Sundance, Devil’s Tower and Mt. Rushmore

For our family vacation we set off to see the sights in Eastern Wyoming and the black hills of South Dakota. James’ father (the first Jim) lives in Sundance, Wyoming, only miles from the South Dakota border. We spent time with him and his wonderful wife, Sharon, their family, and saw the sights in Sundance. The second day we went to Devil’s Tower. Amazing!
This is the view as we approached from the highway. The tower juts about 800 feet above any other nearby land form.
The view from the Visitor’s Center parking lot. The trail leads all the way around the base of the tower, about 1 mile. It’s amazingly tall… 867 feet.
Sam showing off. This sign explained that Devil’s tower is a volcanic intrusion. Once all the surrounding land was just as high as the top of the tower, but was eroded by the Belle Fourche river. Only the hard igneous rock was left. As the magma cooled, the stress points formed into tall, hexagonal columns, and that’s why the rock has the striped look.
Can you see the rock climbers? Abby was a cheerful hiker.
The whole gang taking a rest on one of the many viewing benches…
And yes, we were only half way there!
Indian legends call the rock “bear lodge” or “bear tipi” or “grizzly bear house.” This painting depicts the legend where seven Indian girls were trapped by a giant bear on the top of the stump of a tree, and the bear scratched all the marks into the rock.
At all the national monuments they have a “Junior Ranger” program. Augie completed his booklet and got sworn in as a Jr. Ranger.

In the town of Sundance itself there is a lot of history and charm. It’s a very nice place! We enjoyed driving by the jail where the outlaw got the name “Sundance Kid” and saw the Sundance State Bank, dated 1914.

We had a fun time at Dad and Sharon’s house that evening, with a barbecue and s’mores over a backyard fire.

We had fun at our hotel pool, too. And spent lots of time in our pajamas.

After all this fun swimming, Abby was too tired to wake up!

Then we were off for another fun day in the Black Hills of South Dakota. This is a beautiful area! It’s about 2 hours from Sundance to Mt. Rushmore. We first stopped at a zoo/park called Bear Country. They have hundreds of bears! And we also saw elk, bighorn sheep, mountain goats, mountain lion, reindeer, badger, skunk, red fox, wolves (artic and timber), river otter, and more.

Grizzly bear

The baby bears were so cute! As playful as puppies.
And this is the world’s only pink arctic fox… actually just an arctic fox that rolled in the red dirt.
Now, on to Mt. Rushmore! It was amazing. It is so tall. It’s quite astonishing how they did such a great job carving the presidents’ likenesses into granite. The kids also got their Jr. Ranger badges at this national monument.
 
We found Idaho on the walk of flags… the 43rd state.


The view of the monument from the Grand View terrace.
Inside the visitor’s center, we learned about how it was carved and found lots of little facts to fill out their Jr. Ranger workbook.

Then the youngest 3 were sworn in as Jr. Rangers.
A final parting shot of our family on vacation. What a fantastic trip! We’d go again tomorrow if it wasn’t 12 hours away (that was one long, hot car ride). But we had a marvelous time.

School days, school days...

As this school year wraps up, we've had so much fun with each child doing different activities. It has been a super busy month! I think I have been out to the school for one thing or another 15 out of 20 school days so far this month.

Jimmy: He is still doing ballroom dancing. They have performed at several rest homes/senior living centers this month. They also danced for the year-end school picnic. They have a good time at each event, and Jimmy is very well mannered and greets the rest home residents after each performance and thanks them for coming... and they thank him for performing, too. He has also gone on a scout camp out this month. He still works every morning delivering newspapers, and has picked up a couple of lawn mowing jobs for the summer.

Doing the fox trot

Dancing the friendly waltz

Cha cha dance

I like this picture of him by the river.

Sam: If he's not making trouble he's out having fun. He is very social, and very smart. Here he is with his Hall of Fame certificate for 6th grade--he has to pass of several math sheets, science and social studies topics, memorize all the states and capitals, etc. to get this award. Then he got to go to Blast Off (our local laser tag/arcade place).

He took the camera to school and got several pictures of him with his class friends. He has 24 boys in his school class. They tried to make a pyramid... didn't work.

Slam dunk! His best friend John is behind him. 

Sixth grade... class of 2018. 

Abby is super smart! She had a double honor last week. First, she earned Hall of Fame and went to Blast Off. She flew through her math facts, synonyms, science facts, etc.

In front of the whole school, accepting her award. Her teacher Mrs. Shenton is amazing.

The next day there was another assembly, and (unbeknownst to her) she was chosen as Citizen of the Month. This is a special honor... only 9 kids a year get to be honored this way. She has earned it every year!  As part of their recognition the Citizens of the Month get to go to lunch with the principal.

Very proud of Abby!

Augie: what a shock to have my youngest child graduate from Kindergarten! Wow, he's so smart! He's reading, doing math, learning all sorts of cool songs, doing PE games, etc. They did a kindergarten program this week.

They did four very cute song-and-dance routines.

Augie introduced their Sight Word songs... they sing and learn to spell a simple word like  see, go, with, the, that, etc.

My three awesome students! Riding home from school, enjoying the sunshine.

Augie sang "Time to Say Goodbye to Kindergarten" song. This video is very funny! He is so emphatic and dramatic in his singing. Take a look at this link on Google Plus: Hopefully that works. https://plus.google.com/photos/105382108212397158045/albums/5745476210409303537/5745476211650216754

 I'm so proud of my kids and their accomplishments in school. They have surely kept me busy this month, but they'll have great memories of this school year!

Easter 2012

This spring is turning out so mild and gentle... similar to the mild winter we had, but more colorful and enjoyable. We had a beautiful day for Easter Sunday and we enjoyed time together as a family Easter morning. I took pictures of each of the children with their Easter baskets. We tried to get each child three little "presents" and added to the basket candy from Grandma Sharon and us. Grammy McCartney also gave the children butterfly nets, peeps, and $5. I got the most fun this year... not only did I get this hilarious bottle of breath spray that makes me "look and feel Canadian," but I got to give James this funny Donald Duck that quacks and hollers. It was a total nonsense gift but it's something we'll enjoy bringing out every Easter for the next 20 years. You can see the video below.

Easter baskets waiting for discovery in the morning.

Abby's basket had several books, a little lamb, and a hair bow to match her new Easter dress. We put curlers in her hair and she looked quite cute. 

Here is her Easter dress... blue check dress with bright pink jacket (she picked the colors) made by Mom with love. :)

Sam's basket had candy, a Dr. Who and Tardis construction set, and Skylanders.

My cute Augie! He loves Skylanders (part of his video game) so he got several in his basket.

Jim gets Legos (of course) and some Skylanders, too.

This product is so hilarious I don't want to take it out of the package!

The day after Easter we all went to the Museum of Idaho to see a T-rex named Sue. This was a fun exhibit. Jim showed how generous he can be and paid the $20 admission for our family out of his newspaper route money. So I gave the camera to Jim and he took dozens of pictures, but here are just a few highlights.

The T-rex is eating me!

This docent lady did a great job of explaining how they find and put together fossils, then we all got to hold this bone. 

These cases hold some vertebrae of a long-necked dinosaur.

What a fun family I have! I am so blessed to be a mom to these four beautiful children, and wife to a wonderful husband. We had a very nice Easter. I am thankful for my Savior and how he made life possible through his atonement and resurrection. I am glad we got to celebrate such a nice Easter this year.