School's Out Hike - Gibson Mountain

 For our day after school's out hike (this year we did it the second day after school was out though) we went hiked Gibson Mountain. This was our first time hiking in the area, so we didn't really know the way. It was nice to start off with a lot of green vegetation all around. 

This hike was a pretty constant 15% incline the whole way. That was kind of tiring, but the weather was nice (in the upper sixties), their was some periodic overcast, and there were lots of wildflowers to see. We actually got to the top, but didn't realize it because the trail didn't go right to the peak. Instead, it went by the peak about 30 feet or so down from it. So we kept going for about another mile until we got to a different unnamed peak that was much more prominent. I think where we stopped was right around 7,100 feet in elevation whereas Gibson Mountain peak is somewhere around 6,800. Julia kept telling me she thought we had gone too far, but I wanted to get to a point where we would have a good lookout. From the top we could see the temple and a few of the other peaks we have climbed in the past (Scout Mountain, Chinese Peak, Bonneville Peak, and Kinport Peak). It was super windy at the top, so we just ate some quick snacks and headed back down.

I always think these hikes are a nice way to start the summer break.

Ethan's Birthday

We now have two teenagers in our house! On May 7th Ethan turned 13. He ended up splitting his birthday up into a few days since it fell on a school day. Actually, I think our kids like to split their birthdays up because we don't make them do jobs on their birthdays - so if they can get a weekday and a Saturday in that mix, they know it works to their advantage.

For his birthday meals he had monkey bread and sausage for breakfast, he went to Burger King for his lunch, and then had meatball subs for dinner. 

He also had his last track meet on his birthday, which was the All City Meet. He only had one race that day and it was the first race of the day. So rather than make him stick around and watch all the other races before catching the bus back to school at the end of the day and then catching the bus home, we just took him home with us and let him have the day off.

Ethan is still really into sports. He likes track a lot and had a good year. He ran the 1,600, 800, and 400 meter races. In all of them, he improved a lot over the course of the year. His fastest time for the mile was 6 min 37 seconds, for the 800 it was right around 3 minutes, and for the 400 I think he got around 75 seconds. I am excited to see what his times end up looking like as he hits his growth spurt and his stride lengthens out a lot. He also did the long jump and his longest one was 11 feet 1 inch.

Ethan also likes ping pong (a lot - he even looks up information about top players in the world) and basketball and any other sport he can do. Ethan is also very social. He just wants to be around people - friends, brothers, anyone. He also really likes to get opinions from others when he has to make a choice.

Ethan has a lot of talents. He can generally do well in school without much effort. He is artistic. And he just picks things up easily. He is also not afraid to try hard or new things, even if it means he will not do so well at them. But, at the same time he is competitive and wants to win (mainly against family members) and to make sure the rules of the game are followed exactly.

Here are some birthday and track pictures.

Elliott's Las Vegas Trip

Last year, after Elliott turned 8, we had planned a trip for him to go to Washington DC with me for a conference. However, COVID-19 hit, the conference was cancelled, and everything in Washington DC was shut down. A year later, Elliott was now 9 and wondering when his 8-year-old trip was going to happen. After talking one night, Rebecca and I decided that I should just take him on an outing, separate from a conference that I might usually go to. As we were talking about possibilities, we remembered that Elliott's cousin (Jacob) really liked a trip that he recently did with his family to Las Vegas. Tickets were cheap and hotels seemed affordable, so we decided to do it (although, with all of the resort fees and how expensive things are in Las Vegas, it ended up costing a lot). It was worth it though as I think Elliott will remember the trip for the rest of his life.

We flew out of Idaho Falls, which was a first for us. Our flight didn't leave until 10pm at night. So once we got into Las Vegas, we just took a taxi to our hotel (the Flamingo) and went to bed.

The next day our plan was to go to Circus Circus and spend the day in their Adventuredome (an indoor theme park). On the way we walked through the Venetian, which is always really cool to see. It was still earlish in the morning, so everything was pretty quiet.

At the Flamingo. A view from our room and the outside of the hotel.

Walking through the Venetian.

The Adventuredome was expensive, but once you got in, you got to do all the rides you wanted without paying anything. For about the first three hours while we were there, hardly anyone else was there at all. So we could just walk up to any ride and hop right on without waiting in line. We did lazer tag, did some 4D rides, bumper cars, and some semi-scary and not so scary rides. Elliott had no interest in going on any of the roller coasters or anything that went upside down, which I was really happy about since I do not like those types of rides either. We did go on a couple that were a little intense and Elliott was even willing to do one of them several times. Usually, Elliott has a pretty sensitive stomach and I was worried about him throwing up. But, we were doing a special fast for a youth in our ward who was in a swimming accident, so that helped with Elliott's stomach a lot. 

While we were waiting to get into the Adventuredome, a family who was going home came by and gave us a game card with credits on it still. So we got to spend some time playing arcade and amusement park games. Elliott won two small stuffed animals.

We also watched a couple circus acts. These jugglers were great!

On the way back to the Flamingo we got pizza at the Pizza Press. Elliott loved making his own pizza and that he could eat it all on his own.

We also stopped by Treasure Island to see the pirate ships and walked through Caesar's Palace. Last, we waited until 8pm to see the volcano go off at the Mirage. That was really cool. We got there about 20 minutes early, so we had really good spots.

The next day we planned to do lots of swimming at the Flamingo pool. However, the water was freezing. Elliott and I were numb after being in for about 20 minutes. On top of that, their water slides were not open. So we had to adjust our plans for the day. We met up with Grandma and Grandpa Swift who were driving through. Together we checked out the Flamingo habitat. It was cool to see all of the birds and fish. Then we walked through the Paris and made our way down to the M&M store and the Hershey's store. We also walked through the New York, New York hotel and ended by seeing the water show at the Bellagio. All of the walking wore us out, but we saw a lot of cool things.

For our last night, we were switching from the Flamingo hotel to the Excalibur. We started at the Flamingo because it was a little cheaper and more central to other things on the strip. However, I booked one day at the Excalibur too because we thought Elliott would be really excited to stay in the castle. So we checked out of the Flamingo early and made our way down. On the way we checked out New York, New York again and walked down to check out the Luxor. Elliott was really impressed with the pyramid. We went inside and went up to the 12th floor to be able to look down on everything inside.

Our check in time at the Excalibur was not until 3pm. However, at about 1pm we decided to see if we could get into our room early. The pool at the Excalibur closed at 5pm and Elliott wanted to get in as much swimming as possible. And fortunately, they let us check in early for free. So we got a ton of swimming time. Elliott loved the Excalibur. He loved being inside the castle and seeing all of the decorations inside at out. But the pool was the best part. They had three big pools and they were all heated. We spent the most time in the one with the waterslide. Elliott just did that over and over again. Then, after swimming we ate, checked out the hotel some more, and then watched a movie back in our room.

On our last day, we had to check out at 11am. But, the pool opened up at 10am. So we got all packed up and went down to the pool for 50 last minutes of swimming and sliding fun. Then we walked over to Mandalay Bay to the Shark Reef Aquarium. There, we saw an alligator, komodo dragon, and tons of sharks. The sharks were really cool and it was neat to be up close to them. Our entrance ticket also came with a virtual reality dive with the sharks that was pretty cool.

Then, we decided to save $30 on the taxi fare and walk the 2.5 miles to the airport. It was hot and a little long, but we did it. At the airport Elliott watched some episodes of Boss Baby while we waited for our plane. He was pretty excited to get back home and tell everyone about his trip. I am glad that he had a fun time. And it was really nice for me to be able to spend so much one-on-one time with him.