Hello Utah: Part 1 of Day 1

We arrived in  Salt Lake on Sunday evening.
What was the excitement for Aeva?
Finding a Book of Mormon in the drawer.
Where else but in Utah, huh?
She thought that was the coolest thing.

Here we are snacking on Chupa Chups, the hotel's lollipop of choice.

Monday morning we were up bright and early so that Chris and Rhaevyn could go do baptisms at the Salt Lake City Temple. It was truly one of the highlights of the trip for them.

 What do you go to Temple Square for? To find rolly-pollies of course.

 While Rhaevyn and Chris were at the temple, the rest of the kids and I went up the elevator to the look out at the Church Office Building. I think we were all in agreement that it's a pretty awesome elevator ride. The view was gorgeous from up there. Then we walked the grounds, dipped our fingers in the fountains, saw a mother duck sitting on her eggs, and walked around the temple.

The Reflection Pool.

I love watching the kids touch the temple.

Chris and Rhaevyn found us at this fountain and we thought we'd go listen to the organ concert over at the Tabernacle, but we were all so famished that we decided to go have lunch back at the hotel instead. It think the neatest thing for me about being at temple square, the office building included, was the spirit you could feel. I don't why that surprised me so much, but I loved it!

 Up next: Pioneer Heritage State Park and This is the Place Monument.

Road Trip: First Destination--Idaho

So, we decided to take a road trip to Utah.  
This is Elsa getting lots of air. When the little ones start getting antsy, Chris rolls down the front windows and even opens the back ones.
It's great to hear everyone laugh and squeal as the wind hits their faces and hair. Then he rolls up the windows and they all yell "again, again!!"

So, we drove for about seven hours and stopped in for a quick visit and some hugs from Auntie Leslie and Uncle Matt. Then we headed over to Grandpa and Grandma Lindsay's house.

Saturday the big boys headed out to the drags.
The rest of us got some food for dinner, had lunch, went to Savers to spend the $10 grandpa had given the kids, and went to the park.

The kids had such a great time with Sam.
Rhaevyn loved getting to laugh and play chess with him. And boy was he a big help at Savers. He volunteered to push Elsa around in her stroller, and she was quite content.


Myles is listening to Uncle Matt reenact a scene form Star Wars with the Legos.


The kids found some great stuff at Savers. Myles got a huge bag of Army guys and a Carmen Sandiego Game. Elsa got a bag of Oneida silverware that is just for small hands and has cute bunnies on the ends. Aeva bought a wooden model of the USS Constitution. I found myself a book by Lucy M. Montgomery. I've already finished it. It had the cutest short stories in it.
Anyway, here is Aeva and Chris putting the ship together.

Rhaevyn and I got to hold Baby Emma. What a doll she is. So precious. You always forget how small they start out. Thanks Sarah for letting me getting my fill of baby goodness :) She was simply delicious!

  

Sunday was Mother's Day. Christopher's dad got me a beautiful corsage. 

I'm drying it so I can save it. We went to sacrament meeting in the morning. Then Mom and Dad Lindsay made us lunch for the road. They packed it all up in an ice cooler of theirs that they let us borrow for the next leg of our journey to Utah. It was so nice to not have to worry about lunch. We had fun eating on the road.

Before leaving for Utah we stopped at John and Shanda's house for Baby Emma's baby blessing.  We are so glad that we got to be there for that.

Okay, so hopefully over the next week I'll be posting pictures of our trip to Utah. Stay tuned.

My Birthday

I got up and started my day. I let the kids sleep in a bit, but they made me hop back in bed so that they could make me breakfast, which consisted of oatmeal with freeze dried strawberries mixed in, two slices of bacon and some water to drink.
Myles gave me a shoulder massage while I ate my breakfast.
My birthday couldn't have gotten off to a better start with four precious blessings surrounding me on my bed wishing me a happy birthday.

 The day after my birthday, as we were frantically looking for my van keys to take Rhaevyn to her violin lessons, my RS secretary dropped by with some beautiful flowers and a slice of chocolate cake. It was perfect timing. I pretty much drowned my frustration by eating 1/4 of the chocolate cake. After a prayer offered by one of the kids we did find the keys. They were in Elsa's car seat locked inside the van. All turned out well. The AAA guy came and unlocked the car, and we at least made it to Aeva's piano lesson.  Rhaevyn's sweet teacher rescheduled us for the next day. .Happy day, oh happy day :)

 

 

Check!

This week has been a whirlwind trying to get the house cleaned and everyone packed for the trip.
It was so funny yesterday I heard Myles say that he was going to just go over what he'd put in his backpack. I couldn't help but giggle as he rummaged through it.............
pants: Check!
socks: Check!
swimsuit: Check!
Underwear: Check!

No need to worry about his packing job.
We are all super excited, and I can't believe that most of us are still asleep. Normally we have a hard time sleeping before a big trip.
Well, Idaho and Utah..............here we come!!!