Island Park Paradise!

This week we had such a great time with all the Nadauld family! It was my first trip to Island park -- which is the Nadauld favorite family summer family vacation spot. Taylor's dad is from Idaho and has a special place in his heart for this beautiful country. It's definitely rubbed off on all his 7 boys and now their wives and kids too. In total we were 37 and next year, will be 40! what a crowd.



The following is a long stream of Pictures -- I'm not sure how to capture the fun we had, but take a look for yourselves~


The kids tubing with Taylor (4 of the 7 girl cousins in one tube opposite Taylor -- the looks on their faces were priceless! They didn't quite trust him.)
The kids had fun with the uncles who took them floating down box canyon, and entertained them by the fire.


Cute pics of Alison and Kelly with their cute kids (in-laws via the twins).

Nadauld Boys = FUN! no matter what was going on, we all got lots of laughs. From Battling on the tubes (I don't have a good picture of that, unfortunately, but the game is for all the brothers to get into the tubes and try to force everyone off -- needless to say they refer to the sport as death tubing), to building bike ramps into the lake, to surfing (and tackling each other while surfing), playing tennis, hanging around the fire telling funny stories, playing dice games late at night, and we can't forget fishing! Those were (to list a few) the big kid activities... some pictures to entertain

Adam going off the ramp ( good thing that bike was a rental eh?)

Taylor Surfing, and Lincoln doing a back flip off the board. Of course the #1 rule of the boat was strictly enforced by the brothers -- (ENTERTAIN EVERYONE ON THE BOAT!)

The nieces and newphews are learning quickly from their dads. Some of their activities consisted of Wake boarding, surfing, tackling each other while surfing, a little death tubing (but not so near death), swimming and boating in the beautiful lake, driving off roading vehicles, hanging out with cousins, and of course catching frogs. A few pictures to show you our fun

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Murphy tackling Nick. And on the right, my boys enjoying the boat!

Max and Jake jumping of the "bike Ramp." Jackson Wake boarding for the first time.


The kids with their frogs, a highlight for jake. Thanks Max for finding 16 of them for all the cousins -- is that considered an infestation?



And to top it off there were four wheelers and mini motorcycles for everyone to ride. The older cousins were nice enough to take the younger ones whenever they asked -- which was often.

Believe it or not, I surfed and wake boarded even though I was pregnant. I don't know if that was the smartest idea, but I figured we need to start the little guy off young learning what his future will hold. :)

The picture on the right is of Jake surfing with Taylor, Luke even did it -- although I wasn't on the boat with my camera that time. If you wonder what Taylor and I will be like in 30 years -- take a look at his parents (this is Taylors hope at least). Grandma loves riding on the boat with the grandkids (and even tubes with the kids) and Grandpa is still one of the boys with his skiing and surfing -- Impressive!

My boys in their element -- water and sun!

I caught this picture while Jake was waiting patiently for his turn -- the only hard part with having so many fun cousins around!

It was my first trip to Yellowstone National park. Taylor was quite appalled since this is basically his favorite place in the world. So, we made a Sunday drive out of visiting the national sites with some "brothers" and their kids.

Waiting for the blast ....

And finally it happened -- it was pretty cool. And that we only had to drive an hour to see it really helped Taylor accomplish this "site-seeing" tour. It was beautiful and pretty neat to see the buffalo, elk, deer, and other smaller wildlife so close to the roads. And now I can finally say I've seen Old Faithful.

The only family photo we got all week You can see we were way to busy to take pictures!