Summer Vacation, Goodrich style

Some friends of Justin's parents lent us their cabin for a few days last week. It's down south, near Panguitch and Bryce Canyon. The family has about 400 acres of land so there were plenty of things to keep us busy! Most of the time was probably spent at the cabin or close to: 4-wheeling, playing baseball, catching lizards, playing at the pond, building forts in the loft, and chasing 9 kids!Lana (it was her family's cabin) had all these little rubber ducks lying around so we took them to a little stream and raced them. It was hot enough that it felt wonderful to wade around in the water. Molly fell in to her neck about 6 times and ended up with no clothes on. Stockton enjoyed putting his feet in the water and eating rocks.Just down the road from the cabin was a pond. And going into the pond was a slide they had rigged up. They dug a trench out of the side of the mountain and covered it with tarps and then you were supposed to slide into the very cold water on a pad. This is what it looks like from the top.It was very intimidating. But despite nerves, we all eventually went down. And then we kept going down, because it was so fun! By the last day, even Molly had decided that she would give it a try. (She went down the bottom half.)On Saturday we went to Bryce Canyon to hike around and explore a little. We had planned on doing one of the shorter hikes (1.3 miles) but we ended up on a much longer hike (2.9 miles). What would have been fun and enjoyable as adults turned out to be hard and long with kids in tow. All of the kids ended up getting carried at some point or another, with the exception of Lizzy, who hiked the whole thing by herself! Our family started out with Justin carrying Stockton in the backpack, Molly and I walking. This lasted for a while, occasionally Justin would carry Molly in his arms or shoulders with Stock in the backpack. Eventually we switched and I carried Stockton in the backpack and Molly got a shoulder ride from Justin. That was short-lived, however, because #1-I am way out of shape and couldn't do it for too long and #2-all Stockton did back there was pull my hair-and it hurt! By the end of the hike Justin was carrying Molly in the backpack and I was carrying Stockton in my arms. We did that back and forth through these switchbacks...Once we got to the top though and saw the amazing view we all felt pretty exhilarated. The picture doesn't really do it justice, but it is gorgeous.(I had to convince Justin to stand on that ledge for a picture. He is terrified of heights and was literally shaking.)

After seeing the view we were pretty glad that we did the hike. We quickly ate lunch and headed back to the cabin. We were HOT and sweaty and were ready for a dip into the pond, via the slide.

After some fun on the slide and some dinner our family broke camp and headed home. We were smart and left at bedtime. That way the kids slept the whole way home. When we got home we just carried them to their beds. It was a fun, exciting, but exhausting weekend...we were happy to be home!