The Perfect Escape

 On Wednesday morning, we had to eat a good breakfast because it was high adventure day! This was the only day the kids would be in their groups from breakfast to dinner. We found out when we got to Aspen Grove that some parents leave on Wednesday to go shopping, go to the temple, or float the Provo River, but we were able to fill our time right there "on campus."

Eli lived on soda and soda alone the entire week.

We didn't want to run away on Wednesday because there was a hike that morning we were interested in doing. It was beautiful and I had a fun time chatting with everyone while we were trekking along. 

The boys paused for an intentionally awkward family photoshoot. 

We made it to the top!

Then we were shocked to see our kids were right on our tails! I hadn't realized they would be doing the whole hike that day also, and then to see that they did it so fast was quite impressive! 

When we got back to camp, we found the Stompers were on a little hike of their own, venturing all the way across camp in a tidy little line. 

We went straight from our hike to lunch, to our tennis tournament. Jeff and I went up against a couple close to our same age. They were cute and it was fun to chat with them, play against them, and humbly lose to them. We rushed from that to pottery. Pottery was in an open room sitting over a stream, so you couldn't beat the ambiance! 

Straight from pottery to archery. Wednesday was a busy day!

I got a bullseye!

Jacob yelled out, "Hold up how many bullseyes you got." 

Right after dinner it was time for the ropes course. I was anxious to get on the ropes course. It seemed super fun and it was an activity I had missed while I was sick Monday. 

I was very excited. 

Perhaps too excited. I was sure I would love the ropes course but I actually thoroughly did not enjoy the ropes course. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be and my anxiousness to participate in the course quickly turned into anxiousness to be back on steady ground. It was fun to try, but difficult in execution. 

Back to the pool for a nice evening cool down. 

Thursday morning started as a bust. It ended up raining, so a lot of the activities were closed. We were scrambling around trying to figure out what to do. Finally, I suggested we try out the escape room I had made for girls' camp. I threw it together right before we left and I wanted people to try it out to see how difficult it would be for the girls to solve at camp. I needed some guinea pigs!

It was super fun for me to watch them try to put all my clues together. I came up with the whole escape room all by myself, so I really had no idea if people would be able to put it all together. It was so satisfying to watch them solve my riddles! 

Ben is the escape room master, so I especially delighted in watching him work through my clues. 

The sun came up just long enough for us to take a few slips down the giant slip-n-slide.

The boys got very creative and did all sorts of tricks down the tarp. There were planks, barrel rolls, and a couple flying squirrels. We almost didn't do the slip-n-slide because it was cold and we didn't want to get wet, but we very spontaneously decided to give it a go. We were glad we did because this turned out to be Jeff's favorite activity of the week!

Another highlight of mine was the nonstop wallyball we did at the end of the week. Wallyball was one of the few dry activities in the rain, so we hunkered down in here and spent the night facing off against each other. 

Friday morning was time to go. Jonah said goodbye to his Stompers room one last time. (He was happy to do so. He had a strong start in Stompers but started feeling like the days were a little too long in there by the end of the week.)

All the other kids loved their groups and the things they did. This is Eli's group (minus Eli. He ran off before they took the picture).

Madison, Claire, and Lincoln had an intense game of house going on every evening on one of the playgrounds. They would play until dark every night. 

The old cousin lineup +1. 

Was Aspen Grove better than Disneyland? Does Disneyland have babysitting? Does Disneyland feed you all your meals? Does Disneyland have outrageous crowds? Is Disneyland in the serene mountains with crisp, cool air, a welcome break for a Vegas family? 

This really was my dream vacation. It was perfect. I loved it and I may even be tempted to choose it over Disney as my new favorite family getaway.