Mid-Summer Visit from Some of Our Favorites

A few weeks ago, my sister and her kiddos came to visit!  Then my brother joined the fun.    

As always with their visits, it meant life got a little extra chaotic for a bit, but it was a {mostly} happy chaos, so we loved it!  

Highlights of the visit included: 

* lots of time with J, Manuel, and Isaiah!

* Denali LOVED all the extra attention with them there

* With three of the four C. girls (and Mom) there, it meant we got to do a lot of talking time

*  My Legos got well-loved again 

*  We took a trip to the aquarium

*  Silliness and potty humor was abundant

* I got to expand my repertoire of music to way more "exciting" genres (according to I, M, and J anyway)

*   Lots of combined family dinners and culinary offerings not normally found at our house...

*  Pete came to town and we  had a big family dinner down in Provo to include the college kids

* 7 of the 10 boy cousins were all together...just missing Ben, Jack, and Lincoln

* Had 2 of the 8 girl cousins together...just missing Cam, Ellie, McKenzie, Lauren, Bridgette, and Anna

*  4 of the 8 siblings together!   

*  We don't see Pete often enough, so it was fun to have him there! 

* Pete's son, Davin, is a superstar baseball player who had come to participate in a BYU sports camp.

Lowlights included: 

*  I had a  major meltdown that I can only assume was fueled by hormones,  lack of sleep, and lack of routine.  It was of the epic sort I have only once every few years, so that was stupid.  I got to practice all the skills I had recently learned in my emotional resilience class at church (FSITL).  

* Nate came into town a few hours after Pete and Davin left, so we barely missed having 5/8 of the siblings together

In other news:  

* Some big changes are happening and life has taken a turn for busyness in the extreme and the next few months/years are going to be crazy {and good...we hope!}  I'll probably share more details eventually...

********************************** 

Legos + Potty Humor + Field Trips = Tired

If you dropped by our house recently, you would have found bowls of half-eaten Apple Jacks and Life Cereal, candy wrappers, Taki crumbs, and wrappers from various fast food restaurants we never usually go to.   

Additionally, there were piles of Legos and cars on every flat surface in the house....

No, I haven't taken up Legos and junk food in my middle age....but we did watch our nephews-- Manuel and Isaiah, while their Mom, brother, and sister took a spring break trip to Washington DC and NYC!  

Manuel and Isaiah are 8 and 9 years old, which meant we had A LOT more potty humor happening in our house than we've had in many years!  Cards Against Humanity (Family Edition) is pretty epic for kids this age.  It was good reading practice and had them rolling on the floor in laughter (mostly at the silly potty humor  that is plentiful in this game)! 

We also had a lot more random field trips to places we normally don't go, including mini golf, the country store to see the baby chicks and bunnies....

We went to the aquarium...

We made a visit to the butterfly biosphere in Thanksgiving Point.... 

And the dinosaur museum....

Denali got lots of extra love....

We made cookies for Nana...

And then brought them to her....

I was a wee bit tired at the end of the time we had them, but they are sweet boys and I was glad to give my sister the opportunity to take her other kids on their own adventure!  💗

Atlanta with Most of My Peeps!

 Once upon a time, about 6 years ago, we planned a trip to Alaska, so I could finally get to my 50th state.   I'd been at 49 states for more than 20-years and we decided it was finally time to remedy that.  

Then, sometime after that trip was all planned,  Glen realized that he only needed to visit 4 more states and then Alaska could be his 50th state as well!  Thus was born our Spring Break 2017 trip to the Deep South, so he could visit Georgia, Alabama,  Mississippi, and Louisiana. 

We had a great trip exploring the South and thought we likely wouldn't visit again for a very long time, but, lo and behold, our daughter, son-in-law, and grandbaby  now live in Alabama and we visit as often as possible!  Who would have guessed six-years-ago we'd end up such frequent visitors to the Deep South?! 

So...back to the present day and another trip to the Deep South...though this time not in Birmingham.  

We wanted to have one last hurrah with Ellie before she went off to college, so we thought a little Labor Day family gathering would be fun!   We had hoped it would include everyone, but Adam on his mission, but, alas, Spencer's dog is hard to find care for, so he stayed at home on Kiwi (and Denali) duty!   Garrett's time off as a second year medical resident is limited, so we knew it would need to be somewhere near the Alabamans to make it doable for them.   When weighing all the options, we landed on Atlanta as the location.   It's only a 2 hour drive for Cami and Garrett, Cami had never been to Georgia before (since she was on her mission during our 2017 travels), we really enjoyed our time there in 2017, and flights are cheaper there too.   In other words, it was a perfect fit! 

☺So...be forewarned.  There are approximately 2,093,299 photos in this post and most of them contain the sweetest little 21-month-old in the universe.  ☺

 Emma, Ellie, and I flew into Atlanta on a Wednesday night, picked up our rental car, then immediately drove to Birmingham to spend the night.   We girls had a super chill day on Thursday playing with Lucie, going on a walk in the cutest neighborhood in B-ham (see collage below), getting a little shopping done, and just enjoying some girls' time.

Later that afternoon we all (meaning all the girls) shlepped to Atlanta together and got checked into the AirBnb!  We chilled there for the evening, then eagerly went to sleep, meanwhile Glen's journey was just beginning with a red-eye from Las Vegas.   I picked him up from the airport nice and early the next morning, then brought him back to sleep for a bit, before we headed  to a big farmer's market  for some Georgia peaches, etc.  It was like a Costco of Farmer's Markets and we had fun wandering around seeing what there was. We had to laugh when we found the peaches and discovered that they were all imported from Idaho.  Haha!  We bought them anyway, figuring Idaho peaches in a peach crumble would still be pretty delicious! 

Later that day, we went to the Atlanta History Museum.  It was a place we'd visited during our 2017 escapades and I knew Lucie would love the animals and all the girls would enjoy seeing the Swan House, which was the filming sight of President Snow's home in the Hunger Games movies. 

 

We went to dinner together, then Garrett joined us later that night.   The next day we headed to the world famous Georgia Aquarium.   I've never been to an aquarium that rivals the National Aquarium in Baltimore, but I'd have to say that Georgia's does.  It's the largest aquarium in the world and is one of only three aquariums in the world that have whale sharks.   The whale sharks were quite a sight to see and we very much enjoyed our time there, though Lucie did start to lose steam  and we ended up skipping out on the sea lion show.   

After a good lunch at a Mediterranean place, we wandered around Olympic Centennial Park...{this collage is kind of random}

Eventually we made our way to the Coca-Cola Museum (right next to the Georgia Aquarium).  The lines were long and it was jam-packed inside, but it was an interesting and well-done tour.  The last stop on the tour is a tasting room, where you are handed a cup and allowed to sample as much of the products as you wanted via help-yourself-soda-fountains.  Apparently Coca-Cola offers over 4000 products and the tasting room was filled with dozens of those from around the world.   We tried Ugandan soda, Thai apple soda, and some others.     I am not a soda drinker, so I got overwhelmed very quickly in there and ended up on Lucie duty.   Lucie thought it was the coolest place ever and was eager to sample the wares herself or to try to get me to drink more.   It's not a place I feel the need to ever go back to, but it's totally worth a visit if you ever find yourself in Atlanta! 

The next day we headed to Stone Mountain for a hike.   It's a very unique mountain, which is exactly what it sounds like...a mountain made of sheer expanses of stone.   The trek up is a total party with pretty big crowds of people of all ages from the very old to the very young.  The summit has a spectacular view of the surrounding area, including the Atlanta skyline in the distance.

Here are some more random pics...including a beautiful covered bridge we found, my Atlanta postcard export, another one from Stone Mountain, and an adorable one of Ellie and Lucie at church!

Here are a few more random ones, including Glen at the temple (after the rest of us left), Emma and Lucie playing the "Night Night" game where they'd pretend to sleep until Lucie deemed it time to wake up, and us just loving on Lucie as much as possible.  

Not pictured:  The delicious peach crisp the girls made with our Idaho peaches and the super contentious game of CodeNames where it was lamented that no one knew what the LaBrea Tar Pits were and it went over everyone's head that platypuses have eyes! 

Before parting ways, we broke out the Christmas pajamas a little early.  I had bought these in Thailand for everyone and wanted to get a picture with as many of us as possible and since this isn't our Christmas with Cam and family, we figured this was as good as it was going to get!      Lucie was hamming it up big-time, while I, on the other hand, was feeling greasy and gross at the time, so this photo is NOT something you'll see in the Christmas card!! 

Speaking of my favorite grandbaby (for now), I'll finish up with a little Lucie update:   She's 21-months old now and is quite the little charmer!  She recognizes when she does something funny and she'll repeat whatever it was that made us laugh to try and elicit more.  She has quite the vocabulary now and she can repeat almost anything we say...except for Spencer's name...which, for whatever reason, she refuses {with a laugh} to even try.   She's getting a little independent streak {just like her Mom} and she is starting to want to do everything herself...including, buckling herself into her carseat, brushing her hair, feeding herself with a fork, putting on her shoes, and choosing her own clothes.  I love that she watches Cosmo the Cougar videos while her Mommy puts her "piggies" into her hair each morning.   I sure love this girl! 

In case it's not obvious, I really, really, really enjoy being a grandma {and a Mom} and am very grateful for the time we were able to spend together in Atlanta.    Now we just need to figure out a way to do it more often.  💖

How Far Would You Drive for a Good Burger?

Glen has had a lot going on at work lately, which means that we didn't see much of him this Christmas break.     Even his nights and weekends were consumed with work and in the end he was only able to take three days off during the whole two-week break (Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and New Year's Day).  

So when New Year's Day rolled around and we'd hardly seen Glen, we decided to take a little family trip to Baltimore for the day.   Glen's first job out of college was at an accounting firm there in Baltimore, and we lived there in the summers of 1995 and 1996, and full-time from 1997-1999.    His company had corporate passes to the zoo, science center, and aquarium and as such we visited all three on a very regular basis when we lived there.     

Despite the fact that Washington DC is only about 50 miles from Baltimore, in the fifteen years since we've lived here, we've only trekked back to downtown Baltimore a handful of times.  Especially since without those lovely corporate passes to see the sites, the admission prices are astronomical!  

So when  my brother Tim purchased us a family pass to the National Aquarium in Baltimore for Christmas, we were all VERY excited!    It's been a number of years since we've been there, and it was a delight to go back and introduce the Aquarium to the younger kids!   

Because of the holiday, it was pretty crowded, but not so crowded as to hinder our enjoyment of being there together.   We  oohed and ahed  the whole way through, but especially enjoyed the dolphins,  jellyfish, and rainforest exhibit!  

It's not often that we visit places all together as a family anymore and we thoroughly enjoyed our day at the aquarium and look forward to going back a few more times this year! 

After our visit to the Aquarium, we did a crazy thing.   

We drove an additional 80 miles past Baltimore to Pennsylvania so we could  eat here...

It's called Ruby's Diner and Spence and Glen have had a bit of a fascination with it since eating there one time on the way home from a BYU football game.  

The kids and I ate there just this past summer when Cami was up in Philadelphia  at her leadership conference, but it had been a few years since Glen and Spencer had been able to.    We were all quite excited to partake in this very unhealthy, but delicious meal of burgers, sweet potato fries, and milkshakes (with a lactose pill of course).   I'm sure the employees thought we were a little crazy for having come all the way from Virginia for burgers and fries, but everything was pretty darn tasty and what the heck?  New Year's only comes around once a year and it was a fun way to ring in 2015!

    I slept most of the 130-miles back home, which meant I arrived back home well-rested, well-fed, and well-satisfied at being able to spend an entire day together as a family!  

 ***********************