Hiking in Zion's

I have SO MANY pictures so I'll break up our trip a little. We went to Zion National Park the day after we arrived in St. George. This was my 2nd time visiting Zion's and it was still just as beautiful. Athena and Samantha vaguely remembered it from the last time but for the 2 little kids it was ALL new.

For our first hike, we chose to go on the Emerald Pools hike. Here we are getting fueled for our hike. I decided we'd better eat the bananas first. I didn't want them to get smashed in our backpacks and there are garbages for our peels here. I told the kids, "When your bananas are gone we will start our hike!" They gobbled those bananas faster than I've ever seen. :)

Here is our family at the beginning of our hike.

Zion's is absolutely amazing! My job as mom is to try to get the kids to appreciate it all. We had to stop all along the way and enjoy our surroundings.

I'm leading the pack.

The kids really loved this part of the hike. This waterfall comes down from the middle emerald pool and the trail we were on goes right under it. At first Nathan and Alexandra were really nervous about walking under the waterfall, until they realized they weren't actually getting hit with the water. Well, occasionally the wind blew the water onto us, but just a mist.

Here is the view from under the waterfall. It doesn't show as well in the picture, but it looked really sparkly, like diamonds falling from the sky!

Pshwew! We made it out from under the water - except for what is still blowing our way. All the kids really quite enjoyed themselves.

This is about halfway on our hike to the top. The temperature was PERFECT the whole time.

When we reached the upper emerald pool it was lunch time. I had pre-made sandwiches before we left in the morning and put them in this bag in our backpack. I DID warn the kids that the sandwiches wouldn't be beautiful by lunchtime, but that they would still taste the same. Well, here is proof that the sandwiches WEREN'T beautiful! I pulled them out and they were all mashed into one big sandwich ball in the breadbag!! I had to pry them apart!

There was another lady sitting by us and she heard me tell the kids that the sandwiches still tasted the same even if they are smashed. She pulled out her smashed sandwich and showed the kids. That seemed to suffice and they started eating their lunch. The funny thing is that with all the warnings I gave them, I think I had the hardest time eating the sandwich. I had to literally gag it down! I prefer fluffy bread, even if it does taste the same either way.

After lunch we wandered over to the pools to enjoy their beauty. This waterfall comes into the upper pool. It was a little windy so again, we kept getting a little wet. That was amusing for the kids to try to avoid the spray. :)

Here is Nathan climbing on the rocks. I think that was his favorite part of this hike - all the rocks to climb on and jump off of. He was SO PROUD of himself for being able to hike so well on the rocks.

Athena and Samantha stuck together, as usual. I love to see them being such great friends!

Same with these two. Alex really loves to stay with her big brother. It's so cute. :)

You'll have to click on this picture and see if you can find "it". Much to the kid's amusement, there were water skeeters in the water. They found one in here. Can you?

Thank you, other tourists, for taking pictures of our family all along the way!

Mama's boy!

Me and my wonderfully gorgeous husband!! Athena quite enjoyed being our photographer.

Here is Samantha, on our way back down the mountain.

Athena picked this location for her single picture. I think she did well on her choice of backgrounds!

Thanks again, other tourist. :)

Of course Jeremy had to show us up and climb to the top! I'm just glad he made it down safely. That makes me nervous!!

When we were almost done hiking down (about 1 1/2 hours into our "journey"), Alex started acting frantic and saying she NEEDED to go potty. My only choice was to find a little spot off the trail in the bushes for her and hope nobody noticed! Jeremy took that opportunity to take some cute photos of the kids.

Next emergency, a shoe full of rocks and sand.

So, more cute picture opportunities! While I was helping Alex with her shoe, Jeremy and the other kids found this really neat rock wall with all these carved out formations.

Another nice tourist saw us climbing up here and offered to take a family picture for us. In return we took a picture of she and her daughter. We ended up making friends with this lady because for the rest of the day, she was everywhere we went.

As they can see, it's a LONG way down.

We made it to the end of our hike in just a little over 2 hours with 4 happy kids. To me, that is amazing! They all had fun overall with just a few fights here and there. Alexandra kept herself busy by singing the last little while.

When we got to the bottom Jeremy spotted a lizard to catch (like he always does). He likes to turn them over and rub their bellies because the lizards go to sleep. This was his first lizard to catch for the day.

After the hike, we stopped at the visitor's center for a kid pick-me-up. We all ate ice cream cones! Then we boarded the bus and rode further up the canyon for more beautiful views.

For our last hike we walked along the river on the river walk. It goes all the way up to the end of The Narrows hike. Alexandra's legs were tired so Jeremy and I took turns carrying her. I got to carry Nathan too for awhile. On the bright side, I think I burned off the ice cream I ate! Here are the kids inspecting a bug.

Here is our view at the end of our river walk hike. Pretty!