Granby

We are kind of at that point where we just have to laugh at how frequently things are just not working out for us! Our family trip this year was no exception! Last year, we had pulled South Carolina for our state this year and we were all so excited. Mark and I had actually picked this as our trip our second year we were married, but I was eight months pregnant with Jacob and the timing was just not right {insert our South Dakota trip instead}. ANYWAY, so we were really excited to finally do our long-awaited trip! Plus, this was going to be our first trip to the east coast! We were all PUMPED!

We had everything planned out and then the week we went to buy our airline tickets in August, everything with the delta variant surged up. We are being extra careful with Lydia right now and we just felt like it maybe wasn’t the best time to be flying across the country. We were really bummed but it was the right decision – especially with the timing of her g tube surgery (which we didn’t know at the time).

So we came up with a Plan B! To keep things simple and close, we decided we would do Wyoming as our state! This may sound a little disappointing, but we were all genuinely excited! I planned a low-key but {I thought} pretty great trip! We were going to visit the church history sites and then spend the bulk of our time in Yellowstone. We were all super excited!

But then days before we were supposed to leave on our trip, we checked the weather only to see SNOW every single day of our trip in Yellowstone. Our crew is really good with the cold but walking around in cold and snow/rain, did NOT sound like our ideal vacation. So plan C was born…and that took us to COLORADO!

While we were driving, with the most loosy-goosy plan BY FAR I have ever had on our family trip, Mark chuckled and said he didn’t even know how I was any more. Let me tell you, this year has been brutal. That is for another post, but this is where we are!

This was basically the extent of our plan…go to Rocky Mountain National Park for a couple days and then go to Denver for a couple of days. We found a nice little condo on the western side of Rocky Mountain in the town of Granby, Colorado. It was nestled up in a beautiful location, it had bunk beds for the kids, and a cozy fireplace {which was easily my favorite part!}.

To add to the trickiness of this trip, Lydia got a bad viral infection several days before we were supposed to leave. For a couple days, we weren’t sure if Lydia and I would even be going and thought it might just be a Daddy/big kiddo trip. BUT Lydia was starting to feel better and we decided to go knowing we might just hang out in the condo during the day, but then at least we could be with everyone in the mornings and evenings.

The first night we got there, I went on the Rocky Mountain National Park website only to find that you had to have a timed-entry reservation. What?! And all of the spots were already filled for the next day. We were so disappointed and, honestly, had no idea what to do instead.

The next morning, we took things REAL slow. I went and got some donuts, we snuggled by the fire, while the weather was cold and snowy on-and-off. Once we had a little break in the weather, Mark decided to go take the big kiddos on a hike to get out a little.

While Mark, Jacob, Sarah, and Benjamin went on a hike to Monarch Lake, Lydia and I snuggled by the fire. The pictures look so fun and they all came back saying it was awesome…that is, until the hail started. Poor Ben has been really scarred of storms ever since the experience this summer on the lake and so, sadly, it ended in lots of tears from him.

But then they came home, we got some Chinese take-out, and we hunkered down for the night. BUT not before we got our reservation for Rocky Mountain for the next day! We were determined to have at least ONE solid day in the park!