Road Trip!

A few months ago, my sister invited me to go on a bit of a road trip with her to St. George. She had to speak at an art conference and thought that it might be a bit of a respite for me to take a few days off and join her. She also invited my kiddos to come along. I jumped at the idea thinking that a few days out of town sounded like a little slice of heaven. So I quickly agreed to the idea. The trip was this past week!

Here are my sis and I at the end of a long day of driving with two kiddos. Yes, two. I took the older two along with me and left Toad home with dad. Good move on my part. I returned home to a little sickie with RSV. The next morning, my sis and I decided to throw caution to the wind and drove up to Zions with the kiddos. The first thing we did was the mile long tunnel. This is pretty cool if you haven't been there. It is a tunnel that is really 1 mile long that is cut right through the mountain. There are windows along the way so that you are able to see the gorgeous view periodically.


I will admit though that it kind of freaked me out a bit. I have a little bit of anxiety over things like this. It has to do with earthquakes. You can fill in the blanks. Bear also had some anxiety but ended up loving it so much that we turned around and went through the tunnel a second time.


This is only my second time to Zion's in my life and I am a born and raised Utah girl. Pretty pathetic. The last time I was there was about 12 years ago when all of my siblings and I went down to hike the Subway together.

The kiddos loved every second of the day.


Here we are at a little hike called the "Emerald Pools." This was a cute hike that has several pools along the way. We only hiked to the lower pool. The rest of the hike was rather muddy and kiddos and muddy hikes were not in my itinerary for the day.
Bear LOVED that he found a lock on a rock. He is obsessed with rhyming.
My kiddos love their auntie.



They also love each other.
And their momma. Don't you love how I didn't do anything to even resemble looking attractive. Yep. That is my kind of vacation.



Bear hiking up to weeping rock. This was a very short little walk that Nena wasn't able to manage. She really needs to buck up a bit. I ended up carrying her on my back. At one point, I mentioned to my sis that my butt was burning (aka: I am out of shape) and Nena responded, "Don't worry mom. You are carrying me and I will shade your bum so that it doesn't get hot anymore." Oh, thank you my dear. That will certainly solve that problem.

Amazingly beautiful frozen trees.



LOVE this shot of my sis.

I had Nena read all of the signs along the way. If I am going to pull her out of school for a day to go on a road trip, I am going to stretch her intellectually a bit. She actually got a kick out of it. I think that she got in about 45 minutes of reading this day when I made her read all of the signs.
Really cool how the trees will grow right in between the rocks.

That afternoon, my sis decided to take a siesta but, my kiddos decided not to. So, I packed them up and buzzed them over to the St. George temple grounds. They loved it.
Bear has a little bit of a thing when it comes to temples. He has made a goal to physically touch as many temples as he possibly can. Whenever we pass a new one or have spare time, we go to a temple and let him get out and touch one. He loves it. This is a new one to add to his list.
Bear directing the Mo Tab.
Although the visitor center is very similar to the one in Salt Lake, the kiddos don't tire of it and love every single exhibit.
Cute story: Bear loves the Book of Mormon. He isn't able to read it yet but, he really gets a kick out of looking at it. At the end of the exhibit, he just sat and stared at the books. He picked one up and just kept looking at it and flipping through the pages. When I tried to put it down, he got upset. I looked at the language and it was Ebdo. I was thinking, it would be cute to take a pict and predict a future mission call.
However, when I asked him to put it down, he couldn't. He told me that he was looking for his scripture. I asked what he was talking about and he recited the first part of a scripture that he had shared in primary the week previous. Poor kid. He was trying to find a D&C scripture in the Book of Mormon. To boot, it wasn't even in English. (I wonder how long he would have flipped through that book looking for it.) So, I told him that we needed to look in a different book for it. I walked him over to a little table with a triple combination on it and we found D&C 112:10 and read it. He sighed and said, "that's the one." He bookmarked it with the little ribbon attached to the book and said that he was going to leave it for the next person to read because they might need to know what was in that verse.
Oh yes. Swimming. As a kid, the only perks to a road trip are the frequent gas station stops for unlimited treats and drinks, sleeping in a hotel and swimming. Swimming, swimming, swimming. My sis booked a hotel with an indoor pool. Fantastic idea. The kiddos loved every single second of it and could have spent the entire trip in the pool. Unfortunately for me and not so unfortunately for the other guests in the hotel, I forgot my suit and wasn't able to go in with them. I looked like such a diva of a parent to every other adult there that was shamelessly swimming with their kiddos but, oh well, I wasn't about to go and spend $100 on a suit that I wouldn't ever wear again (I am a tad bit picky when it comes to swim suits are concerned.)
Oh yes, a palm tree. Mini, yes but, we loved the warmer weather.
On the way home, we spotted a Petco and it was adoption day. We had to stop to see the kitties. That brought up questions as to the mysterious disappearance of Kally and Kai (the cats that I had for 10 years) but, questions were quickly diverted with shots of Benadryl to my very allergy ridden kiddos.


Ahhhh. Cove Fort. You have to understand this tradition. You see, on the road down to St. George, there is a little historical monument just off the freeway. It is a fort that was used by the Mormon pioneers waaaay back when. It is a place that is kind of cool to visit once. However, my family has made a tradition of stopping and taking a picture any time you drive to or from St. George. You just have to get out and take a picture, email or text it to everyone that you know and then you can move on.

The catch is... you have to do it quickly or you will have to take the tour given by the senior couple missionaries. I don't mind taking the tour every once in a while but, I can't do it every time. During the winter though, the missionaries don't see a lot of visitors and they eagerly jump to visit with whoever drives up. We had a missionary at our car almost before we had a chance to get out. He was rather disappointed that we didn't take the tour this time.
All in all, FABULOUS trip. It was so good to get away and enjoy some time with just Bear and Nena and my sis. It was a short couple of days but, so very relaxing. Just wish that I hadn't come home to such a sickie Toad.

Randomness of Motherhood

I have a friend who loves randomness. She finds joy in the common and unnoticed. She is constantly making me chuckle. The other day she was posed with the question by her sister "What do you do, just walk around looking for random?" I thought that it was a brilliant idea! So, that is just what I did.

I am in the middle of HUGE Spring Cleaning Fest here at my house and most of the randomness has been collected and put away. However, I have noticed the cute quirky little things that my kids have been doing. So, tonight, I walked around and snapped pictures of what was still intact from their daily wanderings and creativity.

I need to do this more often and just snap pictures of randomness. Those are the things that really speak to the fact that I LOVE that children live in my home!


Nena went a little nuts on the valentines this year and we decided to spice up the entry way with her collage. She has crying hearts, baby hearts, family hearts and hearts that are in need of an asthma inhaler... no really... it is there. She really is quite creative.

Besides from the fact that I REALLY need to scrub and repaint the doors and fittings, I love that she finds joy in the toys that come in fast food kids meals. She LOVED the interchangeable door signs. I get in more trouble by my kiddos for throwing away those dumb, free Happy Meal toys than you would ever imagine. They must know how to keep an inventory because they know almost immediately when one is missing.

Bear loves stickers and tape. I am always finding random things taped to his walls. He is so proud of his accomplishments and likes to display them! He used to have a display on the car window of all of the stickers that he would get at school and the doctor office. Yes, we looked very white trash. Yes, it drove Harvey absolutely nut. But, no, I didn't care and Bear was thrilled that he had his own window art.

For this one, I snapped two pictures several minutes apart. Toad has a collection of toads that are kept on a bookcase to the side of his crib. Every night he grabs as many toads off the shelves and plays with them until he falls asleep. They get put back every morning. He thinks that they are "pity cool."

A few minutes later, he had kicked off his covers (yes, his absolute FAVORITE blanket is a pink and brown zebra striped super fluffy number that a friend gave to me for my birthday) and snuggled up with his toad and his Halloween book. Oh, and notice.... even he is dressed in green. As a side note, Toad is very picky about how he sleeps. He prefers no pants and absolutely detests those one piece sleepers. If I put him in a sleeper, he will wake up in the middle of the night, take it off and throw it across the room and spend the rest of the night as a nakie. I tried to put socks on him but, they end up in a pile under his bed.

Bear has a different taste in evening reading materials. Oddly enough, this book as the same effect on me. Don't get me wrong, I love it and read it every day but......

This picture is what made me think of randomness in the first place. This little glass box sits on top of my vanity in my room. Ordinarily, it is filled with lavender buds but, someone who will not be named, accidentally spilled it all over the bathroom carpet. HUGE mess! It made the bathroom smell amazing though. Apparently, someone thought that it would be much better filled by Randal, the purple monster from Monsters Inc. I just found this randomly yesterday.


No, we do not believe in capital punishment for fairyland. Nena LOVES this fairy and was trying to make her look like she was flying. This is the top of a shampoo bottle and it is tied to the window in my shower. Yes, I have a window in my shower.

Hmmmm..... who does she get this one from. We got some flowers for Valentines day. After a week, they looked pretty dead. So, into the garbage they went. Apparently, Nena didn't agree with my decision to throw out the deceased roses and divided them equally between herself and her two brothers. Each one had a small vase of 4 completely dead roses. I threw the boys away before I thought to do this post. I do like however, that Nena added all of the fluff stuff to her bunch (baby's breath and the sparkly stems.)

There is a statue outside of a bank near my home and it is constantly being decorated by teens. Well, my little fairy is constantly dressing up this little fairy by adding hair accessories, sunglasses or other fun gems. Apparently, this little fairy was getting a bit bored so, Nena spiced up her evening with a little light reading. Notice that it is a manual on a flying fairy that she has.


Aren't boxes interesting. When you go to someone's house and see a box as a decoration, aren't you always dying to know what is inside? No? Just me? Well, maybe it is because I am always finding interesting things stashed away in boxes, jars, cubbies, vases, cupboards and yes.... even the fridge. Here is Bear's blankie that we are constantly in search of.

I gotta give it to Toad. He doesn't take "no" for an answer. When mom says, "no more cookies until after dinner" he understands, "get the toddler chair and get ready to climb."


I have to say, there are times that I would like to do the same thing to the Jazz Dancers.

Looks like Hogwarts is moving into my basement. As far as I can tell, my lamp is going to be in Huffle Puff.

Micro mini tents. I have two tiny Ikea end tables that put next to each other make a great little coffee table for my theater area. If you can turn it into a hide out, my kids will make it so.

I particularly like the tie back.


Who needs a hamster house for a zhu zhu pet when you have a nice big air hockey table. The great part about this one is that the table is completely off limits to the kiddos unless an adult is in the room. So, either zhu zhu pets are exempt from this rule or they are the adult on duty. I haven't figured that one out yet.


It doesn't get better than a talking teddy bear riding a masked superhero rocking horse. There are just so many ways to have fun with that one.


When it comes down to it, this saying is the essence of enjoying every moment of being a mom. I often times get cranky because I am cleaning up one mess after another only to turn around and clean up the first mess all over again. It doesn't help that I am on a mission to completely clean out and organize my house. However, I am so glad that I took just a minute to look around and see the reason that I am constantly cleaning up the mess. I love it and will try to take time to take in the random.