July started off with our favorite hike to Gloria Falls. The falls were huge this year and we still found snow in the mountains. We followed tradition for the 4th of July with our neighborhood breakfast and bike parade, Hebdon family reunion and our neighborhood fire works. August was the month of waterparks and we had lots of fun with friends and family trying to stay cool and relax. Carter proved himself with swimming on his own and then took off and is now our fast little fish- thank you swim lessons! We had a family adventure to Seaquest and fed the giant tortoise and pet some sharks. We dropped off the kids for a cousin sleepover and backpacked to our special spot in Big Cottonwood and enjoyed an uninterrupted game of scrabble ( this year Mary won) and kid free night. We celebrated Jackson's wedding and played with cousins that came into town. We checked out the Daybreak art festival and Jefferson made a Harry Potter stamp and the boys painted tiles for the community mural. We saw a moose and bald eagle on our hike around Silver Lake. We went on a big family trip with our cousins to Mt. Rushmore and saw some incredible sights along the way- Thermopolis (Ugh we missed the longest slide but the hot springs waterfalls were beautiful), Devils Tower (wow, lets climb it), Custer State Park- Sylvan Lake (paddle board yoga challenge), Jewel Cave (only 5% discovered), Mt. Rushmore (Jefferson was the cutest tour guide, and Carter wanted his name to be Lincoln so he could be on the mountain too, super impressive to see the detail and size of the sculptures, and the evening lighting ceremony was very patriotic), Mammoth Dig site (never realized how huge a mammoth was), Wind Cave (we spotted a bull Buffalo meandering on the side of the road- the spirit of the prairie), Storybook Park (the acting of the 3 little pigs with Alec as the wolf was hilarious), Badlands (102 degrees, how did anyone live there), WallDrug (the illusive Rhode Island plate was finally found- just missing Connecticut), The 1880 train (sadly no air conditioning, and we forgot the water but Jefferson was all smiles to be on a steam train), Hill City (ice cream stroll- best T-shirt found "Sorry I'm late, I didn't want to come"), Watiki waterpark (Josh's dream came true), Farson (the big cone challenge). It was a super fun trip and we are very grateful for Josh and Mary, travel and food experts that they are, planning it all. Our last hurrah for July was the boys Baseball Birthday Bash which turned out great- so fun to see them hitting a giant baseball piñata. A few more weeks of summer left- we hope to hit everything on our bucket list.
