Come to Zion

The hamster wheel has been going full-tilt around here for a long time.

Mike has been occupied launching his newest role at work (yay!), teaching econ and doing his calling. The kids are busy, busy, busy of course.  But it's the span of emotionally draining issues (between toddlerhood and teenagedom, there are a lot and varied of those at this house) on top of everything else that have been taking their toll on me.

After Mike returned from being out of town for the second straight weekend, he hatched a brilliant plan to avert my complete emotional / psychological unraveling. He proposed that we take the next weekend for ourselves and go to Zion - just the two of us. He might as well have told me that all of my wildest dreams were about to come true. That's how much of a relief  it was for me to hear that.

We made arrangements with family to help watch the kids. Mike's parents and my sister, Kay, took over for us. We are really grateful to them. Mike's parents let us stay at their new house in St. George. So we got to enjoy first-class accommodations too. Thanks Jacque and Howard!

We set out Friday afternoon and got in about 8:00 PM. Too late to do a session at the temple like we'd planned, so we just went out to dinner instead at the Thai place Mike and his dad and brother had scoped out the weekend before when they moved the Melton's furniture to the new house.

The next morning we headed out for Zion. I think we managed to come on the most beautiful day of the year. Temperatures in the low 70's, clear blue skies, fall colors. It was unbelievably beautiful. I think a lot of other people got the same memo...because it was also really crowded. We we were packed into the shuttle  pretty tightly, but it was so lovely I don't think that anyone minded.

We did Angel's Landing first. Neither of us had ever been, and I was nervous. I hate shear cliffs. I am terrified of them actually. As the shuttle announcement repeatedly warned visitors about the hike, especially the part where they say, "There have been deaths on this trail. You are responsible for your own safety." I thought about skipping it. Mike reassured me, and off we went. The first few miles of the hike were just amazing. The views, the crisp morning air, the steep but safe trail on terra firma. The last half-mile, where the trail scrambles out onto the pinnacle I was at times almost paralyzed with fear.  I don't know how a person can look down on either side of them and see shear 3,000 foot drops and still be able to casually climb on. Believe me, I was hanging on to the anchored - chain that runs along that part of the trail for dear life. At some points we had to wait for hikers coming the other direction to squeeze past us. It was all I could do not to panic. I don't know why, but fear of heights is my Achilles heal. I had to talk myself through it. The worst part was that I was scared for every other person I saw. Especially the kids. While I was clinging to the chain, more than once a 10 year old kid would come trotting past me, and I would almost die worrying about them. Mike kept saying that he wanted to bring the older kids to hike it. I could NOT stand being up there with my kids. So there will probably be further discussion about that I am sure.

Mike got some pretty cool pictures along the Angels Landing trail (while I repeated compulsively, "Mike, put the camera away and hold on to the chain. Hold on to the chain right NOW." He was very patient with me).

After Angels Landing we visited the Emerald Pools. That is a cool little trail. On the way out we passed a bunch of wild turkeys along the river. Mike took some great pictures there too, but in trying to clear some old pictures off the card to make room he accidentally deleted all of our pictures from the morning. It was super disappointing to loose the pictures...Mike was especially bummed since he'd been behind  the camera working on taking great shots all morning. So there's no proof that I made it to the top of Angels Landing (which is probably best because the pictures would probably scare me to look at).


After some late lunch we went for a really short hike to Weeping Rock, a spring cascading over a wide rock overhang. It was pretty spectacular, especially in the setting sun.

Lunch at the Zion Lodge (Mike was still unhappy about accidentally deleting all the pictures from the morning)

Walking up to Weeping Rock. 

Looking out from under the overhang / spring

On the drive back to St. George we were treated to a sublime desert sunset. Mike stopped at the Orange Julius drive thru in Hurricane and we sipped away as we drove into the sunset and listening to Don Williams. 

Back at the house we cleaned up and drove to the temple for a session. Turns out it was a multi-stake regional conference that weekend...so pretty much every temple recommend-carrying adult within a hundred miles was at their Saturday evening session of conference. We almost had the temple all to ourselves. 

I felt so content the entire session. Relieved, like taking a drink of water when you're thirsty. I needed it.

After the temple we picked up some Cafe Rio, and went to the house to kick off our shoes, relax our tired muscles, and enjoy a quiet dinner. 

That day will go down in my memory as one of my perfect days.

The next morning, with everyone in the vicinity at Regional Conference meetings there was no place for us to go for church, so we took a walk around the neighborhood, and then headed north. First to Hurricane to visit my grandparents' graves, then to Holden to visit Mike's grandparents' graves. It was a peaceful Sabbath day.

We arrived home about 4:00. It would have been sooner, but about a mile away from home someone pulled along side us and pointed to our rear tire. We pulled off to look at it and found that it was almost completely flat. We put a little air in it at the nearest gas station and then went home, and Mike took it to have it repaired the next day (it actually had to be replaced). I feel super blessed that we drove 500 miles over the weekend without a problem until we were within walking distance of home. That was a tender mercy.

Sometimes you just NEED a break. I am so grateful that we got to go. Weekends without some major commitment for us are few and far between, so I am extra grateful that we took advantage of this one. it was important. Thanks again to everyone who helped us make it happen.       

Fall Back (autumn in a bazillion pictures)

Tonight is the end of Daylight Savings (I am making a mental note so we don't show up an hour early to church tomorrow). I don't know what you are going to do with your extra hour, but I am going to use mine to catch up with those things I never get to...such as updating the blog.


I LOVE FALL. Always have. It's my favorite season of the year. The colors are spectacular. The light glows. Everyone starts nesting. And the anticipation of the approaching holidays is in the air.

Here are some of the things we've been up to this fall.

Out in Nature

The view up Yellow Fork

We spent a lovely warm afternoon strolling leisurely up Yellow Fork

It was so beautiful.

An afternoon at Gardner Village to see the witches

If you think Mike looks eerily like the Uni bomber with his hood up like that (especially when he has his sunglasses on)....you're not the only one.

Caramel apples outside the sweets shop. Delish.

Putting the garden to bed for the year...

Last of the carrots and beets

Eating the super SWEET fall carrots. The cool-weather carrots are the BEST.

The last few pumpkins ready for picking

Speaking of PuMpkins...

We made our annual pilgrimage to our favorite patch kind of late this year...the day before Halloween. They still had plenty of pumpkins to go around, and we got what we came for...in record time too. Since we also had to carve our pumpkins the same night, I told the kids we had to be outta there in 15 minutes or less. They came through. I was pretty impressed.

Not a bad view

This year's creations included several corporate and team endorsements. My lawyers have advised me not to comment on the question of whether we were paid or not. I'll leave it at that.

And then of course, there was Halloween

Party #1. Neighborhood harvest party / trunk-or-treat

Sully's and Abner's costumes were inspired by their nightly bed time stories which chronicle the adventures of the Super Kids, "Super S" and "Super A". They always save the day!

Here is a video of "Super S" and "Super A" getting pumped up before the big neighborhood party with the official Super Kids cheer that Sully made up. (I love how Abner can only see out of one eye hole of his crooked mask.)

DSCN5555 from Angie Melton on Vimeo.

Tillman and his bff came up with this costume duo for the neighborhood party. They were perfect.

Party #2. @ the Sullivan Hacienda
We celebrated again at the annual Sullivan Halloween bash. We had some fresh brew out of the witch's cauldron, a hay ride, festive food and dancing the night away.

Here are the Super Kids in flight with Mike (aka "Si") giving them a little push.

 The Super Kids took their super strength to the horse pasture where they rolled these 50 gallon barrels around while everyone else got busy on the dance floor...

Boogie time.

DSCN5627 from Angie Melton on Vimeo.

Party#3. Mike's company party for families. No pictures...but lots more candy.

Party #4. (Not technically a party) All Hallows Eve itself.
Halloween finally arrived, with Sully almost beside himself with excitement. After all the Halloween parties we'd been to over the previous week, I had a hard time of it trying to keep things laundered and together. We soon discovered that more than one necessary piece of clothing was still in the dirty clothes, and even more distressing, we couldn't even find certain crucial accessories. As I was getting frustrated searching for things, with the kids chomping at the bit and trick-or-treaters arriving, Mike reminded me, "It's just Halloween. Relax."  That was good advise. So what if Abner went trick-or-treating without his mask and a mismatched cape. He didn't even notice.

Halloween dinner. Spaghetti squash with marinara and meatballs, salad, french bread and strawberry soda.

The whole gang. Napoleon and Pedro were joined by Kip and Deb.

Noble and friends. Noble is in that grey area where it's about time to stop trick-or-treating, but then he's not sure what to do instead. He's embarrassed to wear a costume, but wants the candy. We told him if he went trick-or-treating he HAD to be dressed up. He rounded  up a few friends and some half-hearted costumes and hit the road.  We later learned that most of those friends were not supposed to go trick-or-treating per their parents' policy of no trick-or-treating after 12. I apologized  the next day when I found out, for being that irresponsible parent who allowed her son to trick-or-treat at 13, and drag everyone else along. Sorry again guys. 

J. and her good friend manned the door and the candy bucket at our house. They were pretty good: teasing the older kids and being sweet to the little kids. (Although I was a little disappointed when they didn't chase down that one kid dressed as Beetlejuice after he absconded with and extra fist-full of candy. Little punk.)

Abner expounding on his trick-or-treating adventures over some of his cheese puffs and a strawberry soda.

Happy Fall!!! (And don't forget to set your clocks back tonight.)

A Book Review: Unbroken

Some of you may have heard about this one. I was hearing great things about it, so I added it to my kindle this past week. I could barely put it down for the 3 days it took me to read it. I stayed up until 2:00 this morning / last night finishing it, and decided I had to blog about it right away. I give it 5 stars. In fact, this may have become my new all-time favorite book.  I love stories of human triumph. This one is unsurpassed. In the same spirit as Victor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning (though in the form of an AMAZING story and less of an analysis), this book shows the depths of human endurance and the POWER of forgiveness and love. It's the story of an American Olympic distance runner, Louis Zamperini, who was easily on track to be the fastest miler in history up to that point, when the world descended into war. His journey and the horrors he and others experienced over the next several years is unbelievable. It's got just about everything: Running, the Olympics, Hitler (up close), air battles, a particularly beautiful "Joe vs. The Volcano" kind of  moment, angels, Japanese POW camps, Billy Graham, skateboarding... I won't spoil anything for you here, in case some of you wanted to read it. But I have to say that my admiration for "the greatest generation" and my own determination to live in gratitude and forgiveness have increased.
The author (of Seabiscuit fame) is an incredible story-teller. Fair warning: the descriptions of violence and degradation in the POW camps is graphic, and really tough to read. But the redemption of a human soul is so beautiful and inspiring I was brought to happy tears. This guy is one of my new heroes.

Life is beautiful

Louie Zamperini, who took up skateboarding in his 70's, here at 81

Crossing the Finish Line

Five years and six races later I am hanging it up as the official race planner / timer of the NPA 5k/1 mile fun run. It's been a lot of fun, and at times a lot of stress. I have gotten to know some great people better, and we've made some awesome memories.

 

**Sigh**

 

But life goes on.  Next year I plan to participate as a private citizen. :)

 

This year the kids put up some great times. Noble decided he was going to see how fast he could run the mile. He ran it in 6 minutes 11 seconds. He didn't beat his previous record of 5 minutes 46 seconds...so he was a little bummed, but he still won by quite a bit. 

 

 

 

The next runner was some awesome 2nd grade girl about a minute behind Noble. Then at around 7 min. 30 sec. this guy who had run the whole way CARRYING his baby, crossed the finish line.  That's hard core.

 

 

Tillman came in with his friend at about 8 minutes, Grace about 10 minutes.

Sully finishing strong with a time of 12:16.

 

Here he is with our old friend Michele Rosqvist who ran the mile with him so I could take care of business at the finish line and Mike could direct traffic out on the 5K route. She saved the day. I am so thankful for good friends.

 

Tillman, Sully and our neighborhood/carpool buddy at the finish line.

 

Jessie finishing strong in the 5k. I don't remember her time, but it's faster than I can run.

 

A good time was had by all.

It's a little sad to step away from something you've been a part of from the beginning. But in other ways, I am happy to let others take it on.

 

 

 

Sully Has Lift Off

 

 

Sully recently took one small step for him, one giant leap in the realm of childhood milestones...he graduated to riding a two wheeler.

 

Like his brother Tillman before him he took to it naturally. Not a lot of fuss and anxiety...just get on and go.

His universe has just expanded. And he is pretty excited. Go Sully! Safe travels.

J. In The Driver's Seat

This has been an exciting month for Jessie.  The end of September found us at the Golden Spike Arena in Ogden for the State 4H Horse Championship. 

She was kind of disappointed with Dolli's performance in show events on the first day. Usually, show events are Dolli's bread and butter, but especially in Halter (a ground work event) she came unglued.

In the warm up arena before show events. Looking sharp!

Jessie lunging Dolli before events on day 1.

Trail

A beautiful pivot in the box

But day 2 - speed events - was a different story all together. Historically, Dolli hasn't displayed lightning speed. She's respectable, but Jessie's always just resigned herself to the fact that Dolli would never be winning any ribbons when it came to speed.

She proved us wrong at State. Jessie was blowing past personal bests all over the place. Quadrangle, Poles, and then Barrels. And at the end of the day, Jessie ended up taking 19th overall, out of about 150, in speed. (We didn't see that coming, so we left before the awards ceremony. Oops. We are still doing penance for that one with Jessie. Another demerit on our parenting record. In our defense though, we had been away from home a LONG time, and were anxious to get back to our other children.  Her friend collected her ribbon for her, and she got it at practice later. Sorry J. )

Sun rise on day 2.  Waiting to run.

Here's the video of her Barrels run. She had quite a fan club, as you will hear.

DSCN5403 from Angie Melton on Vimeo.

Here, at the end of another State Championship with the man of the hour, Grandpa Sullivan.
The memories are priceless.

 (By the way, that horse on the left, another of Grandpa's project horses, took first in State...second year in a row for a Sullivan-trained horse, Megan L. riding. Not too shabby. Congrats, Meg!) 

In other Jessie-related news, the long-awaited day finally arrived when Jessie took the wheel. It was long-awaited because I didn't realize that to get a learner's permit she had have her social security card, which I lost years ago and hadn't taken the time to replace yet (more great parenting). So I spent a day at the social security office (thank goodness I squeaked that one through before the government shut down), and then we had to wait a week for it to arrive in the mail. THEN.....there was the written test to take...and then take again....and then take again. (To tell you the truth, she knew her stuff, so I think that the DMV must have intimidated her. Which I can totally understand.)  

Third time's the charm. On her last attempt she passed with a 95%...so I guess she's qualified.

She is now legal on the roads (with a parent). It's hard to believe, but we have a teenage driver in the house. 

...And suddenly, for some reason, I find myself marking the time until she leaves home (can you believe it?) ...because if the day came when she's old enough to drive a car, the day will inevitably come (sooner than later) when she leaves the nest. It's really happening.

We're trying to enjoy it all.  Love you, Jess!