What Happened to July?!

After Apple Garden at Bear Lake, we dropped off the grandkids, picked up another one, and headed to Emmett. Marissa spend a few days with us and we really enjoyed her. She is almost twelve years old and we felt we got to know her a little better. She learned how to knit. With a little more practice, she will be able to make a dishrag for her mom.

The two weeks were really busy. Terry had a list of things to do on the trailer. He had to replace the valves on the sewer because they were leaking.

We had bought a lot of cleaning stuff to try to get the Condo shiny. In some of the parks we go to, it is one of the older RVs. We wanted it to at least be shiny.

Ryan and his family were in the process of finding a home to rent/buy in Emmett. They have been living in Meridian. We were close enough to get to have the kids once in a while and were able to help a little with the move.

I had lots of fun "playing" with the kids, Chaz, Ryley, and Wesley.

Wesley and Ryley were "helping" Aunt Lorrie water her garden!

After two weeks at home, we headed to McCormick Park at Hells Canyon on the Snake River. It is one our favorite places to be. We have been going there with our family every weekend after the 4th of July for many years.

Jenna and Kamber were all curled up with curlers I gave them from a yardsale find.

Boe is one of the best fishermen. Dad and Grandpa have a hard time keeping up with him!
Jenna and Emily are "best cousins" all wrapped up in a life jacket.

We found a float tube at a yard sale and then Lorrie's son Marc gave us one he had hanging in his garage for a long time. We all had so much fun going out on them, until the one Marc gave us just kind of fell apart because the fabric had kind of rotted. This picture is my brother Ron and his wife Kathy going out.

Marissa and Heidi having a "mother/daughter" hug.

Ron and Kathy with their son-in-law Than, their daughter Destiny, and their grandson Gerrick.

Sarah, Jill, and Ryan's wife Lori with Chaz, enjoying the day.

Lori, Chaz, Ryan, Shay, and Jill's husband Dan, enjoying a meal.

A great group of grandkids!

Terry and my brother Bill, who started this whole event for our family when he started coming to McCormick Park with friends from Boring, OR, almost 20 years ago.

We always find time to play games. Mexican Train with dominoes is one of our favorites. Here is Jill, Than, Shay, and Bill playing.

All of my brothers except one, and my sister, and some of their family members came also. This is my brother Frank's daughter Natalee and his wife Andy.

For many years while going to McCormick, we were limited to how long we could stay because of always having to go back to work. This year, we got there before anyone else and stayed until everyone else had gone! Retirement is great!

We left McCormick Park and went to Redmond Oregon to a four-day RV Rally. We had a really good time. We met lots of people, went to a lot of seminars where we learned tons, had great entertainment, and spent more money at the vendor booths. There were over 5,000 people there, all parked in RV's in the parking lots aroundthe fairgrounds. After it was over, we left at 5:30 in the morning to beat the rush and headed back to Emmett.

Apple Garden Campground, Bear Lake, UT

We left Hot Springs on Tuesday to go to Apple Garden Campground at Bear Lake.

We took Jill's two kids, Boe & Kamber, and Shay's daughter, Emily, with us. This was pretty much a new experience for us to have grandkids camping with us without their parents. We have been looking forward to this since we started our new life style. It was tons of fun!

The park is pretty small with few amenities, but it is really pretty and peaceful. It is made right in the middle of an apple orchard (which still produces apples). There were lots of birds nesting in the apple trees. They didn't appreciate the kids' curiosity about their nests!

It was a big job coming up with activities to keep the grandkids busy. They are making necklaces to take home to their parents. Boe and Emily did really good (they are 5 years old), and Kamber (3 years old) did well, too, but she finally gave up after dropping her almost completed necklace several times.

They decorated cupcakes and then got to squeeze the leftover frosting into their mouths.

They had fun having a tea/lemonade party and eating their cupcakes. Emily was the hostess and served Boe and Kamber.

There was a fun playground where the kids played. It was above where we camped so we could hear and see them, but we were usually up there with them.

There were a few bumps and bruises from the playground, but they had fun. Kamber decided we needed to buy her some knee pads!

We had a fun campfire, but the marshmallows were a little sticky!

There was a big hill and they had lots of "tricks" to perform on it. Here they are in various stages of doing somersaults down the hill!

The lake was beautiful. On Friday we drove clear around it. Part of it is in Idaho and part in Utah.

We found a fun beach where we played in the water.

Boe enjoyed trying to skip rocks.

We will head back to Emmett after spending a couple of days in Idaho Falls dropping off

We will be coming and going from Emmett until after Labor Day. We have an Oregon/Washington Coast trip planned for September, then on to Northern Idaho and we plan to end up back in Eastern Idaho for hunting season and Thanksgiving before we go back to Wikieup, AZ. I will try to keep the BLOG up somewhat during the summer. Thanks for joining us on our RV adventures!

Hot Springs, Tremonton, Ut

We were excited to go to Hot Springs campground because I had a family reunion scheduled there for my family on my Mom's side. Two of my brothers came and also my sister, all from Idaho. We had a good turnout and had a lot of fun. We were really worried because we got there the Tuesday before and it rained constantly for two days. It finally cleared up the morning of the reunion.

This campground is really fun because it has a natural hot springs swimming pool that you can swim in no matter what the weather. There is also a 9-hole golf course that is very inexpensive for members and their guest. We had a golf scramble that Shay and the other boys organized. It was a lot of fun.

This was the first time in a long time that all of our kids and grandkids were together. We attempted a family picture. It is certainly a "camping picture," but we are all there. What a group!
I was glad to see my cousin, Scott Robinson (my Mom's first cousin). It had been quite a while since I had seen him.

I was lazy and didn't get my camera out much, so I didn't get many pictures of the other relatives.

But, I did get a picture of my brothers, Frank and Mike Fisher, with their wives, Andy and Janet. They are always a lot of fun to be with. They kept the camp awake part of one night with all of the laughter coming from their trailer!

After the reunion, Shay and Marissa and Emily stayed. We decided that since we are so close to some of our kids and grandkids, we would take turns taking some of the grandkids with us. We kept Jill's kids, Kamber and Boe, and will keep Shay's daughter, Emily with us for the next week. They had fun burying Boe in the sand at the playground.






Of course, there is always time for another round of golf for Shay and Grandpa!



Paddle boats are a new addition to the Hot Springs campground. Shay was out with the kids for about 10 minutes and then I took over. Marissa, Emily, Boe, Kamber, and I paddled around for the rest of the hour. I am sure my legs will remind me tomorrow than I am not as young I used to be!

Emily brought along her "make up" and she decided to practice on Kamber. I am not sure Kamber's mom would approve, but they had fun!
Grandpa is always excited to fish with the grandkids! This little fishing pond hadn't been fished in for about two years before our reunion, but a couple of my nephews caught some good-sized bass during the reunion. Terry was hopeful that the grandkids would do the same.
But, the only thing caught was an ugly yellow catfish by Emily. The amazing thing was that we got her to touch it afterwards!

Echo Island, Coalville, Ut

Echo Island is the Camperworld campground that is closest to Salt Lake. It is just above Park City. It was pretty full the week we were there. As we walked around, there was only one other camper that was not from Utah. It is a lot different than going to the Coast-to-Coast campgrounds where there are people from so many different places. There are also a lot more families.
We didn't feel lonely this time, though, because Sarah's family came and stayed a couple of days with us--her husband Ryan and kids Jenna, Luke, and JT. It was fun. I hadn't had a grandma fix for several months, so I was ready to see them.

It is amazing how much the kids can change in a few months. Jenna will be in kindergarten next year. JT is really starting to talk. Luke is very determined in everything he does.



We all got to celebrate Terry's birthday while the kids were with us. It was a couple of days early, but that's okay. He finally caught up with me in age. There are two months that I am a year older than he is and it can be a miserable two months! We got him a cake and he got a screen tent and a new white shirt for Church.



It has been fun having our tandem bike with us. It gives us good exercise, is economical, and is a good conversation starter. Ryan and Sarah took a little spin on it. When they came back, Ryan was in front because Sarah said he wasn't doing his share of peddling! I get accused of that all of the time, but it certainly is not true!
The weather turned nice enough to swim. There are now two pools at Echo Island. The old one has a slide. The new one is larger and there is also a new hot tub that holds 16 people. They told us there were 141 camping units there over Memorial Day, which is more than the actual number of sites. If you are a member of Camperworld, they have to find you a place to park, whether there is an official site or not--in the parking lot or someplace. It is nice because you know that you will always have a place to park.
Our grandkids, including Jenna, are little fishes in the warm water.

There is a fishing pond that they stock. Only children under 12 and seniors over 62 can fish in it. Of course, having grandchildren visiting always gives Terry an excuse. He kept putting "fish candy" on the hooks and the kids caught fish. (You were only supposed to us artificial bait and no powerbait.) He soon had all of the kids fishing around him asking him to help them catch a fish!

Knotty Pine, Woodland, UT

The last time we went to Knotty Pine Resort, it was pretty rough, but that was several years ago. They have made a lot of improvements since then--swimming pool and hot tub, new restrooms and showers, laundry room, nice playground, clubhouse, more sites, and lots of grass. It may be our favorite Camperworld campground.

The only bad thing is that there was no Internet here and we had to travel to the Church about 7 miles away to park in their parking lot to do my transcription for Travis.
It has surprised us that we are ready to go on to someplace else after a week. We thought that we would be tired of moving so often, but it seems, so far, that we are ready to move on.

We didn't do any fishing in the Provo River that runs along the park since Terry doesn't have a Utah fishing license. But some of the sites were close enough to hear it running during the night.
The new pool and hot tub are really nice. We actually were able to go swimming one of the days we were there. Since it was really busy during Memorial weekend, we waited til the crowd was gone to go.

There were lots of families here over the weekend and it sure made us feel lonely being all by ourselves with no family around, so we invited three brothers to come in and watch the Jazz game because they couldn't get any reception on their TV.

Knotty Pine also has a new playground for the kids. It is really nice. The grandkids would love it here.
We had a campfire a couple of nights. We were camped on a corner and got all kinds of suggestions as to what we should be cooking over the fire. I was roasting some marshmallows and a man brought his two grandkids by so we could show them how to do it. They were waiting for their fire to get to the right stage for marshmallows and I think he was trying to keep them entertained while that was happening.
Our wood was some we had gathered from the woods and it was pretty green--thus the smoke. We have a hard time paying $4-$5 for a small bundle of firewood.





Well, on to the next adventure, and Echo Island Campground in Coalville. It is only about fifty miles away, so we won't have much time in traveling, or cost of fuel! That is always good.

Pleasant Creek, Mt. Pleasant, UT

Terry moved to Pleasant Creek Campground in Mt. Pleasant, Utah, while I was in Hawaii. It was the first time he moved without me. He assured me that I was really missed, but he managed! Pleasant Creek is one of our Camperworld campgrounds that we have ownership in. The best thing is that we have paid up a lifetime membership and there is no cost to them and we can stay in them as many times as we want per year.
This crazy weather!! It was cold at Pleasant Creek. It is kind of high in elevation, but snow is unusual this time of year. We woke up one morning with snow on the top of the mountains behind us. Terry still wouldn't let me turn on the furnace during the night, so we were ready for hot chocolate each morning!
The campground manager likes turtles. She had this one sitting in the office. It looked like the sea turtles we saw in Hawaii when we went snorkeling.

They have built a big new pavilion at this park. They allow family reunions, which we had about five years ago. It is really nice.

There is also a fun playground for the kids to play on.
The pool is really nice, but it didn't open until Memorial day, which is still a couple of weeks away. I am going to loose my Hawaiian tan!
All over the campground there are little carved animals sitting on stumps. There was even a snake carved out of a long stump. They kind of add to the scenery!
I brought back a bamboo wind chime to Terry from Hawaii. It sounds kind of like the drums that were played at the Polynesian Center and in some of the performances at the Resort. It was a better gift than one of those "dumb t-shirts." (He got one of those, too.)

This is the coolest way to cut and serve pineapple. (I learned this in Hawaii.) We had fun eating it, although I ate too much and my mouth was sore for a couple of days!