Arkansas Grovers: Christmas in Utah

We drove to Utah to spend Christmas with Andy's family. They moved there last December. It was different not being in Seattle, but Utah was beautiful with all the snow. The drive takes about 18 hours. It wasn't bad until we decided to stop in Denver for the night. It was about 1:00 in the morning. The kids had been asleep since 7:30 pm. We found a Ramada Inn that let dogs stay, so you can imagine it was crappy. It was in downtown Denver and as soon as we pulled in front of the hotel I see a homeless man. So I was worried that our van with all our stuff is going to be broken into while we are sleeping. When we get everyone inside the room, the kids think its morning and don't want to go to sleep. Dallin refuses to sleep and just wanders the room playing. Andy is trying to sleep and every time someone passes outside the room, Jack runs to the door and starts barking. We stayed 3 hours and decided staying was pointless. We go downstairs to check out and the man says that was a short stay. He was nice and gave us $20 off our bill, but we still had to pay $50 for the 3 hours. We finally arrive Friday afternoon at 1:00 pm. That night Tim and Maria and their girls arrived.

Saturday night Andy got sick with the stomach flu. It only lasted 12 hours.

Sunday evening we went to Temple square and saw the lights and manger display. It was beautiful. Robyn and D and their kids drove down and met us there. When we got back the kids made gingerbread houses.

Monday I woke up with the stomach flu and mine lasted two days. I was so bummed. I missed Christmas Eve pizza and Christmas day steak dinner. Thank goodness Andy and I were the only ones that got it.

Christmas Eve everyone went for pizza and tried to see a movie, but it was sold out. That night the kids wrote notes for Santa, listened to Grandpa read about Christ's birth, and sing Christmas songs. They also got to open matching pajamas.

Christmas morning the kids woke up around 6:30 am. They got just what they asked for. Except that they changed their minds last minute so Santa had to run to a lot of stores looking on Christmas Eve. Sydney got a new play kitchen, Baylee got a swimming Ariel barbie, and Dallin got a leap frog musical table. We had a good Christmas spending time with family. I got Andy a shot gun. He was very surprised.

The cousins had a great time playing together. They spent most of their time in the basement riding their scooters they got for Christmas.

While visiting in Utah, we went shopping, sledding, and the boys went skiing. The kids went to a trampoline place too. It snowed pretty much every day. I loved seeing the glistening snow.

News Years Eve we played minute to win it games and bought lots of snacks. Andy and I were the only ones that ate. I guess we were making up for lost time from being sick. Sydney got sick with the Roseola virus so she went to bed early, and so did Dallin. Baylee was the only child there and got to stay up late. She had fun helping with the games.

News Year day the girls went shopping again and on the way home I got in a car accident. It wasn't that bad, just scraped the front bumper a little, but it was the first day of the year and another bad thing to add to our vacation. The other car didn't have any damage.

We brought Jack on our trip and every day he threw up multiple times. It was frustrating and gross. Andy's parents house is brand new and I felt bad that he was ruining their house.

Andy and I got to go on a date to the Salt Lake City Temple. I had never been before. It was a great experience. Then we went to dinner at a Brazilian restaurant. It was delicious. Our favorite part was the grilled pineapple. The kids went on a date with Grammy and went to a jump house and Chick Fil A.

Honestly, we did have a fun trip visiting with family. Just every time we travel we end up getting sick. We are so grateful for loving families. They are a wonderful blessing in our lives.

The drive home was rough for me. I had a terrible sinus infection and driving through the mountains made it worse. It was freezing. The temperature outside said at one point -19 degrees. I had a bad attitude and was frustrated with the dog. He threw up in the car on our clean clothes that I had just washed. Andy packed the car the night before so I hadn't put some of the clothes in the suit cases. He put them in random places in the car. While stopped at McDonald's I had a thought from the Spirit that Jack was eating something that he shouldn't have. I ignored it and when we went out he had eaten a huge piece of carrot cake we were saving and some popcorn Baylee left out. Thank Goodness Jack didn't throw up. It was definitely a blessing.

Unfortunately he wasn't getting better. He had been sick for three weeks and was very skinny. Jack had a lot of allergies and had been a nuisance to me for several years. When we got home we put him down. It was a sad day. Andy and I cried a lot. I didn't think I would miss him that much. The kids could careless, really! I felt sad that he had died and wasn't coming back. We will miss you Jack.