Busy Summer Already

I'm sure there is more I could say about the Alabama / Florida trip but I'm calling it good.  Our May has been super busy, Alabama, Florida, my birthday, Mothers day, Eclipse, and it's not even over yet.

The following weekend when we got back from Bama was Mother's Day weekend.  I had already agreed to lead a trip for the Earth Forum to Topaz Mountain on Saturday.  We had a great turn out, even though it was mostly already just club members.  We had one geology student show up and she said she would bring more friends next time.  Some of my favorite people are club members, so I was thrilled they could come and they brought their grand kids along.

I worked really hard to prepare for this outing, I built 2 sifters and I am clearly not a carpenter by any means, so I was worried they wouldn't work, but they ended up working great! We found lots of Topaz by sifting in the washes, the kids really got into it too.

I'm the official Outings Leader for the club now so I'll be leading outings all summer.  I kind of feel like the pressure is on but I'm excited to have a great summer, going fun places and meeting fun people.  Meeting cool people is what it's all about and getting out to see the beautiful places in Utah is really my passion! 

So I did Topaz on Saturday and for Mother's Day on Sunday, I wanted to go hunt for geodes in the geode beds at Dugway.  Dan agreed to do it, only because it was Mothers day, it's not his cup of tea.  It was really fun that my sister-in-law also wanted to do that for her mothers day present too and my brother and their kid came along.  We got to drive 50 miles of the old Pony Express road to get out there and that was an adventure in itself.  Dan said it was a place he'd never been in Utah, so he was actually excited about that.

It was a looong looong drive out there, but the scenery was cool.  It was all dirt road too, so it was very bumpy.  Brennan did really well, he slept most of the way down there and the whole way back.  He even noticed the road was different and thought it was fun to vocalize the vibrations, it was cute so we got a vid of him doing it.

 It was kind of a neat location.  From the turn off to the geode beds, you could see the Dugway proving grounds in the background, it's the salt flats.

The first thing we did was try to set up some shade structures because we had a baby and two kids and my Brother's Mother came too.  There is no shade out there and the sun is strong.  Also it is very very windy, so we looked like a three ring circus setting up the tent and all of us had totally given up on it except for my brother.  He was determined though to make it work and it did and amazingly it held up and we put it to good use for the rest of the day.

After we got that set up, we got straight away to digging.  Ben and Wendy, my bro and sis-in-law had the right tools.  They had brought a shovel and nice pick and they dug a big pit and within 20 minutes had found a bucket full of small geodes.  Some were purple, others red inside, really pretty ones.

There was a group of professional rock hunters/sellers parked next to us.  They had huge trucks and had dug a huge hole in which they pulled out geodes the size of cantaloupes that were totally amazing.  They had a saw hooked up to a generator and they were sawing them open on-site.  The women and children that came with them did not seem interested in it at all, it's probably not what they wanted for Mothers day, they stayed in the vehicles or sat around talking and looking miserable.

Dan surprised me and actually got really into digging pits and dug me a nice one and we pulled maybe 30-40 geodes out.  I took them all home but still have not cracked open any of them.  I'm excited to see what I have.  I was actually really surprised to see Dan get into it and very glad because it means that he'll probably come back with me again someday.  My goal is to find one of the big cantaloupe sized ones!

Sara got really into it too. There are discarded busted up geodes laying all over the ground from pits that other people have searched in and she found tons of them herself and was very excited about it.  Sara and her little cousin Benny had the best day following each other around playing "geologist" and finding treasures, singing songs, and jumping in and out of the pits.

It was a long, hot, and dusty day but everyone ended up having fun and finding lots of treasures to take home.  Next time we agreed we'd come back in the fall and camp out because there is too much digging to do for just one day, next time we're digging a big pit, and it's too far to drive.

I almost forgot, we found lots of lizards too.

The last 2 days in Bama

After we returned from the beach we had a day and a half to hang out in Alabama.  We decided to spend our last day hiking at Oak Mountain State Park. 

It turned out to be a really great hike.  We saw tons of wildlife.  I was really hoping I'd be able to show her all the fun critters that I grew up with that we don't get to see as often here.  I think we saw almost all of them that I'd want to show her, snakes, turtles, frogs, etc.  We didn't find any crayfish or salamanders, even though I looked.

Sara is a really great hiker!  She hiked the 4 mile trail all by herself until the last few hundred yards.  Brennan sat in the pack perfectly happy the whole time:

Then we all had a nice b'day dinner for me at the Cheesecake Factory the night before we left.  Fara and Lee got to hang out with the kids a bit.  Sara ate it up!

It was sad packing up to leave.  I'm not sure if I'll ever see my Grandmother again, so I gave her a hug.  That was as strange feeling.  We really enjoyed spending time with her on this visit and she really seemed to enjoy the kids, and of course she always loves seeing Dan too. 

I'm not sure if we'll every stay at Mom's house again either if she moves here.  We don't get to Alabama very often.  I'm glad at least Sara will have the memories from this trip.   I feel like I've already long parted ways with my life in Alabama but this trip, I felt like I was saying goodbye for the last time, one more time.

The Beach! Part II

We all had a blast at the beach.  Sara's favorite thing was to go out on the waves and have Daddy throw her around in the ocean.  She was fearless when it came to water.  Here is a video of Sara and Daddy hitting the waves.
Here are some pics of Daddy and daughter taking to the water :

We ate out every night we were there as a fun vacation treat.  Dan found us really good places to eat via Urban Spoon, the app on his iphone.  We ate at the Boar's Head, which was my personal favorite and Firefly.  Both were culinary vacations in their own right and I felt so fortunate that Dan budgeted for us to have a 5 star culinary experience.  I really can't say enough about how fun it was, it was like having a vacation on top of a vacation.

Here are some pics of the folks all dressed up and ready to go.  It's also a tradition for my family at the beach to go out to eat.  When I was a kid, we always dressed up nice and went out to a nice restaurant at night.  Everyone was always really hungry and it was nice to be somewhere out of the sun enjoying the food and drink.  I'm sure my grandparents had eaten at some of these restaurants as they have been in business since I was a kid.

It was also neat to see some of the old places I saw as a kid that were still in business, the Carousel, where Mary Evelyn and I would walk on the beach to go get her paper every morning.  Also Mike's diner, where we would eat breakfast occasionally.  Also, the little store across from our hotel room was near where my grandfather's old house was and I'm sure as a kid I went in there to buy nets and beach supplies.

We were treated to some amazing sunsets while we were there almost every night from the balcony of the hotel room.

There are several fresh water lagoons behind the beach that Sara and I checked out.  They were full of frogs, I mean full!  At night the frogs croaking were so wonderful.  I really wanted to record the sound and take it with me.  We looked in the lagoons and saw tons of turtles during the day but we never saw the illusive frogs.

It was such a fun trip. We were lucky that Nanna could join us as well.  The kids loved it.   I could have spent weeks there, Sara too.  I stayed on the beach all day to enjoy every last moment.   I hope we are ever lucky enough to get back there.  I cried on my last day at the beach.  It meant so much to me as a kid, those were my very best childhood memories and I'm so thankful that my grandparents and our neighbor let me tag along with them down there and didn't just leave me at home because I was a kid.   I'd really like to go back when Brennan is older, especially so that Brennan can enjoy it like Sara did.  I'm thinking maybe 2014!

Trip Post Part 2 : THE BEACH!!!

It was a 5 hour drive winding down through LA (lower Alabama) to the beach.  Sara and Brennan did great on the car ride.  We took HWY 331 and we wound through all kinds of little towns. One called Florala I think had a Barbecue/ Sushi place and we were hungry so we stopped by for dinner. Some of their food was really good but I don't think sushi was their strong suit.

We arrived early enough at Laguna Beach to get to our hotel room at Sugar Sands and hit the beach.  We did not like the room they had us in.  It was small and cramped and not at all like the rooms I had been in previously when I stayed there.  Luckily Dan went and talked to the front desk and they had a room over on the newer side of the hotel that we could move over to.

It was a huge effort and thanks to Dan we moved over to our new suite.  It had a huge living room, kitchen, and super nice balcony with sliding door.  All the beds were in the back and we all slept in one room, Brennan even slept in the closet in his play pen but we were at the beach so no one cared, we made it work.

 We had to slather the kids in sunscreen, especially Sara with her fair skin.  Here she is with her sunscreen on ready to hit the beach.  Somehow, all of us managed to stay sunburn free all four days we were at the beach!  Sara had never been to a warm beach before so trying on all the beach equipment, masks, floats and vests, was new to her.

 Moose looked really cute in his swim stuff too.  He had fun playing on the hotel room floor with all the floats and ocean stuff.

Sara and Dan hit the water and did for the next several days.  Sara liked going out with Daddy so he could throw her over the waves.  She had a nice life vest and a big pink float that she used.  Also she really liked swimming at the pool too.  Her Astrology sign is Pisces and like a fish, she loves water.

Brennan even got in on the ocean action a little.  He floated out in the water in his little bumble bee float.  The ocean water was cold though, probably about 65 degrees so he didn't like it as much as the pool which was warmer and calmer, more his speed.

We ended up getting Brennan a exersaucer so he could sit on the beach with us while we swam and Nanna watched him so we could all go play in the water.  We tried to keep Brennan happy with goldfish and when he was done eating we filled up his try with ocean water so he could splash around in it.  We tried putting him on the sand but he kept eating handfuls and the seashells too and we felt it was too dangerous for him.  I hope we can go back someday when he's older and can really get into the beach action like Sara did.

The beach was gorgeous and I think Dan thought Florida beaches were really touristy theme park like places.  I kept telling him it was awesome and he saw for himself and agreed.  The beach stretches for miles and miles as far as you can see and it's gorgeous!

There was a guy who owned these beach deck chair things and rented jet skis, it was on the beach right in front of our hotel.  Mom rented us the chair for the week which was a really great place to store our stuff, watch the ocean, and take naps during the day.  The chair deck thing even came with a cushion and an umbrella.   Mom also rented us a jet ski and Dan and I got a 45 minute ride out in the ocean.  It was fast and furious.  I was hanging on for dear life, Dan also saw some flying fish.  We have no pics of the jet ski ride because my camera wouldn't have survived it.

Here are some random pics from the trip: 

Taking a break from the beach, having a snack.

Having fun doing a puzzle in the hotel room, taking a break from the beach.

Nanna sits with Brennan, enjoying the beach.  The hotel pictured in the background.

Brennan eating his snacks on the beach.