Christmas Vacation part I: Utah

We had a wonderful Christmas vacation together! We flew to Salt Lake City, Ut. on the 17th, right after we picked the kids up from school. I flight was delayed a few times, and we didn't end up getting to UT until about 1am in the morning, man we're we ever exhausted. The poor kids were so tired that when we went to get our luggage, they just laid down on the cold hard ground, and went to sleep. Being used to the heat in Texas, they were absolutely freezing the moment we stepped out of the airport, they kept saying how mean we were to make them go out into the cold. We made it to Travis' sister Maia's car, and she cranked up the heat and we were soon nice and toasty warm, then we stayed the night at her house. The kids really enjoyed playing with their cousins, and they also loved the birds they had, and couldn't seem to leave them alone (poor birds).

The next night, Travis and I left after the kids went to bed, and went to Salt Lake and stayed at a hotel there, and then went to a session at the temple the next morning. It was really nice to just spend some time together without the kids. It was also the best nights sleep I've gotten in a long time. The temple was beautiful, but it was very cold. As we were walking there was always beggers, and homeless people asking for money, but I kept telling Travis it was too cold to stop. So my wonderful husband took me into the visitor's center so I could warm up for a second, and then went back and gave money to a lady standing outside temple sqaure, sometimes I wish I could be more like him. Then we went and got the kids from Maia's house in Tooele, and drove to Orem, Ut to meet my sister Cristin, and her family at the Chuck-e-cheese there. We happened to be driving in the middle of a snowstorm, so instead of driving 60 mph, we could only drive 30mph, it seemed to take forever, but we finally made it. We had fun at chuck-e-cheese, and loved seeing my sister, and her new twins, conner and makayla, they are so cute, and each gave me a big cheesy grin, when I said hello to them. The big challenge there was keeping Samuel out of trouble, he kept climbing up on the skee-ball machines, and running up them to where you throw the balls in, we finally convinced him to climb in the play area where climbing was allowed. We stayed at the super 8 hotel in Provo. The next day we went bowling, to a movie, had smoothies and fresh bread(both from places we don't have in Texas, it was yummy). We also went to DI, looking for a winter coat for Betsy, poor girl only had a jacket and was freezing. While we were looking, Austin saw two cute little stuffed animals that she fell in love with in a shopping cart, that no one was around, and asked if she could get them, I told her we could go ask Daddy, so we started walking away. Well as we did so, this crotchety old lady emerged from the bathroom and yelled, "hey stop, those are mine", I apologized saying we didn't realize they belonged to anyone, and put them back in her cart. She sneered at us saying "yeah right" and huffed off. Austin bursted into tears, at how mean the old lady was. We ended up leaving with an upset Austin and no coat for Betsy. So we went back to our hotel and went swimming at the indoor swimming pool. It was really fun, it was really warm, and the kids had a blast. Samuel is quite the little fishy. He couldn't stay out of the water, and tried to swim as much as possible, with mom or dad frantically trying to keep his head above water. His favorite game was to climb out of the pool, and run to a spot where no one was at and jump in, and hold his breath, until mom or dad caught him and brought him back up to the surface. That is one crazy little boy, but we sure had fun. After swimming we walked to the Dairy Queen next door for dinner. There was one family already in there, so we ordered food and sat down next to them. After the family left, the mom came back in, and handed me $6 and some change, she said she wanted to buy our family a box of dilly bars. Surprised I said "thankyou" and she left. I'm not sure what prompted her to do this, but it sure was nice, and made me feel good inside. We also got to have yummy desserts after dinner. The next few days were filled with playing with cousins, and shopping in Tooele. We stayed at the Tooele Army Depot lodging, which was basically a two bedroom apartment. We would go out to breakfast each morning, and then make our way over to Maia's house. One morning we went to McDonalds, which had a nice big play place, and while the kids played, Betsy spent a long time organizing all the shoes in the bins, but she did play for a while too. It had a basketball hoop, that Travis, Joseph and I played with for a while. One evening we went to the Messiah, it was nice, but pretty long, and Betsy and Austin(samuel and Joseph stayed at the house) were getting pretty tired of it so we left after the Hallelujah Chorus. We also went into Salt Lake one day to the Discovery Children's Museum. The kids had a blast, there were so many fun things for the kids to do, we didn't even get to all of it. Finally the big day arrived. Christmas Eve we went over the Travis' Aunt Nora's house in West Valley, and had a delicous dinner, which I was actually able to enjoy becuase Samuel was taking a nap, and didn't insist on sitting on my lap. We had a little Nativity Scene performed by all the children, that I was in charge of. It was a little bit crazy, but we got it done. While the kids were playing we also had a moment with the adults, where each of Travis' sisters, mom, grandma, and aunt all sat on his lap and talked to him for a minute, since they won't see him again before he goes to Iraq. We went back to our apartment, and put the kids to bed. I laid out there stockings, and went to bed too. The next morning the kids happily opened up their stockings, and ate candy and played with little toys. Then we headed over to Maia's house for the opening of presents and breakfast. The kids each got quite a few presents from grandma and aunts. We had a huge boxful of things to take with us. I made a cinnamon roll christmas tree, and eggs and bacon for brunch. It was delicious. Maia's family got a Wii for Christmas, so I set it up for them, and we played games for a little while. We relaxed until dinner time, and had a scrumptious dinner, which was all so yummy! Then we tried to get in a few pictures, but ended up needed to leave before all the grandkid shots were done becuase Samuel and Betsy would just not sit and smile, so I think I made a few people mad when I said we were done and left, but it was just not going to work and I didn't think they wanted picture with kids kicking and screaming. Anyway we went back to our place and packed up to leave the next morning for Star Valley Wyoming to be with my family. Travis' sister graciously allowed us to use their van for the duration of our trip, saving us over a thousand dollars. Thankyou Maia!