About 9700 Ft.

Three yrs ago, a week or two before we found out cancer came back for Chloe, my brother Josh and I took our girls on a backpack trip up in WY. The girls had so much fun (we did too) that they have been begging us to go again ever since. The next backpack trip was the subject of many late night talks I had with Chloe in the hospital as she would often ask where we would go, when her doctors would think it was OK or what we would do. I think talking about it helped Chloe escape from the present or something because she asked me about it all the time. Unfortunately, because of her transplant and all that comes along with it she couldn't go for quite a long time. Addie and Josh's girls have waited patiently for Chloe to be able to go with them [Thanks, to all of them. It meant a lot to Chloe]. Just this spring Chlo's docs gave her the go ahead and we were finally able to find a weekend that worked for all of us. Backpacking with 6 little girls (sorry Ads, still my little girl) is very entertaining, and several people we passed on the trail thought we were a bit crazy for bringing them up there but we all had a wonderful time. Here are a few pics of the adventure in no real order of importance or hierarchical sequence.

This was our view when we woke up. Well actually Josh and I never fell asleep. I can never sleep the first night out of my own bed. It was completely peaceful on the east side of the peak, so we laid there under the stars and listened to the cool sound of the jetstreams in the wind coming up over the peak.



Elsie, taking a much deserved break to eat some fruit snacks. She had a lot of fun and the backpacking was a nice focus for her fun, energetic personality. She did great, and it was a hard trail for a seven year old. She liked to wait for me on the trail to point out something cool or tell me [specifically] how I would die and she'd never see me again if I fell off some cliff. I don't think she asked me once to carry her pack for her. She is already talking about the next trip, hoping we can get the same dry mix cobbler we had at dinner and "Warm Chocolate Memories" brand hot chocolate. We sure created some warm memories with it, and they were chocolaty.
Chloe was always by my side so I had quite a few pics of her. I chose to upload this one and I feel pretty good about my decision. As we walked along she told me how pretty she thought the scenery was and how she was so glad we were able to come. She is always so appreciative of the good things around her. I like that. Her muscles are still pretty weak from all the treatments so she struggled to keep up with the other girls. She had a hard time especially on the steep hills, but she only asked me to help her with her pack on the flats. Considering everything she has gone through, I think she did very well. She loves to hike and see the scenery. She commandeered Josh's binoculars so she could watch the many Mt. Goats we saw on the cliffs as we hiked.
Ever wonder what it looks like at midnight at 9712 ft? Here you go. Josh, Jill, Jamie and Joni aren't always there at midnight, but the rest is pretty accurate. Unless you are looking North. Well, any direction but south including but not limited to NE and NW.
I don't have many pictures of Addie close up because she and Joni were always out front leading the way. Addie did awesome this year, carried all her own stuff and never complained about how heavy her pack was or how hard it was to climb the steep rocky trail. I think she likes the adventure. I heard her several times counseling the younger kids on how to be safe while climbing the steep hills. In this pic above they are about to pass a rattle snake in the rock without realizing it. Josh found him a few minutes later when we got to the top. Luckily, none of us woke him up.
This moutain side should be very familiar to my Fam. Growing up we spent a lot of time biking, hiking, camping and horse riding in the mountains just down to the right of the peak. Good times. In fact, it was here and only here where I rode one of my Dad's horses and didn't get bucked off. Dad had great horses, i'm just a lousy rider. This particular day is so vivid in my mind, seems like it was yesterday. I rode this horse that was probably a mare, or maybe a gelding or stallion. It was for sure one of those three. I forget the horse's name, but it had a beautiful shiny coat of brown. It might have been black though, or white or a combination of any of those three colors. Man that was a pretty horse. I'm not really sure what time of day it was, but the temperature was probably nice for riding. I'll never forget it.
Here are six of nine girls Josh and I have between us. From the left, Chloe, Jill, Joni, Elsie, Jamie and Addie. They are all great hikers and had fun singing silly songs and collecting pocket fulls of 'special' rocks. My girls love hangin out with Josh's girls. They can't get enough of them.
Sunset at the Peak.

The Josh Englands. Josh always makes trips like these adventurous and luckily everything I forgot he brought and visa versa. Though I think I forgot more than he. His girls were all troopers and characters, just like their dad.
The Jake Englands

We all had a fun time and the girls are already asking about where we might go next time. We're looking forward to when The Stacie's(y's) can join us when our little ones are older.

A Little Dirt in His Diet

Moms take a terrible risk sending their kids off to camp alone with their dads. Wait, maybe he's just wearing gloves. Luckily someone lit a latern so we were able to identify the contamination. It took a good half box of whipes to clean this kid up - after we took some pics of him enjoying that monsterous treat, of course.

What we've been up to.

Not much really. Summer has been great, but passing quickly. My sister Kell came up the other week and took some pics of the fam. I think she gets better every time she takes our pictures. Thanks a lot Kelly! We really appreciate it, even more since you shouldn't have been up and about. Our kids are growing so fast it's scary.





I asked Kell to take some pics of Stac so I can have a pic of my Lady on my desktop. I might just wallpaper the long wall in my office with this pic. I'm sure Stac would like to see herself billboard size when she stops by.


In other news, we continue to do things from time to time. The other day we took the kids on a walk by the river.

Then we went camping and forgot to take any pics of our kids having fun in the forest, but managed to take this one of the sunset one rainy night. The pic didn't turn out, but the scenery in person was very nice.

While camping we stopped in at the [very happening] Star Valley Fair. Elsie and Rhen hit a bunch of exciting rides. Chloe was very disappointed because the little rides were boring, and she is just shy of the height minimum for the bigger ones so she was pretty bored with the whole thing, and quite irritated that she hasn't grown more. Dang chemo.


Thanks to Addie's willingness to babysit from time to time [thanks Ads] I've been able to get Stacie out for some fun. This is her riding her bike on a trail. The are also some trees and sage brush nearby in this photo.

She likes to go fast.

At home we've learned an important lesson that buying a swingset and spending 2 days assembling it wasn't really necessary. All we needed to do was take the top of the old FJ40 and park it in the garage. They have gotten way more use out of the fj the last several weeks than they ever have in the swingset. They never want me to drive it to work because they want to play in it during the day. Rhen and Elsie spend hours in it playing and swinging on the roll bar. One night I found Addie relaxing in the back reading a book. Rhen is especially attached to it. The other day when I was leaving to work he was yelling at me, "Daaad, don taka my FJ40!" I thought i'd pass it down to him eventually, but at 2 yrs old? He's a little optimistic.

And finally, just a few months before he is too old for nursury at church, he decided he'd go the other day and didn't put up a fight. I did have to bribe him with a dewskie which I've been reprimanded for doing... but it worked. Even still, I don't have a whole lot of confidence that he will go as easily next time.

He also learned how to put on his belt by himself and was very proud.