Utah highlights

We were able to see and do a lot of fun things in Utah.

Our first event was the Nutcracker with Sue. Since Lydia has been so into ballet I thought going to The Nutcracker would be fun.  It was lovely but sadly didn't start until 8:00 pm (10:00 VA time).  I knew this when I purchased the tickets and tried to find a matinee but had no luck and decided to just hope for the best.  It turned out pretty well.   Lydia did really enjoy the dances and costumes and had a nice time.  We ended up leaving before it was over but made it through all the different dances by the individual groups which is my favorite part.  So at least 3/4 of the way through.

Swimming in hot springs.  Going swimming in Grandma Sue's heated pool was near the top of the list of things Jared and Lydia wanted to do so we made it happen.  We sadly picked one of the worst days.  It started out pretty nice but by the time we made it to the pool, around 3:00 a crazy wind storm had picked up.  There is lots of construction near the pool and we were all having a hard time keeping our eyes open because it was so cold and the air was so dirty.  Not our best swimming experience but we made it happen.

The next day Mark and I went to a session at the Provo City temple and then out to eat at Rodizios, an item very high Mark's list of things to do in Utah.  I'm not sure what happened exactly but Mark was incredibly slow that morning and we didn't get to the desk of the temple until 9:53. We asked if they could please hold the session which they agreed to but told us to hustle.  Of course we had never been to that temple so we had no idea where we were going and had to rent clothes so it took longer than usual but we made it.  I was pretty irritated so it was not the best session for me. While in the dressing room Mark actually saw his nephew Kimball who jsut returned from his mission in July.  It was so random that they saw each other.  Kimball and his girlfriend came over for lunch later in the week and it was fun to catch up with him.

We also went over to Draper city one night to check out their "Tree of Life." It was so beautiful and looked just like the tree depicted in paintings.  While looking up things to do in UT I saw that there was a Bahama Bucks in Draper so after checking out the lights we stopped in for a treat and it was just as good as I remembered from TX.  We had really bad phone service in Draper and could not get our google maps to work so we were fortunate we found the tree.  As we were driving back to I 15 we were looking for Bahama Bucks, (I really wanted them to get to try it. It was pretty high on my list of things to do in Utah) in downtown Draper and all of a sudden I saw it.  It was weird because I did not notice it on the way in and we drove right by it but I saw it just in time for Mark to do a U turn.  They all loved it.

The next day we headed up to SLC to check out the Grand America Hotel and the lights at Temple Square.  A friend recommended the hotel as it has a huge gingerbread house and festive holiday window displays.  I loved it.  The hotel is super fancy and the windows were fun.  We were lucky to have really nice weather for walking around temple square and the lights were beautiful.   I for some reason thought that there were more lights at Temple Square in the past but regardless it was beautiful and so well done.  Parking was crazy but we figured it out and had a nice evening.  Before we went Lydia had an exciting afternoon.  Her two top teeth had been loose for awhile and that afternoon she got Mark to take them out.  We of course had her sing "All I want for Christmas is my 2 front teeth" and recorded it for future viewings.

The next day we drove down to Spanish Fork and Salem to check out more lights.   It was a fun outing.  Spanish Fork was one of those pay and drive through to see lights.  They did have some fun exhibits.  We also stopped by the suit store in Provo.  Mark and his Mom had gone down and picked out a suit for him earlier in the week and they had still not gotten back to them about its delivery.  Sue wanted Mark to have it for Christmas but that didn't happen.  They were both quite irritated.   We ended up  leaving Utah without it and hopefully Mark will either pick it up from the JOS A Bank store here or they will ship it.

You can't tell here but there were multiple frames frames of the ice skaters so it looked like they were doing a cool turn/throw which I thought was cool.

 

Jared was in love with these Killer Whales (of course). It was pretty unique. 

Since Christmas Eve was a Sunday it was  pretty low key day.  By this time I was feeling pretty ready to head back to VA and knew a day at home attempting to be reverent was going to be hard. The night before I mentioned that I might just go to church and then stay for all the wards meetings.  They were all going to be singing Christmas songs and hopefully giving great talks with fun Christmas stories so it  seemed like a nice way to spend Christmas Eve.  I invited others to join me but no one took me up on it.  I think its one of the nicest Sundays of the year and was glad I stayed.  In between wards I practiced playing the piano.  I was often too intimidated to play at Sue's house because I don't really like to play in front of people and enjoyed playing at the church.  Sadly there were only 2 wards meeting that day not three but it was nice to get to sing extra songs and have quiet personal time to reflect on the importance of Christmas.  That evening we read the nativity and sang Christmas songs. Jared was a Shepherd and a wiseman, Lydia was an angel and Mark and I were Jospeh and Mary.

 Christmas morning Jared and Lydia were thrilled to wake up to a White Christmas.  It really is magical.  The grown ups had seen the snow start the night before and were impressed that as much stuck. After opening presents we went out with Cathryn's twins and played in the snow. It was great.  The fun ended when Jared accidentally injured Ian but it was fun while it lasted.  Christmas morning at someone else's house is weird.  Not bad just weird.  We hadn't been away from our house for Christmas since Jared was 2 months old.  We were not expecting many gifts and had told Jared and Lydia to remember how we celebrated in VA but we all ended up with more gifts than we expected.  So much that we had to borrow a suitcase from Sue and check 2 instead of 1.  Mark's brother Steve came over with his 6 grown kids and their little families for Sue's birthday brunch and we enjoyed visiting.  It was a nice day.

The day after Christmas we drove up to Kayesville to visit some friends.  We met up with the Barton's from Egypt who we always love catching up with and then some friends who were here in Virginia last year.  Miley was in my preschool class and it was fun to check out their new home and catch up.

Our last day there we went to see Cocoa and out to eat and In N Out Burger.  We all thought Cocoa was great.  Jared kept talking about how he wanted to see Star Wars, but he will have to wait until he is older.  He still liked Cooca and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would.

In between these outings there was movie watching, (we watched "The Shack" with Cathryn, Paul and Sue, It was horrible! I had seen previews and knew I didn't want to watch it but I did and cried so much!  I know there were some good points and could see them but oh my gosh it was exhausting)  cider and hot chocolate drinking, grandma snuggling, planks building, game playing, visiting and wii playing.  There were also moments of homesickness, fighting, illness, and bad manners but overall it was very  nice to see family and to be somewhere different so we could do different things but there is truly no place like home for the holidays!

Getting to Utah and coming back to Virginia

Monday afternoon we drove up to Northern Virginia for the night.  We drove up Monday night as our flight out to Utah was leaving at 6:00 am Tuesday. When I mentioned this to my friend Julie she quickly offered to get in touch with her parents who live 12 minutes from the airport and see if they were free to take us to the airport.  I protested seeing as how we would have to leave their house before 4:00 but they were glad to help out.  We got up at 3:45 am got to the airport around 4:30 and walked into the longest line I have ever seen at baggage drop. It was crazy.  They had all kinds of ticket agents but the line was barely moving.  We soon found out that Delta had 3 flights scheduled to leave Dulles at 6:00.  Not a good sign. As we were waiting in line Lydia was having crazy coughing attacks. I knew it was because she was up super early in a stuffy airport and since the line was going nowhere quick I took her outside to get some fresh air.  She promptly coughed a bunch and then threw up right outside the door but in a trash can.  As you can see things were not going well.  We went back inside, she sat down in some chairs near us in line and we waited.  Eventually we dropped off our luggage and made our way to TSA, to another incredibly long line. By now it was 5:00 and we were in line with all the other people stressed out about making their 6:00 flight. We got into the line and discovered that there was only 1 TSA agent.  Yes, 1.  It was ridiculous!  To top it off the agent was treating every passenger as if they were a person of high security risk.  Eventually they got 2 more agents but it turned out to be too late for us.  We got to our gate and the doors had already been shut.  We looked out the window at our plane sitting there.  We talked to the desk agents and they rebooked us on a flight out of Regan at 4:00.  Not convenient but our best bet since we would all be confirmed on the flight.  Julie's parents graciously picked us up and let us hang out at their house until that afternoon and then took us to the other airport 35 minutes from their house.  We of course felt horrible putting them out and so appreciated their kindness.  They fed us waffles, Mark and I took naps him first, then me to counter our 3:45 wake up and we took Jared and Lydia to play at a park nearby.

Neither Jared or Lydia took naps even though we strongly encouraged them too and 5 minutes into the drive to the other airport they were out.  We got to the airport with time to spare but we were not free of troubles yet.  Both Jared and Lydia were exhausted and having a hard time in the airport.  As we waited in the TSA line Jared told us he wasn't feeling well. We got to the front of the line and as we were loading up our crazy amounts of gear and carry on luggage he walks to the garbage can and proceeds to throw up in front of over a hundred people.  We tried to encourage him and check on him but at the same time we were trying to not hold up security.  Like some of our items had already started going through so we couldn't exactly stop and give him our full attention.  It was laughable and gross.  Jared finished up and we make it through security but still are not in the clear.  As we leave security a kind woman hands us a disposable travel throw up bag and wishes us luck and offers her sympathy which was really nice of her. We make it to our gate, settle down and then Jared pulls out his bag and throws up again. I'm sure all the people around us were praying we were not on their flight.  While Jared is throwing up Lydia is sitting in Mark's lap crying because her ear is hurting so then we start to worry that she has an ear infection and how will that go down with the change in air pressure.  It was so stressful and sad. Eventually Lydia falls asleep in Mark's lap, Jared finishes throwing up and starts playing like nothing happened and I leave to check out all the airport shops to find all the overpriced children's medicine I can.  Not the best start to our trip.  We make it on our flight, people kindly switch seats with us so we can be seated together and we have an event free flight to Utah.  The one plus was that we had a direct flight.  Originally we went though Detroit but since we missed that flight we were really fortunate to get on this other one and have it be a direct flight.

Coming back to Virginia was a much better experience but still rough.  Our light left Utah at 11:59 pm on Wednesday so basically midnight.  We flew from SLC to Atlanta then to Dulles.  We got to the airport with plenty of time, there was basically no line at the baggage drop and plenty of agents at TSA.  If it wasn't for the timing of the flight it would have been perfect.  We board the plane and it is equipped with individual TV's so the idea of sleeping, (since it was the middle the night after all) does not even enter Jared or Lydia's head. They entertain themselves for the whole flight while I tired to sleep some.  I don't think Mark slept either.   We land in Atlanta around 5:30 am and wait for our 7:20 flight.  Mark got us some bagels and then once we boarded the plane (after being bumped up to comfort cabin a nice surprise) he and Jared who are sitting behind Lydia and I fall asleep before we even take off.  I am really glad Mark slept as he would be driving from Northern VA to Charlottesville once we landed.  Lydia falls asleep shortly after take off and I dozed just a little bit.  Once we land at Dulles we figure we are in the clear.  Julie and her dad are meeting us at the airport then we will finally be on our way home (the trip was feeling a little too long by the last 2 days or so).  Sadly we got to baggage claim, watched all the bags come out and do not see ours.  Mark checks in with the Delta people and it turns out our luggage didn't make it on our flight.  Fortunately it came on a later flight and Mark was able to pick it up from the Cville airport on his way home from church meetings.  Poor guy had to be at the church that night.  He did take a good nap that afternoon but it was a long day for him.

We are glad we could go out to Utah and had a lot of fun .  Sadly Mark was still not feeling great and he Jared and Lydia were all sick a few days of the trip.  Jared and Mark had it the worst.  Then Mark's mom got sick and so did his niece Anya.  So Mark's mom was sick on Christmas which is also her birthday, not the best present.  I do not see us traveling near Christmas again if we can help it and if we do it will be for a shorter period of time.  Mark's family were so kind to us even though some of them ended up being sick.  Hopefully they feel better soon!

Christmas in Virginia

We leave for Utah in 2 days.  Since we are flying there was no way we could take our presents with us so we celebrated an early Christmas here at home.  It was fun and happy and kind of weird. We covered most of our family traditions so now if something doesn't happen Christmas Eve/day its really no big deal.  We would have survived regardless of what we did or did not do before hand but it was nice to have a Christmas here just the 4 of us. Its too bad we couldn't host a cookie decorating, nativity reading and sing along on Christmas Eve like previous years but I know we will do something very similar with Mark's family in Utah. We had a few Christmas activities and treats this week and got presents delivered to teachers.  I did laundry all today (that was the weirdest part of our Christmas celebrations here) and will pack everything up tomorrow.

The much anticipated Christmas tree waffles

Christmas Shape Pancakes.  Poor sad reindeer antlers from last year.

Sugar Cone Christmas Trees. I love how cute and simple these are.

Jared and Lydia have been anxiously waiting to open presents.  They got to open their sibling gift Friday night, our early Christmas Eve.  Once they were in bed Mark and I wrote out the Scavenger hunt clues.

Saturday morning Jared woke up just before 7:00 and Lydia came into out room at 7:22. I write this because for so long they were such early risers!  They are both starting to sleep later in the morning which has been really nice.  Jared is still between 6:30-6:45 but its a vast improvement. We caught up on some Light the World videos and watched the bible videos Christmas Story.  I love this quiet snuggle time to focus on what matters. Stockings were next and then before presents we had our traditional orange rolls and hot chocolate.  Over the past few months I have read a few articles and talked to a few people about birthdays and gift giving in general.  Last year I tried really hard to have meaningful things in their stockings not just little filler things.  This year we opted to do more experience things. One article I read suggested a magazine subscription which sounded fun.  Getting personal mail is so great (one big reason why I send Christmas cards) so I think they will really enjoy it.  We also made a coupon for a movie date.  We never take them to movies unless its the cheap ones in the summer so it is kind of a special treat.  I think we will go in Utah then we could go to a cheap-er theater.

After breakfast we started opening presents.  Anytime I talked to Lydia about Christmas presents she said the only thing she wanted was Barbies.  So Barbies is what she got.  I had been searching craigslist and eBay for a nice collection of barbies and clothes and was striking out.  Then on Sunday a friend who lives here locally listed an ad selling her daughters barbies.  There were 16 of them for 25$.  It was exactly what I was looking for. I picked out 8 or so and wrapped them up for Lydia. My Mom got her a fun Barbie house and she played with it most of today and Jared really enjoyed it too.  I looked long and hard for the smallest one that was still pretty fun looking and once Mark assembled the house it was still pretty big. I'm so glad we got this one.  Once Lydia decided Barbies was what she wanted I started thinking about the Barbies I loved playing with growing up.  My favorite toy that I remember was a Mcdonald's play set. So I went on ebay and found the exact replica.  A 1982 Mcdonald's play set.  It arrived on Monday.  It is awesome. It is missing the booth but considering its 35 years old it looks great.  It was such a trip down memory lane to put it together and watch them play with it. I don't know how long she will play with her Barbies but it was fun to see her to excited about them.  She was entertained with them all day!  

Jared was really happy with his presents too.  My mom hooked him up with some army guys a Star Wars Lego set, and another lightsaber.  We got him a set of walkie talkies and a kids adventure kit. He really wants to go on adventures in our woods and I want to let him but needed a few things for my peace of mind.  So walkie talkies were a must and the adventure set came with a compass and loud whistle also things I needed him to have.  The set has lots of fun stuff and he loved it. Now to make sure he knows how to read a compass and which direction our house is!  His other gifts were a coin set and a huge killer whale stuffed animal.  We actually found the killer whale at a Cracker Barrel in Pennsylvania.  We stopped to eat there on our way back from NYC and when we saw the whale and that is was so big and really good quality for 10 dollars we knew it would be coming home with us.

The first gifts they chose to open were both from my Mom and huge hits. We each get to pick one gift we want to open  first and wait and watch each other then Jared and Lydia take turns choosing gifts for each other to open.  Mark and I just open ours in between watching them open theirs.

This Barbie is the most beautiful Barbie.  I know it sounds silly but she really is.  With Lydia's current interest in Ballet we decided to buy her one new one.  She loves it.

We took a few minutes to have a little wrapping paper fight and then enjoy the wrapping paper piles in memory of my Dad.  My Dad hated messes and things left out except wrapping paper on Christmas day. To him it symbolized providing for his family.  A show of a good year.  That he and my Mom could provide for their family and let them have a fun day.  Some years there was more than others but he always wanted the wrapping paper to be left on the floor so he could look at it for a bit.*
I do miss him.

Jared and Lydia played with their gifts for hours.  Eventually we reminded them of the scavenger hunt and they had a blast reading the clues and finding the surprise at the end.  It was really fun to hear Lydia read most of her clues by herself for the first time. After that activity I made them put on real clothes (mostly just because I needed to wash those pajamas for Utah), we ate a little lunch, (they were not hungry at all and just wanted to play with their new stuff) and then they went back to playing.

 I went out to do a few errands and then when I got back (they were still playing just like when I left) Mark left to go watch the new Star Wars movie with a friend.  I convinced Jared and Lydia to help me cut out some sugar cookies and then after more playing we went to our ward Christmas party. I was pretty grumpy about going, (nothing new as I am always grumpy about them) but had a nice time.  The ward had fried chicken brought in and then everyone provided sides and desserts.  Once I heard fried chicken was on the menu I decided it would be fun to bring waffles to have with it.  A good friend made some shmear using the recipe from Dames in NC.  I tried a new waffle recipe and didn't love it but it was still fun to have chicken and waffle again.  I am sure people thought I was super weird for bringing in waffles but really not that many people even noticed I had them.  A really cute slide show was made up with primary kids dressed as characters from Nativity story and there were a few musical numbers.  It started at 6:00 and was over by 7:15 which was great.     While we were at the table visiting Lydia asked if she could go under the table, a throw back from Colorado when I told she and Jared to play under there instead of running around the gym and soon they had a whole group of friends under there. It was cute.  I'm not sure the other families loved that but they all had a good time under there.

I ended up calling them up to make cookies with me one on one and it was nice to have that little time with them. We were in the same house most of the day but once presents were done they were busy in their own little worlds which was fine and good. As they have gotten older its been weird to think about my time with them at the end of the day and realize how little I saw them some days or interacted with them. I am really grateful we started doing talk time with them each day.  Its a needed time to connect with them.

It was a really nice Christmas day.  I loved watching Jared and Lydia open their presents and seeing their excitement.  The presents we got and my Mom got them were really spot on and it was fun to see that.  Watching them while sitting on the couch with Mark was so nice.  We have an amazing life and this is a wonderful time of year.




* My mom seems to be doing pretty well.  She told me that as she and my sister were setting up the Christmas tree she got really emotional while they were doing the lights.  They did a few strands and then she told my sister she had to stop. The lights were always my Dad's job and it just made her feel really sad.  This is her last Christmas in that house and I hope its a good one.  All of my siblings are coming. (Not that hard since three live there in CA the farthest being 45 minutes away) but my sister Susanna is driving out with her family.)  We had already bought our plane tickets to Utah before my Dad passed away so I am feeling bad to not be there so my Mom could have one last Christmas in that house with all her kids. I'm trying not to think about it too much.