Dinosaur Island at Thanksgiving Point

Ashton Gardens has a new exhibit this summer called Dinosaur Island. We have been a few times already. They have 20 to 30 dinosaurs spread out throughout the gardens that move and make sounds. There is also an information plaque next to each one to tell you a little bit about that dinosaur. Here are some of our favorites.

The T-Rex

The Triceratops

The Brachiosaurus (well actually Tyler's favorite is the Brontosaurus, but they don't have that one).

The full T-Rex was pretty intimidating.

And here they are in motion

We went first as a family and then returned a couple of weeks later with Gawbie, Shannon, Kennedi, and Abbi.

The kids loved riding in the golf cart.

We sure love having our Thanksgiving Point membership and enjoying the different events that they put on in their venues.

Abandoned Waterpark

As a kid, I made a lot of trips between my home in LA and my Grandparent's houses in Northern Utah. Sometime in my youth, this waterpark appeared in the middle of the desert between Barstow and Baker. I remember asking my parents to take me there every time we drove past it. They never did. 

When we were headed back to Utah after my mom's funeral, my kids asked me the same question that I asked my own parents as a kid, "Can we stop there?" Although, 30 years later the waterpark looks a bit different. I didn't stop for them when they asked, probably for the same reason my parents never stopped for me. It is a long road between California and Utah and the more stops we make the longer it takes. 

Well, I finally fulfilled my childhood dreams and the requests of my children when we were on our way back from California in June. The kids had told me that they saw people in the parking lot when they were driving past in March, so I didn't think it would be a problem. I'm pretty sure we were trespassing because we had to jump a short fence to get in and then walk across the huge dirt parking lot, in the 109-degree temperatures!!! I was slightly terrified that we were going to have a cop pull up and fine us for trespassing. I am not much of a rule breaker, so I couldn't get through this pit stop fast enough. Plus, I felt like I was melting in the desert sun. I think the kids were also not that impressed once we got closer. The buildings all looked kind of like this. 

The waterslide hill did not look much different up closely then it looks from the distance. All of the slides have disintegrated from years in the sun. but some of the stands are still there.

The lazy river looked like this, completely covered in graffiti and all of the drains were these gaping holes in the ground that I warned them all to stay far away from.

Camden climbed the stairs up the slide hill but came back down before too long probably because it was so HOT!

The Mario Bros pictures were fun.

We stayed about 30 minutes in total. We were happy to get back to our car, get some water, and turn the air conditioning on again. It was pretty sketchy and there is a reason it is fenced off, mostly because of the huge holes in the ground.

Leo Carillo Beach

Our beach day was perfect. We headed out fairly early with towels, an umbrella, blanket, picnic lunch, sand toys, frisbee, boogie boards, and trackball. The kids loved splashing in the waves and got pretty brave going further and further in until a big wave knocked the boys over. Ashley tried boogie boarding after I gave her a quick lesson, but a big wave scared us enough to give it a rest for a while and we never tried it again. The big wave also knocked my sunglasses off of my head, never to be found again. I was super sad about that.

Ashley was happy to discover that Leo Carillo was a dog beach. There were so many dogs there that day and she was able to pet a lot of them.

She also collected about 500 sand crabs. She had intended to take them home with us, but I told her that they would not survive away from the beach, so she released them back into the ocean right before we left.

I was not as successful in talking the boys into leaving their rock collection on the beach. We did, at least, leave some of them, but brought way more than we should have.

 We left the beach around 4 pm and got home to enjoy dinner and the evening with Grandpa.

Universal Studios Hollywood

We made a last-minute decision to go to Universal Studios Hollywood while we were staying with Grandpa Miner. He opted to stay at home instead of joining us at the park that day. We opened the park up and stayed until closing. We rode as many rides in the first hour as we did between 11am and 7pm. And then we were able to ride almost as many in the last hour of the day too. 

Universal Studios Hollywood was perfect for these three kids. It had a lot of Jurassic World stuff, including the ride...

And the raptor encounter

The boys are really into dinosaurs lately, so they loved that. We rode the Jurassic world ride 4 or 5 times that day.

And then there was "The Secret Life of Pets" ride. The ride wasn't that exciting, but the line was a lot of fun to walk through because of all of the movie scenes we got to walk through.

There was this Animal Actors show that we went to. The kids loved it, especially Ashley. It is her dream to have Lula star in a movie and it was fun for her to see the animal trainers and the pets that have actually been in movies.

We also spent a lot of time in the Harry Potter section of the park. The kids loved the Harry Potter ride. We went on it 4 or 5 times, as well. And we enjoyed butter beer and the fun shops.

Another highlight was the Mummy ride. We are not into mummy movies, but the ride was a dark high-speed roller coaster, and it shoots forward and then stops and shoots backward again. The first time we rode it was such a shock that we had to ride it again just to figure out how that was even possible. We rode at least 4 times that day. 

We walked over 20000 steps that day. We were all super tired by the time we got back to Grandpa's.

Trip to California

To kick off the summer, I took Ashley and the boys to California to visit my dad and to attend their cousin, Thomas, baptism. I was a bit nervous about making the long drive on my own, so we stopped in Henderson on the way down and again on the way back. It gave me the opportunity to catch up with my sister, Christy, and her family. She is always such a great host and so fun to talk to. The drive down was uneventful, and we were happy to pull into Grandpa's driveway on Friday afternoon. We got there later than planned, so I didn't have a chance to do any grocery shopping before dinner. I scrounged through his freezer and cupboards and came up with the ingredients for a chicken, rice, and broccoli casserole. We enjoyed dinner together and then the kids watched a movie in my room while I sat with dad to watch the Dodgers game together (more like he watched the game and I read a book on my phone, but we were still in the same room :)) We did go out on a walk all together that evening after dinner. in fact, we decided that I would wake up early each day to walk with Dad in the mornings and Ashley would walk with him for his evening walks. The only morning walk I missed was on Sunday morning because I didn't know that he walked on Sundays, so I didn't wake up. And Ashley missed the Saturday and Monday night walk while we were away from the house late.

On Saturday morning, after a morning walk with Dad and breakfast, we headed down to Fullerton to spend the day with the Wheelers for the baptism. We got there around 11 am and the kids immediately disappeared with their cousins. Maryn found them later in the girl's bedroom playing with barbies 😂

I visited with Maryn and the grandmas. The baptism was nice and most of the Wheelers were there. Maryn's parents were also there. After the baptism, we enjoyed tacos and visiting in Brian and Maryn's backyard. The weather was bearable, at first, in the shade but cooled off nicely by the end of the party.

We left around 8pm, stopping for gas and groceries on the way back to Dad's house. 

On Sunday, we enjoyed church in the Sunland Ward and hanging around Grandpa's house. We introduced Grandpa to sweet pork (one of our kid's favorite meals) for dinner. I went through mom's sewing supplies and collected some things to take home with me. I also continued reading Mom's journal, something I started when I was there for the funeral.

On Monday, we left Dad at home and spent the day at Universal Studios. 

On Tuesday, I walked with Dad in the morning and then he took Ashley to the LA Temple to do baptisms in the afternoon.

On Wednesday, we went to the beach while Dad was doing his weekly shift at the Stake Family History Center.

On Thursday we hung around all morning, washing bedding and towels, and cleaning up our mess. We left after lunch and headed back to Christy's. 

I was glad that we could get away to spend that time with Dad. I think he appreciated the company.

Some Random Stuff from the past 6 months

In February, Danny and I got to attend a chocolate tasting at this small chocolate factory and store in Provo called "The Taste." This was the spread at each seat. We got a short tour of the factory, and then we returned to our seats so that they could teach us the proper way to taste chocolate (who knew that I had been doing this wrong all my life :)). It involved breaking a small piece off and then rubbing it between your fingers a bit to make it meltier. Then you are supposed to take a big sniff of it before putting it in your mouth and letting it melt away. I tried it out for the first piece I had but then decided that it didn't change things much from just popping it in my mouth and leaving it there for a bit to enjoy the flavors. Danny and I both liked the middle one on the right side, which had a bit of honeycomb mixed in with the chocolate. Although, there was one with dried cherries that was pretty good, as well as one with a strong cloves taste. 

After the chocolate tasting, they had us sample some things from the other plate, including kinds of vinegar and a Nutella spread that they make in the shop. I was a little hesitant with the kinds of vinegar, sipping them slowly. The first one had a tangerine taste to it and did not taste much like vinegar. The second one was also sweet with a berry flavor (I think). So, the third one I was less cautious with, and I nearly threw it back up. It was much more like vinegar. Danny had a good laugh from my reaction. It was a fun date night.

In February, I FINALLY got to see Hamilton. I had tickets to see Hamilton with my mom and sisters in April of 2020. Obviously, that did not happen with the COVID-19 shutdown. So, when things opened up again and we were offered the chance to get 3 tickets to Hamilton in Salt Lake City, we jumped at the opportunity, mostly for me. Danny was not interested in seeing it, so I ended up taking Alyssa and Ashley with me who were both studying US history in school this past year. We almost lost our chance to see it again when our January 15th show was canceled because some of the cast had COVID. We were so relieved to hear that they had rescheduled our performance for early Feb. Alyssa was very familiar with the music, but Ashley had only heard a few of the songs before seeing it. It was a fun afternoon, and the play was SOOOO good. 

I also introduced Ashley to Les Miserables a few weeks later when her school put on a production of it. She had never heard any of the music before we went and didn't know the storyline until I briefly explained it to her on the way there. She liked it a lot and the cast did such a good job for high school students.

We finally installed a patio cover in February. We had been talking about doing it since we moved into this house 11 years ago, and finally decided it was time to do it. Ashley and Lula had fun playing on the scaffolding while they were working on the pillars. 

We think it turned out so good and we love having it. It really extends that living space of our house.

The only downside was when the birds thought we had built it for them. These mourning doves tried to move in on our ceiling fans. And then after we had finally convinced them that the fans were not a good place to build their home, some little birds moved in to build on top of the pillars. Danny discouraged them by putting wobbly 2X4s in the place where they were trying to build their nest.

For spring break, we canceled our trip to California and flew Grandpa Miner in for conference weekend instead. It was fun to have him here with us. After he went home, we took a day trip up to Honeyville to visit Crystal Hot Springs. We had never been there before, and the weather seemed perfect for it that day. The kids loved it, especially the slides.

I took Ashley and the boys to tulip festival alone this year. I think Danny was busy with work at that time. The flowers were gorgeous this year and the weather was perfect that night. We had a lot of fun.

Alyssa replaced all of the balls in her ball hopper when the weather finally warmed up consistently. She had fun with the old balls.

She also built a tennis ball garland to hang in her room.

 Tyler and Camden love going to the Ninja Warrior course. They are both pretty good at it too.

 

Ashley and I went out to see the blood moon in May. This was the best picture I was able to get of it. We had a little bit of cloud cover that night, so it wasn't very clear, but the moon did look really cool.

And Lula had a birthday, too. I forgot to include this in the post about birthday celebrations. Ashley insists on celebrating her birthday every year and made her this cake. Looks disgusting to me, but Lula enjoyed it. Although, it took her 3 days to eat it, unlike Casey.

And I think that catches me up to the beginning of June.