Bear Lake 2011

It's that wonderful time of year again when the Smith family heads to Bear Lake for our annual camping trip. This year we kept hearing reports of how high the lake was and how warm it was. They were right!! It was awesome. Instead of walking 1/4 mile to the beach, the water was 10 feet from the campsites! What a difference that made in the trip. The kids could go to the water without waiting for adults. You didn't have to "pack up" for the day and head to the beach...you could just come and go as you pleased. It was much more relaxing!

This year we also were in a new camping spot. We were unable to reserve the spots that we've had for 20+ years and were forced to get new spots further down the beach. We loved them!! There was so much more room and tons of shade. I think we will be moving there for all future Bear Lake trips. Since our group is only getting bigger and we are using more and more tents, it was nice to have the extra space.

The weather couldn't have been better this year. Usually we have one rainy afternoon or a cold spell, but this year we had a couple hours of wind and a rainstorm at night. The funny thing is that the weather reports said it was going to rain each day....we're glad they were wrong. We were able to enjoy the wave runners in the water and playing along the beach. We did feathers for our hair, permanent sandcastles, and duct tape wallets. And of course, we ate and ate and ate! That's one of the best parts of Bear Lake. Yum.

Of course I took over 100 pictures, but for blogging you have to cut those down to a few. So here are the highlight photos from this year:

The Smith family...all 54 of us!
Nana and Avery

Burying Taylor in the sand!

Grandad and Chad

Evan's big hole.

Three brothers...Dave, Mark, and Mike.

Putting feathers in Austin's hair.

McKinley...chillin'

Ethan at the beach.

Austin driving Dave on the waverunner.

Evan with Ellilia.

Rafting

A while back I saw a great deal on River Rafting on the Provo River. We snatched up 6 deals and

waited for a free day to go and float/raft the river. This year we had an incredible amount of snow and so the river was really high. We actually waited until July because the river was too high for most of June!

We decided to go out on our own on the river (no guide) and it was really fun. We had 6 people and 4 paddles. David was our guide and steered the raft down the river. This was our first trip as a family and it was pretty mild, but it had to be so we could all go. Nothing like the white water rafting that David and I have loved over the years. But it was family fun! We did class I and II's and practiced our paddling and following directions. Evan, McKinley, and Austin even braved the cold water for a little floating down the river. We didn't bring the camera with us because we didn't know how wet we'd get, but we snapped a picture at the end! All in all it was a great beginning to what we hope is a bright future of white water rafting!

Draper Days Parade

This was the first time our family attended the Draper Days parade since David got married and moved away. It was such a great small town parade to celebrate the statehood of Utah. There were floats and politicians and marching bands and vendors throwing candy. It was a perfect July morning and a great day for a parade and carnival.

Alta Hills Farm Summer Horse Camp

McKinley and her cousin Denali participated in a four day horse camp near our house. Each day they got to choose a horse or pony to ride, brushed and tacked the pony and had a lesson. Each day the girls would talk about riding and how much they loved the horses. We hope to be able to take lessons there soon.

McKinley especially enjoyed Penny. She was small and sweet and had a little personality. Apparently she doesn't like other horses, so you had to keep her away from all the other horses during the riding time.

Patch was another favorite of the girls. Patch was a little bigger and a little more bumpy, but sweet and gentle at the same time.



The girls had a fantastic time and brought back a lot of memories for their mothers. I was about McKinley's age when I started my lifelong love of riding horses. The smell of the barn, the beautiful horses, and the kind of people we met there made me remember good times. I'm so glad my daughter can participate in things like this as well.

Eating our Catch!

Like all responsible hunters we made sure to eat what we caught. We had a scrumptious crawdad boil with corn on the cob, potatoes, and crawdads. We were all taught the art of eating crawdads. Boy, you can only get a morsel from each of those critters. First, you pull off the tail, then crack the legs and pull them off. Finally you make sure to devein them and you are left with a small shrimp size bite of crawdad to eat! Lots of work, but yummy delicious. Not sure how many of my kids ate crawdads, but Keegan loved them!


Austin was willing to give them a try. He ate a few crawdads and lots of potatoes. No corn for this boy with braces.

David enjoyed the feast as well.

Camping at Strawberry Reservoir

We packed up the trailer and headed out to nearby Strawberry reservoir for a few days of camping fun. We meet up with the Fitlows and the Sundahl's at Strawberry Bay campground. It was beautiful weather and we enjoyed the day at the reservoir catching crawdads for our supper. I have to admit I have never seen, heard, or caught a crawdad in my life, so it was a first for all of us. The kids, from age 4-14 enjoyed catching the little lobster-like critters. Some were caught with nets, some were caught by hand, and some were caught with a chicken drumstick on a string. All of the kids got into the action and had a memorable time on our first crawdad hunt! Here's a ton of pictures from the hunting:










Together we caught over 200 crawdads and the Sundahl's cooked a feast that night for us. More of that in my next post!

Cheer Camp with Brynn

Since we moved to Utah, McKinley has been asking me about cheerleading. I just haven't found it as popular here for little girls. Near the end of school she brought home a flyer from one of the TA's in her class that was holding cheer camp during the summer. She loves Ms. Brynn, and was so excited to go to cheer camp with her. She had a great time and was one of the smallest kids there so she was the top of the formations and got to do lots of throws and flips. She's pretty good and learned a lot.