The Grand Canyon - Day 2

On Day 2, we checked out of our hotel room, and then waited for Eric to finish his job so he could explore the Canyon with us.

While waiting, we had lunch, and played lots of games:

And then we were off! It was very bright:

We decided to take a drive on a road that is only open to cars during the months of December, January, and February. The rest of the year it is only open to shuttle buses. It had 9 different "official" overlooks.








It was quite snow-packed in places. Not comforting when you could slip on ice and plunge to your death:



The Grand Canyon has awesome hiking opportunities, but the only hiking we did was on paved walkways to and from our car:



The Grand Canyon is beautiful! And not to worry, my orneriness had subsided by this point.

Arizona Highlights - Part 1

The day after Christmas we packed up and headed down to Arizona for the week. Here are a couple of highlights from our first few days.

1. The main purpose of our trip was to see Mallory & Todd (my brother and sister in law) get sealed in the Mesa Temple!



We ALL adore both of them, and were excited as always to see them.



Eric's parents, and Nate & Autumn (another brother and sister in law) were also there.

2. Uncle Derek was there too! He saved the day and watched SEVEN kids for 4 hours while we were at the temple.



Not only did he watch them, but he took them all to the park, and then to a movie, where he he treated them to slushies as big as my forearm. No joke.
3. The kids had ample opportunity to play with their cousins. Which meant I barely saw them.



Sadie and Brenden (who Sadie LOVES - big time).






4. We stayed at a house that Eric's parents had rented out for the week. And since we were with Eric's family, we stayed up late every night playing games. Woo-hoo!



5. We also swam! My sister-in-laws mom lives in Arizona, and was nice enough to let us use her pool. Not only was it heated (to like 90 degrees), but it was also 70 degrees in Arizona, so my kids swam for hours:







Although my kids had a great time, and Eric was having a great time golfing with his dad and brothers, I was having a low-down awful day. I had had a lot of stress the week or two prior and it seemed to all come to a head on this particular day. It wasn't pretty. I was to put it mildly, a mess. I will blame it on hormones (but not pregnancy ones!).

6. After Eric finished golfing, we said goodbye to his family, and headed off to the Grand Canyon. We stopped for pizza on the way, and while biting into a piece, Jackson lost one of his front teeth. It was a little bit of cheery news, to bring me out of my depression:



Stay tuned for my RIVETING post about the Grand Canyon!

Jackson Said

Background Info: As we were driving around the other night, Jackson saw a motorcycle rider with a reflective vest on.

He remarked: "It is so weird how all of the crossing guards drive motorcycles."

How fun that he has thought for years that every motorcycle rider with a vest on was a crossing guard. I almost didn't want to set his skewed view straight.

Sade's 4th Birthday Celebration!

Sade had been sick the week of her birthday. She was feeling better, but her cough remained. Like all coughs, it was exacerbated by running around, jumping, and general rough housing. Well, Sade has been telling us for months that on her birthday she wanted to go to Flip- n-Out. So when it got closer to her birthday and I realized her cough was still sticking around, I tried to dissuade her. Eric and I knew that jumping would send her into a severe coughing fit, and knew we had to put the kibosh on it. I gave her multiple options of other things to do, but she refused EVERY SINGLE ONE. Finally I had to lie, and tell her Flip-n-Out was not open that night. It was either that, or listen to a crying, whining fit the entire night. I am somewhat comfortable with my decision. 

Just to note:  Prior to the lie, I had tried to reason with her multiple times, but she was irrational, and would not accept my reasoning. But the untruth worked, and she accepted that we would go just as soon as her cough vanished, and they were open!

We started the festivities off with a few pictures, and present opening:




Opening Jackson's present:




Tackling him as a thank you:



Opening Megan's present and then tackling her:






She saved her big present for last. It ended up being just what she wanted: A Princess Kitchen!




I wanted a picture with Sade, but she refused to smile until Eric bribed her with a quarter to use in a toy machine at Cici's pizza (where she chose to eat):



It worked!



At Cici's:





After eating, since Sade did not want to do anything else, we went home to put her presents together and play with them. The Princess Kitchen was ridiculously difficult and time consuming to put together, but luckily we have Jackson who is excellent at things like that:





I attended Young Women's (It was my last night, since I was released last week), then came home for cake and ice cream. My cake decorating skills were stellar as always:






It only took her about 6 tries to blow them out. Happy Birthday Baby Sade!