utah va-ca: part wedding. . . part final week

finally. here it is: part 3.

monday, 8.17.09: the wedding. grant spent the day with his cousins swimming and we don't have any pictures because i kept the camera. i spent the day making the wedding cake. it was. . .fun. at least once i knew it would turn out well it was. i wrote all about it here. then it was time for the ceremony. it was a very happy moment.

after the ceremony, my oldest brother and his wife hit the grills and cooked kabobs for everyone. we ate,the kids played,

and everyone visited,hazel and 'spaceship' had a showdown:and rocket won:

and then it was time to cut the beautiful, beautiful cake:

wednesday, 8.19.09: we visited cousin carl and the new church history library in salt lake city.

while we were there carl and hazel caught up with some reading:

thursday, 8.20.09: this was our last day. we spent the afternoon in payson doing laundry and saying goodbye. hazel and lucy got early/late birthday presents from nanny and granddad:

hazel knew exactly what to do:

lucy was slower, but just as thurough:

they each got a new baby doll and strollers as well as a couple of movies. thanks again, mom and dad.

after presents hazel went to meet mary alice as she got off the bus:

and they walked home together:

that is it for the va-ca. it was busy but we enjoyed seeing everyone.

utah va-ca: part II

ok. i took lots of pictures in utah. this being the case, i'm separating said photos into several posts. the slide show was part 1 (8.4-8.10.09). here's part II (8.11-8.16.09):

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tuesday the 11th: we went to the tracy aviary in salt lake city with cousins carl, velvet, grace, laura and kate. as we were walking through the park to the aviary, the girls stopped to pose several times. this one is my favorite (and the only one lucy made it into):

left to right: lucy, laura, kate, hazel and grace

hazel was very excited to meet the ugly duckling. grant was giddy with delight at all of the predatory birds. lucy was less than thrilled to ride the carousel:she cried just about the whole time. i'm not sure why, she's been on several rides before. oh well. later that evening, we had dinner with my sister and family. lucy bonded with sarah:recognize that quilt? hazel had fun bouncing on the bed with avah:thursday the 13th: the girls and i spent the day in payson with my parents. i worked on flowers for the wedding cake:hazel helped nanny and mary alice pick the ripe blackberries:then she and mary alice watched a movie:and lucy read to herself:now it's time to meet rocket aka 'spaceship':isn't he cute? i kind of want to keep him. . . . anyway, then we picked up grant, who had spent the day with his old professor, and headed back to payson to meet our almost sister-in-law. on the drive over we saw a huge rainbow:it was even a double rainbow:so pretty! finally we made it to leah's surprise birthday party:then it was back to pleasant grove, to see jewel, johnny, hayden and brand new baby raygen:i think this is a precious picture, even if grant looks like a bobblehead.

friday the 14th: i went up to payson to bake the cake while grant took the girls to a park with jewel, johnny, hayden and raygen:

'peek-a-boo!'

saturday the 15th: s'mores!

sunday the 16th: cousins mike, brenda, berkeley, sam, sydney and maia were visiting from oregon. they came down with carl, velvet and co. for dinner:

from left to right: sydney, kate, hayden, hazel, laura, grace and maia

sam & lucy

coming soon: utah va-ca: part 3: the wedding. . .

home again, home again, jiggity-jig

well, we made it back to h-town. i took this picture as we flew into the city: yeah right. i should have been so lucky. no, we didn't fly, we drove. 24 long, monotonous hours. broken only by the smell of a ripe diaper, the flash of the gas light warning or lucy's piercing scream. it was a long and tiring 2 days.

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our first day started, as usual, later than we'd planned. by 10 pm we'd only made it to albequerque, which is less than halfway. but we decided to stop, get a good night's sleep and hit the road early. so we did, at the first and, disappointingly, nastiest motel we saw. we got up early and, thanks to the motel having no free breakfast (cheapskates), we were on the road quickly. hazel, who that night had shown signs of being sick (runny nose, small cough and not wanting to eat or run around), seemed more herself. she was content to watch her movies and lucy even took a little nap in the morning. a good start altogether.

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the day continued relatively smoothly. we stopped for the usual reasons. we reminisced about past drives. and [almost] before we knew it, it was 9:30 pm and we were less than 120 miles away from houston! the goal was in sight, hazel was sleeping and lucy was watching peter pan. "this drive wasn't so bad," we said. then lucy, in her usual 'all or nothing' attitude, decided she was done being in her carseat. have you ever heard that child's squeal of delight? now try to imagine the noise she makes when she's really upset. oh the humanity!

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it was awful. i could not calm her down. neither could her bottle or her binky or a movie. grant finally rolled down his window to just drown her out. with the 75 mph wind blowing in her face she kind of stopped crying, but she just started up again every time he closed his window. finally, she wore herself out (it only took about 2 hours) and she fell asleep whimpering.

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we decided to stop at a wal-mart by our apartment to pick up some food, so we wouldn't have to do it on a sunday. as we pulled in, my heart sank. the parking lot was less than half full (a bad sign for wal-mart). it was about 11:45 and i had just assumed that the place would be open 24 hours. luckily, i was able to get in and pick up bare essentials, i.e. milk, yogurt, cereal, etc. just as i was trying to remember if we had any eggs, a voice announced that anyone not at the checkouts would not be able to checkout. so i ran, almost in tears, to the front of the store. i made it in the nick of time and as i came out and started walking to the car, i could hear the kids.

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hazel had awakened, miserable, and she joined lucy, who was going full steam. so with both kids wailing, we drove the last 3 blocks home. just as grant was looking for the road to turn on, there, in the rear view mirror, flashed red and blue lights.

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so, we got pulled over, literally right across the street from our new apartment. in my head i thought, 'once the officer comes to the window and hears how the girls are carrying on, he'll let us off. . .' and can you just guess what happened next? the girls, both of them, immediately calmed down and didn't make a peep while the officer introduced himself and said that grant was pulled over for speeding. as the policeman walked back to his car, i fought back the strong desire to either laugh hysterically or burst into tears that would put the girls to shame.

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after 5 minutes or so, the officer came back to the window and said he was letting us off with a warning. he said that he knew we were tired but that was no reason to speed (in case you're wondering how fast we were going, we don't know. i doubt grant was going more than 5 over, since we were trying to find our road and the speed limit was 35). he was going to have us switch places since grant looked so tired, but when we told him we lived right across the street, he just let us go.

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but it's all over. we're home. we were blessed to not get an expensive ticket, probably because we were trying to avoid shopping on sunday. the girls slept in until almost 10 am (and so did grant and i). we're slowing beginning to get things in order. and hopefully, in a few minutes, we'll all be taking naps. . .

what we've been doing. . .

since i had a billion pictures, i decided to do a slideshow rather than a super long post. sadly, you'll all miss out on some of the details, like how we finally got to meet grant's half-sister, aliyah, and our niece, sarah; how dangerously slippery the hike was with the steep, shale-shard covered trail; how bad i and some (or most) of my siblings are at wiffle ball; and how hazel calls jared's dog, rocket, 'spaceship' and the trampoline 'bounce-o-line'. we are having lots of fun visiting with family. hazel and lucy love being around their grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.

me ol' bamboo

the last week has been super busy. we packed:hazel cleaned:

and we moved it all through torrential rain to our new apartment. here are some peeks:

this is the view from the front door. straight ahead is the dining area, the doorway on the left is the pantry inside our bigger (not big) kitchen.

the hallway closet.

the hallway, looking down to the master bedroom. the girls room is on the left, the hall closet is the first door on the right and the bathroom is the second. i'm really excited about our new place. i'll post better pictures of it later when it's all put together. the only thing i'm sad to leave behind at our old place (which i loved, until we got neighbors) is the beautiful bamboo that was right outside our door:

anyway, we finished moving saturday and on sunday, we left for utah. the first day made for some pretty bland scenery:

but once we made it into colorado, it got more interesting:

the girls were ok. hazel was easily entertained with coloring and movies (at least until our players broke, sigh, it'll be a long drive back).

lucy, on the other hand, screamed and squealed a lot. we found the reason why on the second day, she has another tooth (her left eye-tooth) and a little tylenol conked her out:

saturday's monday night flashback #22

shocked? you should be: i'm early, not late this time. i thought that today, being our 6th anniversary, would be appropriate for a flashback. six years is a long time. a fifth of my life. a sixth of grant's. we've done a lot. we danced and dated. grant tried to teach me to mountain bike. we went on a cruise to mexico. we worked together. we visited san diego, oregon, las vegas, wyoming and idaho. we've thrown pancakes. grant completed his bachelors and masters degree. we've had two daughters, who have given us many adventures. we moved to texas for more school. here's to 60 more years full of adventure.

sorry, no new-old pictures. they're all packed away. perhaps i'll update this post later. . .