We left on Tuesday June 11th. We drove the minivan down to Mount Pleasant, Iowa where Mariah and the kids got onto the Amtrak train to California. Meanwhile Brian drove out to meet them. This way we would have a vehicle to drive home from Utah and the kids wouldn’t have to sit in the car for the whole drive. It also meant that Brian could take a circuitous route making whatever geocaching detours he wanted. The family arrived in San Francisco late on Thursday, and Brian met them in Santa Cruz Saturday afternoon, just before Father’s Day.
We spent a few fun days at a cabin in the redwoods in the mountains above Santa Cruz. One day we took the train down from the mountains to the beach, spent the afternoon at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk amusement park and then took the train back up at the end. We drove down to Los Osos and spent a few days with Mariah’s Aunt Barbara. Carrie and Zac enjoyed seeing Barbara’s pottery studio and made good friends with her cat, Taj. It was a very pleasant visit with good memories for everyone. From there were drove up to Yosemite and went camping with Torrey and his family. We met his second daughter, Amber, for the first time. Carrie and Zac had great fun playing with Amber and Kaia. It was a new experience for Carrie to be setting a good example and she was much more motivated to hike up to the top of the waterfall when there was someone younger than her on the trail.
After our camping trip we drove out the east end of Yosemite, through Death Valley towards Las Vegas. The day we spent driving was Carrie’s birthday; we have had a history of being away from home on her birthday. This year we had her birthday party right after school got out, so her friends would be available to attend. On this day we stopped in Death Valley, where it was 240 feet below sea level and forced our three children to get out of the air conditioned van and pose for a picture in 123° Fahrenheit. When Carrie got out of the van, she screamed like a lobster being dunked in boiling water. She declared on the spot that it was the worst birthday ever (this includes having dinner in the shelter after the flood of 2008 and losing the van transmission in the middle of South Dakota in 2010). We visited Brian’s parents in Las Vegas and visited Zion National Park on our way up to Park City. We arrived in Park City on the 29th of June, just in time for Mariah’s institute which started on the 30th.
We spent three weeks in Park City. Brian was in charge of the children most days. There is an extensive bike trail system and a free shuttle bus system throughout Park City, which the children learned to navigate easily. Under Jeri’s supervision they would walk to the library to check out books and movies and then take the bus home. They visited Mariah in the afternoon, when the math institute hosted tea and cookies. Brian arranged a number of trips; a hike to Donut Falls and a trip to Salt Lake City to the Mormon Tabernacle were the highlights. The ski resorts had zip lines and other amusements during the summer, but the kids enjoyed the trampoline the best. We were in Park City for the 4th of July and have to say that the parade was not up to Waverly standards. We left Utah on the 20th of July after the institute ended. We stopped for Sunday Mass at a little Catholic church in Doniphan, Nebraska and were reminded of how much worse things could be. We spent some time in the afternoon at the Omaha Zoo and finally arrived home on Monday July 22nd, after being away from home for six weeks.
Brian has continued with his geocaching hobby, hitting many milestones this year. First he filled his calendar, having found a geocache on every day of the calendar year (he took care of February 29th last year). On the cross country drive without the family, he found the oldest caches in Nebraska, Kansas and Colorado. He found a cache above 11,000 feet elevation, to go with the cache in Death Valley below sea level. He found geocaches in a continuous stretch of counties from Iowa all the way to the Pacific Ocean. He has reached near legendary status with local cachers for putting his family on a train so he could geocache across the country.
Jeri became a teenager this year. She has decided that she prefers to ride in the front seat of the car, so she can tune the radio. Her parents are learning more about her taste in music, which includes Demi Lovato and Pink. However, Jeri is learning about her father’s competition to identify the title and singer of any song that comes on the radio. With improved communication technology, Jeri was not completely isolated from her friends during our six week vacation. She was still able to text and message her friends from Utah and California, so she was still current on the latest events. At home she would rather hide in her bedroom with a good book and her iPad. She is mostly pleasant and maintains good grades, so her parents count their blessings.
Zac started band this year. He has been wanting to start percussion for years, and this was his opportunity. He still practices piano and has a great singing voice, when he can be bothered to practice. He crossed over from Cub Scouts into Boy Scouts in November. There was quite possibly no one happier than his father, who was relieved of duty as Webelos Den Leader. Brian will likely get drafted into leadership duty for the Boy Scouts eventually, but he is taking a break now. Zac is looking forward to the camping trips.
Carrie started taking piano lessons like her brother and is in tumbling like her sister. Carrie is a voracious reader and prefers non-fiction books. She is intrigued by how things work. She is proud of her math skills and wants to be good at math and a good reader, like everyone else in the family. Social interactions are more challenging for her, but she gets that from her parents. She is stubborn and willful, but wants to be kind and helpful as well. We are proud of her and her growth as she continues in school.
Mariah is in her final year as director of the Scholar’s program. The newest academic dean noticed that she has served ten years of a three year term, and discussed her exit strategy. Since Wartburg is hosting the regional honors conference it was decided that she should complete the year before handing off the position to someone else. Mariah (and the family) are looking forward to the decreased work load, but she will miss the students and have a hard time watching someone else repeat her mistakes.
At Thanksgiving we traveled out to California for Aunt Barbara’s memorial service. She had heart surgery in September. While she survived the surgery, there were many complications. When she finally regained the ability to communicate, she asked to be removed from life support and was able to die in peace. We felt very lucky to have a quality visit with her this summer while we were in the area. She left us the portrait of “Auntie Dale” which has been in the family for generations and now occupies a place of honor over our mantle.
We are looking forward to a quiet Christmas at home with the family. May you find yourself surrounded by the people you love this Holiday season.