Braydan's Baring Birthday

All Braydan wanted for his birthday this year was for me to climb Mt.Baring with him. I thought for sure I could get out of it. Surely Alisha wouldn't be able to babysit all day Saturday (she could). When it poured rain Friday, I thought there's no way we'll go now.

We went.

So . . . go I went with a happy attitude. That was part of the present, to have a happy attitude. I think on the way down I might have forgot about that part. . .. 

Anyway the hike started off great. The sun was just coming up and we were on a trail merrily crunching through leaves (for about 10 min.) when Wes said we need to turn at the creek up ahead. We get to the creek and I look around for a trail and there's nothing but straight up. I think he must be confused, but no, up we go into the trees. Apparently, if there's flags every hour, we're on a "trail."

I love this picture because it shows how steep it is behind Amber! 

We climb and climb straight up for a few hours and get to the ridge where I learn that we're not even half way. What!? I'm already filthy dirty from grabbing tree roots and mud, and anything I can to pull myself up and we're just getting started.

After a nice little jaunt on the ridge, we get to some snow.

See my happy face?

Then lots of snow. Then lots of snow on huge boulders. Scary. The whole time Wes and Braydan encouraged us on, "you guys are doing so awesome! Isn't this fun? This is the best present ever!  It's just over the next ridge, or we're almost there!"

I wanted to yell at them! "No this is not fun! And I'm not doing awesome! I hate this!" But, I didn't say that :)

I was so glad I had my snow pants and gloves. I thought it was strange when Braydan packed them in my bag, but he knew what was coming. It was hard climbing up, but what was even harder was thinking, "how in heck am I going to get back down this?" Braydan kept telling me, "just don't' worry about that yet."

Wes on the summit

We made it to the summit, 4,000 vertical feet later. I literally crawled backwards to summit. The rock on top was not very wide, so I never even stood up on it. I was too scared.

I loved going back down the first part in the snow cause I could slide a lot.  It was actually fun. 

But once we got back in the trees, it was scary steep. I cried and prayed off and on the whole way down. I wanted to give up, but after sitting for a few minutes, I would remind myself that I had to keep going cause they weren't going to carry me out.  I slid a majority of the way down on my bum!  My nice pants were black by the end of the trip. I was covered in mud!

This picture is after we got back to the bottom and out of the trees.  I could not believe I just climbed that mountain.  It was crazy looking back up at it.  If they would've pointed to it in the beginning, I would've never believed them that we could do it.

 I've never done anything that hard and don't know if I will again, but I was glad Braydan had a fun day and got his crazy present. Thank you Dyers for going with us, especially for blazing a path in the snow and putting up with me!

Halloween

On Sunday night we carved our pumpkins with the Kimballs.

Kaleb wore his pink headband he made in his sunbeam class the whole night. That's another story altogether.

His caterpillar kept him company during the carving.

I have a bag full of costumes I've collected and the kids picked different ones all week. This is what they settled on for trick-or-treating. It was chilly so I had to force Eliza to put on a layer with her dress.

The kids had twice the endurance as last year.

We met up with the Adams and raced around the neighborhood.