Family reunion at Aspen Grove

The Mower Family Reunion at Aspen Grove

We just returned from Aspen Grove, it's a BYU camp for families. We had the whole entire Mower gang there. The kids loved playing with their cousins. It was so cute to watch them play together. This was my kind of camping. We had showers, bathrooms (I hate out houses), and all the meals were made for you in a huge dinning hall. They also had a kids club were the kids went during the day. They even watched the baby! With the kids being happily entertained, Dan and I were able to do all kinds of fun activities. They had rock climbing, ropes courses, volleyball, and basketball (only Dan played B-ball). We also did a short 4 mile hike to stewart falls. It was a spectacular waterfall. The hike was really enjoyable. Everything was so green, because of the unusual rain fall we had in June. Since it was a BYU camp they also had guest speakers everyday. We went to a few of the lectures. The topics were alot of fun, and helped us focus on our family, and try to improve in a few areas. The whole trip was so fun, and so relaxing. I even got a couple of naps!

Kate posing in front of our lodge.

Benjamin's looking very happy. We were in the dinning hall eating. It was so nice to not worry about cooking at all for an entire week!

Kirk as an "onion chief" at frontier night. When he came from the kids club he was telling Dan all about the "onion chief". I had never heard of an Onion Chief before, but thought perhaps it was story the councilors told the kids. Then when we went to the frontier night that evening, Kirk said "look Grandpa an Onion Chief." He was pointing to someone dressed as an Indian. So we realized he was calling the Indians, onions. We've tried to explain it to him, but he still calls his feather hat an "Onion Chief hat". I think Frontier night was one of my favorite nights of the whole camp. The staff did a great job, everyone was dressed in western wear. They had all kinds of different frontier games. Kirk's face looks blue because he had a snow cone. They also gave out sheriff badges for shooting toy cans, feathers for listening to Indian stories in a tee pee, and all kinds of other cute games and prizes. I only regret that Kate didn't make it there. After dinner she crashed in the room. Dan and I didn't want to wake her, so Dan stayed back at the room. He wanted to rest his foot (he had twisted it playing basketball earlier that day). I think it was good to give Kirk some one on one attention. He had me, and both Grandparents all to himself, since the other grand kids were fishing. Needless to say he got about fifty pictures taken of himself. He was loving it!

Dan getting ready to climb the rock wall, and do the ropes course. It was a really great feeling to accomplish something that your not sure you can actually do. There were a few times I wanted to quite, but when your in the middle of climbing a wall that far off the ground, you really don't have a choice but to press on. It's amazing what we are capable of when we don't have the option to quit. I never thought that I was afraid of heights, but I was definitly nervous while I was up there.