Life After Sundance...

Once we left Sundance Laura and Robert went back to Robert's parents' house for the reunion with his family members. They were coming to town for his sister, Laura's, wedding on Friday. Robert has TEN living siblings and so that is a pretty large crowd to gather for various occasions. Almost everyone was able to make it so that was great.

Jen and Lowell went to their house, Jim's mom flew home and we stayed with Chris and Missy for a few days. One of the days we went up to Thanksgiving Point for lunch but stopped on the way at the Veteran's Memorial Park to visit the grave of our good friend, Garth, who passed away a few years back. He is the doctor I use to work for in Las Vegas, forty years ago and the person that introduced us to the Church and baptized us 33 years ago.

Our entire family holds him in very high esteem and so Jen and her kids and Chris and Missy's family and Jim and I all went to find his grave. Garth was from Idaho and spent many years in Las Vegas so he doesn't have a lot of friends in Utah. He had never married and a lot of his siblings have passed away now. I am imagining we were among the few visitors to the cemetery to pay tribute to this wonderful friend. His contributions to our lives cannot be measured, they are priceless.

The cemetery is very pretty but wouldn't you know the sprinklers were being repaired in this part and so his grave site was surrounded by dead grass. Hopefully they have fixed it by now!

We surrounded his grave and had a family prayer together and then decided a photo of our feet would be fun! Laura and Robert's family was sorry to miss this and Lowell was working. There was a sweet spirit there.' Uncle Buffalo' as we called him, is missed and loved by us all for sure.


We are rather weird family (no kidding, you say?) We all have the same Toyota Sienna from the same year, same color. Bizarre but it was a fluke...we didn't plan it or anything. And I think the only color they sold that year had to be silver. Seriously, I could not find it in a parking lot without the permanent roof rack. It is funny to see the line up when we all go someplace together!

When we arrived at Thanksgiving Point it was lunch time and the kids really enjoy the Deli there. They have good sandwiches and it is very 'kid friendly,' so that filled the bill for us!
Snapped a shot of their gigantic chandelier just for fun!

Here is a goofy photo of Anyslee and Me
that Missy sent over the other day!
Aynslee is so funny!
She loves posing for photos lately!

We strolled through the Emporium which is a huge, fancy, home shop and that took just a few minutes. You cannot even think about shopping with a group that large. But it was a fun walk through. The major things to see At Thanksgiving Point, as far as we were concerned, were the beautiful gardens.

They have a lot of acreage there and a big hotel and lots of events, like weddings and receptions that are held there each year. One year they held the county fair there when I was visiting. It was wonderful. Imagine a fair held on grass instead of dirt or gravel. It was really neat. At night we sat on the grass and watched the lighted Ferris Wheel spin. Having the grass made a world of difference to the carnival atmosphere. It took the hot and dusty feel right out of the equation. The best part was it was like going back in time about 25 years. You felt safe and your kids were safe. You didn't have to keep your eyes glued to them every second. It was a very nice family activity like in the olden days before people got scary. I love that about Utah!

It was a lovely day and the flowers were so gorgeous.

Scrumptious! It makes me feel so bad that we never did plant any annuals this year in our garden pots in the yard. We have been gone too much and I just couldn't see the point of spending the money and then having them all die while we were away so much.

So I am enjoying the flowers everywhere else instead.
Brilliant, huh? Not really...just lazy!

The trunk on this tree looks like it was
tied in a knot like a cherry stem.

Beautifully framed red tree
though the Gazebo window.

These poppies were so bright and cheery!

The water features and displays are so fantastic.
You feel like you are at a mountain stream.

Of course we had to stop at Cabella's for Grampa on the way back. That was fun if you are into outdoor sporting equipment...well, ah, not really, but it was fun to see him enjoy it so much. We enjoyed this lazy day very much and it was nice to have a little nap when we got back to Chris and Missy's house.

Thrill Seekers

The Stratosphere Hotel in Las Vegas
As we passed it Robert said,
"I really want to bungee off of there!"

After our eight hour drive to Las Vegas we started to pass the various hotels on our way to ours in the late afternoon. We started out quite early in the morning picking the kids up at Robert's parents' home. We visited with Janet and loaded them up into the car. We then headed over to Robert's Dad's office so he could say good-bye to his Dad for a few years. It was not the first two year good-bye for them as Robert served a mission for our church in Japan for two years when he was 19. However, that long a separation is never easy. We took some pictures of them together in the courtyard of his lovely office complex.

Bryant, with Robert, Laura, Spencer and Ross

Doesn't Robert look like is Dad?

After we left there we traveled down to Cove Fort to pay a little visit to this church history site. We had a nice time and saw some wonderful exhibits of what life was like way out there in the desert a hundred and fifty plus years ago.

Entrance to the Fort

It is meticulously kept and maintained by missionaries, as are all our church history sites. The miracle of irrigation and TLC has produced a beautiful oasis in these parts. It was a beautiful day. The fort site was selected by Brigham Young and founded and settled by Ira Hinckley in 1867. He is one of Robert, Ross and Spencer's ancestors which made this visit all the more interesting for us.

This tree is so lush and pretty. It is 150
years old and supported by cables.

All of us in front of one of the original
little log cabins at the fort.

After we arrived in Las Vegas and got settled we had dinner and the evening was just free for relaxing or going out walking on the strip. The next day was our play day in L.V. The guys basically spent the entire day at Circus Circus with the boys in the roller coaster place. They had a ball, all four of them. They got home after we did that night.


They were far too busy going on roller coasters to take any photos so these are from the hotel website. I cannot imagine staying in there for all those hours but they did. Viva la difference!
Jim said it was a combination boardwalk and county fair under a big dome to regulate the temperature.

After this great fun they did mysteriously
find their way to the Stratosphere Hotel!

So apparently Robert wasn't kidding about jumping off the Stratosphere much to our surprise. :-0 This has to be the first time I have ever seen Robert doing something like this. I told him he blew his cover of being totally sensible at all times! I am glad to know he is not 100'% perfect in every possible thing! He is not allowed to scare his second mom like this, even after the fact! Thank heavens, Laura and I were at the show seeing Celine! Here is Bungee Boy getting into the astronaut outfit! He does shine in a uniform though, doesn't he? That is beside the point though! Just kidding! I am just so glad he was safe! Easy to say, after the fact, right?

All straps checked 4 times to assure
they would not malfunction.

Hugging his boys before the 1,149 foot plunge!

He survived and loved it but they all
look relieved, don't you think?

Why Grampa did not do this too is beyond me, it is so like his adventuresome nature to want to do it. But for whatever reason, he didn't. {{ Thanks Babe!}} Maybe he felt like he had already spent his mad money on Celine! Perhaps he stayed down to take care of the boys! Oh I know, maybe it is that you value life and limb more in your sixty-somethings. Whatever the reason, I am so glad.

I think the plan was to keep a low profile about this particular activity where Mom and Gramma were concerned, and the fact that they took three taxi rides back and forth between the hotels during the day. But the boys just couldn't keep it back. The first words out of their mouths were, "Guess what Dad did?" "Guess what we did!" Boys will be boys, always and forever! More power to 'em and us for that matter!