After seeing the Texas Longhorn (Uncle Hank's favorite team) we thought we needed to through the sign out in every picture.

Maya thought she needed to climb up every rock and then jump right back down. This was not working out very well....the girl seems to have no fear!

Tyler holding on to Maya's dear life...

and me using the walking stick to keep her from charging off!

When we decided to take the kids to Zion's we started telling them they were going to be in a Jr. Ranger program (which we both would of loved when we were kids) and they freaked out! They thought they were going to have to climb huge mountains, eat bugs and sleep out under the stars with nothing to protect them. Once they started coming up with these ideas we just kept feeding them and ear full. It was very cruel we know but was it was also fun to see what they could scheme up in their minds. Well being the nice parents that we really are we decided to save them some heart ache and tell them the truth... but not after we loaded up the car and headed out on "their adventure." We ended up taking them on an easy little path ending at a spring. They had a ball! Much better than eating bugs for dinner. Haha

Ella was in charge of Maya, and as you can see by her body language she was not liking this adventure at all. Oh poor Ella!

I don't know how many picture we have of Maya doing this pose, but it just makes me laugh because it shows exactly who she is...TROUBLE!

I'm holding onto Maya because she stood up on the chair and it flipped out from under her....

These are not very good pictures I know but I do need to document the reason our two year old looks as though we had beat her... if you can see behind the two people reading their menus there is a drop off onto the sidewalk. Yes! Maya did slip and fall beneath the bench, luckily we caught her right before she fell completely down. None the less she made quite a scene!

To top off our wonderful stroll down the beautiful Springdale main street, Maya was trying to keep up with Drew and the girls and she forgot to watch where she was going (not uncommon for a two year old) and before I could run up to her and grab her from missing the curb....she biffed it! And if I must say so this is not your average curb. This baby had some height. Poor, poor Maya!

To be on the safe side I decided that I better hold onto her while we were looking at the Elk and Buffalo. I could only imagine chasing after her while these Enormous Beasts were chasing after me!

Yes, she did fall behind the rock wall. That was one of many accidents Maya had this summer.

Our room walked out onto this wonderful football field...

After many hours in the pool our little fish decided they needed to rest up for more night swimming.

The kids could not figure out why we had two toilets in our bathroom. They thought it was pretty cool. We were not exactly sure how you were supposed to use it so we decided it worked best to wash our feet. Haha

We all needed a little grub and some rest before we headed out to the pool (well actually Tyler and I needed the rest it is really exhausting driving with four kids)

Family Vacation 2009

This year we decided to stay close to home for our little get away. I had just stayed in Zion's with my mom and sisters for her 60th surprise birthday and I knew the kids would love it. I tried to stay in the same place we did but they had no openings so I found this little piece of wonderful. It was so beautiful! It felt like we were in an apartment instead of a hotel. Later this year we had found out that it was rated the #1 place to stay in 2009 for family vacations....Can I hear a Woot Woot for Ebbi!

Ava and her first day of Preschool 2009. It was "So Sunny and my eyes won't open" but we had to get a picture on the famous rocks.