A month in Utah: week 1

When we lived in MA, I had several friends from Utah who would travel back to Utah for the whole summer with their kids.  I was so jealous of them.  David thought it was ridiculous and pretty much said "dream on" if I even let the thought cross my mind.  So, I was pretty surprised this summer when he suggested that I spend a month in Salt Lake.  I wanted to take a longer trip than my normal week or two.  I thought maybe three.  He said - you might as well just stay a month!  He knew I desperately needed a break from some things in ABQ, and was totally on board with me getting away.  I think he ended up regretting that generosity sometime around week 3, but he was a trooper and made it.  My high school reunion was scheduled for the first weekend of August, so leaving for the 4th of July and stretching it out until then was quite a bit.

So, after our 4th of July weekend in Denver, David drove back to ABQ with his parents and Christine.  I loaded up the kids, dog, and cat into the truck.  The 5 of us drove across Wyoming (my least favorite drive EVER- I hate I-80 in Wyoming!) and headed to Salt Lake.  The kids were BEYOND excited to be making this big long trip and staying with Sean and Kate for a month.  I was looking forward to getting to do all the things we never have time to do and maybe helping my family a bit since I'm never around when people need help.

We tried letting Kitty out during this drive.  She just snuggled up with Shadow.

After a long day of driving with kids and pets, we finally made it!  I know - Melissa just cringes inside when I pull up with a truck load of crap, including furry creatures.  She is such a good sport to host us, no matter what menagerie we bring.

Week 1 turned out to be a lot of helping.  I am glad I was there.  Lots of things went wrong and they kind of needed an extra warm body to man the posts.  The kids didn't care - they just played with their cousins for days on end.  I had all these visions of having tons of time to just sit in Melissa's kitchen while the kids went in and out the back door all day.  It definitely happened.

Barnhisel Beach

Sloan tried so hard to play like a big kid. 

Shadow sure likes Aunt Lissie's yard.

Randy and Grace had lots of fun jamming in the basement.  Those two are kindred spirits for sure.

Mom's birthday was that first week too, so it was super nice to be there for that.  Dad came over that night with a sack full of rocket supplies and helped the kids build their own rockets for a future launch date.  He is such a fun Grandpa.  I love that he spends quality time with the kids when he can.

We did make it to the zoo with this crowd.  I love the pictures of the kids from the back standing at this fence.  It's kind of like a growth chart.  I have so many of Grace (and Hattie too) standing at the fence when they were Sloan's size.  We couldn't get enough of this cool Arctic wolf.

I really can't believe how much we did on this trip.  This is only the first few days.  I think I'll let the weekends have their own posts because they were all huge adventures.