Michael & Amanda and chicklets to call our own: Wampler Family Reunion

This year makes the second annual Wampler family reunion. This year, Michael and I were in charge of reserving the campsite. We tried so hard to get a campsite at Redfish Lake in central Idaho, but the reservations only open 6 months before the day you want to reserve. And you can only reserve online. So I would check every day for an open campsite, just one, and they would always be reserved. I logged on at the exact time that the reservations opened up and they were always gone already. I called and talked to a couple people with the reservation site and that were the camp hosts and they all said the same thing, you had to make reservations online. So the campsites filled up and we were out of luck. Instead, we chose to camp in Island Park. We were right by a river and the campsite we got was a group site, so plenty of parking and plenty of tent spots. It was nice to be by a river so some of the noises around us were drowned out, like kids crying, dogs barking, that kind of thing. And it was really nice to not be that far away from Utah because Brenda is getting married on Saturday and that's the last day of our trip.

We got there on Thursday and set up camp. Chris and Laura were able to come, yay! They live in Albuquerque, NM right now and we weren't sure they were going to make it. Since Heather and Brandon got married last weekend and Brenda and Gavin are getting married this weekend, they decided to come camping. Everybody in the family was able to come and it was really nice. The boys went fishing. We went hiking. We all went to Mesa Falls and saw a moose! And we had a good time just hanging out. It was nice to just chill and not have an agenda for a couple days.

On our way up to the campground we stopped by the fish hatchery in Ashton where Michael has been volunteering. We fed the fish and Ivan loved it. And he didn't fall in this time!

Do you see the giant brown trout in there?!

Ivan loves his camp chair.

Chris making some awesome breakfast burrito stuff.

Ivan is a climber! At least he had Jane to show him how to get down.

These guys were everywhere!

Lots of game playing was had.

Ivan and Ben decided to be best friends.

Ivan even shared his snacks with Ben.

The pretty moose we saw on the way to Mesa Falls.

Mesa Falls

Me, Brenda, and Charlotte. It was really hot that day and I don't think Charlotte liked being stuck in the sling.

There is an Osprey nest just across the ravine from the falls viewpoint. At the visitor's center, they had a spotting scope set up to see the nest. There were 3 birds in the nest when we were looking through the scope. Michael looked through and saw one pooping, and he was super excited. So I looked and saw one poop too! They lean over and shoot the poop like 3 feet out so they keep the nest clean. Who knew?! Apparently we are really fascinated about poop.

The whole camping gang! Except Kirsten and Matthew. Matthew is Michael's cousin and Kirsten is his girlfriend... and hoping to be wife pretty soon!

We went hiking in Harriman. Brenda, Kirsten, Matthew, Ivan, and I had a blast. Laura watched Charlotte while we hiked and Charlotte laughed and laughed at Megan (her cousin).