Oh where oh where have the Turner's been?

We made it back home after spending a wonderful week with family and friends over in Utah. First of all the weather was just great, not too cold, not to windy, and just perfect for us Californians who freeze most of the time when we go there. We did have to wear jackets though.

We made it up to Justin's parent's home friday afternoon, just in time for the kids to head out on a little adventure with Grandpa and Dad. We don't know what we would do in Parowan if the Gap didn't exist. (The Gap is a series of hills or mountains, whatever you want to call them, that are west of Parowan and famous for Indian writings.)

We then headed up to West Valley City on Saturday after getting a good nights sleep. We got up there just in time to color Easter eggs with our cousins and thanks to grandma and Aunt Cor we had plenty of eggs to color. We dyed them, tie dyed them, and made them sparkle with glitter. We even were able to put stickers and write on them if we wanted to. Then it was off to the big hunt in my parents back yard. It is a great backyard for an Easter Egg Hunt. Grandpa hid eggs in trees, by the wood pile, in the raspberry bushes, in the planter boxes, and all over under the deck where there is all kinds of junk. The kids had a blast and very full baskets. Tyler even stayed out back longer to find all of the eggs that no one else found with Grandpa and dad, lucky him. He was just so excited to have eggs, now he will carry them around for a couple of weeks. We may even have to have a few suprise hunts in our home.

Monday we went to the Hogle Zoo with my parents. It was so much fun. We got to see the new baby orengatang, giraffe, and, mihr cats. They were so cute. The Orengatang played in one corner and kept putting a bucket on its head, it the other corner was the mom dead asleep on its stomach. We were wondering if she passed out because she was so tired. Maybe we all need to be put in a cage with our kids and we can lie face down in the hay just to get a little more sleep. Only with my luck my kids would just keep jumping on me. At least this baby just played quietly with a bucket. Poor Mackay woke up with a fever this morning but was a champ to walk through the zoo all day. He was extremely tired by the time we got home and crashed on my parents couch. He was burning up the next day so we just let him relax on the couch while I visited my Grandma and Justin took Tyler to the park and out to lunch.

Wednesday we relaxed in the morning and packed up for our return to Parowan. We stopped in Saratoga Springs and visited with our friends the Carricks. Their house is looking good and their basement is almost finished. It was fun to be with them and the boys just loved seeing Gavin and Colin their boys that are the same age. They talked us into staying for dinner and we had a hard time leaving, but made our way down to Parowan by 10 p.m.

For the next couple of days we slept in ate a late breadfast and then headed out in the hills for some great adventures. It was so much fun and very beautiful in its own way. We found a crystal mine and filled up our pockets, or I should say our kids filled up our pockets with all kinds of rocks. We climbed rocks, slid down mountain sides, built little fires, and did a lot of hiking. The kids were great troopers. Most of the time they hung back with Grandpa and Justin and I did the exploring.

Saturday we spent our time making it back to good ole Ridgecrest and wondering what our lives would be like if we lived in Utah. After listening to all of our phone messages we were wishing we were still on vacation, but time to get back to living life.