The Epic Journey Part 2

We started off early in the on a Thursday morning. My cousins daughter Laura (Cousin once removed? I never did understand how all that works- Regardless she's my cousin), was headed up to Escalante from San Diego with her 2 kids so we decided caravan. It's a bit less than a 10 hour drive according to Google Maps. (We made it in less than that.) We took a rather long short cut through Zion's National Park. But as I had never been to Zion's I didn't mind too much. (I've been trying to upload a picture of Zion's but it's not working!!! Darn that lost camera!)
I have driven (literally) across the U.S. and I'm not sure that there is a road that beats the scenery on Hwy 12 in Utah and that's saying a lot. I live in Alaska where the views are magnificent. You drive through Red Canyon- These are 2 separate tunnels that you drive through. The pictures aren't the greatest as they are from April's phone as she and David were driving. You don't enter but you also pass Bryce Canyon National Park as well. I'll show you more of Hwy 12 in the next post.














That night we congregated at my Aunt Evelyn's house. All my cousins weren't there yet but when you there are like 35 Grandchildren, 77 Great grandchildren and I think 10 Great-great Grandchildren, well I'm not sure there's a house big enough for all of us! It was needless to say a bit crowded but so much fun to see everyone.

Here is a picture of Daniel and Aunt Emma fooling around waiting to go to the funeral. I really didn't have to do much with my kids while we were there because they had so many surrogate Mom's. Though the kids were a bit overwhelmed by having so many people wanting their attention. By the time the funeral started they just wanted me but I was busy playing for it, so we would squeeze hugs and cuddles in between songs.
I love this picture because it is SO my family. This is my sisters April (piano), Hannah (violin) and Eliza (viola). We are always playing, or singing for something. They are practicing for the funeral here. My cousins daughter later joined them as well.

Waiting for funerals to start can take awhile... The kids all had fun taking random pictures. This is my brother David. He lives in Texas and I don't get to see him nearly enough. It was SO much fun to talk to him and see him. April, David and I shared a hotel room while we were there and the first night we were up until 2am just talking and laughing. Wish we could do it more often guys!

Reagan and my sister Eliza hanging out waiting for the funeral to start.
Don't I have handsome cousins? These are the oldest boys of each family of my cousins. As you can see they span many years. My oldest cousin, Richard, I believe is my Mom's age and the youngest cousin I have, Bryce, is 16 I think?



Saying goodbye to Grandma. It was great to see everyone though. I was sad when half of the family left right after the family dinner. I hadn't seen some of these people in about 15 years and there were so many people it was hard to talk to everyone before they left.
The next day was a sleeping half day for Daniel so while he stayed home with Grandma Lyman I took some of my siblings, my Dad and Reagan and went to Devil's Rock Garden. This is a fabulous place that I grew up going to as a child. We drove up and Reagan said, "Mommy, look! There's big rocks!" Another thing to make me sad about loosing my camera. There are 2 natural arches there that I had pictures of. I love this place. I have such fond memories of it. My favorite is when we had a family reunion and we played hide and go seek at dusk in the rocks. It's a child's gigantic playground and it meant a lot to me to be able to share it with my daughter.
Later that day Daniel was a bit more awake and my cousins took him, Jonathan and Emma to slide down the Red rocks down the street. Bet you didn't do this as a kid!
Next stop, and next post Ogden UT