April 30, 2025

Left side - Snow Canyon hike, Baylie and some new toys from Darren, Vortex hike, kids at Pizza Pie Cafe

Center - Rachael's spring concert, foosball fun, Lagoon, fun

Right side - Quoridor duel, Sadie, Easter dinner in SJ, Sadie and Baylie

April 28, 2025

Today I had lunch in the break room at work. Friday I had lunch in front of the Four Faces ruins and art. Friday was way better. Adding it to my “cool lunch spot” list. 

April 27, 2025

I love the day after when you can look back and remember all the awesome things:

No bugs. Fantastic weather. Flowers and bloomin’ cactus - wide open primrose, yellow, globemallow, desert daisy (my name for it), and locoweed. Amazing rock art - Four Faces and All American Man. Angel Arch - bigger than I thought and us being the only ones there. Only seeing 11 other people in 4 days and no one for over 24 hours. Bear tracks. So many stars. Darren carrying my pack down the sketchy part. Morning wake up calls from the Spotted Towhees. Pink morning sky. When the rock spires lit up with dark sky behind it. Salt Creek - come for the arch, stay for the rock art and ruins. 

April 26, 2025

The canyon comes alive with Spotted Towhee birds as the morning begins. We started our hike out early and we followed Bear tracks on the trail. Haven’t done that before. Then we climbed out of this land of canyons.  What a great and hard backpack. 33 miles through some cool stuff.  

People total. Wed- 5 Thurs-0 Fri- 6 Sat - 0 = 11. 

April 25, 2025

We woke up early to hike to Angel Arch. It was such a lovely morning. The sky was pink, the primrose flowers were wide open, and then some spires lit up. Sigh. 

Angel arch was awesome. It was bigger than photos show. We snapped a few photos and ate some breakfast and then headed back to camp.  I really wanted to spend more time here. I’ve wanted to come here for quite a few years, finally made it, and we were the only ones here but we had a lot of miles to cover today.  I did send up a thankful prayer and said hi to my mom and dad (with a few tears). I always think of them when I see cool things. 

Back to camp to pack up and then head out for a long afternoon of hiking. Oh, we heard an owl last night. Cool! Darren pulled out Merlin at 2am to get it. The nights have been nice so far - lots of stars and not too cold. I think it was mid to low 40s but my sleeping pad and bag have kept me cozy. 

April 24, 2025

Birds sang us a good morning song to begin the day. Our neighbor came over to chat during breakfast. He commented on our interesting breakfast (which included fruit pies) and yet gladly accepted one. :) The sun lit up Kirk’s Arch across the way. It was a pleasant walk this morning with a nice breeze as we spotted some arches, and found ruins and pictographs. Said hi to All American Man. We had a fabulous lunch spot at Four Faces. I loved this art. Near here were also yellow flowers and “bloomin’ cactus”. (Must be said as Mason said it many years ago.)

The afternoon was a slog. It was warm and long and packs were heavy after hiking all day. We spent the late afternoon and evening relaxing at the campsite and getting water. 

April 23, 2025

Salt Creek Canyon here we are. 3 nights of backpacking fun. Today we drove to the cathedral butte trailhead on Beef Basin Road. 4.5 miles hiking down into the canyon for our first campsite. 

Heard crow wings flapping as we sat and chatted at our campsite which is one of my favorite things. you can see Kirk’s Arch from sitting at our campsite. Chatted with our neighbors as we filtered water. It’s nice when the only thing to do in the evening is get water. 

Thinking of my dad as Rob talks about surveying, and my mom as we drive over so many cattle guards and I had to touch the car roof. 

April 21, 2025

Happy Kenzie’s birthday! Celebrated a few days ago with dinner at “Pizza Lemon” as Darren calls it, and candle making. 

Kenz is such a great kid! Her students are so lucky to have her. I am so glad she came to glacier with us last summer. Also thankful for a hike or two with her, some family time with her, and lots of Sunday evenings. 

April 20, 2025

He is risen! He really is and it makes everything ok. 

Christ the Lord is ris’n today, Alleluia!

Sons of men and angels say, Alleluia!

Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia!

Sing, ye heav’ns, and earth reply, Alleluia!

Good family Easter weekend. Saw my 5 kids and spent time with my side and Darren’s side. Sadie was very happy with the dessert choice of strawberry shortcake. 

April 19, 2025

There was a Denise birthday celebration in Richfield. It was a good excuse to get together with the siblings. We chatted and played games and were all together for the first time since my mom passed away. We talked about her and I heard stories I hadn’t heard about her and about Denise. It was a good day. Denise, Todd, Don and Cheryl, Cris, and me. Kim, Kaden and cutie Mazie were there for a bit as was Mason and Rachael. 

My favorite part of the day was actually playing Dr Mario with Mason. A last second win and other close games were way fun. 

April 18, 2025

Lovely road walk in the mountains with some snow coming down. Sigh. 

Such a great evening with pre-birthday Kenzie celebrating. Listening to Sadie sing Amish Paradise just topped off the evening. 

And then I finished a good book. What a good day. 

April 16, 2025

Came home from my hike and noticed the aspens have some leaves! 

April 15, 2025

I love seeing regular patrons at work.  Today my 5 year old patron friend brought me a drawing. It’s awesome. 

April 13, 2025

This was a lovely week. After going to the temple on Wednesday I have felt hopeful. I know that we can always have hope because of Jesus but this felt even bigger. I haven’t had that strong of feeling of hope for a while and it feels like a gift.

On this Palm Sunday I imagine how hopeful Christ’s entrance to Jerusalem must have felt. Horribly hard things followed but with His resurrection there was hope again. While there are days where hope is dim, in Jesus there will always be hope. Celebrate the days of hopeful excitement and know that He is risen. 

Psalm 146:5 Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God:

And then this picture shows up and just makes me smile. October 2010. 

April 11, 2025

More spring evidence - Found some glacier lilies on our quick Horsetail Falls hike. I love these flowers. Also Rachael’s spring concert. (Lots of plucking.)

This week had thing interactions of kind and thoughtful people. Farmer Gary showing the girls the brand new lambs, Claire and Spencer bring Sadie a gift from their travels they saw and knew she would like, Bob and Vicki coming to Ephraim to support Rachael at her concert. I told Bob, who was my high school basketball coach - could you have imagined 35 years ago that we’d be at an orchestra concert together? :)

April 10, 2025

I love Sadie’s art people. 

April 9, 2025

Cam, Sadie, and I took Baylie in a walk to see the lambs. Happy spring. (There are more than 2 now.)

Also, the girls are into foosball lately and it makes me smile. They crack me up playing each other. 

April 8, 2025

Lamb alert! Lamb alert! I said that twice because there are two!

April 7, 2025

Happy my mom's birthday.  I miss her.  Why did it take her passing for me to realize some things?  And why did it take her passing for me to learn some things? I look back to when she was young and things had to have been difficult at times.  She worked hard to come out on top.  She was a great mom and she sure loved her grandkids.  Here's my recent picture find of her.  She did not love the water but still went to Lake Powell often for her family.  (August 1993)

April 6, 2025

Desert wandering, warmth, and watching President Nelson for a good weekend. 

Kids also had a good weekend. Minecraft movie (mixed reviews), foosball, and Pizza Pie Cafe. KT MR C S

April 5, 2025

Enjoyed another beautiful warm spring day down south. Got out to hike Padre Canyon. It’s a cool canyon. We added a spur and closed the loop for a 7.5 mile hike. Came back to sit outside with some chips and dip while pretending Del Boca Vista. Ha ha. Sandee made us dinner (in addition to breakfast) and then we took a drive to see some Joshua Trees at sunset. We really are practicing retirement. Closed the day out with Joker Rummy. We also watched some conference. 

April 4, 2025

Darren and I are spending the end of Spring Break in Beaver Dam.  It was a lovely day. Good weather, a walk, a puzzle, a hike, a casino buffet, a card game, and hanging out. 

Sandee does the best lunches and Clayton cracks me up. You never know if he’s telling the truth or just making things up. I thought for sure he was making things up when I asked him where they got the name Gunlock for the town and he said that it was from Jacob Hamblin’s brother whom they called Gunlock. He was right - Gunlock Will Hamblin. He also called Juniper trees Juniperus which I thought he was making up but sure enough, that’s the first part of its scientific name.