Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Our Little Family Vacation

Sometimes in this past year I have just felt really grown up..
Once such instance was when Blake and I planned a little family vacation to Yellowstone for Memorial Day Weekend..

I really love that we can travel together and that I married a guy who is so adventurous and motivates to me to enjoy life and take a break.







So right after we drove into Yellowstone Park we saw a very small herd of Buffalo way over in the distance, and I'm telling you guys.. our hearts almost stopped. haha


Then a couple of minutes later we drive RIGHT by a huge Buffalo and man we are out of the car seriously
as excited as we could be..

And little did we know..



Yellowstone I'm sure must quite literally mean the Land of Plentiful Buffalo..




 But it was still really amazing to be seriously right up close to these beautiful animals we don't see everyday..


Isn't this such a sweet picture?
While I was taking it my heart was so full of gratitude.. 
Camping, Yellowstone, my sweet Husband..
I really couldn't ask for anything more it was such a happy weekend.


We decided that we wanted to camp and use our cute tent in Yellowstone.. 
[and so apparently did the rest of the country..]
Let me just tell you.. it was crow.ded. but like always it was way fun camping with Blake.
He brought us hot dogs to roast and all kinds of yummy food [pickles.. mm.. haha] and starburts..


Then after dinner and a game of catch we decided we really wanted to take a walk and explore a little bit.. 
And lo and behold.. I bet you will never guess what we saw..


That's right folks... herds and herds of beautiful Buffalo..


One of the most interesting walks I've ever been on that's for sure.
 


& The next morning, after dreaming of buffalo, we were off exploring the park.


Blake hadn't been to Yellowstone since he was little and he really was SO cute during the whole trip and wanting to see everything.. it was fun showing him things I liked and remembered and his sweet attitude literally made my day.


This is my.. okay.. it's freezing.. can we go now? face..



Now here's the thing.. I just can't believe that these are naturally happening in the ground!?
This seriously blows my mind..



Then around lunchtime we decided it was prrooobabbly time to stop and see Old Faithful..


Now for being faithful he really was quite the tease.
I think it seriously started to go off and then stopped like
FOUR times..



And then finally.. guys.. it happened. The real deal.
& It was so cool to be able to experience it with Blake.


Then after lunch we went back to exploring..
And the craziest thing happened..



An Elk just jumped out RIGHT in front of us.. I have definitely never been that close to an Elk before..
And he was just leisurely strolling along..
Oh man. 



So you can sure bet I jumped off of that platform and closer to the Elk so that I could get a picture of course!
 
And if you were wondering, that park ranger was just not as excited as I was about me being out in the wild next to this wild animal..
He SCREAMED and waved his arms frantically.. kind of like his life depended on me getting back on that platform..

And then he marched right down to us and explained that MY life depended on me being on the platform.. I definitely felt like I was back in school being sent to the hall or the principals office.

But he was right.. I'm glad we got this little picture with the elk before he was right.. but he was right.
& He actually was very nice about it.. telling me I wouldn't be so pretty if the ground collapsed and I was in a burn unit.
Fair. Enough.

 
 
So you can bet your bottom dollar we stayed on this platform..
:)
Because look at that handsome man! We don't want to ruin this good thing we have going on here.. if the platform makes you "less cute".. then we promise to stay on the platform until the next elk comes along.
 

Oh my gosh this was definitely one of my FAVORITES.
 
It was called Dragon Mouth Cave or something like that.. but doesn't that look like there could be a dragon in there? I loved it.
 



 
And this was another favorite that we stumbled across in an attempt at a bathroom break.
We didn't get a bathroom.. but I would trade a bathroom for this site anyday.
[Well.. okay maybe not anyday.. but hypothetically speaking..]

This is the GRAND CANYON of Yellowstone.. isn't it awesome.



It's also called Artists Point.. and you can see why..
 
 
This is probably my favorite picture from the trip.. I think that the background looks like a painting.
It deifnitely melts my heart everytime I see this.
I feel exceptionally blessed.
 

Then, [yes. after a little detour don't worry we eventually found a bathroom..]
We drove to Lamar Valley and seriously entered into a very spacious.. hard to find animals.. mountain like Zoo.
Not really a zoo.. but we saw a lot of cool animals.
Pretty much the same right?




These were the coolest Rocky Mountain Big Horns, or Rams..
There were like 8 of them and they were really hard to see until you got really close to them..
Which of course we had to do obviously.
 


And then two of them started fighting and banging their horns together!
I have never been so excited to see a fight before.. It was really cool I felt like we should be in the Sound of Music or  something with a lot of spacious mountains.
Love these animals.



As we were driving away from the Rams we saw this spectacle of people..
haha
 
I had to take a picture of the people before I found any animals they made me laugh.. and we figured with all of these cameras there better be something good.
So we took a leap of faith and parked the car and hiked over here.
 


And there was something good..
 I don't know if you can see in the middle of the picture but it was a FOX
 
 
And not just any fox.. one with her little baby fox babies
[kittens maybe?]
Oh they were so cute. I was ready to take them home with us.
 

And just when we thought we had seen everything.. we looked out our car window and.. there they were..
BLACK BEARS just chasing each other and playing.
 


They seriously ran right in front of our car!
 I couldn't get the camera back out fast enough.. but they didn't even glance at us just kept running after each other.


I don't think I have ever gotten such a good view of a Black Bear.. but from a very safe.. long.. safe.. distance away these Bears were so cute and I really was shocked at how lucky we got.
 




We finished our little adventure at the artist paint pots..
[Blake was trying to get a picture of the plops of mud.. I think he did pretty good actually.. you can kind of see how they were bubbling]
 



The one more Elk, and one awesome unbelievable weekend, and definitely falling even more in love with my sweet husband..
 

 
We had to head back to real life.
I'm so grateful for breaks and the fun things in life.. and more than anything the good people in your life that you can share them with and really make everything worth while.
 
I hope everyones having a perfect Summer and getting to enjoy having a little break!