Grammer and Pappy Mike!

 My parents came to visit us for my birthday! Leading up to their arrival I was just so excited. We had been gone about a month from our home and to see their faces was lifting to my soul. I'm glad they were the first visitors because we realized we force people to go on strenuous hikes and we probably shouldn't do that to everyone who comes out here😂 Nonetheless they hung in there like champs and played with the boys lots. We sure love them.

They stayed at an Airbnb right up the road. We found a trail right next to it with these big rocks.... *obviously* a 30 minute pit stop was needed.

The most high maintenance kid we have.

This was a hike we started at Silver Lake then went up to the Twin Lakes Reservoir. We were hoping to see the bull moose again but to no avail. We had a great time regardless!

This mama of mine... she takes care of me! She knows me well and provides words/comfortable things that keep this mama of 5 crazy boys going. Most importantly she reminds me to give myself grace. She understands how hard raising kids can be and that if they didn't eat carrots today that doesn't make you a bad mom. I love her so much.

Papa bear

This guy. He's the key to these hikes. He has confidence, stamina, patience, endurance, excitement, and fearlessness. So glad I get this journey with him.

Every little girl should have a dad that loves her like this one loved me. His patience is incomparable, he made me laugh my entire life, and he made me feel like no-thing in this world was more important to him than me. I'll declare it until the day I die, he was the best one.

One great thing about my parents is that kid behaviors don't bother them. If they scream, fight, argue, talk non-stop, cry, complain, want to play silly games.... any of it and my parents look right at me and say, "they're just kids! And they're GREAT kids!" I hope to hold that quality when I'm a grandparent. They love this crew and this crew surely loves them.

Found this on my phone. Jet Thomas is very fascinated with animals and whenever we run into a track he wants to get a picture so he can look up what kind of animal it was. I hope his fascination is God's creation never dies!

Uncle Michael sent a fruit basket... the boys helped :)

Now we come to the dramatic portion of this programming. The hike at silver lake was a little more strenuous than we had intended. So instead of doing a big hike we had heard of a different "Silver lake." One that is a reservoir that you can swim in or just hang around. So we thought, "this will be better... nothing taxing." What we didn't know is that to get to said reservoir you have to travel 3 miles on a narrow and rocky path up the side of a mountain with significant drops to the side. If you don't know this about us JT always drives. Always. All the road trips, all the small errands.... a.l.w.a.y.s. My mom and I had been getting car sick on these adventures out to mountains so for one of the very rare circumstances in our marriage JT let me drive and mom rode shotgun. We get started in the Rim-bus on the dirt/rocky path and about 30 seconds and a couple hundred yards into the road we realized what we were in for. Our vehicle isn't exactly made for rough-terrain... it's actually the worst! Rear-wheel drive, top heavy, not great tread on the wheels. However, at this point I couldn't make a 3 point turn and neither could I back down because of the cars behind us. So onward we went... 30 minutes later I had almost passed out from fear at one point and my mom had lost all the blood from her face. When we got to the top I was shaky and just started crying in JT's arms. So... I shall never ask to drive again😂 

PS** JT drove us down like the champion he is**

The drive up was dramatic but when we got up there it was amazing!! There were large rocks to climb on and views of the mountains on all sides. I'm now lobbying for the small purchase of an AWD vehicle so we can go again!

It was so sad to say goodbye! I'm so thankful they came! It did my heart so much good❤