We had a good day celebrating and playing!

On our way home from Dinosaur National Monument we stayed the night at Rifle Falls State Park. We were surprised at how amazing this little park was. Right outside of the campground was this triple falls. And all along the cliff are some very cool caves.

You can explore them and find lots of fun areas to climb and play.

Both Cannon and Emerald were amazed and having the best time!

Then you can hike up above the falls and have a wonderful view of the valley.

The last thing we did was to walk behind the falls and enjoy the mist.

We even saw a Marmot on the drive up the Canyon and enjoyed watching people rock climbing.

Rifle falls is only a little over three hours from Denver if you are in the area, it’s definitely worth a visit.

You can camp at Rifle Falls State Park or Rifle Gap State Park. If you aren’t a camper there are hotels in Rifle.

View from Rifle Gap State Campground.

If you have additional time the hike to Rifle Arch is also amazing!

We only had a little time to visit Dinosaur National Monument because we had to beat a snow storm that was approaching the front range. We made the most of the time we had and hope to go back sometime soon to see more!

We arrived near the entrance and enjoyed the many road-side dinosaurs.

The visitors center is very nice as you come in from the Utah Enterance.

Entrance is included if you have a National Parks Pass.

While in the Visitors Center we got our Parks Passports stamped.

We made our way to the Quarry Exhibit, which was AMAZING, I have never seen anything like it.

I think it is similar to the Grand Canyon in that pictures will never do it justice!

The kids really enjoyed seeing the skeletons.

But their favorite part was TOUCHING the dinosaur bones (it’s allowed)

After the Quarry we hiked the Fossil Discovery Trail.

You can find some more fossils in the cliffs and see fantastic views.

I can imagine that it would get very hot here in the summer!

After leaving the quarry we drove down to an area that had petroglyphs.

The art is so interesting and the kids had great time playing in the dirt looking for lizards.

We had hoped to hit some more sites further east on the Colorado side.

But a snow storm was headed for the front range and we didn’t want to tow our trailer in the snow (again) so we headed south for warmer weather and a shorter drive home. I am not too disappointed as now we have a great excuse to come back and explore the other half of the park!

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Have you ever been to Dinosaur National Monument?

Any hidden gem National Monuments or State Parks that are your favorites?

We didn’t realize it until we entered a National Monument, but this week is National Park Week!

There are some special events happening in celebration of Earth Day this week.

We LOVE national Parks, here are some of our favorites:

Yellowstone National Park

Arches National Park

Rocky Mountain National Park

Grand Tetons National Park

Canyonlands National Park

Dinosaur National Monument **Included with our National Parks Pass**

Capital Reef National Park

On our list for later this year:

Source – Saguaro National Park

Source – Joshua Tree National Park

Source – Great Sand Dunes National Park

High on our list to see as soon as we can are Glacier National Park, Yosemite National Park, And Denali

What is your favorite National Park?

I love this girl so so much it hurts at times.

She is a bright shining star and I can’t imagine life without her. Please excuse me while I go cry over baby pictures.

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Three years has gone way too fast!

We are enjoying Emmy being two for the last few days.

We are loving our time together and celebrating our favorite little girl.

We woke up to beautiful views over a small lake. We enjoyed a slower morning the. Drove the Rifle Arch to do a little hike.

The kids still love hiking and Emmy loves to trail run!

after our hike we drove to the Colorado side of Dinosaur National Park.

Then camped for the evening off Harpers Corner Road

More adventures to come!

With a snow storm coming in earlier than expected and other family health issues we came very close to not getting out on this adventure.

We wanted to take Emmy somewhere fun for her third birthday so we hustled to make it happen. We didn’t quite beat the snow storm and the drive was a bit scary.

luckily the views this morning were worth it.

can’t wait to celebrate our girl all weekend!

We are currently riding on the spring weather roller coaster here in Colorado. Last year this was April 16th:

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And this was April 27th

At least that was the last snow of the season last year.

This is our forecast for the next few days, hopefully this will also be our last snow, but it has been known to snow in May.

We are squarely in spring and we had lists for summer  fall and winter bucket list so it seems fitting to fit in a few spring bucket list items before we are in full summer.

• Go on at least 12 family hikes
• Three camping trips
• Visit at least three new to us playgrounds
• Run outside at least once a week
• Set up our humming bird feeder
• Run a virtual half marathon
• Start a garden
• Go to an amusement park
• Set up our butterfly house
• Make welcome to summer baskets
• Eat dinner outside
• Go for a trail run
• Enjoy popsicles outside
• Play in the bounce house or slide
• Go on a search for neighborhood frogs and turtles

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What’s on your spring bucket list?

I can’t wait to see the documentary about Des Linden’s record breaking 50k, for now it was nice to see clips in this news report:

We didn’t get up to too much today, it snowed so we didn’t head out to any playgrounds. Instead we spent our time prepping for our trip this weekend.

We are excited to get away for Emmy’s birthday and celebrate her as much as possible. We are a little concerned about the weather since we have snow this week and we are planning on pulling our trailer through the mountains. But we are hoping for the best and planning on adventure!

Emmy’s hair here is my favorite! Messy hair, bright eyes, ready to take on anything!

Do you have any fun adventures planned?