Labor Day Weekend at Groundhog

I am not a fan of school starting in the middle of August. I LOVE the summer with the kids and the trips we get to take. So when Labor Day rolls around and school has been in session for 3 weeks already, I am ready to take them out of school and enjoy our LAST big vacation of the summer. It still is summer, right?
This year Clarence went hunting in Colorado with his buddy Todd and his brother Derron. Clarence was fortunate enough to kill his elk the beginning of the week, and ended up being the only one that trip to kill one.

On Thursday I pulled the kids from school about noon and we headed to Colorado to see Clarence and stay for the extended weekend. I really had fun with on the way up there listening to "Chickens in the Headlights." It's a book on tape, and I would highly recommend it. My kids loved it. 5 1/2 hours later we made it to the trailer. Not bad, considering I had 4 kids to deal with by myself!

The next morning Kaitlyn was having a ard time adjust to the altitude and so we decided to go on a rive to a little lake and have a picnic. We thought we could just drive straight to the lake, but as it turned out, we had to walk a little ways to get into it. We would walk a little ways and then stop and rest for Kalitlyn. At one pont Derron had stayed behind with me to help Kalitlyn and the rest of the group was ahead alittle ways off when a bog ol' bull stood up in the meadow and started walking around. Ethan was too excited and had to tell Derron, who had brought his bow "just in case." Ethan ran back as fast as he could and yelled, "Derron, there's a bog ol bull up there!!!!!" Well you could only guess what happened next and that bull took off before Derron could even get a good look at it.

We made it to the little lake and had our lunch. It started to rain a little bit, so we headed back. On the way back we started to notice these tiny strawberries litter the forest floor aroind us. Here a couple, there a couple. We would stop and eat up these tiny morsels that were SO sweet and juicy. We wanted to save a bunch, but they were so tiny and juicy, and didn't really keep well in the bags. So we went on our merry way wishing we had some kind of berrieds to eat later. Almost to the truck I spotted a rasperry bush. After looking around more closely I noticed there were SEVERAL raspberry bushes. In no time we were picking raspberries. Soon though we notices a peculliar thing start to happen. Our hands started tingling when we touched certain parts of the plant. The mystery was solved when this part of the plant went into my pantleg and started stining LIKE CRAZY!!!! It felt like someone had just burnt me. I had come in contact with some poison sumac. We decided then that it was time to head back.

The next day Clarence and Derron went hiking/hunting aournd Lone Cone to see if Derron could fill his tag. I decided to take the kids on a ride to the top of Flat top. There is a pond up there that has salamanders in it. 2 of the kids visited it the day before and were eager to show Kalitlyn and I what they discovered. They did manage to find their salamanders, along with this little fella. Isnt' he cute?

Sunday we went to church in Dolores. This was a new experience for my kids, and they really had fun with it. they are used to big wards with lots of youth, and the ward we went to was very little, with 4 young women and a tiny primary. It was good for them to see what other places are like and they do appreciate our ward a little more now.

After church we had a picnic by the Dolores River. We did try our luck at fishing the stream, but we soon realized we were not prepared for stream fishing. We decided it would be best to head back and fish at the lake where we knew what we were doing. Once back at the trailer the older kids went exploring and found a fort on the property. We don't know who built it, but I was grateful for the hours of entertainment it provided for the kids as they worked fervently on improvements to the fort.Clarence had the tough time of supervising.

That night we made a cobbler with the wild berries we gathered.

I love this man. He is the cobbler king!Needless to say, it was a big hit.
The next day was Monday. Clarence took the kids out fishing and they caught about 8 fish. The kids had fun and I had fun watching them. After a fun filled morning we cleaned the trailer, packed the bags and headed home. It was the end of another successful trip. Every time I get to spend time with my kids and watch them play together and help eachother it is a successful trip to me. I am grateful to be blessed with such a terrific family. I have a wonderful husband and 4 terrific kids. Yes, I indeed do have much to be grateful for.

Need I say more?