Fall Break 2025 in Moab (Part 1)

We spent a few days in Moab exploring and adventuring, and Andy's family joined us for part of it. We had so much fun and loved sharing one of our favorite areas with Andy's family!

Dinner stop on the way to Moab at a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place
in the middle of nowhere meant mediocre Mexican food and mountains of fries.

Liza set up her nail salon (complete with TV show) in the hotel.

We slept in while Andy's family drove to Moab. After enjoying a
yummy lunch at a local cafe, we hit the park.

Our first hike was to Delicate Arch.
The weather was perfect and the kids did a great job!



Andy managed to carry Sydney and a big
backpack on a precarious ledge. Gold star.



The next stop was Double Arch, one of my favorites.
It's such a great place to take pictures and just climb around and explore.



Friday morning the boys played Black Jack in the lobby
while waiting for everyone to assemble.

We started the day hiking Park Avenue.
The views were amazing.






Back to School

It was a quick turnaround, with just a couple of days to get into school mode after our end-of-summer trip to Florida, but everything was fine. Luke and Liza started at new schools, but at least we already know how things work at Luke's school (having had a member of the family there since 2018)!

The start of the school year should have been traumatic for Liza, since she transferred to our local high school after 3 years at our charter school, but she was just really excited for a fresh start, new friends, and a more exciting volleyball season. Jack, on the other hand, had a little freak-out before school started, worrying that he's not ready to be a Senior, or really, he's not ready to finish high school and be a responsible adult. I told him he doesn't have to have everything figured out yet, and that there would be time to transition after high school.

Liza was kind enough to get up and take this picture with the boys
on their first day, even though her first day was two days later.




The kids have now finished their first term. It took a few weeks to get into a groove, but we knew we were there when Liza and Jack are both dreading school each day. Luke, however, is still enthusiastic about school. One night, a few weeks into the school year, I asked everyone what their favorite part of the day was. Luke said, "School and volleyball."

Jack, studiously doing homework after school on his first day of Senior Year.

Liza's first volleyball game at her new school was the day before school started.

And she had her own little cheering section!

Liza's first day!

Several weeks into the school year I asked the kids what their favorite classes are. These were their responses:

Jack: I like seminary but I also like Socratic.
Me: What's your least favorite class?
Jack: Math.

Liza: Coed Volleyball.
Me: What about an academic class?
Liza: ASL

Luke: Not Latin
Me: So what? Math?
Luke: Close. But English is my favorite.
        Luke has since joined Match Club, which he attends during lunch every Tuesday, and which will have several competitions over the course of the year.


Luke, before school on day 3, following in his oldest sister's footsteps
by bringing a stash of Oreos for the snack locker he and his friends put together.

(earlier that morning, doing homework)


Both high school kids went to Homecoming in September.

This was the ask Liza's date left at our front door.
She had a lot of fun at the dance, even though it was outside and it rained.

Liza's group came to our house to take pictures and they turned out really well!
Dog was walking around outside so she snatched him up and they posed together for me.
Obviously, he was honored.

Jack had a lot of fun too, especially with the theme of the dance being
Men in Black. All the boys were in black suits and the girls were in black dresses.
He and his date were the only couple wth sunglasses though!

Lamily Reunkein

Back in February, I was at Garrett's mission homecoming lunch in Pleasant View, talking and laughing and having a great time with my aunts and uncles and cousins. We started lamenting the fact that we don't have family reunions any more and everyone was saying that they'd like to get together again. I offered up my house as a venue for a weekend reunion and all that was left was to decide on a date.

After some deliberation, I decided the best time would be Labor Day weekend. I asked my buddy ChatGPT to help me create a nifty save-the-date graphic I could send everyone, and this is what it came up with:


It was so bad, I decided not to change anything, and started calling our upcoming gathering a Lamily Reunkein.

But when I asked for RSVPs, it turned out that almost nobody would be coming from out of town. And as the weekend drew closer, people started backing out from a portion of the weekend or the entire weekend. I was already burned out from all the traveling and entertaining we'd been doing over the summer, so instead of trying to host a tiny family reunion for a weekend, I decided to switch to an afternoon cookout on Labor Day in the hopes that more people could come if it was just for a few hours. A few people came. And we had a great time with them.

But Ben and Suz had been planning on coming for the whole weekend all along and they kept their plans! So most of the weekend was a bit of a reunion for the Utah siblings, and that was really fun too!


Suz was prepared with many pounds of yummy saltwater taffy!



On Saturday we divided into two boats to raft the Provo River. It was a beautiful day,
warm and sunny and not too hot! (And everyone felt much safer and had more fun than the
last time we were on the River in July.)







After rafting we had dinner at Malawi's Pizza in Riverwoods
and the kids played in the splash pad.




On Sunday morning, Whit helped with the farm chores.
We went to church, then had dinner together in the evening.
And no reunion would be complete without games!








We had three additional visitors join us for our cookout on Labor Day,
which also fell on Sydney's 6th birthday: Jeanne, Garrett, and Alysa.


Teddy was with us the whole week and ended up
spending most of the time in the house, since the
mosquitos were bad outside. The cats didn't appreciate
having him around, but he seemed as happy as usual.