Here's a run down of the week. I'll apologize in advance to anyone who might be reading this. I fear this may be the only scrapbooking I ever get done, and I want to include the whole trip. So if this post is long and boring, I'm really sorry.
We headed up to Island Park on Sunday. Baylen worked Saturday night so I drove up. It was kind of tricky driving and trying to entertain the kids. Baylen wasn't able to get as much sleep as I was hoping he'd be able to, but I think he survived. The lodge we stayed at was huge! There were enough beds for all the adults and several of the kids.
Sunday night we just hung out and played games. We went on a short little walk around the surrounding area. The kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins.
On Monday, we went into Yellowstone. We did the entire bottom loop- which took a good portion of the day. We started with Old Faithful (luckily it wasn't all that faithful because we got there late and were still able to see it).
We also went to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. That experience made me a little nervous. There was only a short rock wall separating my curious kids from a several hundred foot drop. I was a basket case the whole time we were at that stop.
We saw some wild life... a grizzly bear and cubs, a coyote, buffalo, and elk. Baylen took lots of pictures of these but none of them have our kids in them (for safety reasons!!!) so I decided they weren't interesting enough to post.It was neat to see some of the sights, but this portion of the vacation definitely wasn't top on my kids' list. It was a lot of driving!!! Ashlyn had a really hard time being confined to her car seat!
This may seem cruel to take a picture of my screaming child. However, I had literally tried everything else and I thought maybe the camera might distract her. No such luck.
On Tuesday, we were able to go to Mesa Falls. This stop brought back to mind several fun memories of my time at Ricks. I think Baylen got a little tired of my stroll down memory lane, but he was sweet to listen.
The kids had fun designing bottle rocket launchers and bottle rockets. They also had a blast testing them out. We ended up with several of them stuck in trees.
We were able to enjoy the hot tub as well. Actually, some of us enjoyed it. Tanner was terrified of what might attack us from out in the dark woods. Hailey was terrified of the jets and bubbles. Their smiles on this picture are definitely forced smiles!
On Thursday, Baylen and I took the kids to West Yellowstone to shop. We then played around in Island Park while everyone else went into Yellowstone to do the upper loop. We had a lot of fun just skipping rocks in the water and hiking around.
Of course, no Sillito family get together would be complete without some jammin' with Grandpa. The kids had a blast singing and dancing to grandpa's guitar.
Unfortunately, we had some kind of stomach bug go around the group. Several of us ended up with it and were down for a day. It seemed to hit the adults alot harder than the kids. Either that, or the kids are just tougher than we are!
Grandma planned several things to do with the kids. She taught them how to water color paint and painted the girls' nails. I don't have any pictures of these things because they happened on the day that I was sick in bed, but the kids did have a great time!
Baylen got in a lot of fishing. Not much of it was successful fishing, but I think he still had a fun.
I took a picture of these shoes because it always made me smile when I looked over at how many shoes were lined up. There were a lot of "silly" toes- 360 to be exact!!!
The kids really did have so much fun playing together. I rarely even saw them when we were at the lodge. Tanner loved having his boy cousins around. He and Koby are best buds. It is too bad that they live so far away!
Baylen ended up sick on the day that we left, so we didn't do a whole lot on the way back. However, I did take the kids to the St. Anthony sand dunes for a few hours. They were in heaven. Mickell loved doing summer saults down the hills. Tanner- well, he was in his own world. I'm not exactly sure what he was playing, but I'm sure he was pretending to be some kind of super hero. Hailey loved building with the sand. Ashlyn couldn't stand the feel of the sand but she loved watching everyone else. We definitely need to go back there again when Baylen can enjoy it with us!
Overall, it was a good trip. The weather didn't exactly cooperate (it snowed and was freezing cold), and the sick days were the pits. But, we loved spending time with the people we love. We really are blessed with such an incredible family. This trip definitely reminded us of that!
This is the best picture I could get of the grandkids. It's sure hard to get a good picture of 18 little kids!
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