Hawaii Again...

I was lucky enough to take my trip to Hawaii because of one of my friends. She had a couple of free condos in Maui because of her travel club membership, and she decided to invite us and some other friends to join them on vacation. Our little travel club consited of me my two girlfriends, one girlfriend's new husband and our 7 kids - three 19 year olds, three 17 year olds and a 13 year old. We have all been friends since our kids all were all toddlers at day care together. With 3 woman, 1 man and 7 kids, all from Utah, the polygamy state, we decided to call our trip the "Sisterwives Tour".

One of fun little excursions was taking the whole family to a luau. The old Lahiana Luau is right along the water were we were treated to yet another lovely sunset. I was a little worried that the kids would all think a luau was lame, but they all enjoyed it as much as we adults did... even if they were a little apalled about the dead pig in the pit!




Our "family" at the luau. Being a big Utah family and all We couldn't all fitat one table, so the 17 year old girls got one of their own.

Aren't they just cute as can be?

Nerd Humor

One of the guys in my lab has spent most of the summer in a lab in Australia learning new research techniques. He finally sent us postcard this week. I love his quirky sense of humor, sending us a little of his research in the mail. I guess laboratories don't sell post cards to send to your friends back home.... maybe there is an entrepreneurial opportunity there. LOL. Oh, the horizontal white "lines" in the picture in the middle... that's DNA!!!

Vacation...

I guess I took a little vacation from my blogging as well as a real life vacation. The kids and I took a trip to Mauii with some friends. One of our tourist moments was a trip to the top of the Haleakala Volcano to see the sunrise over the crater. Fortunately we did this on our second day there, because still being on "Utah time" (4 hours later) made getting up at 3:30 AM so we could be at the 10,000 ft summit by sunrise a little easier. It was, perhaps, the most spectacular sunrise I've seen in my life. Also a cold one! Even in Hawaii it's darn cold at that altitude! It was also an easy summit, we could drive nearly to the top, and it was only a short hike to the summit... it seems that hiking to 10,000 ft is easier at sea level LOL!


It was Sunday, which for me was actually Son-day, as it was my son's birthday. He thought that rising to see the sunrise was pretty cool way to start his birthday.

Me and my boy, waiting for the sunrise!



Being the the lucky boy he is, he got to end the day in style, as this was the night we chose for a sunset dinner cruise. Sunday, Son-day, Sunrise, Sunset! Sea level to10,000 feet in one day. I think my boy had a great 20th birthday!


Sarah, Matt and the setting sun!

My Universary...

Yeah, today was the day... My Universary. That's my name for the day that would have been my anniversary had my marriage not come to such a sad demise. Having divorced 18 months ago this was 2nd Universary, but it was kind of a big one, because had things worked out the way they should have it would have been my 25th aniversary.

I was a little worried about getting depressed, so I figured the best thing to do was to stay busy... fortunately one of my hiking, biking buddies suggested we join the local Meetup mountain biking group for a ride. So after work we headed out to the Glenwild trail in Park City. The coordinators split up us into two groups, a beginner type group (most of my friends and I) and a more advanced, gonzo, type group. Mike, who led our group was really patient with us beginner types, and he gave us some great instuction. With the exception of one of my friends taking a bad spill, it was a really nice ride.

My other anti depression plans was to invite my buddies over to meet my friend Miss Rita (Margy-Rita!)after the ride. I thought it would just be the four of us, but the rest of the biking group was so nice I ended up inviting everyone for the apres-ride margarita party.

It's always interesting when you open up and are friendly to strangers. It turns out the coordinator of the group lives a couple of blocks away. One of the women, was also a recent divorcee, another woman lives near by and was sure she knew me, turns out are kids played on a soccer team together, and we have several common friends. Every turn of the conversation we found commonalities. My old friends, my new friends, we all had fun talking and laughing! We even toasted my Universary. I can't think of the last time I had so much fun inviting a bunch of strangers to my house. I think it's something I should do more often. Turned out to be just the thing I needed on what could have easily been such a dreary day! Reach out and be friendly. it may just bring you happiness!

Watch Me Create!

Wow. I can tell it's summertime... I've been too busy (hiking, biking, socializing) to keep up with my blogging.... guess I'll be posting some retro-blogs soon.

Meanwhile, today you can find me entertaining teenagers over on Watch Me Create!

Hiking again... Alexander Basin

Today I hiked with the Wasatch Hiking Meetup Group up to Alexander Basin In Millcreek Canyon. This hike was not for the faint of heart. It wasn't very long, only a mile and a half up to the basin,but it was steep, but about a 1300 ft elevation gain. This trail went pretty much straight up the hill with hardly any switch backs. And I mean UP! It was definitely humbling for me, as I was the slow one in the group, something that I'm usually not. Proof I really need to loose the extra weight I guess(or shave off some years as I always seem to be the "old" one in the group)

The wild flowers were incredible, and we got to see a great big bull moose!





This shot reminds me of the ending scene from "The Sound of Music"


Look close there's a moose in there!


Some wildlower pictures of course!

4th of July Roadtrip Part 2

I can tell it's summer, been too busy playing outside to post in a timely matter. (That and a few evil issues with my laptop) But anyway, I wanted to share a few more pictures of Mystic Hot Springs before we hit the road. Both Sarah and I were enamored with Mike's old bus collection, the blue bus had been outfitted to sleep in and can be rented for the night. Sarah was dissapointed he didn't stay in the hippie bus.





And of course we had to soak again in the morning...

4th of July Road Trip - Part 1

Sarah and I decided to go visit her brother Matt in Durango, Colorado for the fourth of July weekend. Since a good road trip always includes going out of your way to visit fun spots we decided to take the long way and head down to Mystic Hot Springs in Monroe, Utah.
Mystic is a funky little hot spring. It's old, run down, and a bit of a hippie sort of place that's totally cool. The owner did artwork for the Greatful Dead, and being a music fan has concerts there sometimes. He's also a lampworker, and has/had other lampworkers living there. Kinda of a hippie lampworking commune... how cool!
I'd been there once before, but it was Sarah's first time. She must have her moms hippie wanna be gene, as she thought the place was totally cool, especially soaking in the tubs up on hill.
and how can you not like soaking in the hillside tubs? The scenery is spectacular!

We got there after dinner and were able to enjoy the setting sun. Sarah had fun taking some arsty pictures while the sun was setting. I especially like the ones of her feet in the tub.


Matt wanted us to bring Daisy to visit, so she happily joined us on our road trip. She was thrilled to sit by the tubs and keep us company.

Summer aromatherapy!

It's that time of year again. The Linden trees are in bloom. I love this time of year because the Lindens, which are fairly common around here, are addictively fragrant. There are some outside my building at work, and many in the park in my neighborhood. I like to walk through the park with Daisy just to drink in the air. It is such a wonderful smell.

It's good day when you wear out the dog...

Daisy and went hiking today. We headed up Millcreek canyon, and decided to hike Porter Fork. The first mile and a half or so is a narrow paved road that's dotted with quaint summer homes. A paved trail doesn't exactly sound rugged, but it is pretty steep and a nice workout. Perhaps that makes it a wussy trail and that's why I never hear about anyone hiking it? It's a favorite spot of mine for an evening hike, because I know if I should end up coming down in the dark it's easily navigable.

At the end of the paved road you enter the Mt. Olympus wilderness area. I've hiked into the wilderness area a little ways, but never very far, as I usually hike this trail after work and have limited time before the sun sets. My first picture was taken at my normal turn around spot.

Today was my day to get further up the trail. As you can tell by my third picture, the trail goes quite a ways higher, up to a nice meadow surrounded by a cirque of mountain ridges. I hiked up through the meadow and a little further. Eventually the trail should head up over the ridge, but the meadow seemed like good turn around as Daisy, who's almost 9 years old, was getting pretty tired. She never really understands the point of hiking where there isn't a creek, and we'd left the creek behind a while back. One thing about these steep trails, they give you quite a workout going both up and down. Ask my quads. And my dog!

My requisite weird close up flower shot for the day. The sun light shining through this sticky geranium was so pretty... so why not take a picture from the underside of the flower?

Raindrops on roses...

...and primrose and lilies. I'm not sure we've ever had such a waterlogged June. I checked the NOAA weather site and found a page that said the month to date had 2.4 inches of rain while the average for the month of June is 0.6 inches. I bet those measurements were out at the airport, I'm sure up along the mountains where I live we've had much more. I'm sure I've dumped at least 4 inches of water out my wheelbarrow, which has been sitting in the yard awaiting my planting my deck planters. I've had a flat of plants waiting at least two weeks for a dry night to do do some planting.


Tonight was that night. The second day in a row without rain, I figured the soil in my pots was dry enough to work with, so tonight was planting night. Clearly I should have dumped the water out the wheelbarrow more frequently, because my back yard was teaming with mosquitoes. Or were they from my pond or my fire pit or somewhere else where water could pool? Regardless, I've never had so many squeeters in my yard - it actually made for an unpleasant planting night.