Fish Fry and Party Plane

After we finished rolling up our sleeping bags and sweeping out the cabins, we drove to Uncle Dave and Aunt Audrey's house for the annual post-Alpine Fish Fry. It is kinda funny that we have made a traditional after party that is over an hour away but pretty much everyone goes to it. As always, the food was delicious and the company was great.

Her head looks so tiny!

Elliot loves driving on the rocky road just as much as I did as a wee lass

Elliot and his (much tougher) second cousin found a hornet's nest. One got him through his jeans and left a nice welt!

After lots of love and a warm bath, he was adequately recovered enough to enjoy a river sunset

Elliot with Jace (Troy's son)

The next day, Max drove us to the Provo Airport. After we made it through security, they announced that our flight was delayed by 3 hours. I kind of wish we had asked Max to come bail us back out, but we were afraid that they would move the flight up again. The airport is tiny with just one big room to wait in. We were hanging out when my friend Palmer called me on the phone. It was pretty random because we haven't talked for a long time, but he had a question he knew I would know the answer to. We had been chatting for a while when I noticed Palmer's brother Spencer Dickson in the same terminal as me! What are the chances of that?? To make it even crazier, I found Ian Blake, another guy from my home stake on the same flight! So there were 3 people who grew up in the McLean, VA stake who were on this flight from Provo, UT to Mesa, AZ. It blew my mind. 

Alpine Fiesta

This year's Alpine theme was "Fiesta," and as always it was indeed a party!

Mom was recovering from another ankle surgery, so we drove her between as much of the lodge and the cabins as we could to keep her steps down. Elliot was always glad to help. 

These two are such great buds.

At the bonfire! There were somehow maracas for all the kids

Elliot had a turn "conducting" a song with the (very impressive) Alpine Band. The band had an accordion, banjo, and some guitars and ukuleles. 

He very clearly had no clue what was going on

Sadly, Max was the only one of my siblings who could come this year. He scored extra uncle love. 

Bloods with our sweet Alpine shirts!

The crew! We are on the right side.

Elliot with his awesome "mexican mosaic," and Amber chilling in the background. I adopted her as much as possible as the closest possible stand in for Breezy. 

Max brought his hammock and took some nice naps in it.

Little Annie 😂

Annie making faces with Mimi during the program. They got lots of bonding time!

This is honestly Elliot's favorite part of Alpine- smashing wood chips into dust with a rock. Shout out to Uncle Max for teaching him this nifty skill.

Not pictured here are the hours of Alpine volleyball and the women's retreat, which was a Quinceañera for the two cousins who happened to turn 15 this year. It was beautifully decorated and very tender and moving. Everyone shared some advice, which was a mixture of humorous and wise in a typically Johnson manner. 

I loved catching up with my Aunts, Uncles, and cousins. Aunt Siri told a story about how one time she was driving home late at night. Uncle Randy looked up at the "x miles to Reno" sign, then fell asleep. 4 hours later, he woke up and they were driving by the same sign! Somehow she had driven in a huge circle without having made any turns. We got all riled up with confusion about how such a thing could be. Uncle Vaughn had some good cow stories too. 

The farewell pinata

CANDY FOR ALL

One Day in Provo

After the Grand Canyon, we were home for 2 days before heading out on another adventure. We realized that we could squeeze in a trip to Alpine with only 1.5 days off work for Aaron. We found some pretty cheap Allegiant Air flights to Provo. I absolutely adore the Alpine family reunion and was so glad that I got to go this year! As an added bonus, we got to spend a day with Max in Provo!

Annie was a HUGE fan of the safety information brochure. 

I LOVED walking around BYU campus and seeing the new buildings going up. I kind of wish we had walked up to the 3rd floor of the Clyde to check to see if our much used microwave was still there.

Max took us to the Bean Museum, the new life sciences building, and part of the library so that he could take me on a tour of his office while Elliot and Aaron hung out in the new playground that they built in the library. Max's office is pretty sweet, complete with a nap couch! He is a media specialist for the library, which means that occasionally a professor or department will want him to film or edit something for them, but it sounds like he mostly gets to use their equipment for his own projects. It is a pretty sweet gig. 

Just hanging with a hippo

Elliot was unwilling to stick his head in for the photo op

Next stop was Bam Bams BBQ for dinner

This was around the time that he confessed to eating popsicles instead of drinking water whenever he gets thirsty

The final entertainment for the evening was mentos and diet coke rockets with some of Max's friends

Watching from a not entirely safe distance

We had a blast with Max. I love going back to visit Provo, and would have been happy to walk around campus all day. But there were further adventures to be had!

Grand Canyon with Some Bloods

We were home for a mere week and a half before heading off on another adventure! Jacob had just finished his mission, and Mom and Dad Blood decided to have a road trip before dropping him off at BYU. Elizabeth, and Kade were tagging along with them. Mary's family and our fam met up with them when they ventured into Arizona. Altogether we had 4 of the 10 siblings- not bad! The plan was to visit the Grand Canyon for an afternoon and then spend two nights at an airbnb in Flagstaff.

There was an accident on the highway that completely blocked all lanes in the middle of nowhere. We managed to get on a detour that took us (and a few hundred other vehicles) on this long dirt road through a tiny town. We probably tripled the annual amount of traffic on that road in the few hours that the highway was shut down. We got to the Grand Canyon an hour and a half later than anticipated, but that was still long enough to see some sites and eat dinner at the Arizona Room (thanks dad!)

Fortunately, Elliot has a healthy fear of cliffs

The Returned missionary in all his glory

The Airbnb was really nice. It had a big backyard with lots of boulders and a hot tub. Mary's family had another nice rental house about 5 minutes away. I love hanging out with the Bloods. We got in some good board game time.

Cousins on a rock

 We decided to go on a hike in Walnut Canyon, where we got to see EVEN MORE cliff dwellings! These were built around the same time as the others that we saw in New Mexico and Colorado. This was different from the others that we saw in that it took us along a trail where we saw several small dwellings. They were all over the place! You could see them across the canyon too. I can just imagine them trying to yell at each other back and forth across the canyon.

So many cliffs. Elliot had to hold hands with me or Andrew the whole time

I love Avery's pose

Watching TV back at the house. I love Benjamin's pose

 A Grandma in her element

Annie bonding with Grandpa while we ordered pizza at a nearby park

We didn't bring our swimsuits, but Mom Blood bought Aaron an awesome pair of patriotic swim trucks from the clearance rack at Walmart for five bucks. I borrowed a swim suit from Elizabeth, and we had a lovely hot tub soak after the kids went to bed. Kade had a lot of great updates on the hunting club he has been running. He had some celebrities that came by, and one of them featured his hunting club on his TV show! Aaron got this weird, extremely itchy feet sensation after the hot tub. The internet said to soak in cold water.

I think this picture really captures one of Aaron's finest moments. 

We went to church on Sunday morning and then ate some leftover pizza at a park a few blocks away from the church building. It was great to catch up with everybody!

Poor blotchy faced baby :( At least she has a Grandpa who loves her!