Do you know the ice cream man?

Daddy flagged the ice cream man down in time to get a special treat!  A Powerpuff Girl popsicle! Delicious lemon flavor!Too big to finish it all on her own…  Good thing little brother doesn’t mind leftovers!

Vacation – day 13 (last day)

It was cold when we woke up!  And there were ground squirrels everywhere! It was a long ride home.  Montana was really pretty and green.  We stopped at McDonalds two times for chicken nuggets.

I’m glad I am home with Kitty Warrick and all my toys!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 12

Yay!  Yellowstone!  I found some buffalo earrings.  They are very pretty and they dangle!  This bison calf was painted so pretty, I wish I could take it home.   Driving through Yellowstone was only interesting when we saw animals.  We saw moose and elk and deer. Pinkie went with us to see the hot springs and painted pots.  It was stinky!We saw cloudy water, clear water, and water that looked rusty. This water looked like gray milk. I saw Old Faithful two times!  I really like the gift shops in Yellowstone.  There are machines that flatten and stamp pennies.  I’m collecting them!  My favorite is the one with the bison stamp. Here are the bison!  They did not say, “Go C U!” Finally a campfire to roast marshmallows on!  It was fun just throwing the marshmallows into the fire and watching them grow.They smelled good while they were cooking too. Daddy made dutch oven stew and hobo pie cornbread for dinner.  It got cold really fast, even by the fire.  After showers, Mommy, Zachy, and I cuddled in the tent until we fell asleep.

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 11

Cody, WY is the home of Buffalo Bill.  We spent a lot of time in the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, which is five museums in one.  My favorite was the Museum of Natural History.  I liked pushing buttons for animal sounds and videos, touching the animal skulls, and filling my passport with stamps.A beautiful day for walking in Cody, WY!  There were lots of bison inside the Buffalo Bill center.  None were alive. I liked this bear. Both sides of him. We rode on the trolley and got a tour of the city.  There was a lot of historical information.  I was glad I had Pinkie. The gun was heavy.After the trolley ride we went to the candy store.  Later we saw the free Gunslinger show.  I liked the costumes!  It started to get cold and rained a little.  It rained a lot during the night!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 10

Today is a driving day as we leave Colorado and go to Wyoming.  The weather is stormy and we saw lots of lightening as we drove.  Oh my goodness gracious!  And big fat rain drops hit the windshield – it was loud!

Look at this cool Hershey’s Kiss cloud!

A double rainbow!

We camped in Cody, Wyoming today and I learned what a jackalope was.

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 9

At Aunt Joyce’s house we played with Tristan’s air blaster gun.  It’s like a trash can with a handle and shower cap that shoots large gusts of air.  Lots of fun! Aunt Joyce taught me a joke:

What does a cow say?  MOO!

What does a sheep say?  BAA!

What does a bison say?  GO C U!  (for Colorado University)

Great Grandma took this nice picture with me.

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 8

Oh boy!  A pink wedding!

Congratulations Laura and Tanner!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 7

See Vacation – day 6 activities on Zachy’s blog.

This morning I went with Auntie and Grandma to the Denver Botanic Gardens.  I really liked the dinosaur exhibit and the Mickey Mouse cactus.

Daddy was go-karting, but when he was done he and Mommy and Zachy and Grandpa met me and Grandma and Auntie at the Denver Zoo.  It was a really nice zoo with lots of animals.  They were hot and so were we.

There weren’t any bison or penguins or barn owls, but there were bats!

The carousel was giving free rides, so I rode on the zebra.  Mommy and Zachy were on the jaguar. The seals were Zachy’s favorite! These guys are funny looking! After the zoo we had dinner at the Downtown Aquarium, an underwater dining experience.  There were pretty glass fish and anemones that lit up all over and we were seated right next to a giant fish tank!  Tuna, sharks, and even a scuba diver swam by as we ate dinner and dessert.  I got to decorate a giant rice krispie treat with chocolate sauce and candies for my dessert.  It was pretty enough to eat!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 5

Here’s a pretty picture from our campsite.  It was hot in the tent this morning.  No sleeping in… Here we are at Arches National Park.  It is still very hot.  Look at all the stuff packed on top of our car! The rock structures were really neat.  We saw sheep rock and elephant rock. I liked looking for windows in the rocks as we drove by. At the visitor’s center I got some bird fact cards to color.  There is a barn owl! I learned all about plants like the yucca from a ranger and earned a junior ecologist sticker! We didn’t walk the trail to the double arches, it was way too hot!  But we did walk the 104 steps between the trailheads!  There is a lot of counting this trip… It was so hot I stuck to the fence! Thank goodness the car is air conditioned!            This is Colorado.  Yay!  Another state!  I held my breath and wished for chocolate milk. We kept looking for wildlife on the rock walls, but didn’t see anything.  The river below was full of river rafters though.

Tomorrow I get to see Grandma!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 4

Let’s drive away while Daddy tries to pack the car!  Ha ha! I love Mommy’s glasses.We went to the Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake City.  There were so many birds!  Cool birds like the Tinamou where the daddy raises the babies.  Baby Tinamous can’t digest seeds so they eat the adults poop (with broken down seeds in it) to get the enzymes they need in their stomach.  Eww! We also went to story time and fed the ducks.  There was a bird that was almost as old as Grandma!  It was called a Condor. My favorite part of the aviary was the bird show.  There was a pretty barn owl in the show named Aurora.  Barn animals are my new favorite. These tall grasses surround the flamingos, hiding their pond.  But we found them!

This was the scenery all the way to Green River (same state).  We did see a train and counted 95 cars, but overall pretty boring.  We camped at Green River State Park and met Great Grandma for dinner.  I had rainbow sherbet!

Love, Elena

Vacation – day 3

Daddy packed up the campsite and Mommy took us on a walk to the interpretive center (which was closed!).  But we did see some covered wagons, the trail they went on to reach the ferry on the river, and some signs telling of life in the 1830s.  It was cool seeing the wagon grooves still there!

Today we went to Salt Lake City!  We saw bison (my new favorite animal) and entered the Great Salt Lake.  Isn’t the reflection on the lake pretty?  Here are the antelope on Antelope Island.

  It was super hot.  The air was hot, the sun was hot, and the sand was hot.  Hot, hot, hot. After wading through stinky algae and hordes of brine shrimp, we are finally up to our knees in water.  The Great Salt Lake is very shallow.  I don’t like it at all.  The salt got in my eyes and mixed with the sunscreen and I cried all the way back to the car.  Mommy and Daddy both laid back and floated.  Zachy too.  The water was warm and full of itty bitty creatures. I didn’t like the cold shower after either.  This bug drove with us all the way off Antelope Island. We saw the bison and antelope on the island.  Cool!

We camped at Cherry Hill.  It was city camping with not much room to run around.  Zachy and I collected all lots of little, rotten apples in the campground and made a big pile.  Sweet dreams!

Love, Elena