The Utah Visit - St George

Monday - Pioneer Day

The morning started with a pancake breakfast at the chapel. Pancakes, eggs, sausages, orange juice and a bike parade in the parking lot. A little Rummy Cube before breakfast.

Elder Bacon ready for service! Or you know - online, at home MTC. (He was exhausted by the end of the day - it was a long day of online training.)

The girls made some perler bead creations.

Marcus's homemade sign - on the door of the office right off the kitchen.

We went - Jon, Michelle, Kate, Lovey, Alice, Fiona and I to the Barbie movie. They had this cute Barbie Box in the lobby. I wanted to take a pic of Michelle and I, but didn't and thought - oh well, after the movie, but then after the movie I didn't really want to anymore. I don't know how I feel about the movie. It was funny - lots of laughing. But that every single male character in the movie was an idiot, it didn't feel good. And the ending... I wanted Barbie and Ken to need each other. I don't know. I just don't...

Alice saw this movie with Ken and wanted a pic. Scary - eek!

Jon and Michelle have reusable cups and buckets - much cheaper but goodness were they ever HUGE!

Seth showing us all his perler bead creations over the years - some really, really cute ones.

We went for a jaunt to Target. The girls were super excited to go, but then... Alice found some lip scrub. Kate wasn't really looking for anything so didn't find anything. Fiona was tortured. She experienced American sticker shock. She's been looking at a few different Our Generation Girl Doll items, some big ticket items that she wants to save up for. The items she was looking at were 55-60% cheaper here. Fiona was devastated. She knows that the American dollar is worth more, but it didn't add up. She didn't end up buying anything, and I'm not sure when we'll go back to another store, cause that was a little more fun than I was expecting.

The chickens by the door - I am still very amused by all of this.

Lovey ironing the perler bead creations after I kind of messed up Alice's - but then I fixed it, but then I felt dumb, so thank you Lovey!

Alice made her own dinner - a nutella wrap, with bananas on the inside and strawberries and powdered sugar on the outside.

Fiona loves her cousin Seth! Cuties!

The dinner that Michelle made - dairy free and gluten free, that none of the children would eat. 

At the end of the day we went out with Jon and Michelle's friends and we went to watch fireworks. Happy Pioneer Day!

Tuesday - Zion

This morning Fiona and I took Maggie and Copper for a walk before it got too hot. I watched Maggie pacing the main floor last night and it broke my heart. That isn't normal animal behaviour. We had a nice walk through the neighbourhood. It wasn't a long walk because it was already getting warm at 8 in the morning. After Lovey came back from her first day of soccer tryouts we headed out in the minivan to Zion!

Michelle in her awesomeness stayed up last night and made scavenger hunts for the girls! How sweet is that!

It's funny because bison was on the list, and I erroneously assumed that we'd see the real thing, because Jon and I did last year. These however ended up being the only bison that we saw.

It took about two hours to get to Zion National Park. It was a beautiful day, and it wasn't too busy. We drove half way up the the long tunnel and got out to take some pictures.

The tunnel was built in the 1930s and that is quite amazing to think about.

One of the other items on the list was the checkerboard mesa. We stopped there and ran around on the rocks - we didn't venture to far away from the road, but it was neat being on the rocks and sand and seeing cacti.

Our next stop was Mt Carmel, Utah and the Thunderbird restaurant. We had a nice lunch, and a little trip into the gift shop. Kate picked out a bracelet, Alice a magnet, Fiona a keychain, and I picked up a pig!

We looked for the bison on the way into Mt Carmel and the way back, but we didn't see any. Thankfully the wasn't a line up to get back into the park! Oh and Jon did try to convince the girls to go an extra 2.5 hours to go to Bryce, but they were not interested - another time.

Last summer when Jon and I went through Zion we didn't stop that much, because we thought we'd head back the same way we went in. But, the park was much busier the day we went last year and Jon decided that we would see other things and go a different way. This year, I wanted to get out more, and just see the landscapes outside of the car, so we did.

We stopped briefly at the visitors centre - next time we'll have to check out the museum, before we headed home. But then Jon thought we should pop up to the western entrance of Zion and see Kolob Canyon. We didn't tell the girls - because it would only add 30 minutes to the trip. It turned out however that the canyon road is closed for maintenance for the next several months. So next time for that too.

We had a nearly perfect day. Fiona was a little out of sorts on and off. She did enjoy most of it I think! And there was a close call with finding a bathroom, but all's well that ends well right?!

The only really awful thing today was the fate of poor Beyoncé the chicken. When Michelle came home from work and put out fresh water for the chickens only three chickens came running. She found the other chicken in bad shape in the chicken coop. She brought the chicken inside and put it into a cold bath. The chicken perked up for a little bit, but it wasn't looking good. We went to bed hoping for a miracle, but by Wednesday afternoon Beyoncé was no longer.

And here he is! Elder Bacon, after his second full day of online MTC. He's super excited to go to the Provo MTC next week!

Wednesday - Goodbye St George (until next week!)

I wanted to leave by 9 am so a serendipitous visit with Heidi could happen in the Salt Lake City airport. The girls were awesome. Kate and I went on a little jaunt with the doggies, and the girls packed up their things. We cleaned out Seth's room, and off we went.  I think we pulled out at 9:15.

When Kate and I got back from the walk, there was a humming bird - so fun!

Goodbye number one to Marcus - we'll say the final goodbye at the MTC in Provo in a week.

Goodbye Seth and Lovey!

Lovey having a cuddle with Maggie!

The pitstop in Fillmore at the Maverick!

Alice wanted blue takis. I didn't realize that they would really make her blue - ugh! 

And just a funny last note about our road trip from St. George to Farmington - when we were going through Springville I wanted Alice to take a pic so we could send it to Elder Ellison - an Elder currently serving in our ward. Alice missed the sign that said Springville - both signs lol. I told her to take a random highway pic, and then she decided to go one better and pasted my face into the pic lol. It's silly and goofy and I just wanted to remember this!