Dave's Birthday

Dave is officially an old man now.  He found a grey nose hair and that proves it (to say nothing of the whole head of grey hair he also has).  We celebrated Dave's birthday on both Friday & Saturday- lucky guy!  Friday night Grandma and Grandpa came over to watch the boys while Dave & I met up with our friends Paul & Jen Gaerte.  Dave & Paul team teach a primary class at church and have become pretty good friends.  Their birthdays are also only a few days apart, so when Jen asked if we wanted to celebrate together, we jumped at the chance!  We went to a new wing place that opened up in Layton.  It was pretty good (I love wings!).  I think my favorite part about it wasn't the food, but the fact that we were there with other adults and we could take our time to eat (which was good because it wasn't a quick meal).  It was the first time in forever that we've actually ordered an appetizer, main course, and dessert so that was kind of treat in and of itself.  After dinner we stopped by this awesome place called Boondocks.  I've been there before, but it has been a long time.  We stopped in to play a round of mini golf and then some arcade games, but they also have bumper boats, laser tag, go carts, a batting cage, bowling, etc.  It's actually a fun little place and not too expensive (unless you have a big family).  It was really a lot of fun, and again, just so nice to not have to chase kids around.  Dave was awesome at mini golf and scored the only hole in 1 of the night.

Then on Saturday we wanted to do something fun as a family for Dave. We decided to go on a drive up one of the canyons near-ish to our house.  We figured we could get out and walk around a little bit as well.  We ended up driving up Big Cottonwood Canyon up to Silver Lake.  It has a board walk around a good portion of the lake so it would be an easy walk for the boys (we weren't planning on doing any hiking, just relaxing). The drive up the canyon was beautiful- I love the rocks and the water, and feeling surrounded by trees.  The boys fell asleep during the drive too, so for a few minutes Dave & I could pretend we were on our own.   We also saw a moose cross the road on our way up.  That was pretty awesome.  And it was nice and cool at the top.  Someday I want to take Guardsman's Pass- you can drive up over the tops of the mountains from Big Cottonwood Canyon into Midway/Park City.  We brought Daddy's presents along with us, so that he could open them whenever we stopped. So yeah, we got up to Silver Lake and stopped to walk around. We saw plenty of ducks and even a few beaver dams and a beaver lodge, but no beavers.

Beaver Dam

Dave opening his presents with the boys

Trees changing colors in the canyon

Walking around the lake. 

And Dave decided that for his birthday, what he wanted wasn't so much a gift for himself, but to get the boys something fun instead.  So we came back down from Silver Lake and went and let the boy's pick out a toy for themselves (hopefully something that Dave & the boys could play with together).  They settled on a dinosaur lego set that the boys came home and wrapped for Dave.  Saturday night we had cake (BTS Cake, if you've never had it, make it) and had friends over.  There were enough kids that they all played together and the adults could sit back and talk.  The "party" ended up going pretty late (by our old people standards) and it was really just the end of a good day.  I hope it was a good one for Dave. :)