Labor Day Weekend

This year for Labor Day, we decided to join my family on their annual camping trip near Jackson,WY. They have gone there for the last 6 years or so and always invite us and it just has never really worked with our schedules. This year since the kids hadn't started school, we decided it would work out to go. We left Lovell Friday around 2 and drove the 4 hours to our camp site through Yellowstone National Park. It was a beautiful day so we stopped at West Thumb for a bathroom stop and to walk around and see the geothermal sites.

We came around a corner in the park and saw this big guy coming right at us in the road! The boys were so excited to see an animal!

My boys on our walk at West Thumb.

First thing when we started our walk, we saw this baby elk. We were curious as to where the momma was but found her just a short distance away getting a drink and eating.

The momma elk.

This was one of their favorites because it was bubbling mud.

 After we made a the small loop at West Thumb, we continued on to our camp site. We met up with grandpa and grandma Foulger, Megan and Jabin and the Whitlocks (family friends) at Coulter Bay campground. We got there and the boys did a little bike ride around the campground while we started to get dinner ready. We had corn from grandpa Asay and bbq beef sandwiches for dinner and then it was off to bed. Jabin and Megan were nice enough to let Christian, Landon and I bunk with them in the camper they brought while the two older boys slept in grandpa and grandma Foulger's camper.

Shucking some corn for dinner.

Dinner in the dark!

Landon in his bed. It was perfect for him!

 Saturday morning we woke up to a little bit of rain in the morning. We ate french toast for breakfast and then went down to Jackson Lake so the boys could fish.

Enjoying breakfast in grandpa's camper.

There is nothing better than hot chocolate in the morning in the mountains!

The mountains were beautiful!

 The boys were in heaven! They set up their poles and then threw rocks in the lake forever! The guys decided to have a contest to see who could hit the buoy first with a rock using Carson's wrist rocket. I'm not sure any of them hit it, but they came close!

Trying to find the perfect rock!

Travis flinging some fishing line around. He found a pretty cool lure on the end of it!

Christian trying out the fishing. If the weather had been better, he would have tried to fish in a river, but it just didn't happen. I guess we will just have to go back!

hanging out.

After hanging out by the lake for a while, we decided to go on a walk around to the marina. 

Starting out our hike.

Our family in front of the Tetons.

Our destination. Grandpa was telling the boys about the time he built the Tetons and decided to  put a dam in so that they would grow bigger and then they got really big! He told the boys this story about 4 times and it changed every time!

 We walked to a point and watched the boats and enjoyed the nice day. There were all sorts of silly rock formations that people had built. Jabin told the boys that they were where people were buried. The boys decided to build one of their own.

Carson by the big rock formations.

Building their own.

Carson and his "nose" that he found.

Three cute boys.

After a while we decided we needed to head back and have lunch and get ready for the day. We showered, the kids had naps and then we drove into Jackson for the rest of the day.

Landon enjoying this root beer at lunch.

 When we got to Jackson we walked around a few of the little shops. Christian was on a mission to find a hat he had seen in January when he was there for meetings but wasn't successful.

The boys had fun trying on these buffalo hats.

Our family in front of the antler arches.

We put our names in for dinner at Merry Piglets, a funny name for a Mexican restaurant, and went and waited for the shoot out to start. They were delayed because of the sound guy, so we didn't end up getting to watch it before it was time to eat. At dinner, we told them we were celebrating Travis birthday, and they brought him a huge fried ice cream to share with us all.

Travis sitting on one of the cool statues on the boardwalk in Jackson.

He was pretty surprised!

Ready to dig in!

After dinner, we headed over to the Playhouse and watched Paint You Wagon. It was so good and the boys LOVED it! It's a small theater making it very cozy and the performers were really close. We ended up getting back to the campers around 11:30, making for a late night!

Landon riding on the saddle before the play started.

Sunday, we slept in and had a huge breakfast and kind of hung out in the campers until it stopped raining. When the rain stopped, we decided to go on a big hike around part of the lake. We hiked for about 2 miles and the boys did great and walked the whole way! They had lots of fun seeing all the different kinds of mushrooms and trying to find animals. On one of our first stops, we found a bunch of tiny little toads. The boys had a blast trying to find them in the rocks. I think we caught about 6 of them.

Our group at the first stop.

Looking for more toads and seeing if they can swim...and they could!

Carson and two of the frogs.

A cool leaf Carson wanted me to take a picture of.

We stopped one more time to take some pictures and rest for a bit.

Landon trying to climb up using some roots. He was filthy by the time we were done with out adventure but he sure had fun!

Almost done!

We stopped at the end and threw some more rocks before we went back and had a light lunch.

Our group hanging out.

For dinner that night, we went down to the fire pits (they didn't have any at the campsites themselves) and cooked tin foil dinners and then roasted marshmallows for a treat. We didn't linger very long because it was cold!

Waiting for our dinners to get done cooking.

Christian, Carson and Travis roasting some mallows.

Landon enjoying a smore!

Monday, Travis' birthday, we got up got ready and headed out about 11. Most everyone was going to head to get pizza, but we decided to just head home so we could get stuff organized for the kids to start school the next day. We made a stop at Wal-mart in Cody and then Travis picked to eat lunch at Wendy's.

Our group:Jabin, Megan, Travis,grandma Foulger, Jill, Carson, Grandpa Foulger, Christian and Landon.

Jabin and Megan brought a gift for Travis to open and he was so excited for more ninja turtle stuff!

On our way home we saw two buffalo (this guy was walking down the middle of the road) and a moose.

 Once we got things unloaded and semi put away, Travis opened a few more gifts. I sure hope he had a great birthday!

 

That evening after dinner, Christian gave each of the boys father's blessings and we all snuggled on the couch before it was time for bed. It was a great weekend and we look forward to going back again!