Spring Break

For Spring Break, I packed the kids in the car and drove down to Tucson, Arizona to visit my sister Michelle with my parents. I car ride down actually went pretty well unless you count the fact that it was snowing here when we left which made for some slow spots and then also that a couple of my kids get car sick and threw up. Although, throwing up is nothing new for my kids, so they just threw up in their little throw up bags and we just kept on driving. Then when we got to a place with a trash can, we would throw the bag away and keep on going. Jenna threw up twice and Spencer threw up once. I know, TMI, but this is my journal, so you get ALL the gory details.

We were supposed to leave at 5 in the morning, I even set my alarm so that I could get up shower and then get the kids ready. However, I must have just turned my alarm off and went back to sleep because the next thing I know, there is someone ringing my doorbell at 5 in the morning and I was thinking, "Who in the world would be ringing my doorbell at 5 in the morning?" Then it dawns on me that I overslept my alarm. It was my parents they were all ready to go. So I jumped out of bed, got dressed, and while the kids got ready with Steve's help, I packed the cooler (the rest of out stuff was already in the car) and then we were gone by 5:30.

When we first got to Michelle's house (around 5:00 we made pretty good time) Spencer was VERY excited to see that they have a Nintendo Wii.Melissa immediately changed into shorts (remember, it was snowing in Utah).And Jayden headed outside to play in the backyard. Where he continued to play for the rest of the week.We mainly just hang out at Michelle's house. It was nice not to have things scheduled all the time and just let the kids play and relax. On Wednesday, my parents went to the Grand Canyon (Thank goodness because my Mom has only been talking about it for the past SEVERAL years, and now she can understand why we haven't wanted to go with our little kids) so Michelle and I took our kids to the Desert Museum which has some animals for the kids to see. The first thing we did is took our kids to see a bird show. But man was it crowded and mostly with old people with huge cameras. I think there were several groups of senior citizens there. And they had all of the up close spots. You just stand along a trail, and so our kids could only see the birds when they were flying right above our heads and that was only for a split second.That was where Jayden has his first and only melt down. He was not happy to be standing there with a bunch of tall people all around and no clue what was going on. Not to mention, it was a little hot just standing there in the sun.So, we said bag that and just left the bird show and took our kids to see the rest of the stuff. Here's Jenna, Jayden and Meagan (Michelle's youngest looking at the Gilo Monster. Funny thing is I have a picture of Melissa, Spencer and Rebecca (Michelle's) oldest doing the same thing the last time we went like 5 years ago.
See, funny how that works!

Thursday night, we took the kids to Mesa for the Mesa Temple Easter pageant. My Dad and I had all the kids (minus Meagan) in my van. They mostly just watched movies while we drove up there. Thank goodness for portable DVD players.Here is the kids with some of the cast from the show.
We took a picnic lunch and ate that there for dinner and then when it got dark, moved over to the seats.

I think this was the ONLY time my kids were even the slightest bit cold the entire time we were there. The weather was is the 70's and 80's every day. All in all, I think that the kids all had a pretty great time while we were there. I should have taken more pictures of the kids just doing the everyday stuff, but I didn't think about it. I was too busy enjoying just doing nothing! Thanks Michelle and Brett for a great time!