Utah Trip (Catch Up Post)

Well, that was fun. 

We'd only been at Grandma's house for a few short hours before Carson jumped from the top bunk and cracked a bone in his foot. 

I knew something had gone wrong by the urgency in his voice. "Mom, mom, mommommommom," he said in a panic. "Come 'ere come 'ere come 'ere," I rushed to his side and he collapsed into tears while holding tightly to his right foot, and soon Brian and I were wrapping it in ice and tucking him into bed, talking in hushed tones about how we were going to work out the details of the following day, which now would need to include a visit to InstaCare.

Just a few hours before, on the drive up to Utah, our car had started flashing its 'check engine' light loudly in our faces. So that needed to be attended to as well. Thankfully, with Grandma and Grandpa, we had four adults around to help take care of all the things, so early in the morning I left the little kids with Grandma and Grandpa, loaded Carson into Grandpa's car, sent our own car away with Brian to the car repair shop, and drove Carson to the foot repair shop.

X-Rays confirmed the break and he was given a boot, crutches, and instructions to avoid all that is fun for the rest of the summer. Or, I'm pretty sure that's what he heard anyway. But even though we had to cancel our trip to Lagoon the following day, we tried to fill it with fun.

And what could be more fun than a boys against girls Chocolate Chip Cookie Baking Contest:

Timothy and I got to be the judges,

and we took our job very seriously judging the taste, the texture, the appearance of each cookie, and the presentation of the platter as a whole.

The girls came out victorious, but the boys handled their defeat well.

While the bakers were baking, Timothy and I went to the park across the street. Grandma and Grandpa live right across the street from an elementary school, so our kids love to go over there and play on the playground after school hours.

Eliza and I hung out in the shade of a tree for the most part. And tried to ignore the fact that there were hundreds (thousands?) of honey bees roaming around in the spring flower buds above our heads.

We took a day to introduce Eliza to her cousin Olivia.

Olivia tolerated the whole ordeal and even gave Eliza a few kisses. Cute.

This particular trip was all about the Alder family. But we snuck a night in with my family to see Amber in an outdoor Shakespeare play. And introduced her to Eliza.

We all enjoyed the play very much, even the children. That might have had something to do with the candy we kept dishing out, though.

Other than that, most of our time was spent hanging out at Grandma's.

Which is really a favorite place to hang. Her backyard is beautiful, relaxing, and fun.

Miles perfected his catching skills,

Timothy perfected his multitasking,

and his baby loving,

and his sand playing.

And we all enjoyed the perfect weather.

We love it here.