Topaz Mountain

Saturday morning we woke up early and headed to Topaz Mountain. It is a mountainous area located near Delta, Utah. You can sift in the dry stream beds and find topaz gems. Topaz is generally clear. At times it can be pink or brown. The girls had been looking forward to the trip for a while and were excited to head out. We went with Wes' family and one of his mother's co-workers and boys. After a 3 hour drive (some of it scary I might add) we made it to our treasure hunting spot. It was busier than I had ever seen it before, but still very fun. The only downfall to this area is that there are NO facilities whatsoever. You learn to get close to nature and make do.

Supplies needed: small shovels and screens for sifting the dirt. From there you pick through what is left to see what shiny thing awaits you. Some of the gems are of better quality than others. The sizes we found ranged from an inch to teeny, tiny bits. They aren't super valuable gems, but it is still fun. The last time we went to Topaz Adelle was just over a year old. She loved digging this time on her own and discovering things. Lydia was quite self sufficient as well.
A lot of family members also went hiking.

Devin, Lexi and Jeff camped out overnight and Lexi remarked how cold it had been! The girls are scared to camp out there since they heard a story from their Dad about a scorpion that hung out under his tent once while camping at Topaz. I was more than happy to just make Topaz a day trip :) We didn't see any scorpions, but we did see a lot of lizards which I enjoyed. Lizards are one of my favorite animals. It was fun to see them sunning themselves on all of the different rocks. They were small, little things less than 6 inches long.

Wes' Dad was thinking of taking Devin and Lexi's engagement photo out at Topaz, but that was quickly rejected after a night of camping without any facilities.

After a full day we headed home with our little, Ziploc bags of Topaz. Adelle totally zonked out while eating Cheetos.

It wasn't long before both girls were out. After a restroom stop, and sugar though the girls were wild and hyper the rest of the way home. We had fun telling jokes. Adelle's are especially silly because they don't make much sense. Sometimes it just makes us laugh harder. Here is a classic Adelle joke. "Why did the egg cross the road? It didn't it got chopped into sevenths!" Like I said, they don't make any sense, but they make us laugh. Poor Lydia also got nicknamed "Lydia Chicken Butt" at one point which sent us girls heartily laughing. I think Wes and his Dad thought we were nuts!

We didn't apply sunscreen as well as we had thought. We entirely missed the back of Adelle's legs and they are bright red. Just call us the parents of the year. Wes' legs were quite toasty red as well as his ears and the back of his neck. Because I burn so easily I purchased a LARGE sunhat which I wore the entire time and I slathered myself in sunscreen. One of my socks shifted though and I ended up with a burn on one spot on my ankle. I looked pretty silly at church the next day and I did get a few remarks. Lydia was the only one that didn't burn which is pretty regular for her. She has her father's complexion. After we all got baths it wasn't long before we all headed to bed because our fun day had completely worn us out. Even though we enjoyed Topaz it was good to be home.