Utah 2014

We started off our summer of fun by heading to Utah to see my family for a couple of weeks. We had a great time, as always, visiting friends and family. It's so nice to have a few extra hands to play with the kids!

If you want to be the most popular kids at the Portland Airport, make sure to get some Voodoo Doughnuts to share with your out-of-state friends and family.

The first day we were in Utah we met my sister-in-law and her kids at Kangaroo Zoo, a place with tons of blow-up slides and bounce houses. My kids adore places like this :) True to form, Lily is drawn to the tallest slides and insists on going up the stairs and down the slide all by herself. She is pretty adventurous! Tommy is always coming up with new tricks to do as he goes up and down the slides, too.

Lily and Jet going down a small slide together.

Tommy running a bit of interference for Lily so she can get up the stairs without being knocked down by bigger kids. He's a bit showy about it :)

One of the highlights of our trip was the sleepover we did with my brother's kids, Jarom and Makayla. We played at Jungle Jim's Playland for a couple of hours. The girls enjoyed doing the rides. I was actually shocked that Lily LOVED the roller coaster. She didn't look like she was having very much fun while she was on it, but when she got off she begged to go on the "go faster" again. She is an adventurous little girl who always wants to go faster and higher. The boys were less adrenaline junkies and preferred to play games and earn tickets. At the end they had hundreds of tickets, enough to buy two air guitars and some candy for the girls. After our adventure at Jungle Jim's we went to a horrible all-you-can-eat pizza buffet that the kids loved. They mostly ate the dessert pizzas, which are my favorite, too :)
We had a sleepover and watched the Lego Movie. I think the kids were up until past 10:00, but all four of them eventually settled down and slept through the night (miracle!). Did I mention that it snowed the first day we arrived in Utah? In June? It was pretty amazing.

The next morning we got up and decided to hike Donut Falls. Since we don't have many real mountains close to Portland I really love to take advantage of how accessible the mountains are when we visit Salt Lake. A short drive gets you into the heart of the Rockies with opportunities to do easy hikes, harder backpack trips, and everything in between. Donut Falls is a pretty easy hike until you get to the very end. The trail then disappears in favor of large boulders that require all fours to get across.

Here we are at the trailhead. We ate doughnuts and chocolate milk before starting out on our hike. Notice that snow in the back left of the picture. We saw plenty of it - in June!

All four kids running up the trail. I love that my kids love their cousins so much!

We decided that we wanted to cross the river to get a better view of the Falls. I carried Lily while the three older kids navigated their way across rocks and fallen trees to get to the other side. As I watched them problem-solve and make decisions about where and how they would proceed I wanted to cheer. These kids are warriors. They can do hard things. (And don't worry, we crossed at a very shallow and calm place in the river. I kept telling the kids that the worst that could happen would be some wet feet.)

This is about the moment my heart swelled with pride for these kids fearlessly crossing the river.

The kids threw rocks into the river for awhile and then we decided to head back down. On the way back across the river we opted to just step in and walk across rather than navigate over the rocks and trees again. That water was freezing cold! It's all runoff from snow, which made our feet go numb within a few seconds. Again, the kids were warriors and walked across the river holding hands without any complaint. It was a proud moment for me and definitely a highlight of the trip.

At the top and across the river!

On Friday we met a bunch of my friends from high school at a fun park. We got to chat while the kids played. One of my friends brought ice-cold Kool-Aid in a pitcher, which Tommy loved. He kept asking me on the way home, "Mom, do you know how to make that drink? Do you think we could make that drink sometimes?" Love it.

That evening Sadie came to my mom's house and the kids played in the giant sandbox with their cousin, Jet. My mom keeps it stocked with soft sand and fun toys. The kids can play in there for hours.

This sandbox is seriously as big as our apartment in Portland!

Ben flew in on Saturday night after enjoying a full week of bachelorhood at home. On Sunday his sister, Steph, came to my mom's house to play with the kids for a few minutes. We love those guys.

On Monday the family got together at the park to celebrate Tommy's birthday from earlier in June. Everyone spoiled him rotten with Legos and airplanes, pizza and doughnuts, and quality cousin playtime.

Makayla, Tommy, and Jarom at the park.

The Three Amigos.

On Tuesday we took the kids to hike Ensign Peak. It was very hot and dry, but we still had a really fun time. Luckily the hike is short and the view from the top is amazing, so it was worth it. My mom also took Lily and me to get a pedicure. It was Lily's first, and she LOVED it. For days afterward she admired her toes and said, "I have sparkly toes!"

Beautiful, beautiful Salt Lake City.

Our last night in Salt Lake my mom watched the kids while Ben and I went to the temple. We all went for ice cream afterward. Lily loves ice cream more than anything in life and exclaimed, "We go for icey!" all the way there.

Tommy and Grammy are pretty fond of icey as well.

We love you guys and can't wait to see you again!

Christmas 2012

This Christmas was a first for us: we spent it with extended family! Usually we stay at home in cozy Arizona, buy a pizza, and hang out in our pj's for Christmas. But this year we decided to trek up to the snowy land of Utah to be with family.

We went to the Mesa Temple and saw the lights on Thursday night (the 20th), thinking this would be a great way to kick-off our little vacation. We were supposed to leave early Friday morning. However, Lily had other plans. She would not go to sleep Thursday night no matter what we tried. She's usually a great sleeper, so this was very strange. By about 3:00 am all of us (including Tommy) were still up, so I took Lily downstairs to see if she was hungry. By the way she downed the slices of cheese and Cheerios I offered her I guessed this was the problem all along. Once she got some food in her belly she slept great the remaining hours of the night. Turns out she was starving, poor girl.

Since we got almost no sleep that night we felt very uncomfortable about driving all day Friday. We decided to delay our trip a few hours and stay over in Las Vegas rather than make the entire trip in one day. We had a slow morning, took naps, exercised, and started off for Vegas around 1:00 pm. We stayed in a hotel just off the strip for $20 that night! Now, it wasn't a great room, but it suited us just fine for one night. Except that Ben and I didn't get any sleep again because we each had a child in bed with us. And those children like to move around and squish us at night. And Lily may or may not have fallen out the bed once during the night. Needless to say when Saturday morning rolled around Ben and I were exhausted. We slathered on some peppermint oil to wake us up and headed out for Salt Lake around 6:30 am.

We were blessed with a very good drive in spite of our exhaustion. The roads were clear and Lily only had one poop-plosion, so that was good. It was remarkably fun to arrive at my mom's house about 5 hours before she was expecting us.

On Sunday we celebrated Lily's first birthday. Cute girl demolished her cake and probably could have eaten another whole one. See the previous blog post for the best birthday cake video out there.

It started to snow the morning of Christmas Eve. It was a perfect white Christmas. We ran a few errands that morning, cleaned up the house, and shoveled a whole lotta snow together. Tommy had a BLAST in the snow! He wanted to go out and play in it every day we were there. Thanks to Grandma Chatterton for buying the kids their snow gear. They both looked adorable all bundled up, and they stayed really warm, too. Lily couldn't quite sit up straight or crawl in her snow gear, but that's probably best for everyone:)

Tommy really wanted to build a snowman, but the snow was so powdery he had to settle for a snow fort instead. He loved making and throwing snowballs!

Christmas morning was beautiful and SO fun! Everyone was so kind and generous to our family this year. We are so grateful to the many angels who made this Christmas so special. A big thanks to Shawna for those adorable pj's the kids are wearing! Lily was starving on Christmas morning (as usual) so we opened up the treats she got in her stocking so she could munch on them while Tommy opened his presents. The rest of the day was spent hanging out, playing with presents, and visiting with family. We were so lucky to get to see all of my brothers with their families this time around. Plus, we even got to see Aunt Steph and Uncle John later in the week (I can't believe I didn't get a picture!).

Don't Tommy and Uncle Carson look so much alike? Two good-lookin' guys! The kids loved playing with their cousins while we were in Utah. Tommy absolutely idolizes his six-year-old cousin, Jarom. He'll do everything just the way Jarom does it. He loves playing Angry Birds on Grammy's iPad with Jarom. He also loves watching "Curious George" with Makayla and running around playing pretend games with both of them. Lily loved playing with Jet this time around. They can both crawl and pull themselves up on furniture, so that was cute to watch them interact. Baby C.J. (again, I can't believe I didn't get a picture of all the cousins together!) was only about two months old at Christmas, but Tommy talks about him all the time. He always says, "Lily is bigger than C.J." Yes, yes he is, Tommy.

We love you all and hope you had a great Christmas!

Utah Trip Part Two

I got to see my dad a couple of times while we were in town.  We went to the park and got ice cream one night and then a few days later we went to McDonald's and ate lunch.  I was glad he made time to come see Tommy and me.

We decided to go swimming on Sadie's birthday.  I am so glad we did because it turned out to be Tommy's favorite activity of the whole week.  I was so glad that Ricky and Sadie came with us because they suggested we go to the Dimple Dell Rec Center in Sandy, which I didn't even know existed.  They have an indoor pool there with a huge play area for the kids.  It was like a splash pad, a playground, and a swimming pool all wrapped into one.  Ricky and Sadie were so cute to play with Tommy and to let him splash them.  I was impressed with how brave Tommy got by the end.  There was a little water slide that had quite a heavy waterfall at the top of it.  Tommy doesn't typically like getting water on his head, so I was surprised when he wanted to go under the waterfall and down the slide.  I went down with him the first few times and then he got really brave and went down by himself.  Because it was so slick it really shot us down quick, but he loved it.  In the video below, that's me screaming, not Tommy:)  He talked about going swimming with Ricky and Sadie the rest of the week.

Over the weekend Ben was kind enough to accompany me to my ten year high school reunion.  Can you believe it has been that long?  I'm getting old:)  In some ways high school seems like way more than ten years ago, in other ways it seems like just yesterday that I was playing volleyball and going to Prom.  I was a little bit nervous about going because I wasn't sure exactly who would be there and whether or not it would be awkward with certain people.  I don't have any regrets from high school really.  I feel like I was kind to people and there was nobody that I was dreading to see, I was just worried it might be kind of awkward.  My fears were quickly set aside, though.  It was just a ton of fun!  Almost everyone seemed about how I remembered them and there weren't any huge surprises about the direction any of my friends lives' had taken.  It was so fun to see old friends and to reminisce a little, but to also catch up and meet their spouses.  I loved the evening and I am so happy I was able to be there.  On the way home I felt so grateful to have been good friends with such great people that had such a positive influence on my life.

The best part of the reunion was that it drew my closest friends back to Utah for the weekend.  There was a group of five of us that used to go to the dances together and go on trips together every summer.  They were the girls I cried to when I was sad and laughed with when embarrassing things happened.  They were the girls that I had slumber parties with and that I cut class with.  They were there for me through my parents' divorce, through all my failed relationships during and after high school, and on my wedding day.  In recent months they were among the ones that cried with me when I had a miscarriage and celebrated with me when I got pregnant again.  We still stay in touch, but all five of us haven't been together for about three years.  I think we all look hotter now than we did ten years ago:

Me, Toni, Andrea, Jenny, and Celeste.  FGGO forever!

Tommy loved having my mom's and Ricky's dogs around to play with.  He was especially sweet with Sammy because she is old and sweet to him.  He loved getting right up in her face and talking to her in a really high little voice.  He called her, "Sammy Sam" and gave her hugs whenever he bumped her or accidentally hit her with a ball.  To this day he calls all dogs either Sam or Kodex.

Here is a video of Tommy being silly with my mom. What is it with boys and poop?

The last Sunday we were in Utah I went to take a nap and threatened the life of anybody who woke me up. Yes, I was that tired. It had been a big week and I was pregnant! After I woke up from what I think was nearly a four hour nap (haven't had one of those since before I was married!) Tommy and I snuggled up on the couch and read books together. It's one of my favorite things in the world to do.
We had such a great time in Utah. We got to see so many good friends and loving family. We also got to see quite a bit of rain, which was so fun for us desert rats:)

Utah Trip July 2011 - Part One

This year we went to Utah for the Fourth of July and had a blast.  It was so nice to get out of the Phoenix sun and to enjoy time with my family.  We did so many fun things while we were there.  My only regret is not being able to spend even more time with friends and family we love.

We rented a car this time to drive up.  There were two reasons for this.  One, our car has a history of breaking down on road trips and we really didn't want to get stuck in the desert.  Two, my mom graciously offered to let us take her van back to Phoenix so we could haul a twin mattress down here for Tommy.  It was so fun to drive a nice little car and to know that we didn't have to clean it at the end of the day:)  The drive went well.  Tommy was a real trooper and even went potty in the public restrooms on the way.  We played lots of games and kept Tommy happy by having one of us sit in the back with him most of the way.

We had a really fun Fourth this year.  It started at about 6:00 am when Ben and I drove down to Provo so I could run a 10 K at BYU.  We were a little bit late and ended up walking up 900 East just as the race started.  We could see all the runners coming from Kiwanis Park onto 900 East running away from us.  I started to cry because we had driven all that way and then I missed the start.  We kept walking up the road, though, and Ben encouraged me to go ahead and run the race anyway.  I started about 10 minutes after the official start and I couldn't see any other runners ahead of me.  I was kind of embarrassed to be so far back and to be running slow anyway because I was 14 weeks pregnant, but I went ahead and finished the race.  I ran completely by myself for about two miles before I started passing some of the slower joggers and walkers.  It was fun once I started, though, and the race volunteers were so nice they even stopped traffic just for little old me.  It felt great to be able to run outside with the backdrop of the mountains to the east.  It was beautiful and I loved every minute of it.

Later that evening we went to my brother, Wes', house for dinner and to watch fireworks.  They live right by Thanksgiving Point, so there is always a good firework show to see.  This year aerial fireworks were legal in Utah.  It was quite the party.  Many families were having parties in Wes' neighborhood and so the sky was lit up from every direction.  The kids (and adults) loved it.  Tommy was kind of shell shocked and talked about the loud fireworks and the pops the entire drive back to my mom's house.  We had a great time and were grateful to get to spend the evening with my entire family.  Below is a video of the grandkids throwing Pops with Grammy and one of the kids playing football together.

The next morning we went shopping at the mall with my mom.  She bought Tommy some new pajamas with cars on them, took him for a train ride, and bought him a cookie.  He was a happy camper.

The next day we went to Wheeler Farm with Jamie and the kids.  I really wish we had something like that here in Phoenix.  It's free to walk around and look at the animals.  The kids loved it.  We got to see cows, chickens, horses, goats, rabbits, and ducks.  Tommy's favorite thing was sitting on the tractors.  He could have done that all day long.  Maybe I need to buy an old tractor for the backyard that he can sit on and pretend to drive:)

Tommy driving a tractor.

The kids looking at cows.

Feeding the ducks with Grammy.

Our next activity was going to the mountains to eat doughnuts and play.  I remember as a kid that we used to go to a picnic area and eat those cheap Hostess powdered sugar doughnuts and drink chocolate milk.  That's just what we did in the mountains and I wanted to do it with Tommy.  We all packed down several doughnuts and then we went exploring.  Salt Lake has had a really wet winter and spring so the river was higher and faster than I have ever seen it before.  There were sand bags all along the path.  In the video below of Ricky and Tommy throwing sticks in the river you can see some trees on the left that aren't usually in the middle of the river.  It was crazy and a little scary to watch the kids right along the rushing river, but we had a great time.  We found a cave that Ricky and Sadie explored, we climbed on rocks, and we threw sticks into the river.  Thanks to Ricky and Sadie for gathering sticks and branches for the kids:)  They could have stayed there all day long!

 

Miraculously we got a picture of all three kids smiling at the same time.  The secret?  Just say "poop" and they all start laughing.

Jamie, Makayla, Ricky, Sadie, Tommy, Me, and Jarom.
 
My mom with her three favorite people:  Makayla, Tommy, and Jarom.

I love in this next video how Tommy is trying to eat his doughnut while running. Never mind the piece he drops on the ground and then eats:) I'm so glad the cousins love playing together.

Quick Trip to Utah

In April Tommy and I had the chance to go to Utah for a few days. Tommy loved playing with his cousins and Grammy's doggies and I loved being able to relax and see the people I love.
Tommy called Sammy "Black" and he called Kodex "White". He had no problem getting right down with the doggies, letting them lick his hands, and giving them loves. It's a good thing he has Grammy's dogs to visit because he won't have a dog of his own for a very long time:)
I love this picture of my mom playing with her grandkids. I can't imagine her being happier than she is when she is surrounded by those little ones.
Grammy and Tommy had lots of good times at the park together while I took some much needed me-time (went for a run, attended the temple, met my girls for lunch). Tommy showed off a little and and climbed up and went down everything at the park. I guess they spent several hours playing together. He was one tired little boy! Thanks to my mom for watching him all day, although I know she is thanking me for the same thing.
It's hard to get three active kiddos to look at the camera at the same time!
Tommy loved playing with his cousins, Jarom and Makayla. He is finally old enough that he plays with other kids rather than just next to them, so it was really fun to see the kids interact with each other. Jarom is about 2 1/2 years older than Tommy, but the two of them got along so well. They both love to play ball, and Jarom is really gentle with little kids, so they had lots of good times playing together. Below are a couple of videos of the kids playing ball together.

Here are some pictures of the family. Aren't we cute?

From left to right: Jarom, Jamie, Wes, Makayla, Ricky, Sadie, Carson, Crystal, Tommy. We missed you, Ben!
Do you see what I had to put up with growing up?
Me with my sisters-in-law, Jamie and Sadie.
Here is a video of Tommy doing his nightly ritual of beating up the largest man in the house. It wasn't quite as good as jumping on his daddy, but throwing pillows at Carson was pretty fun.
The weather was great the first couple of days we were in Utah, but then it got REALLY cold and snowy. I'm talking like 30 degrees cold. I was planning to run a half marathon at Thanksgiving Point that weekend, but when I woke up to this, I chickened out. I run because it's fun, but running in snow, wind, and 30 degrees? Not fun. So I didn't do it:) Maybe we'll try for a half marathon again this summer.