Utah Trip: Part Three

Okay, I promise this is the last post about our Utah trip. We just had too much fun to make it fit into only two posts (meaning I took too many pictures). I think after this post I'll finally have it out of my system and maybe I'll be able to do regular posts again. We'll see.

On Sunday after we dropped Daniel off at the airport we drove out to his sister Gretchen's house in Layton. The rest of Daniel's family came up too, so we had a big family dinner, followed by a fun walk to the park. We spent the night there, and then the next day we went to a different park, played around, ate pizza for lunch, fed the ducks, and then went swimming at the Layton Surf 'n Swim.

My kids had so much fun with their cousins Adalynn and Beck (Gretchen's kids). It made me sad we don't get to seem them all the time like we used to. Rachel was especially in awe of Addy. After we got home, I asked her if she had a good time playing with her. She replied, "No, Mom - I didn't have a good time with Adalynn - I wish I was Adalynn."

Monday evening we drove down to Orem to stay with my parents for a week (they were back in town after being in England for the first part of our trip). My kids spent most of their time playing out in the yard, and had so much fun. They also loved hanging out with my little brothers David and Vic. Tristan pointed out to me that David (who is 12) is closer to Tristan's age than he is to mine, and he told me he wished David was his brother instead of his uncle. I think he really was hoping we could arrange a way for David to come live with us. The boys also spent a lot of time reading - they could not believe all of the books at Grandma's house. Other fun things we did: hanging out with my sister Bekah and her daughter Mariah, game night with my sisters and their husbands, lunch at the mall with Grandma Nini and Gretchen, and the Bean Museum in Provo. We went with Gretchen and her kids, my cousin and her two boys, and one of my friends from high school and her three boys. Every city needs a Bean Museum - I love that place. After we were done with the museum we walked down to the BYU Creamery and had lunch and ice-cream.

It was so fun to see my family and spend time with them. The week went by much too fast. I was a little nervous for the flights home with just me and the kids, but everything went perfectly. We left early Sunday morning (my dad drove us up to the airport). We got through security fine (the only hassle was putting on everyone's shoes after) and then had to wait awhile before our flight. Luckily everyone was in a good mood and excited about flying again. The boys just sat and read the whole time we waited, and apparently looked well-behaved - when we all got on the airplane, I sat in one row with the girls and had the boys sit in the row in front of me, and a lady came and asked if she could sit next to the boys. I said sure, but warned her that I wasn't sure how it would go, and she said, "Oh, I was watching them in the airport, and knew I wanted to sit by them because of how good they were." I'm not sure if it was true or not, but it sure made me feel good. I wish I knew who she was - she was so nice to them. They all just chatted away the whole flight. I could hear bits and pieces of their conversation, and I could tell things were going to be just fine when about 10 minutes into the flight she was already asking Tristan math problems.

We landed in Denver and had a two-hour layover, which could have been problematic, but ended up going just great. We walked around and explored the airport for awhile, riding every escalator in sight to waste time. Then we got some lunch and sat down in the food court to eat. Tristan got a Happy Meal at McDonalds, and they were kind enough to give us 4 toys with his meal so that all the kids got one, which was nice because they spent the rest of the layover playing around with their little toys.

The flight to Austin was a little longer, but Lizzy put her head down on my lap and fell asleep right as we took off, so that helped things a lot. Another nice lady sat by the boys and helped them out whenever they needed it, and before we knew it we were landing in Austin. Everyone was so excited to see Daniel again, and as much fun as we had in Utah, it did feel good to be home again.