Surfing with Nacho - Cozumel

{For 18 months – Jan ’17 to Jul ’18 – I'm posting our letter to Miranda while she's on her mission to Cochabamba, Bolivia.  Our letter titles are taken from a list of family sayings & catchphrases we recorded onto a pillowcase she has with her.  You can read her adventures on her mission blog: www.hermanamadsen.blogspot.com!}

Naming the letter "Lake Powell" would have been too boring.  But guess what we did this week?

You know, every time I write our family letter, I feel a little like we live this exciting life... hahaha!!  I mean, don't forget that a lot of the week is doing our jobs, yard work, asking friends to play, and cleaning some more.  It has been a pretty relaxing summer, but in 2 days, it's going to change to a house full of students.  Yikes.

So when we got to the hotel in Page, the kids swam in the hotel pool while I ran to Wally for groceries... for almost 3 hours.  Everyone in the world had congregated in Page, and hardly any of them spoke English.  All cleaning the stores out of flip flops, beer, and snacks.  Too bad they didn't leave any for me.  You'll have to guess which ones.  =)

Then in the morning, we gave Carlie & Morgan their bday presents together.  They got really good seats to Imagine Dragons.  They're both really excited, but only one of them cried.

We got out on the lake.  Here's the highlights:

We went back to our family's little swimming hole:

We landed ourselves in Fiesta Mexicana again.  =)

Hey, turn this off it's too much.  We're saving the Lake Powell trip (and anything else next summer) until you're with us, so don't be sad!!!!

We had Back to School blessings, then put our sunburnt, tired selves to bed.  We were missing one girl to fill up the girls' room though.  =)  

In the morning was Carlie's breaky in bed.  After she ran to the hotel breaky on accident.

Then we checked out of the hotel and hit the lake.  We're powering straight home after this day.  Driving out to our spot:

Dang it.  I forgot to name the last one "3."  Dang it.

Halle:

Kierste:

The last water pics.  It's a really cool wipeout:

Ah, stayed on.  But still super scared, and excited, respectively:

Rekt

I think we thoroughly exhausted them:

Then the boys went school shopping with Dad & stopped by Johnny Rockets.

The girls went school shopping at the mall with me, then ran to McDonald's with no picture.  =(

Morgan had his breaky in "bed" this morning:

And we celebrated Carlie's bday at Grandma's.  See your little doggy?  She goes to Grandma's with us whenever we eat outside.  =)  Being loved.  =)

And boys in the trees:

Ok, so school starts tomorrow for Derek, the Sevey, and Tuesday for everyone else.  Oh my gosh I'm in charge of t-shirts again for Westfield, pack meeting is this week, and I'm going to be the secretary for PTA this year.  It's all starting to crunch down.  Carlie will have swim team after school some days.  She, Derek, & Connor will take piano from Tina; Halle & Kierste will take from Britney again, who will come to the house; Derek will have drum lessons; Morgan, H&K, and Connor will have soccer; and the twins would like to do gymnastics again.  Or sewing class.  We'll have to decide.  That's all.  I think Dad stays the same, working hard and making all of this possible for us.  =)

The solar eclipse is tomorrow at about 11:34am here.  We get about 93% eclipsed, but a TON of people are going up to ID Falls/ Rexburg, camping out, and seeing the 100% eclipse there.  They've already set up port-a-potty's along the freeway for the horrendous traffic that will be coming out of ID afterward.  People are paying $1000 per campsite, including the Edwards.  =)  We would have done it with them if school weren't starting and we weren't just getting back from Powell so close.  It would just be too crazy for me.  FOOD IS GONE from the shelves up there.  They are diverting food from Utah to be brought up there...  Hahahahaha - the history being made, and the stories that will come out of this!!!

I love you so much, and to prove that, I'm going to leave you with some more amazing memes.

I've sent better ones, but I couldn't leave any of these out.  =)  

Love, Mama


Also, one that didn't make it in the letter because I didn't know if Miranda would have heard about all the terrorist activity going on by people claiming to be Nazi.  You know when you need to find your Jedi name, or your warrior name in any fantasy cosplay, it's like the first 3 letters of your last name and the last 3 of your mother's maiden name, or whatever.