Mama's don't let your babies grow up to be Cowboys

Grand Tetons from Colter Bay in Grand Teton National Park

Right now it is Thursday morning, July 17, and we are in the Grand Teton National Park. We are about 30 miles from both Jackson Hole and Yellowstone, and the whole area is just breathtaking. On the drive up from Lander, we kept seeing huge mountains and wondering if those were the Tetons. Well, once you REALLY see them, you know. It’s just beautiful. Our campground however, is not so beautiful. It’s good from a location standpoint, and it is has very pretty views, but there is nothing for the kids here but one super old swing set. I have learned along the way that there are things I need at the campgrounds, and a good playground ranks right up there at the top of the list! But what makes this the worst campground we have been to yet are the mosquitos. It is straight up attack of the flies starting at 4pm every day. You literally cannot go outside. Even if you have bug spray on. And if you need anything from outside, well you better shut that door as fast as humanly possible because those suckers are quick and small. It’s actually shocking how much blood they have in them when you kill one because they are such small mosquitos. Clearly they have all been having a good feast around this campground. Maybe all kids are like this, but my kids have bad reactions to mosquito bites. Especially Macy. I remember when she got her very first bite. It was a few days before I was going to have Luke and the night before I went into the hospital, I noticed that the bite looked really bad. Cam (our forever nanny and family BFF) took her to the pediatrician the next morning and it was infected and she had to take antibiotics. This ended up happening with the next several bites she got, so I am a bit of a freak about them getting bitten. You know what can make me an even BIGGER freak about them getting bitten? The fact that the lady at the campground told me that this area has the highest incidence rate of West Nile Virus in the country. Yes, the whole country. (I really hope my mom doesn’t read this entry.) So needless to say we are covered in OFF, long sleeves and pants and basically try to stay inside after 4.

Yesterday was our first full day here and we took the kids on a beautiful hike in the Colter Bay area. Again, supposed to be 1 mile. Again, it took 2 hours. But the views were totally worth it and the kids had a great time throwing rocks and collecting sticks (which immediately turn into swords or guns) and we didn’t have to really carry anyone until the end. All in all it was  a great hike. Shawn and I are itching to go on a nice long one and of course my in-laws offered to watch the kids so we could so we are hoping we can get out to one today!

I do need to find bear spray. Stat. I was online yesterday morning looking up hiking trails on the national park website and there was a huge orange alert banner thing scrolling across the top. I clicked on it and it said ‘There are an unusual amount of grizzly bears’ roaming around right now and all of these tips on being “bear aware”. Most of it involves food and just not exposing your food in any way. I let the kids have some fruit snacks in their pocket on the hike yesterday and then regretted that decision the entire two hours because apparently they can even smell your water bottles. So from here on out, we will all just starve on our hikes. I can’t take the bear stress.

Yesterday evening we took the kids into Jackson Hole. What an awesome, adorable little town! I get what all the hype is about. I could spend 3 days just walking around that place. We arrived just in time for the kids to watch the ‘Shootout’ that is performed every night in the town square. Luke was definitely in his element (of course dressed in his cowboy gear) and gave me the entire play by play once they all met me at the restaurant where I was holding our table. After dinner, we headed over to the Rodeo, which occurs every Wednesday and Saturday evening during the summer. I have never been to a rodeo before and found myself having mixed emotions over the whole thing. I just felt bad for the animals. And I am not really even an animal person. (Shawn grew up in Oklahoma so his perspective is a little different than mine.) But the kids enjoyed it and at ‘halftime’, or whatever that would be called, any kids 12 and under could go out onto the field (again, whatever that’s called) for some fun. I had no idea what was going to happen, but nevertheless Luke and Macy wanted to go so Papaw and I went down there with them. There were probably 100+ kids and they had those 6 and under line up in the front and the older kids behind them. I asked a few people what was going to happen and since most were here on vacation and had never been themselves, they didn’t know either. I finally heard someone say that three sheep were going to come out with ribbons on them and the kids needed to chase them and try to grab the ribbons off. Aside from the fact that I felt terrible for these poor sheep who were about to have the living daylights scared out of them by this mob of children, I was also a little worried about Lukey getting trampled like a bad wal-mart black Friday. I had already calmed Macy’s nerves because she was worried they were going to attack her (why not? That’s what she had been watching all night) They yelled ‘Go’ and off they went. Sure enough about 20 seconds in, Luke falls down, but thankfully there was a dad out there following his boys and he grabbed him immediately and picked him up. I was on his heels after that. I don’t think I ever even saw the sheep. It was something neat to cross off the list but it’s not something I would rush back to!

We are here for two more nights (unless the bugs drive us out a day early) and look forward to exploring more. We haven’t seen a ton of wildlife yet so I plan to look up some good evening drives (yep, in the CAR) so we can try to get some good sightings. We did see some bison off in the distance last night and they looked massive from far away, so it would be cool to see them up close! Speaking of cool, the weather is amazing here. It is chilly in the mornings, in the 40’s, and gets to about 75 in the afternoons with no humidity. I heard Richmond is quite literally a hot mess lately, so I am going to thoroughly enjoy this while I can!

P.S. I just got 17 gray hairs waiting for all of this to upload. You won't be hearing from me until the next campground - that I pray has better internet!

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