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Today we drove to Mirror Lake.

We were going to spend a week up here, but since it snowed, we decided to leave a day later.

When we arrived at camp, we were greeted with patches of snow!.

He wanted to save some for later. Into his pocket the snow went 🙂

I need to make a note for next year: They close two of the three sections of the campgrounds on 9/9. Site 69 was the only site big enough for us. So if we want to camp in the other sections- which had trees 🙂 We need to get there a week or two earlier.

Eli LOVED our campsite. Each site had a huge sand pad for tents. Eli thought it was just a huge sandbox. He enjoyed every minute out here digging a driving his trucks.

We walked around the lake.

It’s a beautiful lake. I know why the campground is always full when we have tried to make reservations in the past.

Eli wanted to take our picture. Not bad!

That evening the temperatures dropped and it was quite cold out. Eli had to warm up his patootie. 🙂

We made smores. I like mine like a Norwegian open faced sandwich 🙂 No graham cracker, just chocolate and marshmallow.

This time of the year is just beautiful in the mountains. I’m glad we took the time to get away for a few days.

We took an hour today and drove to the copper mine. It’s the world’s largest excavation and open-pit copper mine.

This is the outside.

This is the inside.

How big are those trucks driving down there?

Here is a tire from one of the trucks.

The bed of the truck. The truck is the size of a two story townhouse.

The dirt slide was part of the landslide that happened in 2013.

This equipment detected slope deformation and the crews were evacuated. No one was injured in this slide. I wish they could start using this for earthquake detection.

Looking into the mine.

One: Love my boys. It’s never a dull moment.

Two: This little guy was in the green and school without any card moves! For only 1 day, but FINALLY, he did it!

Three: Made my first candle out of beeswax from our hives. The cutest little thing. It’s only 2 inches!

Four: We catered the missionaries lunch. My phone number gets passed down to the new missionaries that come into the stake. Always happy to bring them lunch!

Five: Service. I’m grateful I had the opportunity to serve others. Their payment to me was a picture 🙂

Always nice to remember the good and the positive that happens throughout the week!

We started the day with a family reunion at a splash pad.

I caught up with one of my cousins. She is running her first 1/2 marathon this month and gave me her ideas on how she stays hydrated during her runs. I’m running a 1/2 marathon Saturday and will be trying her ideas. I’m excited to see if helps me stay hydrated and fueled.

That evening we went to dinner at Siragusa’s.

They have excellent sweet potato gnocchi in their house cream sauce. Really tasty.

I couldn’t help it. I purchased more pumpkins. You can’t have too many, right 🙂

Good thing for holidays. We needed a day to take off and enjoy being a family.

One: I can’t get over how cute these bees are. Fanning off their hive to stay cool.

Two: Taking my son out of school early to get a treat!

Three: The tasty treat! The most delicious brownie ever made!

Four: My favorite place to run. A few hills to keep it challenging, paths without traffic to keep it quiet, and bridges to keep it interesting.

Five: Crusty bread right out of the oven with fresh honey creates a perfect side for dinner.

That’s our favorites of the week!

I’m excited to share our five favorites from this week!

One:

It’s been so hot out, our tomatoes have struggled. We FINALLy were able to get 3 ripe tomatoes out of our 30 tomato plants.

Two:

The flowers in our yard are looking beautiful this year. Our bees are loving them.

Three:

This little guy started kindergarten and is loving it.

Four:

Our bees have been busy. We have had fresh honey these last few days. It’s delicious.

Five:

Talking about bees! I’m getting brave around them. I don’t jump as much when they buzz all around and I finally touched one!

That’s our favorites for this week!

My little pea is in kindergarten! I’m so excited for him.

I’m going to miss him during the day, but he is going to a fantastic school and I know he is in loving hands. The teachers are great and they see what each child needs. They ordered 1st grade curriculum for him and will continue to work with him at the level he needs.

Went for a run. Worked on speed today and really pushed myself. It sure was different to just…run. No little coxswain to tell me, “run faster, mommy.” “It’s boring when you run slow.” 🙂

It’s Monday, so we went to the prison for lunch.

They all asked where my son was. I guess we go here a lot 🙂

See that empty chair. That is little pea’s chair. We tried to take a sad picture, but it looked terrible, so smiles it is. But we were really sad he wasn’t there!

I had to eat my egg and cheese bagel by myself.

After lunch we went to schmidt’s bakery for a treat. They have the best chocolate mint filled cookies.

My laptop died this morning so that evening my computer guys tried to fix it. So far it’s not looking good.

Thank you for fixing my video on my blog! 🙂 Even though blog work isn’t very fun for him, I appreciate all he does. I really love his guy.

Did it work? Are they dismantling the “broken” frame and moving the wax to another part of the hive?

The bees were on it! Looks like the experiment so far is successful.

Before…

After…

We will check on the frame at the end of the week to see how it’s doing.

Albert from Eco Bee Box gave us a frame with three layers of wax. A normal honeycomb that is built by bees only have 1 layer.

Albert wanted to know if the bees would dismantle this frame of “broken” wax and rebuild the wax elsewhere in the hive on other frames.

We decided this would be a great experiment for the large beehive.

The purpose of this experiment is to give bees wax so they don’t have to waste their time and energy on making wax. This will be good for a smaller hive to build up quicker by letting the bees concentrate on making honey and taking care of their brood, instead of making wax.

This is a close up of the three broken layers.

This is how I dress 🙂 I’m so going to get stung one of these days.

What does a 4 year old do to keep busy?

Soaking himself!

I am getting brave. I touched a few bees!

Putting the experimental frame in the hive.

We will give if a few days and see what the bees do!

We love visiting Colorado. The temperature is 10′ cooler and it’s so green.

We stopped off at the Colorado Temple.

Eli had so much fun with Rin.

Gage taught him how to play video games. Again, I guess I have deprived my son….

We played with their cute puppy. Eli now wants another dog.

Too old for pictures.

They have a park across the street from their house. Eli thought it was the coolest thing to open the front door to a park!

He loved these springy things.

One day we ate lunch at Garbanzo. If you want a great tasting falafel, come here. I enjoyed my wrap. Next time I will skip the hummus. I like hummus, but it over powered the falafel. Excellent lunch.

I thought I had a picture of Court and the whole family hanging out on the couch. I can’t seem to find it. But it was enjoyable to be with Ferelyn and her family.

We always have to stop here for donuts.

These long john donuts are to Colorado as a warm croissant is to Paris. If you pass through you must experience one.

They are filled with white fluff, or we call it, icing. 🙂 So tasty. This is why I ran 13.1 miles! So I can eat one of these for breakfast EVERY morning.

Our last day we at breakfast at Snooze. I thought it was going to be another breakfast/ Ihop place…

This was most delicious breakfast I have had. They don’t have cooks in the back, they have chefs. Everything had great flavor. Even Eli’s pancake.

I ordered the Smashed Avocado Benny. When I run the race next year, we are coming back to this restaurant!

We always enjoy coming out for a visit. Thank you for letting us stay with you for a few days!