Trip to Utah, Part One - Family Vacation!

We took a big trip out to Utah the end of June and it was fabulous! It's always a big deal to do a cross-country trip like this, but the kids were troupers and we had a great time. We had a family reunion out there and decided to head out a few days early so we could see some other people and sites and enjoy a little vacation with our family. It was wonderful!

The trip started out a little rocky. We found some AMAZING deals on airline tickets flying nonstop out of Chicago, and decided it would be worth the $1600 we would save to do it that way, even though Chicago is 5 hours away. So, we drove up on a Friday afternoon, stayed in a hotel, and left early Saturday morning. The flight took off as planned and we were excited to be on our way, when about a half hour into the flight they asked if anyone on the flight was a nurse or a doctor. Hm...something was going on, then about a half hour later they announced we would be making an emergency landing in Omaha. Not great, but we figured we'd be on our way once they got the sick passenger off. Well, it turned out to be a flight attendant, and for some reason another flight attendant went with him, so we couldn't take off again because we were short-handed. They announced that they would be flying in two more flight attendants but they wouldn't get there for FOUR more hours. Boo...so our flight was almost 6 hours late which was a major bummer because we missed out on some of the things we wanted to do on Saturday.  We were very grateful we didn't have any major plans like a wedding or something though! That would have been terrible!

(Thanks to Jeremy's ingenuity we were able to use bungee cords to strap the carseats to our big bags. Two rollers, one hang-up back, four carseats, a stroller, a diaper bag, and four backpacks. Luckily it's summer so our clothes are smaller!)

All set to get on our first flight (early in the AM):

Ready for take-off!



Keeping ourselves occupied at the airport, hehe.

Finally sleeping on the plane...

We had planned to spend a few hours at temple square with some friends, and we were still able to see the friends and spend a little time at Temple Square, but it wasn't quite as long as we were hoping. And the kids were so tired, but they hung in there really well.

On top of the Conference Center - pretty much the only thing we did in Temple Square was stop in the Visitor's Center and then do a brief tour of the Conference Center. At least now the kids can recognize it when we watch General Conference!

At the fountains in City Creek. That place is impressive! Kristin and I with sweet baby Clara. Kristin and David were in our ward when we bought our first house in Sandy. They are such great people. Kristin and I used to go walking together when Eli was a baby and I still miss those walks! She is such an incredibly good person and it was great to see her and pick up right where we left off!

 Connor, Anna, Eli, Isaac, and James. I seriously took 10 pictures and this was the best I got! They were pretty wired.

We didn't get the kids to bed until about 9pm, which was 11pm Eastern time, so they were wiped out. But it was a good way to reset our clocks! Everyone slept until almost 7am, which was better than we hoped.

 We took Grace's pad out of the hotel's portacrib so we wouldn't have to break our backs getting her out. We stuck it in the closet. Cutie pie! Grace was a perfect angel the first half of our trip. She slept great and was so adaptable with everywhere we went. It was definitely a different story once we got to Heber...

 We've done this a few times at Residence Inns now. They always have a sofa with a chaise, so the boys get the sofa bed and Anna gets a makeshift bed on the chaise. The pillows are to stop anyone from falling in the crack, but they make a nice barrier too. :) They were all so excited to be at the hotel. It's been awhile since we've had a family vacation!

Sunday we enjoyed breakfast at the hotel and then went to Saratoga Springs to see my dear friend/old roommate/bridesmaid Paige! Paige and I have known each other since 7th grade and it was great to see her in her beautiful home and meet her cute kiddos. She fed us a delicious lunch and let our kids have a blast in her playroom. They had just returned from a 2-week vacation the night before so she was awesome to let us come!

After lunch, we went to church in Riverton to see Heidi and Sam bless their baby Levi. It was our first time seeing him and I was so excited! He is such a sweet baby. It was nice to be there for the blessing and enjoy church with Heidi and Sam and my parents.

After church, we went to Jeremy's cousin's house! We certainly got around on Sunday. Robert and Melarie live in Draper and it was so great to see them! They also invited two other cousins - Lauren (and Jess) and Ari (and Cameron, Bethany, Naomi, and Wesley). We hadn't seen Lauren and Ari since Ari's wedding over 5 years ago, and therefore had never even met Jess or any of Ari's kids! And it had been 4 years I think since we saw Robert and Melarie. They are all so fun. It was so nice just to chat and relax and see all the kids (2nd cousins) having a great time together. It was like a mini reunion!

 These two are so cute! We have lots of pictures through the years with them. They were born less than 2 weeks apart.

Then on Monday we met up with our dear friends Rachel and BJ! They drove all the way up from St. George with their four kids to spend the day with us and we felt so honored and blessed! The kids were all tired (they drove up late Sunday night) but we made the most of it and had a great day. We went bowling in the morning, had Cafe Rio for lunch (yes!!), and then swam and visited at the hotel that afternoon. It's great to see those guys any time we get the chance! And our kids have such a great time together which is an added bonus. I should say the boys have a great time. The two three year-old diva girls weren't so sure about each other, but I'm sure they'll warm up to each other someday. :)
(Anna had her ears plugged the ENTIRE time at the bowling alley. She really doesn't like loud noises!)

 A dog-pile goodbye.

The next and last day of our super-packed pre-reunion vacation was spent visiting Jeremy's grandmother at a rehabilitation center in Orem and taking the kids to Provo and BYU. It was great to see Tutu and have her meet Grace. The kids got to help her do some of her exercises and we even ran into two more of Jeremy's cousins while we were there. We're glad to see Jeremy's grandma doing better after a bad bout with pneumonia. Hopefully she'll come out stronger than ever!


Crusin' down to Provo in our sweet rental van!

After visiting Tutu, we went down to Provo and enjoyed a walk down memory lane. We drove to the old Provo Tabernacle which is now the beautiful Provo City Center Temple. It is so gorgeous! Especially with the backdrop of the mountains.

 Anna kept holding up three fingers to show her age in every picture...right in front of her face.

 Pretty flowers!

 Then we drove around campus a bit and stopped and showed the kids the enormous library (they were impressed), the HFAC, the Wilkinson center, and the BYU Creamery. We ate lunch in the Cougareat and got some more BYU paraphernalia at the Bookstore, and of course ended the day with Creamery ice cream. It was great!

 Above - Connor and Anna wanted to walk up to the fifth floor in the HFAC.

 Oh the memories!

 Future Cougars!!

  After that we headed up to Heber for the Astle Family Reunion! More to come later!