4th of July

Usually for the fourth of July, we go to the Gorge with my family, but this year we decided to go for the 24th instead. We hadn't been to visit Vance's dad yet this year, so we thought we would take this opportunity of a 3 day weekend to do so. He lives in Rock Springs, WY which is about 35 minutes away from the north end of the Gorge so we went boating all day Friday. It was a lot of fun. I can't help but laugh everytime I see his boat because it was given to him by my dad because it was our old family boat. When we gave it to him, the boat hadn't been used for a few years, and the last time we used it, I swear it was going to fall apart if it hit another wave (at least that's what it felt like!) Apparently, it wasn't in as bad of condition as I thought because it did pretty good! However, there were a lot of boats out so we hit waves like crazy, many times of which I thought for sure the boat was going to flip! It was quite scary at times. In fact it made me so nervous I refused to let go of Isaac the whole time and I made sure Vance had Mason good. (I think I was the only one who was nervous at all the entire time. It's just me. I can't help but worry too much all the time.) We went tubing for most of the time, and then attempted to go cliff diving but were unable to find a safe enough spot. I was not able to get pictures of people tubing because I was too busy watching where the boat was going and holding on to Isaac for dear life! J/K!!! This first picture is when we stopped for lunch on the shore and I laid Isaac down for a minute while we got lunch ready.

This was Mason almost the ENTIRE time on the boat (which was pretty much the whole day). He had to be in his daddy's arms or he flipped out. When Vance took his turn on the tube, Mason cried. When Vance got out to go cliff diving, Mason cried, etc... This picture was taken when we got back in the boat after lunch so he didn't quite have his life jacket on yet, but I promise both kids had life jackets on the entire time in the boat. He was also very tired and hot, so that didn't help him have a fun time at all. He was like this the entire trip though. I have NEVER seen him cry in his whole two years of life as much as he did in these 3 days of our trip. It was horrible.

Here is Vance checking the depth of the water before they jumped in. (Doesn't this look a little familiar?! Maybe he did learn something from getting the jeep stuck after all!) Unfortunately there was a shelf of rocks that came out too far so it was not very safe to jump.

I know this life jacket looks a little too big on him, but it's the only "infant" one I could find. It didn't seem as big as this picture makes it look.

On Saturday, we went for a drive up to the top of the plateau. One of my favorite parts of the trip was seeing the wild horses.

Everyone climbed to the top of Pilot Butte except me and the kids. I did not have the right shoes, and it would of been impossible to get the kids to the top and back down safely anyways.

Mason running up the hill after his daddy.

After climbing Pilot Butte we went target shooting with some 22's.

Beautiful Rock Springs!

Here is Vance fixing his dad's truck. What a hottie!!!!

Later that night, we went to the firework show. It was a whole different experience, and I loved it! Since the big fireworks are not illegal in Wyoming, everyone was lighting their own fireworks before and after the main show. So we would look across the whole valley and there were fireworks everywhere, along with right above our head from people doing it that were right by us. It lasted forever and it was way fun. Mason was in amazement the entire time and he just cuddled up to me on the blanket and didn't move until it was over. That was the one thing that entertained him the most on the trip. Sunday we woke up and went to church, got packed up, and traveled home.