This were the happy moments of our trip!

Jason drove most the way.  He's a good driver, and I'm a good entertainer. :)

Joseph didn't understand why he had to be strapped in practically all day! :(

Overall, our trip to Colorful Colorado was AMAZING!  We left Thursday morning and drove for a while- made an official lunch stop in Boiling Springs State Park.  Which was NOT "an oasis on the prairie" and to which I officially declared that I would not return to the sticker-infested grass and overgrown trees....to which I officially took back when we arrived at the hotel and found in my email that Boiling Springs is the official campground for YW camp this year.  WOW....Jason and I got a good laugh out of that one.

The Oklahoma panhandle wasn't as bad as we thought.  It was a lot of grass plains and it made for good discussion about what sort of people would live way way way way out.

We made it to Lamar about an hour later than desired with two screaming kids and checked in.  Kaylena was screaming because I had left the car to go in and check in.  Joseph was screaming because he wanted to get out.  Both screamers were satified when we checked in and went swimming at 9:30 at night!!  Needless to say, this is probably was shifted our internal clocks to late to bed and late to rise.

After Lamar, CO we did a stop in Puebla for a 2 hour lunch and play at Burger King.  I LOVED how many BKs there were instead of McDs.  The BK had a playplace and we seriously stayed there for a couple hours and met some very nice people.  Then we rolled into Colorado Springs around dinnertime.

Overall, our weekend with the Richards' Family was absolutely perfect.  Friday night was yummy yummy burgers with ice cream for dessert and fun trampoline for the kids and chatting for the adults.  Saturday morning we went to Garden of the Gods and although it took us what felt like for-ev-er to find somewhere to park, it was totally worth it.  I can see how that would be a fun place to go when it wasn't so crowded, but even though it was pretty full for the memorial day weekend crowd, there was plenty of rock formations and rock climers to look at.  It was beautiful.  I tried uploading pictures, but I guess the computer is tired tonight.....  Saturday afternoon and evening was another relaxing one with hot tub fun, trampoline fun, walk fun, music fun, park fun, and fun fun.  The weather was so interesting too.  It was nice and cool in the morning, then a bit after lunch and into the afternoon it would heat up to where it was noticeably hot and a bit uncomfortable without AC or fans or shade.  The amazing thing though was then it would cool down to just as cool and sometimes COLDer than the morning.  So by the time dinner was done with, the windows could be open again and walks required pants and even a light jacket! (which Adrianne suggested we bring and I didn't believe it, so didn't pack any, so we ended up borrowing some, so now I know....hehe).  Sunday was fun to go to their ward and meet a lot of nice people.  Sunday afternoon we went to the cemetery to see Laila's grave and all the stories around that and those around her and where she ended up not being buried.  That was a really neat part of the trip too and we're so glad we got to visit.  The whole trip just seemed like it was a good balance of relaxation, activities, and friendship.  What good friends we have to take us in and cook for us for a whole weekend!! 

On our drive home we went through KS and were able to have even MORE topics to talk about.  Kind of related to the drive out there though, was the idea of living on land out in the middle of nowhere.  If it came down to that, Jason and I decided that we would have a hill house- where the temperature stays around the same as the earth's temperature 68 (ahh...) and live next to the Richards so Jason could assist in Mike's cheese-making process.  It's a good practice because unless you have a fresh, live, milk-producing cow, calcium would be hard to comeby.  We stopped in Hays, KS and definitely enjoyed our stay at the hotel there.  Then decided that if we weren't livin' it up in Colorado, we were ready to come home.

Coming home though, was a bit more tricky than we anticipated.  About 2 1/2 hours north of the city we stopped in The Great Salt Plains in Oklahoma.  It was kind of eerie with miles and miles and miles of dried up lake replaced with salt and there was literally NO ONE out there.  I think what made it scarier though was the storm that we could see off to the NorthWest.  We were keeping an eye on it as we got out of the car to start digging and about 2 minutes after we got out, the winds changed over to a cold wind from the north and we could see dust flying up in the distance.  If we weren't in Oklahoma already, it would have been exactly like the Wizard of Oz scene!!!  So, we hurried and packed the kids back in the car and drove the mile back to the dirt road from the middle of the Salt Plain.  We didn't see the storm intially, but when it finally caught up with us it was raining, then hailing, then REALLY hailing!!!  We couldn't get any radio reception, so we called our friend whose son does storm chasing.  Luckily, she guided us about where the storm was and we were able to avoid the tornado part of it and hang out in Enid.  Then, once that storm had passed and before the next one came from the NW, we headed out.  Unfortunatly though, there were also storms in the south, moving through the metro.  By this point though, we were able to get the radio station, so we took our sweet time and chille din Guthrie for a bit until that hailstorm knocked out power and caused major damage to vehicles in the metro and then we arrived safely home.

Look how dark it is in the background.....that's THE STORM comin' in.  Or are we on the moon?? ;0)

Ahh.....and after all that, our entire family slept in until 9:30 today- which I think is a first.

Today consisted of laundry, bills, organizing, playing, and getting ready for another campout tomorrow night.  Oh how I miss the weather and friends of Colorado.....