Ethan's Bench

We had a very fun morning.
 Back in April, a scout in our stake, Sam Bodrero, asked if he could dedicate the bench he was putting in on the Siphon Draw Trail in the Superstitions to Ethan.  I was more than happy to have him do that.  They called for his birth and death date and sent us pictures of the final project.  It was such a cool tribute to Ethan. He loved hiking!  After we moved back from Yuma we took so many hikes by the Superstitions, but never on the Siphon Draw Trail.  (I'll add some of Ethan hiking at the end.)
It was interesting that this trail is the exact trail Parker and Marcus hiked with our cousins the week of Ethan's funeral.  I had never been on this trail before, but they had.
I need to take a moment and thank Tiffany AGAIN for her help with Brady! She helps us a lot :)  I didn't want to pack an extra 17 pounds of Brady on my back for the hike.  Not only have I not hiked for over a year, I haven't done any kind of excercise.  I am totally out of shape.

 Here are Parker and Madilyn on our way up.  We really had no idea where his bench was so we just kept going.  We would like to have done the whole trail but it proved to be a bit more of a hike to the bench then we thought.

I try not to have any pictures of myself taken, but this one happened.  Yes, I look about 300 lbs, but that's what I look like as a nursing mom (always fun for me).

I think they wanted a picture from every rock.

Marcus tries to avoid pictures as well, but I did manage to get this one.  Right before this we had run into a church group hiking the trail and asked if they knew if there were any more benches ahead.  We were getting tired and it seemed like they wouldn't have benches any further up??  They were not sure.  However, we did tell them about Ethan and told them to let us know if they came across his bench.  Sure enough a few minutes later, they yelled down to us they had found the bench!

When you are sitting on Ethan's bench, the above picture is the view.  It was about 10 am, but the shadow from Superstition Mountain makes it look dark around us.

In this picture you can see the view behind the bench where the trail continues.  It was gorgeous.

Here is the family waiting for someone to hike by us to get a picture of all of us.

We stopped some hikers and took a couple of pictures with us all.

We LOVE where Ethan's bench is!  It's not at the trailhead with all the others.  Its not the easiest hike and the view is awesome.  We're excited to hike it each year.  Hopefully our shapes improves as we do it.

Madilyn fell.  And the good mother that I am thought to take a picture first!  She's a tough cookie and didn't mind my lack of help.

Parker posing. 

Madilyn fell again.

And again.  She begged that I not take this one, but I did.

Then Parker fell trying to run from his dad.  I was on hand to take a photo.  I'm the shadowy figure that doesn't look like quite 300 lbs as a shadow.

Lastly, I fell.  Now, the screen on my camera doesn't work.  I have the worst luck with cameras.  I am trying so hard to take pictures especially after losing Ethan.  This is just a point and shoot but we just bought it two weeks ago because I lost the one with all of the Brady's birthday photos!  I am not sure what I am supposed to learn about not being able to take pictures.

Here are a few pictures from our hiking trips with Ethan: