Moab

We got back from our vacation to Moab on Tuesday and I wanted to post some pictures of the things that we did. I have a hard time narrowing down the pictures, so this is a long post, but here is a bunch of pictures from our trip. (Click on each picture for a bigger version)

Hailee was actually excited to get in the car for the 5 hour drive, she knew that it was Grandpa's car that we borrowed and she thought it would be fun. Plus she does a "Full Body Cheese" every time she sees the camera.

She actually did excellent on the drives to and from Moab, throw in a movie and she is good to go. We bought two new movies for her, Lilo and Stitch and Chicken Little, she watched each of them several times and didn't want to watch anything else.

One of the first places we went was Dead Horse Point, it's just outside of Moab and offers spectacular views. Hailee had fun climbing around on all of the rocks, she did take quite a spill and scraped herself up pretty good. From that point on she kept saying "The Point hurt me" or "The Point gave me an owie" It was pretty funny.

Brooke and Hailee at "The Point"

We also ventured to Canyonlands National Park, it was raining a little bit but we didn't let it stop us. We went on a little hike even in the rain. We found that Hailee really loves to hike.

We hiked up to Mesa Arch, it's just a little walk really, but Hailee hated being in her backpack. She just loved to walk around and play on all the rocks. Of course due to the many thousand foot cliff that's on the other side of the arch we forced her to get in the backpack so she wouldn't go running off.

Hailee was really excited to see any sort of wildlife, she chased some lizards and thought this crow in the background was pretty cool.

Because she liked hiking so much, she thought it was fun to try on my hiking boots. Of course she is already very into shoes and tries on shoes anywhere she goes. No matter the size.

We went to the Moab Arts Festival at the park over the weekend and one of the highlights was being able to play on the blow up toys at the park. Brooke enjoyed the roasted corn on the cob and we had fun just hanging out at the park.

Hailee was very excited because at the park they had a "Teeter Tot", she has one at her day care and loves to play on it. She thought it was pretty cool to also make Mom and Dad play on it with her and make sure to sit on each of the 4 different animals.

I did get a few minutes to take a bike ride, I was in Moab it's a sin not to ride a bike. I road the Bar M trail and the Circle O loop in the middle of it. It's an easy trail and worked out perfect to ride during Hailee's nap.

We went to Arches National Park and took a minute to check out Balanced Rock. Of course Hailee loved running around but has proven to be quite a clutz, even walking around on a paved trail she had quite an amazing trip onto her stomach and somehow had enough force to flip her body over.

We took the hike up to Delicate Arch and it proved to be quite challenging. There is a lot of steep parts of the trail and it rises quite a bit in a short time. It's a long 1.5 miles to the top. Hailee didn't want to be in her backpack again and walked most of the trail herself. She also thought it was fun to drink out of the camelback.

Brooke and I had a hard time keeping up with Hailee's little legs. She just kept going up and up the trail, she did great and took so many steps she almost wore out a pair of shoes on this hike alone.

Of course I had to carry the empty backpack that she refused to ride in.

We eventually made it to the top and had lunch at the arch. There were tons of people up there and it was really difficult to get a picture without anyone else in it. But here is proof, we made it.

Hailee showing off some of the injuries she sustained on the hikes we went on. She is pretty tough, she falls and gets lots of scrapes and bruises but it doesn't seem to slow her down for more than a few seconds.

Moab has a nice little trail through town, so we took a leisurely bike ride to...

The ice cream shop of course. Cleverly named Kaleidescoops.

Hailee has so much energy it's amazing. She just ran everywhere we went, I think she had fun being in so many new places.

We drove almost 300 miles and of course one of Hailee's favorite activities was to go to the park and play on the slides.

In Moab they have this weird Hippie park with all sorts of musical instruments built out of used and recycled stuff. It's actually kind of cool and you can hear the sounds all over the park. It's not usually a lot of real music because it's a lot of kids Hailee's age that just love to bang on the pipes randomly. She had fun though.

And as we were packing to go home, Hailee occupied herself by making a train of matchbox cars. We packed up and headed home. It was a fun trip and I think we all had a good time, we were plagued with some bad weather and some weird bad luck but all in all things turned out really good.

Movies, Music, Video Games

Well I have been quite a slacker on the blog lately, especially with my posts regarding entertainment.  So here is a run down of what's going on lately in that area.

Movies:
I really haven't seen a lot of movies lately.  But I have seen a few that I wanted to mention.

21 (* * * *)

I went a couple of weekends ago to see 21 and I really liked the movie.  It's a story about a group of students from MIT that figure out a system counting cards, then head to Vegas to make some money.  It was a really good movie, it was stylish and interesting, it was really fun to watch.  It's based on a true story, I am not quite sure how accurate the movie is.  There was a documentary about it that I have seen, but it's been several years and I don't remember the details.  But I really do recommend the movie, the plot was good and there was a few twists here and there that I wasn't expecting. 

October Sky (* * * 1/2)

I know this movie is old, but it was on TV the other day and I remember liking it when it came out so Brooke and I caught it.  They have been playing it on the weekends on USA or something, so if you catch it, check it out it's a good movie.  It's the story of Homer Hickam, about when he was a boy and he experimented with rockets. 

I Am Legend (* * *)

Brooke and I checked this out on PPV a few weekends back.  I thought it was a pretty good movie, it was intense and pretty scary.  The visuals of the city sort of rotting away were cool, although I think the time line for that was way off.  It was a fun movie to watch, if you like those kind of movies,  but there were tons of plot holes.  I think it's a cool idea and it was probably a good time to revisit and older movie, The Omega Man (which I haven't seen, but now want to).  It's worth seeing but don't have too high of expectations.

Dan In Real Life (* *)

I thought this movie was really boring.  Brooke and I got this on PPV a week or so ago.  We both thought pretty much the same thing, the movie was super slow and the casting was way off.  I guess we really didn't know what we were getting into, but you see Steve Carrell's name and you expect funny.  There were a few laughs here and there, but the movie just drags on and nothing happens, the plot hardly moves forward.  I think the casting of Juliette Binoche as the love interest of this movie was a huge mistake.  She has no charisma on screen and you really wonder why these guys are even interested in her. 


Music:

I am in a huge music slump right now, so anyone out there that wants to recommend something good, post it in the comments.  I was really disappointed that the Jack's Mannequin CD got delayed I was looking forward to that.  I do listen to an immense amount of music every day, so I can get burned out very easily.  I listen to morning radio on the way to work, but then I listen to my iPod a few hours a day at work while I am drawing and the entire commute home, afternoon radio is awful.  So I generally average the equivalent of several CD's a day.  That's a lot of music and I need a lot of variety, but my taste is pretty specific.  But I have found a few good things.

Joshua Radin:  We Were Here
Josh F. hooked me up with this and it's mellow, but it's really good.  It's a lot of acoustic guitar and stuff, it's relaxing. 

Ashes Divide:  Keep Telling Myself It's Alright
This is essentially A Perfect Circle, without Maynard from Tool.  So if you like A Perfect Circle, you will like this album.  It's a good mix of some heavy and some mellow stuff.  It doesn't have the longevity that I wish it had, but it's good.

Mae: Singularity
I have actually had this CD for quite a while, but I haven't really listened to it much until now.  It's pretty good and it's much better than Mae's earlier efforts, the production value especially.  If you like the whole pop-punk thing, check out Mae.

Video Games:

Well I have been playing video games a decent amount lately.  Brooke has continued to go to bed quite early every night, although she is doing much better and stays up much later on some nights.

Grand Theft Auto IV
I wasn't even planning on getting GTA IV, I have played most of the other games in the series and nothing has been good since GTA III.  But the game got such stellar reviews that I had to check it out.  It is a good game, it's fun and the open world environment has never been better.  It's the best GTA that they have put out.  Having said that, I wish it was cleaner, I really do.  I know they were trying to push it as far as they could, but they went too far.  Luckily most of that stuff is optional. 

Rock Band
I really love this game, it's so much fun.  When I got Guitar Hero 3 I wasn't really interested in Rock Band, I thought that Guitar Hero was fun and I didn't really want a bunch of huge instruments around the house.  I was wrong, in fact unless they drastically change Guitar Hero, I won't buy another version of it.  Rock Band is so much better right now, it's a blast especially with a big group of people.  If you have a console that supports it, go get it. 

Call of Duty 4
Still one of the best games I have ever played and for sure the best game I have played online.  It's so much fun and it's got great game play.  Again, if you have a console that has COD 4, go get it and play it online, it's a blast.  Be aware, it's addicting.

So that's what's been going on lately, well the past 2 months or so.  It's actually more than I thought I would have to write about.  Make some comments and let me know about good movies to check out and especially some good music, I am in need. 

Frontrunner

Today we took our first trip on the new Frontrunner train. Hailee had a lot of fun on the ride. We took the train from Clearfield to Farmington and then Brooke met up with us and we went on to Lagoon for the afternoon.
The train is quite nice and it's really smooth and fast. There was a ton of room on the first level but the top level was packed. It was fun, Hailee has been wanting to go on the train ever since she saw it at the Grand Opening last week but was unable to ride it.

Hailee thought it was fun to look out the window and see all the things pass by. She sat down and asked me where her "buckle" was, but there isn't any seat belts so she took the opportunity to get up and check everything out.

We finally found a ride that Brooke could go on at Lagoon, other than the kid rides. With her being pregnant it's hard to find rides that are safe for her, but she enjoyed riding on the swings and we all had a good time.

Brooke just thought this was a really cute picture of Hailee, so I thought I would post it.