More Summer fun...

In our 3rd trip to Utah since January, we actually had quite a bit of family time. This was one of those rare trips where Wayne wasn't totally booked up with recording sessions or bookstore promotions and we had a lot of free time together as a family.

We pulled into the Salt Lake valley late afternoon on August 4 and were hit with the almost unbearable heat! I'm sure it was HOT when we lived there, but I honestly don't remember it being so uncomfortable. (I guess I have re-climatized back to our cooler Canadian climate!)

We decided that since we've started reading the Doctrine and Covenants as a family (we read the illustrated children's reader with the kids), that it would be fun to visit the Church History Museum. It had been about 6 or 7 years since we were there last (Emmy was about 3 or 4 years old). There was so much great stuff to see, but we were mostly grateful for the cool air conditioned shelter!

There was a great exhibit called, "I Am a Child of God" and it had a bunch of fun activities for the kids. They got to touch part of President Hinckley's walnut tree that was later cut down and made into the pulpit for the Conference Centre.

They also had fun dressing up and pretending they were part of Lehi's dream...holding to the iron rod and walking on the straight and narrow path.

We did some more of the "tourist-y" stuff this trip. Wayne took Emmy, Azia and Parker on a hike up to the Timpanogas Caves. We'd done the hike a few years ago and had a good time. This time, however, I opted to stay home (and stay cool) with Cardiff and Sawyer.

We also went to Thanksgiving Point for the first time and checked out the Museum of Ancient History and an IMAX movie.

Wayne did manage to book a session in the recording studio to do up demos of a couple of the country tunes he has co-written with his brother, Allan. Yes, he does write country music! YeeHaw! Allan was able to join them in the studio to witness the talents of the studio musicians; as did their other brother, Brian, who now has caught the recording studio "bug". Wayne also introduced his new Christmas album, "This Night" to different vendors, distributors and bookstore owners at the LDS Booksellers Convention. We are all very excited about this album and we hope you'll all check it out when it is released this fall!

Great fun had by all on this trip. We left our second home on Friday (Aug. 8) and brought Jade, Mike and their boys back with us. They came up to Lethbridge for a week, so the cousins had a lot of good times together. More pics in the following post!