Seth receives the Priesthood

Seth has been so excited to receive the Aaronic Priesthood and be just like his dad and brothers. Early in January, Seth was sustained in church and later ordained to be a deacon. Grandma and Grandpa Daniels were there to support Seth, and we are so grateful were able to come to this big event.

Dad is helping Seth learn to tie his own tie.

Mom almost forgot to take a picture, but we grabbed one at home.

Seth has done a great job passing the sacrament, and he loves going to Young Mens' activities. We are happy to have another worthy priesthood holder in the house.

The best part of Seth receiving the priesthood for Mom is that all five of us can go into the temple and perform baptisms. So, the week after Seth was ordained, we all went to the Saratoga Springs temple to do baptisms. It was cold and windy, so we didn't get great pictures. But it was amazing to feel the Spirit and be together as a family in the temple.

Seth could not wait to go to the temple!

It was so amazing being together as a family in the temple!

Death Valley Day 3

We enjoyed Death Valley.

Friday was our last day in the park. We ate a quick breakfast in the room and got checked out. Then we hit a few stops on the way out of Death Valley. This was made a little bit more exciting by the fact that the gas was so low in the van, that we were going to have -16 miles of gas when we arrived at the nearest station in Pahrump!

Our first stop was at Zabriskie Point. We only spent a few minutes walking around, but the colors were really nice, and we wished we'd have stopped in this spot first. We continued east to another road that took us out to an overlook called Dante's View. This was the best place we saw in all of park. It was like being on top of the world looking down into the depths of the valley. We left with a really good memory of Death Valley.

There was an outdoor museum near our room where we stayed.

This was a beautiful view of the rocks in Death Valley.

Dante's View was amazing.

It was also so windy and cold!

Luckily, it was all down hill from there to Pahrump, and we filled up with 6 miles to spare. From there it was less than an hour back to Tiff's house. We had lunch with the Poole's (at least the ones that weren't at school). Then, we got to play with them for the rest of the day.

The lowest we have ever driven a vehicle.

Ben loves hanging out with the boys.

On the last morning, we went and watched Audrey participate in a cheer competition. It was really fun, and a lot different than our boys' baseball or basketball games. We still made it home by 4 o'clock, with Mark driving most of the way. It was an awesome trip!

Audrey did so well!

We enjoyed watching her cheer so much!

It was so fun!

Death Valley Day 2

We finally got to sleep in a little. After bowls of cereal in the hotel room, we headed north about 8 o'clock. Our first stop was a Borax Mine exhibit. We walked around and took in the history for a few minutes. 

The Harmony Borax Mine display was interesting.

Seth took the photo this time!

Then we continued down to the sand dunes. The wind has been blowing a lot since we've been here, but it was mostly calm as we walked around the dunes, thinking about R2-D2 and C3PO on these same dunes. Seth and Dad even took a picture of themselves ready to get pulled out of the sand by Jawas.

Walking on the dunes just like C3PO and R2-D2.

Do you think the Jawas will pick them up?

It was a fun morning at the dunes.

So much sand!

Our next stop was for a longer hike. It was steadily uphill, and the boys showed some reluctance, but we walked 1.75 miles to the end of Mosaic Canyon. This one was up a narrow slot canyon much like the Golden Canyon the day before. There was a little more scrambling, and Dax climbed straight up a wall at the end of the canyon. The canyon was also a lot narrower in certain sections, which was fun. We like these scrambling hikes, because we have to work together. The boys are really good at helping Mom over the obstacles, and we need that sense of teamwork.

The Mosaic Canyon had a lot of fun rock features.

We thought this wall looked just like petrified wood.

We loved the winding beginning.

Everyone was scrambling all over. Can you see Mark way back there?

Mark found a nice place to rest.

Seth hiding like a Jawa.

We enjoyed this hike together.

Seth found a rock shaped like a tall Utah.

Look at those stripes.

Mom loved this trail.

Good thing Mom didn't know Dad let him do this.

Dad and Mark hiked all the way to the end.

Mom slid right down this chute.

There were fighter jets flying over for some of the hike. They were so loud.

After the long hike, we did some driving. We'd heard of a waterfall and an overlook that we wanted to try on the far west side of the park. The distance of the drive was daunting, and the road was narrow and full of hills and ridges that made it an interesting winding drive. Unfortunately, the overlook was horrible. Not only wasn't it interesting, but it was also terribly windy. The wind almost blew us right over the edge! After only a few minutes, we started back toward the center of the park.

The wind was strong!

We couldn't find the waterfall, so we stopped at a restaurant for lunch. It was really expensive, but the food was good, and we couldn't waste that 50 mile drive. Turns out, the road to the waterfall was all washed out by the recent hurricane, so there was nothing to do over there but eat. We enjoyed the food and the ancient restaurant, so it was worth it.

We enjoyed a hot lunch!

Then we made another long drive. We came back across the park and turned north. Many roads are out up there, too, but we made a single stop at Ubehebe Crater. This is a massive volcanic crater 500 feet deep and almost 2 miles around. We decided since we drove we up there, we better do some hiking. But this one was steep! There were some massive climbs up the along the rim of the crater. Still, we made it through the ups and downs all the way along the narrow rim trail. At the end of the day, the phone informed us we'd climbed the equivalent of 100 flights of stairs!

The crater was huge!

Seth cheered Mom on by finding purple flowers for her along the way.

We had fun some of the time. ;)

It was interesting to see different sides of the crater.

Seth was a real trooper!

A third long drive brought us all the way back to the ranch. We quickly changed into our swimsuits and headed out through the twilight to the swimming pool. It was warm and nice, and took away many of our aches.

We changed and quickly headed up to the ice cream place. The ice cream was also expensive, but we'd burned a lot of calories on those uphill hikes, so it tasted like we'd earned it.

The pool is fed by a spring, so it is always 87 degrees.

The ice cream tasted so good!

Our final adventure was to see the stars. We drove just a few miles up to our first stop of the day at the Borax exhibit. The sky was so dark, and the stars were so brilliant! With our binoculars we could see moon around Jupiter. We even saw a few shooting starts. It was the perfect end to a long day.

It was a great end to the day.

Death Valley Day 1

The most beautiful sunrise in Joshua Tree.

It was certainly an exciting day in Death Valley! Well, the first four hours weren't that exciting. Mom made eggs and bacon and we got packed up by 7 o'clock. Then we made the four hour drive to Death Valley National Park. There was a construction zone with waits of up to 45 minutes, so we were pretty happy when we only had to do 8 minutes. Other than that, it was boring. 

We got into the park about noon, but we were in the far south end, and there is nothing at all down there. We found a lone picnic table in the middle of nowhere and Mom made lunch. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing, so the boys sat in the car while Dad ate his lunch alone at the breezy table. 

Another national park!

Mom sent Seth to take pics of the historic ruins while she made lunch. He did great!

There were some interesting things at the ruins.

I love looking at Seth's pictures.

Dad eating all alone in Death Valley.

The boys lunching in the car.

After that, it was more driving, but at least we were in the park. We watched the phone excitedly as the elevation dropped down to zero, and then fell all the way to -270 feet. At about that time, we reached our first major stop at a place called Bad Water Basin. In a rare freak weather event, a hurricane brought a glut of rain to this area, flooding the basin, which is usually a massive salt flat. For us, there was a very shallow salt water pool that stretched far across the valley. It's maximum depth wouldn't reach your knee, and it forms a perfect reflecting pool.

We parked about 200 feet below the "Sea Level" sign and walked out across the salt flat to the edge of the water. Mom, Dax, and Seth decided to wade a bit, so they took off their shoes and went in. We spent about an hour at this site, and toweled off when we got back to the car. It was really beautiful and we were lucky to see that sparkling basin.

We had fun watching the elevation drop.

Bad Water Basin covered in water.

This is the lowest point at 282 feet below sea level.

The water had such nice reflections.

We couldn't believe how different it looked compared to pictures we had seen.

We had fun exploring the basin.

Mom and Dax walked out into the water. But the salt was hurty!

Seth went the furthest.

Standing in the salty water.

Up the road a little further we did a hike to a natural bridge. It was steep in the soft sand, but it only ran about a third of a mile each way. Still, we were tired and stiff and didn't enjoy it quite as much as we should have. We made stops at the Devil's Golf Course and Artist's Canyon, both of which were nice, but we didn't stray too far from the van at either place.

Seth found a spot so it looks like he is floating.

We were pretty tired, but we made it.

Mom was the only one who walked up under the natural bridge.

Devil's Golf Course

Painter's Palette

Finally, we had our energy up for a serious hike into Golden Canyon. This canyon is famous for being used in Return of the Jedi, but mostly, we just thought it was pretty. The canyon was about as wide as a two lane road, and many smaller slots ran steeply into the rocks around it. Seth and Dad explored one, and Mark and Dad explored another, but both went on for hundreds of yards, and they never found the end of either one. We walked a long way in this canyon, and it was nearly dinner by the time we rolled into Furnace Creek and the Ranch where we are staying.

This is where a Jawa hides and watches R2D2 go by.

There are a lot of colors in the rocks in Death Valley.

The canyon was very pretty and did look golden in the afternoon light.

We had a fun time in the canyon.

The narrower sections were so cool.

These slanty rocks were cool, too.

We pulled up to check in, and Mom went inside, just as the wind started to really whip. Suddenly, the rain came, and it came in a torrent. Then a flash of lightning cracked very near us. All the light went out in the building, and the computers shut down, which delayed our checking in. Soon, though, the computers came back up and we got our key and headed to the room.

Unfortunately, the power still wasn't on in the rooms! We groped our way to the bathroom and brought in a few suitcases. Then we decided to head back to the cafeteria for dinner.

Unfortunately, the lights were out there, too! The General Store, the Ice Cream Parlor, and the Saloon were all dark. Only the door to the cafeteria was open, and as we stood hopefully in line, the power suddenly came back on, to no small applause.

We went into the cafeteria and ate (they gave us all the child's price for our troubles). There was lots of food, and we were hungry after our long day. The pool was still dark, but lights were on in our hotel room. So, we made sure that we had a roll-away bed for Seth and settled in for the night.

It was quite an adventure!

We also spotted this coyote just hanging out by the hotel.