The Canyon

Last weekend we had some visitors!  Ryan and Lindsay came to visit and it was a lot of fun!

On Saturday we decided to take a little trip to the canyon...and I don't mean the Grand Canyon...that would have been quite the drive!  About 20 miles to the south of where we are is Palo Duro Canyon.  It's the 2nd largest canyon in the U.S. (next to the Grand Canyon, obviously).  The Canyon is about 120 miles long, as much as 20 miles wide, and a max depth of more than 800 feet.   Compared to the Grand Canyon at 277 miles long, 18 miles wide, and 6000 feet deep.  It was pretty impressive.

Driving out there all you see is ranch land.  Flat as flat can be and then...boom!  All of the sudden, there's the canyon!  We didn't drive too far into the park.  There are numerous hiking trails, picnic areas, and camping spots.  We chose to take a 1.5 mile trail (one way) since we were hiking with a 3 year old! 

Our view from where we started hiking.

Riley and Lindsay checking out the cactus.

We didn't quite make it all the way to the end of the trail.  We decided what was at the end of trail wasn't that interesting to see, which is kind of unfortunate because we were less than a 1/2 mile from the end.  Oh well!  It was a good thing we turned around because Riley was pretty tuckered out by the time we got back to the trail head.  He had to be carried some of the way back.  But, other than that, he was a trooper!  Carter had a nice little seat in the carrier and snoozed a good portion of the hike.  We didn't really hear a peep from him almost the whole time!

It was stinkin' windy though!  I'm talking the kind of wind that feels like it will knock you over and the kind of wind that pelts your legs and face with dust!  It doesn't feel too good!  Needless to say we all felt quite grimy when we got back to the house!  And on the way back home there was so much dust in the air it just looked like we were in a huge smog. Crazy. 

Lindsay took this picture on a walk later in the day. That's dust in the air!

It was a fun, but tiring day.  Riley crashed even before we were out of the park and the rest of the day was pretty laid back! 

Easter {2012}

Easter this year was a little different for us.  Typically, we would have gone to one side of the family or the other and ate yummy food and had an Easter egg hunt.  However, since we don't live across town anymore we had to do our own thing.  It felt quite strange, but all in all, it was a relaxing day spent with just the four of us. 

I'm not usually one to do projects and activities with my kids.  That's just not really my thing.  But, this year I thought I'd try to do some special things with Riley since we weren't getting to do our usual Easter.  I saw this idea on Pintrest to do Resurrection Rolls and thought Riley would enjoy making them.  I decided I'd give them a shot on Thursday since I had other things I needed to make on the weekend.  Here's what you need:

ingredients

AND

a little helper!

Really quite simple.  Each ingredient represents part of the burial of Jesus.  Riley had a lot of fun making these and while we waited our '3 days' he found something to occupy his time!

He loves to wash dishes!  I think thanks to Nana! =)

He enjoyed eating them too!  Forgot to take a picture of the final outcome, but the 'tomb' was empty!  HE HAS RISEN!

On Sunday we headed to church after the boys dug into their Easter baskets.  That's one way to get Riley out of bed!

And Carter dug through his own basket too!

Riley eventually got ready for church and just HAD to have some candy.  Good thing there wasn't very much in one egg!

We managed to sneak in a few pictures before church.

After looking back at this picture I realized that everyone was completely ready except me!  Oh well!

After church, we headed home for our own Easter dinner.  We even pulled out the china!!



For dinner we had:

Spiraled Ham

Mashed Potatoes with Bacon and Cheddar

Roasted Asparagus

Frog Eye Salad

Easter Egg Bread

and Strawberry Pie

Then, after we all had a nice nap, Riley got to go on a little Easter egg hunt.  It wasn't terrible exciting--there's not too many places to hide eggs when there aren't any trees or landscaping in our backyard to hide them in!!  But, he had fun and actually hunted eggs a couple different times.

HAPPY EASTER!