Salt Lake City

We had some pretty late nights, and then with hotel blackout curtains, we could have had some late mornings. We tried to let the girls wake up on their own, but sometimes we had to wake them. And then we'd bribe them to eat quickly so they would have time to swim.

This was one of those bribing mornings.

I think the pools were their favorite part. We swam at every single hotel pool, and we only stayed at 1 or 2 that didn't have pools.

We had the girls write in their journals every day before they watched a movie in the car, and every day Laney wrote about the pool. She'd have us write "the Rays went to the pool," or "the Rays had fun at the pool." On one of the days that our hotel didn't have a pool I was all excited for her to write about something else. But that day she had me write "the Rays didn't go to the pool." Silly girl.

The drive was so pretty and hanging with this guy all day every day was super sweet.

We sent an email to several of our Utah peeps telling them we'd be at temple square from 4-7 and inviting them to join us. We didn't have much time, so even though we'd have loved to stay a full day or two and personally visit everyone, this was the only way.

We ended up with a very successful and productive 3 hours.

Our besties from New Mexico, Remy and Stacy came with their two cute boys.

Stacy was our school psychologist at AABV while I taught there. We used to go walk on our lunch breaks and our families would BBQ and play games together. Love them!

We also got to see our mission son, AJ and his cute wife, Mykel. It was so fun to meet her and see how grown up our boy is. He's one of our all time favorite missionaries for sure.

We had picked up Cafe rio for us and Wendy's for the girls to eat at temple square, and the girls ran around.

These kids all ran around and climbed on everything they could.

We had hoped Addie and izzy would hit it off, but they were just a little too old and a little too much time had gone by, and they were incredibly awkward with eachother.

Trying to get a picture of the kids with the angel Moroni was not easy. But I'm always up for the task. (;

We had been joking about how we were free range parents as our kids ran and climbed on everything. Frankie had somehow gotten herself behind a steel fence and when Matt asked her to get out, she told him she could climb it. He let her, she fell, and the top, sharp part of the fence caught her skirt and tore it. She looked like she got in a fight with a dinosaur. Good thing this was just a hand-me-down skirt. 

Mindy was the next one to show up, with Jack and izzy. Mindy and I were close friends before she left Maryland 3 years ago. We always start right where we left off whenever we get together. 

And then Shelly, Rosie, and Pete came. It was so fun to see Shelly.

She hasn't been gone that long, but everything is different when you don't see eachother at least once a week.

We didn't really get time to explore temple square with the girls, (we've both been there before) but it was good just to be there. 

We ended up staying till 8, and really weren't ready to go even then. Shelly walked with us to our car, and when we passed by the Relief Society building, Matt got a picture of us. I miss working so closely with her again. I served as her 1st counselor in primary, and she was my secretary in Relief Society. Both were wonderful experiences. I miss her!

From there we headed over to aunt Jeanne and uncle Ray's house. We texted her about 2 hours before we came over. That's just the way of the trip! Thankfully we were able to stop by, and Delaney wanted a picture of her in this fun helmet.

Frankie had been saying she felt sick while we were there, and then a few minutes before we were getting ready to go, she turned green. Then, as I was dragging her to the bathroom, she threw up. We are fun house guests! We took that as our cue to leave.

As we did, the sun was setting and we could see the temple lights through the trees, and it was gorgeous. Again, cheap iPhone pictures are no good, but it was really something.

We laid Frankies chair back, gave her a Sprite, and she fell asleep like this within about 3 minutes.

She was completely out. Which was good because there are some windy roads as you leave Utah.

We stayed that night in Evanston, WY, not too far outside of Utah. But with Frankie having gotten sick, we didn't want to risk going too far, and we didn't know if we'd find anything else in the desolate state that is Wyoming. The next day as we drove, we saw dozens of signs for Little America and so wished we would have stayed there instead! Next time!