Southern Utah

It's the annual post where I express dismay at the how quickly the summer has evaporated and I have not posted about any of it.

We go to Utah multiple times a year to get grandparent and cousin time for the kids, but after driving 11 or so hours to get to grandma's house, we haven't shown them much else of the great state we grew up in.  So this summer we kept them in the car for a couple more days and took them down south to....

Bryce Canyon with my mom, dad, and brother, 

 the Coral Pink Sand Dunes, (aka the day we spent on Tatooine and/or Jakku)

 Pipe Springs (okay this one is technically across the boarder into AZ but my ancestors were the first white settlers there and now it's a National Monument so it's a big deal to us.), 

  and Snow Canyon.  

(The kids' first exposure to classic Utah slick rock & slot canyons.  They loved it!)

We also drug them to a half dozen great aunt's house and an odd second cousin or two.  They were pretty good sports about it.

My mom had the kids collect sand at all the different places and she help them make souvenir sand tubes. 

  And I had the kids draw all the fantastical things they imagined in the Utah desert on top of some of our vacation photos.