Our Utah Trip

[BUT FIRST...in case you missed this on facebook...]

NOW, back to UTAH...Kids in the car near the UT-ID border on I-15

***

We got super lucky because Uncle Jess (Rich's bro who lives in Florida but develops wind farms all over the US) was in SLC for ONE day, and it was the day we we drove down from MT! We met him for dinner in downtown SLC.
Before dinner, we took a walk to stretch our legs (and our wallets at The Body Shop sale...I scored some new pink grapefruit body wash and lotion) at the Gateway.



It was a VERY hot day in SLC, so we let the kids get soaked in the fountain...

Heidi got the wettest (of course).

James didn't want to get wet, but Addie "helped" him.

SPLASH!
***

We went to the car and changed into dry clothes, then we went to dinner at Tucano's Brazilian Grill...YUM! The gang with Jess

The gang with me

***

After dinner we caught the trolley and rode over to temple square. It was so calm and beautiful!

We got to visit the Christus statue

Heidi, Addie, Rich, James, and Jess looking at Jesus with T-Square in the background
***

We took the train back to Gateway and said goodbye to Uncle Jess, and headed down to the Phillips' home in Eagle Mountain where we were staying. I didn't take any pictures of our kind hosts, Rita and Geoff--SAD!--but we had such a nice time there! On Friday morning, we went to Aunt Jill's hair school to get hair cuts, then we did a little thrift shopping, stopped by Mom & Mark's house, and headed up to South Fork Park for a picnic with the Buchert Clan.
(We had a blast with The Tribe)

Heidi at the park sign.

Rich bought James a set of little construction machines as an early bday gift while we were getting our haircut and he was OBSESSED with them the rest of the trip, bless his heart. Addie happily returned the favor of all the times he played Barbie's with her and she played with him at the park while we waited for our friends to arrive.

Such a boy...I LOVE IT!

The girls wanted to show off thier new hair do's...

Heidi

Addie

Heidi checking out the mountains around Provo Canyon

more playing in the dirt

more posing...Sweet Adeline
***

Eventually our dear ones arrived and I was surprised to see Baby Sam Egan...

he's 13 now! Sam is my dear Heidi's ("Big Heidi") oldest child and only son.

This little doll-baby is Helena Ruth--RUTHIE--Heidi's baby girl.

I kept remembering that Heidi told me Ruthie's sisters called her "Hen-on-a-roof" when she was born. So cute!

Gathering for a blessing on the food

[clockwise from bottom: Jeanne, Grandfather Buchert, Papa Rodriguez, Oma Buchert, Maggie, Sam, Amy, Chris [they go together], Heidi, Elijah, and a sliver of Rob]

Digging in

[Grandfather, Maggie, Chris, Heidi, Elijah, Ellen, Geo, Anna, Rob, Johanna, Me]

James' new trucks were a big hit.

Finn, James, Ruthie and Josie playing in the dirt

James & Josie

The kids used charcoal from the fire pit to draw these amazing pictures

[Finn, Heidi, James, Addie]

Maggie, Heidi, James, and Scout

[Scout and Finn belong to Johanna; Maggie is Heidi's 2nd child]

"Little Heidi" and Josie are 18 days apart.

Heidi and Georgia were telling me all about a groovy website called "Knock-Off Wood."
I look dorkily excited.

The Two Heidi's

(remember this?)

James & Josie

***

We had a beautiful night with the Bucherts et al, and then we stopped by the Petersens to swap cousins. Addie slept over with Ally & Belle & Ben. We took Jack with us to sleep over with Heidi and James at Phillips'. SO FUN! On Saturday Rich did some yard-saling with his buddy Jeff Spalding, then we went back to Petersens to swap kids--we left Jack & Heidi & Ben with my BIL and took the girls with me and Jill to do some school shopping while Rich went to lunch with Jeff. When we got back to Petersen's, Heidi was goofing around riding Ben's little bike and she crash-landed on her face and scraped up her knee. She had a mild concussion and couldn't remember the wreck, but she seemed better an hour later. We went to AF Hospital to visit my mom in ICU--she looked really good and we had a good visit. She should be going home later today. After the hospital, we headed up to SLC to Martin & Becca Buchert's house for a potluck/family dance.

Scout, Anna, Daffoldil, Heidi, and Finn playing with the ipad.

Note the tragic road rash.

Martin & Becca have a trampoline...it was a big hit. I don't think James ever got off!

I love this photo of him mid-air, with Ruthie and Addie.

Picnic time!

{Clockwise from top: Jeanne, me, Georgia, Heidi, Becca, Johanna with Finn, Jacob & Anna [they go together]}

Martin & Andy overseeing the festivities

Jumping Beans!

Ruthie, Heidi, Scout, James, Addie, Josie

The Family Dance kicked off with some limbo.

Our Fine Host showed us how it's done...Go, Martin!

Daffodil looks pretty daunted by the limbo stick!

(Geo and Addie held it up)

James, Heidi, and Ruthie (in a new dress), still jumping

Johanna looks exasperated with her kids--Finn and Scout are so cute!

[and I couldn't help noticing Johanna's AWESOME jeans and belt]

Rich did an awesome limbo tuck-n-roll!

Jacob and Anneleise are engaged...so they limbo'ed together

Heidi and Rich take a breather

Heidi lost a tooth on Friday, before the bike wreck.

I love this picture of Martin dancing with his girls. Daffodil looks super into it, and Anna looks so sweet over his shoulder.

Oh, my...there is much to comment on here. Mostly I love how Eden and Maggie (lower left corner) and Anneleise are all doing the same move.

Georgia raised the roof with some White Stripes

[[[ASIDE: do these fotos remind you of this?...]]]

[Village of the Damned, 1995]

The Two Heidis Dancing

Rob (far right) acts as a responsible eldest sibling and shows the kids how to boogie.

[Sam, Annie, Martin's legs, Heidi, Jeanne, Eden, Becca, Maggie, Rob]

***

As the evening wound down, we thought we should replicate our glam session photo from 1992, sans the glam, of course...

Remember this?

Here we are, 18 years later.

In living color!

Jamie, Jeanne, and Heidi =BFF!

Grossing Jeanne Out.

another attempt...mi amigas lindas!

I promised Heidi I wouldn't post this when Rich said, "Wait, Heidi looks tarded in that one," but I couldn't resist. Plus, how cute is Addie right there?

We had SO. MUCH. FUN.

Note Little Heidi being crazy here, and the addition of Heidi's sparkly little niece, Scout.

***

Oh, it was hard to leave that party. I love the tribe so much, and there were so many unfinished conversations. I wanted to talk to Anna about her wedding plans and life in Hawaii, to Joh about her recent move to SLC and life after Africa, to Heidi about every little thing--daily life, motherhood, marriage, being the bishop's/doctor's wife, etc., and Georgia and Jeanne and Becca, too. But the night slipped away and we'll have to catchup electronically (although it is my new mission to lure Martin and Becca up on a little family vaycay). I hope to visit Heidi in upstate New York VERY soon.

***

On Sunday morning, we got up early and cleaned up, said good by to Rita and Geoff, stopped to say goodbye to cousins, and hit the road around 11:30am. We took a couple of breaks along the way, the quickest and most refreshing being this one near a spring just over the Montana-Idaho border on Hwy 20...we were 2 hours from home.

James, Heidi, Addie at the spring.

Thank you, Bucherts/Egans/Smiths, for all the fun, and to The Phillips for the accomodations.

We love & miss you all!XO

Some Highlights

So far on our trip to Utah...
We've explored downtown SLC with Uncle Jess
(pictured here taking us out to dinner at Tucano's)...

We had a beautiful picnic with our Bucherts...

Reunited with "Big Heidi" visiting from New York

Got rreeeaaaallly dirty & cleaned up again!

***

Today we will go see Nana at the Hospital, play with Petersen Cousins, and hang with Bucherts again. YAY! LOTS more pictures to come!

NewsBrief

My Mama's in the American Fork Hospital with sepsis.

James has a double ear infection.

I have a sinus infection and the accompanying all-over inflammation is DEATH.

BUT...I caved and got us some antibiotics to kick this bug to the curb so we can party with the Buchert/ Egans like it's 1994 this weekend.

AND...I single-handedly did every bit of laundry in this house, sorted through every drawer, bin, and closet of kids' clothes, put all the keepers away, made piles of "awesome handmedowns" for friends, "too worn" for thrift store, and "need to be hemmed or mended" on my sewing table. All while watching a freaky French movie starring the ever-adorable Audrey Tatou on the satellite.

Click HERE to see what me wee ones were doing while I was in the AZ.

melins out.

Arizona

My Grandparents (who are more like parents to me) celebrated their 60th Wedding Anniversary on Sunday, August 22nd (and if you've been following the blog, you understand what a miracle it is that Grampy is still here to see the day). We had a family party for them on the 21st, so my sister Laura (who lives in Helena) and I decided to fly down together and attend the festivities. She arrived at my house on Wednesday night and slept over so we could leave at 5am to catch our 9am flight from Billings to Mesa, where we would meet our sister, Lisa, and proceed to Tucson.Laura took this picture of Thursday's sunrise near Columbus, MT

***

After Lisa picked us up and Laura got her rental car, we stopped in Casa Grade to pick up Laura's oldest son, Tallon, who was adopted in 1992 and raised by an LDS family (The Smiths! We love them!) in SW Colorado. Tallon decided to find his birth mother a few months ago and he met Laura earlier this summer. He was born during the first month of my mission in North Carolina, so I never got to see him or hold him like other people in my family. Here is our very first hug:

Tallon & Me

Tallon & Lisa
***

TUCSON!!!

We drove down to Tucson and checked in to our hotel, then went over to see the Grandparents. There we learned that mom (who had arrived from Utah the night before) was in the hospital. So we went to see her, then got some eegee's for dinner and went back to rest at the hotel.

Sam, Kristen, & Owen stopped by to visit us. Owen brought Grover ("Gwo-gwo")

As you can see, Owen is looking a lot like his pappy these days, and his mommy is still gorgeous as ever.

Mini-Sam!

This is the beautiful little garden around our pool

Tallon had fun swimming with his "Uncle" Marshall & "Aunt" Abby

I loved these courtyards at our hotel...I really want to take my family to Mexico!

Laura & Jared with Gramp & Gram

Me & Uncle Matthew hangin' at Gram's on Friday

Friday afternoon we went out to the Linden Chapel to help Sam & Kristen set up for the party.

Starting to make Kristen's vision a reality!

There's my alma mater!

(facing east on Speedway & Euclid--note the huge thunderheads coming from the southeast...

they would later bring a monstrous monsoon storm that lasted well into the night on Saturday. My wish for a full-blown, thunder-and-lightning monsoon storm came true in a big way!)

Tom, remember getting slurpees at this sev? It's totally pimped out now.

(the 7-11 near the Institute on UA campus)

***

I slept over at the G'rent's house on Friday because Aunt Marti went home to Sierra Vista for some R&R (it was Uncle Ralph's bday Sunday and Cousin Maren had her baby boy--Cooper Ralph Allred--on Saturday morning). It was delightful but too short! I loved eating oatmeal with my Grampy Saturday morning and vacuuming and visiting. Sam even stopped by and helped me fix the vacuum. It was just like old times, when we lived there, the 4 of us, 14 years ago. *sigh* Saturday afternoon, we got dressed up and the Mayberry's picked us up for the big party.

Me & Gramps--his hair is growing back after chemo and it really does feel just like bunny fur.

Kristen made this beautiful poster for the entrance to the party.

Cousins gathering

Sam & Owen

Our two baldies: Grampy and Mom

[mom released herself from the hospital and came to the party, but she is still very sick and back home in Utah]

Cousin Cortney brought this pretty little cake from Gram & Gramp

Uncle Matt and my little baby Candace Kay

Uncle Matt & Yarky--Larkin, my cutie cuz.

Cousin Bill and his baby, Bruin

(aka Bruiser...they bred him for rugby)

Cousin Dave Mayberry's family with the Grandparents:

David, Lucy, Papa, Gram, Lacy, and Penelope/Peeps

[see all the family shots here]

Cousin Elise with Robby, Sarah, and Jeff--such a cute family! We talked about how awesome Jeff is on the way to Phoenix after the party.

Dave & Peeps

[I have video of Peeps talking about the party--"it's for Gramma Lyn because she got married" how long ago? "2 hours ago"--and her new cousin, Cooper; I'll post that bit on vimeo soon]

We invited Michael & Anna Gregg to the dinner since we knew the Posties couldn't make it from Australia. These crazy Gregg boys--Marcus & Zachary-- were pretty good substitutes, but we missed our Liam & Spencer and the rest of the fam! (Thanks for coming, Greggs!)

Sam MC'ed a little family history quiz.

Elrey cousins: Bill & Cort, Pearl, and Affee

(and the back of Samantha's head).

A fun display of pictures Kristen & Lacy put together

Aunt Elaine & Pearl at the treat table

My cute mommy

Me & my Grampy

Me & my Gram

Tallon & Gram

As we were leaving, we got this picture of Uncle Matt's family:

Aunt Lorelyn, Uncle Matt, Samantha, Larkin, and Candace with the Grandparents.

It was SOOOOO great to see Larkin and Candace. I spent so much time with those kids when they were little, I feel like they're mine.

After the party, we drove up to Phoenix to sleep over at Lisa's house and catch our plane at 4am...here are Lisa and Tyler hanging out on the stairs while Laura and I got packed up. After this, we went out in a torrential downpour and got some Wendy's and watched SNL together and laughed ourselves to sleep (for 2-1/2 hours, then we left for the airport). Thanks for all the fun, Lisa--I love you! PS: Cody's the big spoon and don't you forget it!

***

We flew out of Mesa at 6am, landed in Billings at 9am local time (lost an hour--the flight is only and hour and 45 minutes! That somehow makes the 20-hour drive even more painful!) and were on the road back home by 10am. We got here at 11:45 and Laura got in her car and drove another 2 hours home. I had a hour to cook some lunch (warmed up chicken enchiladas and made brownies) and take a quick shower before my family came home from church. It was a joyous reunion...

Me & Addie

Me & James

Me & Heidi

My cute "Welcome Home Mom" sign...

so glad I went, but SOOOO glad to be home!