Chad, Britt and the boys came to Utah to visit over Labor Day this year. We love having them and the girls love having their cousins around! We did so many fun things while they were here. I'll try and get through everything we did together!
Grandpa and Grandma Iverson happened to be coming through Utah the first night that Chad and Britt were here. We met them, along with Chris Judy and their kids, downtown for dinner. We ate at the Garden in the Joseph Smith building. It was good food, but mostly great to have such a fun get-together with family!
Grammie and Papa were nice enough to let the kids sit on their table, so us parents could get in some good chat time.
After dinner, Nolan and Rease had a blast looking through the big windows at the temple and the city below.
These 2 cousins are so cute together!
The next day, we spent the day and night at the cabin. I didn't get a lot of pictures of us while we were there but did snap this cute picture of Nolan and Rhen getting a "ride" on the hammock.
We made dinner in the dutch ovens and then Papa and the kids did the dishes. They are such good helpers!
That night, Josh and Rease decided to sleep outside in the tent. Rease loves "camping" with daddy, even if it is just outside our door.
We got up bright and early the next morning so we could be the first ones on the lake - we got there at 7:00 am. We spent a fabulous day at Deer Creek - which is quickly becoming our favorite spot to boat. The water in the morning is perfect glass and usually we are one of the only boats on the lake until about 11:00. 
We got these awesome pictures of Steph doing her thing on the wakeboard - you go girl! I didn't get many other pictures of skiers/wakeboarders, but Josh, Caleb, Justin and dad all had their turns. Dad is a great skier and loves having the perfect water to ski on. This particular boating trip though was not his best. He was on his last run and took a hard fall trying to jump the wake - he had a hard time getting up. After being back in the boat for a while, we realized that he was not okay and wasn't saying much. He later went to the doctor and found out that he had broken three ribs on that fall - no wonder he was in pain. That's the end of skiing season for him!
Rhen and I spent some time on the shore and she entertained herself throwing rocks into the water - so fun! 
Back at the cabin after a long day on the boat - just relaxing in front of a movie. 
The next day Grammie set up an appointment at our local fire station to have the kids go through a tour of the fire truck and station. It turned out that they were pretty scared and shy and didn't quite know what to think of this big truck and all the crazy fireman clothes. This is the best picture we got of the kids and the fire truck. 
Rease was trying to be brave - you can tell she isn't quite sure what to think. She kept saying that she didn't want them to turn on the loud noise. I finally realized that she is scared of the siren and was afraid they were going to turn that on when she was around. 
Rhen climbing in the fire truck. 
And this is her favorite cheesy face. 
This is where Rease spent a lot of her time, because she was being shy and scared of everything.
Rhen tried to cheer her up but it didn't do much good. 
She really just wanted to be by herself, so she found a new place to sit. 
We finally did talk Rease into going inside the fire station with us and getting her own fire hat. She was okay once we were inside and away from the fire truck.
These were the nice firemen that showed us around. It ended up being a great tour and the kids had a good, fun experience. 
Later that night, Chad made his fabulous home-made pizza. He learned how to make authentic pizza when he was on his mission in Italy and believe me, they are the most delicious thing you will ever taste. 
Hayley was in charge of cutting the cheese into small pieces.
And Rease helped roll out the dough. 
What a good cook we have! The pizza turned out amazing as always and I don't think there was even a crumb left over.
We also took a trip to the dinosaur museum while they were here. I have actually never been and we really enjoyed it - it is an awesome place! 
And the kids enjoyed themselves and loved all the crazy dinosaur skeletons.
There is one part in the museum where they let the kids "dig" for dinosaur bones. It was super cute and fun for the kids to do for a while.
Rease liked to see all the different types of animals.
This is a crazy big turtle skeleton! We had a great visit and learned a lot of new things!
One of my favorite things to do in the fall is go to the BYU football games. Dad got enough tickets for us to all go while Chad and Britt were here. We left the kids with babysitters and spent the afternoon tailgating and cheering on the cougars!
I was in charge of cooking the brauts.
And we always try to watch the band as they are coming into the stadium.
It was a fun game and especially fun to all be together! The weather was perfect and the cougars won!
Justin and Steph had us over for a bbq one afternoon. They always have so many delicious, different types of meat for us to try out. This time they decided to do shiskabobs and had about 6 or 7 different meats to choose from. Plus all the vegetables you could think of. It was delicous and fun to try all the meat they had. 
Just a few of the shiskabob creations...
Grammie and Wyatt.
Uncle Chad and Wyatt.
The best part of Justin and Steph's house is the yard. It is a perfect place to spend a summer afternoon and there is a sandbox for the kids to play in - what could be better? They had a blast! Thanks to Justin and Steph for hosting a fabulous bbq for all of us!
We also celebrated Nolan's 3rd birthday while they were here. Britt invited her siblings that are living in Provo up for cake and ice cream and we had a fun time celebrating with Nolan.
Happy Birthday buddy! 
As you can see, we had such a great time and packed as many fun things into one week as we possibly could. Unfortunately I don't think it was a very relaxing vacation for them because we were always busy - but boy did we have a fun time with them here! We love you all and can't wait to see you again! Thanks for coming to visit!
So we've been to Greg's cabin 4 or 5 times now and have always talked about driving up to Bloomington, Idaho and hiking to Bloomington Lake and spending the day there. We have actually tried a couple of times and for some reason or another the road to the lake has been closed and we have never been able to get inside the gate. This year we really wanted to try again and made it part of our weekend plans. The forecast called for rain in the afternoon so we headed out early Saturday morning. The drive up is about an hour but the whole way is beautiful and we enjoyed hanging out with just us.
I love the mountains surrounding us. 
