Back to School Season

We were grateful to be home Saturday because there were lots of preparations to be done for the back to school season which we were heading straight into with Lila having LHS Dance Company camp the following week and schedules were posted on Saturday and of course it wasn't right so we had to schedule an appointment for a schedule change. While unpacking, doing laundry, and housework we took time to talk with each of the kids about what their school schedule would look like and what they hoped to get out of the year. It was nice to talk with each of the kids in preparation for their back to school blessings Steve gave them on Sunday, August 3rd. Steve even gave me a blessing as I start going back to work. It was a lovely Sunday afternoon.

 

Then we wandered over to the walkabout for a bit. Lila and I have made a goal try and get a few steps in on Sunday in the form of a leisurely walk to touch base about life and keep our bodies moving. Well as it always turns out when we get to the neighborhood gathering she ends up having more fun than she thinks she will so we finished the walk without her and just as we rounded the corner to head home we saw her and her friends coming towards us. I teased them that they were all set for the school carpool.

 

Monday, August 4th was a full day. We got Lila up and off to dance camp, yay she can drive herself. Then I had new employee orientation and a few other appointments in the afternoon. The girls and I snuck in a quick shopping trip to Love Olive while the boys were at pickleball. Then Steve and I took the boys to the Farmington Pool for dinner and swimming (we had been invited to attend the party since we coached Marcus's football team). They had a blast. Marcus even tried going down both of the slides and Andrew jumped off the high diving board a couple of times. The first time he tried to cannon ball and spun a little too far forward which caused him to smack his face pretty hard against the water so I was impressed he braved it a couple of more times after that.

 

I was pretty lax this whole week with the chore and schedule thing. I figured the boys could use a free week before school started up so they spent a lot of time chilling, reading, swimming, and maybe even having a little extra electronic time. I did manage to squeeze in a back to school hair cut one evening.

 

After dance camp on Tuesday, Lila went over to the school to make her schedule changes and get her parking pass. She called me as she was talking to the counselor because she could not get into the CE classes she wanted and take AP Lang. I was so proud of her discussing it with the counselor and all of her options. She was kind but advocated for herself and what she needed. It finally ended with her taking 2 different CE courses which will be fine but the last trick was seminary wouldn't fit into her schedule. I get that they try to level the classes so I told Lila just to home release that period and we would talk to the seminary principal. She came home crying because that's how she deals with stress, but I told her I was so proud and her schedule will be great! She even tried going by the seminary building to talk with them but it was locked so I sent the seminary principal and email and he said, yes they would take her any period she could come over. So that was a relief to her. It was BOGO Fiiz day so I took the girls to get a Fiiz drink that afternoon. Also as part of Lila's dance camp they attended two days at Ririe Woodbury in SLC. So I arranged a carpool for the team and drove down one afternoon to pick a group up. It was fun to chat with the girls. 

Friday, August 8th Steve had a work picnic and hike team building. 

 

He was a trooper to come back in time to help me grill for the Dance Company since we hosted the team BBQ at our house. I asked their Coach if she would like to invite Mom's to the last 20 minutes to socialize while we enjoyed dessert and she thought it was a great idea. It was so fun to put faces with names and get to know each other. It turned out to be a great evening.

 

While we were doing the team bbq, Ellie headed to the airport to pick up a friend from the U who would be staying with us for the weekend so they could attend a wedding together. Lizzy was so sweet and I'm glad she could stay with us. It was crazy because she flew home and had two days to finish loading up her stuff to move back to the U. Ellie had been working hard on packing up stuff and getting the basement cleaned before the bbq and Lizzy visited. She finished vacuuming just as the first guest arrived, whew! 😂

Saturday, August 9th Lila had team pictures and the cute seniors on the team arranged to pickup all the dancers and take them to Ogden for the team pictures which was so nice. Then they all had lunch at Culvers together. After which Lila drove over for a team action shot they were trying for the first time ever and it took longer than anticipated so individual shots were pushed back. Lila was patient and got them done. Lizzy and Ellie went paddleboarding, then to do baptisms at the Layton and Syracuse temple with a Fiiz run afterwords for an "authentic Utah experience" Ellie said. Then they showered and got ready go to the reception. 

 

 

Meanwhile I went to a bridal shower and we did some catch up housework around here and helped Andrew finalize his talk for Sunday. Yep, he spoke for the first time on August 10th and he did great! He really worked on his talk all week as part and then we listened to it Saturday and gave a few suggestions but so proud of him and how composed he was. You can still watch it on YouTube if you would like.

 

Monday, August 11th was a pretty normal day, I really needed to go to Costco to get some items on sale and stock up on lunchbox appropriate food. So after dinner we took the girls to Costco (they like the clothes at Costco and I thought Ellie might stock up on a few food items for her apartment). The boys kind of wanted to go but we convinced them they could chill at home which was a good thing because they had some ceiling fans on sale and we bought so much stuff we were squishing it in every crevice of the Tesla. 😂 

 

Tuesday, August 12th Andrew had his final fiddling performance at an assisted living facility. Ellie had taken him to the other two since Steve and I usually have a commitment that evening but I was available this week and so happy to attend with him. The teachers were really glad Andrew was there because several of the older students had back to school night and he was the only one playing the more difficult pieces. So proud of him and how hard he works on the violin.

Ellie picked up her dog, Kodiak Thursday, August 14th of course everyone was excited. The poor puppy seemed a little scared at first. He is a puppy who likes to nip/chew on things and excitedly pees everywhere. I'm praying this is truly everything she hopes it will be for her.

That night the boys had back to school night so Steve was a trooper to go with me and we quickly ran around to their classrooms met their teachers and signed up for what we needed. Then we picked up Habit Burger for dinner because frankly I was burned out.

 

Friday, August 15th we got up early because Ellie's move in time was 8-10am. Steve took her and Lila down with all of her stuff. The nice thing is there is a dedicated parking lot so they were able to get a spot to park close to the building unlike last year.

I had a commitment that morning after which I took the boys down so we could have lunch together and see her apartment. 

She's living by herself in a brand new studio apartment but the space is really limited especially with all of her boxes still so I took Lila and the boys home while Steve stayed to with Ellie. Lila and I cleaned all of the cars from our trip and in preparation for her driving to school. I also washed and cleaned Ellie sheets and the guest bedroom sheets so I was busy. 

While were at lunch I remembered I had made a cute back to school sign for Ellie but forgot to take a picture that morning so when we got backed I emailed it to Steve and Ellie. They pulled it up on her tablet and took this picture. Fun fact she also recently learned that one of her seminary teachers from NUAMES is now teaching institute at the U so she is going to take a class from him.

Steve told me Ellie was struggling to let him go. So they decided to go on a little hike. Then after much debate she decided to come home and stay the night.

Saturday, August 16th we watched a few new Phineas and Ferb episodes which is just what we needed for a little light thing before taking Ellie back to her apartment. As I was making lunch and banana bread for her to take to meet her neighbors we noticed she was crying outside. I asked her what was going on. She couldn't find words so I kept asking questions until it came out that she is not enjoying school. We talked through her options of possibly withdrawing for this term and taking a break. I asked if she wanted to try other classes or apply to transfer schools and she said no to both of those. We looked at deadlines to withdraw and decided she might as well try it for a few days. I also told her we don't expect her to get straight As but to just do her best and to enjoy this time. She calmed down a little. As we drove back to SLC that afternoon we listened to Elder Uchtdorf's talk, Fourth Floor, Last Door because we had been joking last night about how a few things in her apartment were not quite finished, the WiFi wasn't setup and it was missing a few shelves and Steve said well you are the last door on the 4th and highest floor which made me think of this talk. It was beautiful to listen to. Ellie enjoyed attending he YSA ward and catching up with some friends on Sunday. I keep trying to teach my kids that some feelings of nervousness and anxiety are normal especially as we start new things (a new school year counts and living on your own after a rough year with roommates is a lot of change). We are proud of Ellie and want to help here succeed and recognize her strengths.

  

Monday, August 18th school began for all of my children. Lila was out the door at 6:55am carpooling with her good friend Macey. It was a little funny because the night before Lila said, "I'm freaking out that I'm not freaking out about school." 😂 I said, "You are a junior, you got this!" Then she realized she never walked her classes so we talked through where she would go for them and she was fine. GO GIRL!

Then I took the boys to school at 8:40am. Thankfully the boys line up in a similar area this year which is nice.

We had planned to meet Ellie for ice cream in Bountiful to celebrate everyone surviving their first day but with the bus schedule and things we just decided to pick up the ice cream and take it to Ellie. When we got to Ellie's apartment it smelled really bad from the dog. So after I dished up ice cream I opened her new vacuum mop we bought and started cleaning. She said her classes went well. She did have a little crash on her bike, her dropper post went down and she lost her balance. She also said it was tough sleeping with Kodiak so she decided to come home for the week to hopefully get the dog into a good routine and commute to classes.

 

The boys love going out to see the dog after school and getting him to do his tricks at feeding time. Poor Marcus's allergies are acting up though.

I was able to go in and help with Marcus's first fun Friday. I had a good time. We played Back to School Phone Charades.

 

We even received a sweet sweet email from Andrew's Chinese teacher after the third day of school.
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Moore,

Hope this mail finds you well. This is Tan Laoshi. I am truly happy to be Andrew's Chinese teacher this school year! Over just these first few days, I have already seen so many wonderful things in him that I would love to share with you.

Andrew is such a remarkable student. In class, he is always attentive, engaged, and his Chinese ability really shines. What touches me most is that he consistently speaks Chinese during lessons, setting a great example for his classmates. For example, the other day when I asked a question, Andrew not only answered in Chinese but also used a more complexed sentence pattern-his classmates noticed, and it encouraged them to try harder too. Moments like that make me feel so grateful to have him in my class.

I hope you can continue to encourage him at home, because his growth and confidence are already inspiring. Please also let Andrew know that although I sometimes have many tasks to manage in class and may not always get the chance to chat with him personally, I truly care about him. I want him to feel that his teacher notices and values him every single day.

It is such a joy to teach Andrew, and I look forward to a wonderful year together.

With warmth and appreciation,
Ms. Tan Laoshi

It has been a crazy and good week. I have seen the Lord's hand in my life as thoughts have entered my mind or as I have been able to quickly prepare a Fun Friday or primary lesson as there are so many other demands on my life right now. I also had a day of work Thursday to learn the material I will be presenting and felt calm and comfortable with the material. Life is good and we just keep doing our best each day as the Lord guides us a long.

Wedding, Football, Reception, Camping & Tsunami

We've been preparing for our big summer adventure all month. After coming back from camping at Granite Flats we kept going through the camping gear in preparation for camping on Channel Islands. I spent two days going through the camping gear and cleaning the garage. I took two loads of stuff to DI and we filled the garbage can a couple of times (even after doing the dump run following Granite Flats). It feels really good to be organized and I think it really helped with how smoothly our camping experience went. We also found a new tent on sale that would be smaller to take on our adventure and which we need since the old one is no longer waterproof. Marcus even drew this picture of our trip at the beginning of summer, he is so excited to go camping on an island and see dolphins.

 

When Steve requested time off for this trip he included Wednesday, July 23rd because the wedding was originally planned for Thursday and it worked out great because it gave him time to finish stuffing and packing the camping gear. He did attend a couple of meetings and work a little but overall we were finalizing things to hit the road early Thursday, July 24th. I also had to quickly attend some onboarding for my new job that day which gave me some online training that I did while on the long drives (good use of time if you ask me).

 

We were aiming to the hit road about 7:30am. It was closer to 8 but the kids travel so well now. I packed snacks and some salami, cheese, and crackers for a light lunch along the road. I had also reserved the Paddington movie series from the library, well I couldn't get the first movie so we rented it from google and let the kids watch it Wednesday night while Steve and I finished packing. We also decided to relisten to Inkheart because I don't think we've finished it (I believe we started that on our trip to Yosemite). 

 

Carole had invited whoever was around for dinner Thursday night and we managed to pull up to her place right at 6pm (which was the estimated time we told her). There was this great view of the temple out one of windows at Carole's rental.

 

We had a nice visit with Terry (Carole's youngest sister) and her husband while we were there. Katie kept saying how excited she was to be getting married and how excited she was for us to meet Jonathon. Steve's brother Greg, the father of the bride, was also there. We helped Katie and Carole think through a few things about the next day then we headed out to check in to our hotel which was about 30 minutes further south. I booked a Staybridge family suite with two rooms, free breakfast, and a kitchenette. It was half way between Levi stadium and the temple.

 

Friday, July 25th the boys and I got up and got ready to go to Training Day camp. We ate breakfast with Steve and Lila before heading out. I was a little nervous to drive but we made it safely and caught the shuttle to the practice field. The boys were totally excited. Sourdough Sam was out on the field as we waited for practice to start. I asked the boys if they wanted a picture with him but they never really wanted to.

I don't know why I held on to Marcus like that but I did. We were all having fun and so excited when #23 McCaffrey came out onto the field, Marcus's favorite player.

They even let us out onto the field for a bit and I held Marcus up on my shoulders and at one point he was within 30 yards of CMC #23 he was so excited.

We had fun. Marcus was a little disappointed that they didn't scrimmage more but their QB was out having a baby that day. I told him that practicing is more than just playing which applies to instruments and all facets of life. Also they stayed down the field from us because I guess a spectator got hit by a ball the day before so it was a little ways off but still way closer than being in the giant stadium. At the end Kittle came over to do signatures but we never got close to getting one which Marcus was ok with because he doesn't really like Kittle (that boy! I told him before we went that he could only say nice things about all the players).

 

As we were heading back to our car I started getting texts from Steve that they were out of the temple waiting for Katie and Jonathon to come out for pictures. Steve's brother Doug who lives in Templeton was nice enough to pick up Steve, Ellie, & Lila on their way to the temple.

 

I felt a little bad missing the sealing in the temple that day but felt it was a good split to send Steve with the girls to the temple while the boys and I did something they were really excited about. When we got back to the car we ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and some snacks before heading to the 49ers museum (you get a discount to the museum when you attend training camp). We really had a great time in the museum. The guy behind us in line asked where we were from and when we told him Utah he said, "Steve Young! One of my favorite 49ers of all time!" I said, "Yeah we're BYU fans too." The boys did not know who Steve Young was and I'm going to have to look up some old football games with him to watch with the boys. We had fun taking pictures with this green screen like thing on our way in and out.

the hall of fame had life size statues and we of course took a pic with Steve Young

We loved the quote below and you can read about the piece of field they saved from the old stadium and all those balls hanging represent the 197 touchdown catches Jerry Rice made.

 

Looking at the rosters for all the superbowl wins I realized Tom Holmoe was on the 49ers team with Steve Young when they won. I worked with Tom at BYU Alumni so that was kind of fun.

Our last picture before heading back to the hotel. Steve was also leaving the temple so we decided to meet them for lunch. It was fun to visit with them for a bit. Our boys adore their boys and they are so good to each other. It was a fun little catch up, they will be our next stop on this crazy vacation. They are gracious enough to let us stay with them for a couple of nights so we can attend Katie's reception.
 

 

Ellie decided to stay at the temple and help with pictures then headed to Atascadero with our niece Lexi that night. She helped setup for the reception and played games and hung out with the older teen girls.

 

Friday, July 25th we had a baptism appointment at the Oakland temple so we decided to head up that way. The freeway was a little packed so Steve headed to the carpool lane. We heard someone honk but didn't know what it was for then right in the middle of this crazy stop and go traffic the car in front of us shot out into the other lane than cut back in front of the car in front of them. That car tried to do the same thing but slammed into the car that had originally passed them. Then it sped off. Talk about witnessing a hit and run. We talked with the kids about how things easily escalate and to take a breath and recognize the situation is not as big of a deal as we think it is. We got parked and took a family picture then Steve took Lila and Andrew in while Marcus and went up top to the garden area.

Then Marcus and I ventured over to the visitor's center where we found several pamphlets in Chinese so I asked him if he could read any of it. He was finding words he recognized when a sister missionary walked over and told him he was doing well. When I looked up her badge was in Chinese, she is from Utah and did the immersion program so cool. She played the message from the Christus in Chinese for us then gave him a few more things to practice his Chinese. He told her he was hoping to be called to serve in Taiwan, I did not know this. Then she offered to play a video for us in the big room, she was listing the options when he stopped at the one about the football coach to tell her we went to the 49ers training camp today and he would like to watch the video about the football coach. Steve and the kids were done with in 25 minutes and headed over to the visitor's center to meet up with us. They watched the end of the video with us and then we explored the center a little together and looked at the Golden Gate bridge through the window.

 

 Here are some pics from Ellie helping setup on Saturday for the reception.

 

 

 

Saturday morning, July 26th we were hoping to be able to catch a couple of the new Phineas and Ferb episodes on the Disney Channel but unfortunately they aired at 9am eastern time which was 6am our time so we missed them, boo! Steve and I did a quick little workout after breakfast and before the show time. Then when Phineas and Ferb didn't come on we decided to pack up and hit the road. When we arrived at Doug and Joddy's, Doug offered to take the boys flying or they could go swimming or whatever. They just wanted to play for a bit so we sat outside chatting, the weather was so lovely the whole time we were in California. The boys jumped on the trampoline and eventually everyone got in on the action. Then they changed into swimsuits to go swimming. It was fun to watch Doug and Steve showing a little brotherly love as they pushed and jumped around throwing the frisbee in this team game of keep away. 

 

I decided to go take a nap for a bit and after 20 minutes I received a text message from Carole saying Rick and Phyllis needed the code to get into Doug and Joddy's place. So I sent the code and got up to tell Steve and Doug that they were on their way in. At which point Doug decided it was time to start cooking dinner and I helped the boys pick up the pool area. Then they got in the hot tub for a bit. I visited with Rick & Phyllis while Steve helped with dinner and then showered the boys. We had a lovely dinner then made a quick change to head to the reception. I always forget how spread out things are there. It was a 40 minute drive down to the reception so we were a little late but still had time to mingle with all of the family and see some fun celebration activities with Katie and Jonathon.

 

We stayed until the reception ended and helped clean up a little then we decided to leave Steve and Doug to finish the cleanup while Joddy and I took the van and headed back to their place to put the boys to bed. When Steve and Doug got home we stayed up visiting for a bit before going to bed.

 

Sunday, July 27th we attended sacrament meeting with Doug and Joddy. Ironically they had a missionary reporting who had just returned from the Ivory Coast where one of Stephanie's boys is heading. It was a beautiful meeting but I told the kids we could not tell Aunt Stephanie the stories we heard until after Gabe returns. Carole joined us for sacrament meeting and asked if it would be ok if she joined us for lunch which Doug and Joddy were gracious enough to be willing to provide food for whoever wanted to come. We skipped out on the second hour of church and decided to drive by Steve's old house. The kids don't remember it much but it was fun to drive the old roads. I took a quick little nap before Doug and Joddy got home. Steve was kind enough to do a load of laundry while I relaxed. We helped them prep lunch. Carole came over by herself which was unexpected. We enjoyed a yummy lunch and visited with Carole for a bit. Ellie texted me asking if Lexi, Mary, and herself could come over for lunch. I had invited them earlier and they had originally declined due to their church time but it worked out because we had lots of food for the company we were expecting to come with Carole. So they came over. Just as they were sitting down for lunch Carole excused herself because she was tired, can't blame her, it was a busy wedding weekend. We visited with the adult cousins for a bit and tried to convince Ellie to stay the night with us but they had plans to play games with Carole that evening. So I told her we'd pick her up on our way out in the morning and that she needed to be ready by 9am.

 

Steve went with Doug to his office to install something, the last piece of the upgraded equipment they've been working on. Joddy and I went for a little walk while they were gone. Then we played games, ate sandwiches, and just enjoyed a chill evening. We got up Monday, July 28th with the plans to continue south for our camping trip. Doug got up early that morning for work so we said goodbye to him the night before. We enjoyed breakfast with Joddy and the boys then headed out around 10am. We picked up Ellie then headed to Target to look for some water shoes since Ellie left her camping backpack with her water shoes at home. We also grabbed a few food items we needed for our camping trip. Steve went across to Costco to gas up the van then I sent him in to get a box of applesauce pouches for camping. We managed to find Ellie a pair of shoes in the kids section. I was hoping to get Marcus a watch, his broke on Saturday but we could not find anything that was not a gaming watch. Then we hit the road for Ventura. We decided to stop in Santa Barbara. I had read there was a Channel Island Visitor's Center there. . .It was a little dinky room with some info and a spotting scope, not too impressed but we walked out on the boardwalk and saw dolphins and at lunch there in the harbor, it was so delicious. Steve and Andrew split a swordfish dish, I had a yummy salmon salad, Lila had shrimp, and Marcus had fish and chips, while Ellie had a giant chicken sandwich.

 

Then we went straight to the visitor's center in Ventura to pickup Jr Ranger books. They had a lot more information about the islands and a cool exhibit.

 

Then we checked into our hotel which was only 5 minutes away from where we catch the ferry Tuesday morning. I could not have gotten any closer, so I was happy with that because we needed to be at the docks by 7am. Everyone took turns showering while we transferred clothes to smaller backpacks to take camping. Then we watched a movie together. We could hear the sea lions barking in our room so fun.

  

I woke up Tuesday, July 29th at 6am. I started to quietly get ready for the day while everyone else slept for a bit. Then Steve took a few things out to the car as we waited for breakfast to start at 6:30am. Everyone snagged some breakfast then we drove over to the dock. Steve checked us in then we started carrying gear down to the ferry including the three double kayaks we rented. Then we had a quick orientation about kayaking before getting in line to board the ferry.

 

 

We saw bottlenose and common dolphins on the way out to the island. They are playful and like to ride the wakes of the boats.

We arrived at the island along with a lot of other campers so we made a bucket line to offload all of the camping gear. Then the rangers gave us a quick orientation. We checked into our campsite then we managed to carry all of our gear back to our site in one trip. We did stop to look at the cute fox that crossed our path. Don't worry we saw a lot of them and the kids loved it. They even named one H2O because he liked to hangout by the water spigot next to our campsite.

Thankfully no one was at our campsite so we were able to setup early. Then we had a quick bowl of noodles before heading back to kayak for the afternoon. As we got to our kayaks we realized one of the life jackets the rental company sent us was totally ripped open. I walked back up to the guided kayak tour kiosk to see if we could rent a life jacket to which they said no so the kids came up with the idea to use some of the duct tape on the oars to tape up the life jacket so we did. I did text the guy we rented the gear from and he said he would send out another life jacket but we never saw it. . .

 

 

We were told to not kayak east to Scorpion rock after 11am because the wind picks up making it hard to get back to the harbor, but has we went out a guide was taking a group east but we decided to head west and explore for a bit. It was our first time in double kayaks so we wanted to see how everyone did and we had a blast. The boys did start to get cold towards the end so we were glad we bought and packed wetsuits for them to wear the next day.

Seriously amazing and the water was so calm that day. We got out to where the waves were breaking pretty hard and decided to turn back. 

 

After changing into dry clothes I took the boys to this little bush fort like thing I saw people climbing in and out of earlier. They all had fun exploring it a bit.

 

 

 

Then we went back to camp, had dinner, and then decided to go hiking. We did Potato Harbor which was the most beautiful hike ever! It was a bit windy up top but we were all so glad we pushed through to do the whole hike that evening and it was almost sunset as we reached the end so beautiful.

 

It was just starting to get dark when we got back to camp. We made hot cocoa and had some nutter butters with it. It was a great little treat to top off the day with. As we were getting ready for bed the rangers came by and told us there had been an 8.8 earthquake in Russia and that there were tsunami warnings for the coastline. They were only expecting 1-2 feet increase right at the coastline around midnight. If anything changed they would come down to the campgrounds and let us know. To be honest I was pretty calm about the whole thing. As I have told a few friends this story they have made comments like, "kids we're sleeping with our shoes on" so I was pretty proud of myself for not freaking out in the beginning.We said our evening family prayer and went to bed as normal. It took Steve and I a little bit to fall asleep because there was a young men's group taking up a few of the single sites next to us who were up pretty late playing and chatting. Then at 11:30pm the wind picked up and the trees above us blowing in the wind sounded like ocean waves. I woke Steve up in a panic asking if that was the ocean. Steve calmly said, "No. We're fine." I laid there panicking for a bit, I may have even thought, this is it. Then I took a few breaths, said a prayer in my heart that it would calm down, then asked Steve if he was for sure we were ok. I finally fell back asleep a little while later. 

 

I woke up, Wednesday, July 30th, at 6:30am and snuck out of the tent while everyone kept sleeping. Then Lila popped her head out. She always pokes her head out like this in the morning.

Steve and I slowly started making breakfast for kids as they woke up. We finally woke Ellie up so we could get out kayaking earlier. She then shared a funny story. So Andrew lost his pocket knife at Deacon's camp the week before. As we were packing for this trip he thought it might be in his sleeping bag. He checked his bag when we got into the tent but then we realized he and Ellie use the same style bag and we don't really keep track who's is who's so we yelled out through the tent to have her check her bag but the girls were off to the bathroom. Anyway, Ellie came out that morning with Andrew's pocket knife to which she said she dropped it open after finding it because Lila was freaking out about a spider then forgot about the knife until the morning. I said it was a good thing the tent or mattress didn't get punctured. To which she said well in the middle of the night said spider ran across my face so I ushered it outside the tent quickly and quietly. We were all teasing her and laughing but Andrew was happy to have his knife back once again.

 

When we got to the beach things were really quiet. We wondered why the early ferry hadn't come in and if it was safe to go kayaking, remember there had been a tsunami warning. We saw two kayak tour guides pulling gear out and asked them what was going on and one of them said, "The world as you know it has ended." I looked at him and said, "Don't mess with me dude!" 😂 He then explained there was no early ferry that day and that we were good go kayaking just to watch the dies and currents as they were affected. So off we went. We headed east to do Scorpion Rock since it was before 11am.

 

This may or may not have been Marcus's default position. I had to keep telling myself, I workout so I can kayak with my 9 year old. 😂 He would help steer when we really needed or I would ask but often he was just chilling like that with his paddle resting.

 

We rested in a little cove area for a bit and had lunch. It was nice to fuel up before continuing. It took some convincing to get the girls to eat something out there but they were glad they did. 

We saw so much wildlife this day out kayaiking. We saw seals, star fish, and Steve even spotted a crab amongst the seaweed.

We made it a little farther than we did the first day before the waves started to get really big. We decided to brave going around one more corner just to see what we could see before heading back. The girls had already told us they didn't want to kayak our last day on the island and I felt like it wouldn't be worth all the effort to get back out to that point either. This is where I wish we would have gone east to Scorpion Rock the first day. The water was really pretty calm day that day and we had fresh arms so then we could have possible made it farther out west before the waves started crashing. So that is one thing I wanted to note that I would have done differently but we did the best we could with the information we had and who knew a tsunami would come and make crazy waves for the next few days.

 

When we got back to camp. Steve hung up the hammock while the kids had a little snack of cold cereal. The hammock is a nice addition and a great place to relax.

 

Then Ellie took a nap and the other three read and relaxed. Steve and I decided to do a quick hike on our own. It was fun but we definitely did the best hike with the kids. I had a slight slip out on the way down from that hike. It really didn't hurt but I decided it was time to buy me some trail running shoes as my camping shoes. I had just bought the boys some before Deacon's camp.

 

Then we had dinner and decided to a movie in our tent together. We have never done that on a camping trip before, we totally unplug but we were all tired from our long adventure and it was a fun thing to do. Then we went to bed. Ellie managed to catch a fox up on our table checking things out that night. Good thing we kept everything in the fox box and our latching containers we brought. 

 

The next morning, Thursday, July 31st, after breakfast, I took the boys down to the pier to meet the park ranger to get their junior ranger badges while Steve started stuffing camping gear back in their bags. The park ranger was nice and visited with them for a bit. When he went to swear them in, Marcus said, "I've done this like a hundred times." I laughed and explained we're from Utah so we are spoiled with National Parks.

 

We left our big tent up for a bit with all of our gear in. We were at a point where it would be a quick take down if someone came to checkin to our site that day. There were 5 sites around us vacant the whole time we were there which was nice. We sat at the table playing a game and chilling.

 

After the game we took down the tent and Steve and I took a load of stuff to the camper lockers near the pier. While the kids chilled in the hammock and took more pictures of wildlife.

 

Then we had a little lunch, took down the hammock, and hauled the rest of our gear to the camper lockers. Then went exploring this little area by the pier where we saw some more crabs.

Here we are waiting for the ferry to take us back to the coast. The waves were really big on the ferry ride back and water was splashing clear up on the side of the boat so not too many people ventured out on to the balcony area even when we did see dolphins on the way back. The captain even noted a weird current he saw as we were pulling into the harbor which was a side affect of the earthquake/tsunami.

 

So there you have it. We loaded up are vehicle and headed out for our three hour drive to Barstow. We stopped for dinner at an In-n-Out about an hour into our drive. When we got to the motel we had two rooms so we all quickly took turns showering and then went to bed. We were tired. We got up Friday, August 1st, had breakfast and were on the road by 8:30am heading for home. As we drove through Vegas we pointed out the giant Raiders stadium (because the 49ers and the Raiders were once arch rivals) and we have not driven through Vegas in a very long time so it was a new site to us. It looks like a pretty cool stadium. After we made it through Vegas, I ordered some delicious smoked pizza to be picked up in St George for lunch. It was really yummy and I even got a peach cobbler dessert one that was delicious. It was a fun change of pace but still a fast way to get food (even faster than our In-n-Out stop the night before). It was definitely a good adventure to end the summer, we did a little of everything. We feel so blessed to explore this beautiful world Heavenly Father created for us. We also feel of His love as we spend time together seeing the beauty around us.