Coming Around Again...

Have you ever had the chance to take your children on a trip that you went on as a child?

My mom worked really hard to always make sure that we had some kind of family vacation in the summer. My favorite memories of my childhood are mostly from those trips. We've tried to do the same thing with our kids.

This weekend, we took our kids down to Bryce Canyon National Park. I remember going down to Southern Utah and hitting Zion's, Bryce, Grand Canyon, and Canyonlands one year as a child. We weren't that ambitious, though-- we only hit Bryce.

Confession time--Layne and I realized this summer that we have never taken our kids camping. Sure, we've gone on lots of trips, and we've even bought tents, sleeping bags, camp stoves, lanterns, etc., but we've never even gotten some of them out of their boxes.

Until this weekend.

Quite honestly, we had a great trip. I never realized how much work it was for my parents when I was a kid-- until I became the parent and my dad wasn't there to do the cooking and my mom wasn't there to buy the groceries and pack and keep things clean.

I do have to admit we cheated a little-- we stayed in a tipi that was already in place. There were flushing toilets and showers and even a pool. But, you've got to start somewhere, right?

Tipi, Sweet Tipi

Down into the Canyon. Which isn't really and canyon. (No stream in the middle.)

The Kids and I at Rainbow Point


Bet you wish you had my hat.

Emalee was pooped after 5 miles of hiking.

Happy Birthday to Layne. (I love you, Honey!)

Breakfast in the morning (That was always my favorite part of camping when I was little. Not as much fun now that I'm grown up and Dad wasn't around to cook.)

Going down Navajo Trail into the canyon. (Again, not really a canyon.)

Wall Street slot canyon. Em hated the heights getting there and I hated the walls once we were down.

Doug and Layne.

Weird things about Bryce-- everyone we ran into was German. I don't know what the draw is, but English was definitely in the minority. They even brought their own buses to sleep in-- European plates and all. I didn't appreciate them smoking in the jacuzzi, but other than that, it wasn't a big deal.

We had a great time-- it went way too fast. There was no cell service, so we actually went without phone, email, etc. for a whole weekend. Just what we needed.

Layne and I both found ourselves wondering why we don't do stuff like that more often. Now, we're going to start planning small weekend trips to Zion's, Canyonlands, Arches, etc...

Who's in?