Southern Utah June 2017

With Brandon being gone for 2 weeks and work ending, I was really not looking forward to being alone for so long without much to do. My sister had planned a trip to Utah to take Jonah hiking, so I decided to tag along. Isaac and Dominika were living in Cedar City at the time, and I'm always up for an excuse to spend time with my #2 favorite human: Adelina!

I flew into St. George, Utah, and stayed with my cousin Melissa and her family for a couple of days. I flew in at sunset and it was so gorgeous - I was so wishing Brandon could've been there with me.

Melissa and Thomas have been building their own house for about 2 years, so it was fun to see the progress. I'm so impressed that they even know how to do any of this. It's going to be so gorgeous when it's all finished!

It was so great to catch up with Melissa. She's been one of my best friends for the majority of my life, and being with her always feeds my soul. On Sunday, Tessa, Jonah, and Holden flew in and met us at Melissa's house and Isaac drove the kids over as well and we had a big family dinner together, then I rode back to Cedar City with them.

Dominika, ironically, was in Indiana for a couple of days for a funeral I think, so the first day I was there I spent with the kids while Isaac was at work. We played, went to the playground, and (I) napped.

Ephraim was so sleepy in the swing. I remembered having this exact same experience with Adelina a couple of years previously when she was just a baby. The swing is so soothing!

Dominika had suggested I take the kids for a short drive after the playground to help them fall asleep. I think it worked. I don't really remember. But I got to check out the beautiful scenery near their house!

But like seriously. How cute is she?

The next day we all visited Zion National Park and hiked the Emerald Pools trail. 

It's always hard to capture natural beauty in a photo, I think, but Zion is especially difficult. The cliffs are so huge and majestic, the colors are striking, and it's just so impressive. No way to capture that in a photo.

Tessa packed Ephraim, since Isaac had Adelina, but the pack was broken and not very comfortable, so she just carried him on the way down. He fell asleep pretty quickly.

This girl loved all the visitors and attention, as usual. She's such a ham!

Dominika got home late that night, so the next day I joined Tessa and Jonah to hike Kolob Canyons, a separate, less-traveled part of the park. The first trail we took, Kolob Canyons Viewpoint, was STUNNING, but the gnats were insane. Constant buzzing, constant bugs in the face. We didn't stay long because of that, but I couldn't get over how pretty the view was and it was so peaceful, compared to the busy-ness of the main canyon trails we were on the day before.

We came back down the canyon a bit and did the Taylor Creek trail. It was a different kind of trail - the destination was a Double Arch Alcove rock formation. It was a pretty easy, level trail along the creek, but it gave Tessa and I time to talk while Jonah ran ahead.

On the hike back out, we noticed a plane circling not far from us. As we drove out of the canyon, we realized there had been a brush fire just outside the park - crazy how quickly it started and was put out!

We got some dinner, then that evening, we headed up to Cedar Breaks National Monument. It reminded me of a cross between the Grand Canyon and Bryce Canyon. GORGEOUS! I wish we'd been able to get there earlier. We were losing a lot of daylight and weren't able to spend as much time there as we would've liked. At 10,000 feet, it was pretty chilly!

 These bristlecone pines are close to 2,000 years old!

We saw these strange raised trails all over the ground and finally spied the culprit!

Because it's so high, not all of the winter snow was melted - it made the trail pretty tricky in a few spots!

I was so grateful to have been able to go, loved seeing Isaac, Dominika, and the kids, and of course really enjoyed the scenery, but I was happy to come home because it meant Brandon would be coming home in just a couple of days. I'll no longer enjoy traveling nearly as much if he's not with me.