Grand Canyon and lots more!

We had such a fun road trip.  I love going down South with my kids, because they don't play xbox, watch TV, have homework, there is no yard work or house work, we can just play and have fun together.  When Dianne mailed out the Easter Egg Hunt invites this year, I decided I wanted to do more with the trip then just the hunt.  Mat and Andrea were thinking the same as me and when I asked them if they wanted to go to the Grand Canyon, they said that was already their plan.  So we joined them.  On Wednesday we drove into Cedar City and drove by the new temple.  It is opening later this year.  Then Gator and Davis got in with Mat and went on to Toquerville while Owen and I went and visited SUU.  It was so extremely weird going on a college campus tour with my own kid.   I didn't really pay attention to much of the tour because I was too busy thinking how strange it was, but I did notice what a beautiful campus SUU has.  We met and talked to all the football coaches then stayed for their practice.  It's crazy how much Owen loves football.  When he was young, I refused to let him play, I wanted nothing to do with the game or my kids playing, but the next year he got his way, and I have completely changed my way of thinking.  I love football.  After that  Owen and I went out to eat just us.  That was so much fun, because he was so excited after the tour and practice, we talked about football and enjoyed one on one time. 

We drove to Toquerville and spent the night there then got up early on Thursday and drove to the Grand Canyon.  We had originally planned to visit the North Rim, it is only 1 1/2 hrs away from my dads so it would've been perfect.  We booked a hotel room, then found out the North Rim was closed until mid May because of winter.  So we just decided to keep with our plan and drive the extra time to the South Rim and then back to the hotel the same day.  What a nice drive.  We didn't stop on the way there because we wanted to get there and see the Grand Canyon, but I kept a mental note of a few places I wanted to stop on the way back later in the evening.  Our first impression of the Grand Canyon was  "Wow!  Okay, not what?"  I'm glad we didn't stop there though and continued further into the park, because we saw some amazing views and got out and walked along the rim for a bit and that was so much more awesome then that first view. 

We left the Grand Canyon and got something to eat then I wanted to stop by those places I had seen on the way.  We were working against daylight though, but it worked out perfect.  No traffic and we were able to see some cool things on our way back to the North Rim.  We stopped at the Navajo Bridge.  One word, scary.  It actually made us dizzy looking down because we were so high up. And we also stopped at a place called Cliff Dwellers.  

 As we drove past the hotel on our way to the Grand Canyon, it looked like a beautiful place.  It was in Jacobs Lake Arizona.  By the time we got into town it was dark, but we walked around a bit Friday morning and it was a really pretty place.  I loved the fun diner we had breakfast at. 

We drove back to Toquerville and spent Friday and Saturday there playing.  The kids made up a new game of tennis raquet baseball and they played for hours, along with the river and egg hunt that took up all their time. 

 We planned on going to Milford Sunday to visit Grandma Stewart and Dave had driven down with his guns so the boys could go gopher hunting.  Just to be one step closer to Milford, after the hunt we drove to Cedar to spend the night in a hotel, and the pool was the last place the kids decided to spend the rest of their energy.  By this point in the week, we hardly had any, so they didn't last long before they were showered and in bed.

Gopher hunting in Milford.  We had a fun spring break, and it was so hard to think about coming home and going back to school, work, basketball, and soccer.  First day back and we've got it all today.  It was an awesome trip, lots of pictures, memories, fun, and family.