grandpa!
The kids very favorite thing to do at the cabin was go in Grandpa's boats. He had several new kayaks that we got to break in a little bit, and the kids had a blast. They especially had fun crawdad hunting in the shallow reeds of the reservoir.
Lexi even got to man the two-person kayak by herself for a little while when Grandpa got serious about crawdad hunting and got into the water.
We also had a good time hiking and playing games with Aunt Melissa and Grandma.
Getting our kids to sleep in a new place where it wasn't exactly dark was a challenge. Below is Dave asleep in Clara's bed while she is wide awake playing with her dolls. At least she's still in the bed, right?
On the way home from Utah we stopped outside of Glenwood Springs and did the "Hanging Lake" hike. It was pretty challenging with our three little ones, but we made it to the top of the mountain and the beautiful lake. Another one of Colorado's breathtaking waterfalls checked off our bucket list!
If you look closely at the top right of this picture you will see Cole's chipmunk friend. He enjoyed taking a little break with him on the way down.
There have been tons of different wildflowers blooming all over our property this month, and Lexi and Clara have really enjoyed making me wildflower bouquets.
One of the rare happy moments in our home where all three kids are doing something together and enjoying each other's company. Making toast and pretending to be butterflies. :)
A new splash pad park opened near our house so we went and checked it out. It's all handicap accessible, so there were some different swings and other fun toys to try out.
Lexi and Clara enjoying popsicles in the shade of the trampoline on a hot day.
A little later in July my friend Jessica Dunlap and her cute kiddos, Hudson, Beau and Hannah, came to visit for a few days. It was so good to spend some time with her! And our kids had lots of fun together. Of course we had to take them to Garden of the Gods, and all of our little mountain goats did great! Six kids between two and seven.
One of the other main highlights of their trip was grasshopper hunting in our back yard. Cole was beyond happy to have some other little boys who wanted to go hunting with him, and by the end of their visit we had several jars full of grasshoppers.
We also went hiking through the meadow by our house to try and find our horse friends. Unfortunately on that day we couldn't find them, but it was still a fun hike finding all sorts of cool branches and sticks and bugs along the way.
