I will finish posting about our trip at a later date. Until then I'll just give y'all a heads up on what's up. We're moving. In three weeks. When we left on our family vacation we hadn't even IMAGINED that we would be considering even entertaining the idea of moving...So Yes, there is more to this story. and no right now is not the time for me to write about the details. I have to keep packing. OH and Melissa can I please have more boxes? And thanks for the ones you've given me so far!!!!
Back to busy I must go
Good day to ya.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Friday, July 18, 2008
Third Leg
No, I'm not sure *technically* how many legs you can have in one trip. And I am sure a punchline will emerge soon. You'll know when it happens. Anyway...
We left Laramie and headed to our boomerang destination. Which would be the point in our trip that would head us back in an easterly direction. This location was Rigby, Idaho. The whole point of this trip was to introduce all of our children to Jason's grandfather, who was diagnosed with brain cancer a couple of months ago. Well we didn't make it. I guess he didn't make it. He died on June 8th. But we'll discuss that a little later.
So we were off to go visit Jason's Grandma and his Uncle and Aunt (whom I have talked to but never met.)
We *potty breaked* outside of Rawlins(one of the armpits of WY) and I offered to drive. Jason had driven the entire trip thus far and I was trying to be considerate. So down the highway we start and we ran into the ONLY real weather of the whole trip. It started pouring rain. Like Texas rain. Thing is they use black top on their roads. Not concrete like they do in TX. It creates this silver mirror like effect when you have tons of rain. I couldn't see crap. And then there were the semi's. Wind, rain, tractor trailers and 75mph. ahh driving in WY. The only thing we were missing was the snow and ice, oh and fog. Needless to say Jason panicked a little and drove the rest of the way.
We cut through the Targhee National Forest. This is when things started to get gorgeous.
I must sorta apologize for the occasional blurred bottom these pictures are all taken while driving and through the dang closed window.
I must admit that I have never seen Wyoming so green. Growing up there and being in art classes you learn a lot about the color yellow ochre. That is typically the color in any foreground of a WY landscape. They have had a ton of rain and snow this year. And man was it worth it to see the results. I appreciate the green in TX it's green here all the time, but it was almost as though WY was saying "look at me. Aren't I pretty. I can be green, too."
To be continued...
We left Laramie and headed to our boomerang destination. Which would be the point in our trip that would head us back in an easterly direction. This location was Rigby, Idaho. The whole point of this trip was to introduce all of our children to Jason's grandfather, who was diagnosed with brain cancer a couple of months ago. Well we didn't make it. I guess he didn't make it. He died on June 8th. But we'll discuss that a little later.
So we were off to go visit Jason's Grandma and his Uncle and Aunt (whom I have talked to but never met.)
We *potty breaked* outside of Rawlins(one of the armpits of WY) and I offered to drive. Jason had driven the entire trip thus far and I was trying to be considerate. So down the highway we start and we ran into the ONLY real weather of the whole trip. It started pouring rain. Like Texas rain. Thing is they use black top on their roads. Not concrete like they do in TX. It creates this silver mirror like effect when you have tons of rain. I couldn't see crap. And then there were the semi's. Wind, rain, tractor trailers and 75mph. ahh driving in WY. The only thing we were missing was the snow and ice, oh and fog. Needless to say Jason panicked a little and drove the rest of the way.
We cut through the Targhee National Forest. This is when things started to get gorgeous.
I must sorta apologize for the occasional blurred bottom these pictures are all taken while driving and through the dang closed window.
I must admit that I have never seen Wyoming so green. Growing up there and being in art classes you learn a lot about the color yellow ochre. That is typically the color in any foreground of a WY landscape. They have had a ton of rain and snow this year. And man was it worth it to see the results. I appreciate the green in TX it's green here all the time, but it was almost as though WY was saying "look at me. Aren't I pretty. I can be green, too."
To be continued...
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Second Leg
After staying in Amarillo, we left early (but not Too early) to head off to our next over night spot, which would be my parents house in Laramie. We were off to a slow start considering we had to have 4 "potty breaks" in the first hour. We drove 287 through a tiny spot of Oklahoma, (The whole time we were there I kept wishing I new more of the song than just "OOOOO klahoma where the wind comes (sweeping)rushing through the plains" see I don't even know that much) It was nice to drive that way because it made getting into Colorado so much faster. Colorado is another state that I consider home. The only thing about that side of Colorado is that it's very FLAT, it's a lot like OOOOOklahoma. I guess Heavenly Father didn't plan all of the landscape around the future state lines, curious. Going the other route you can definitely tell when you hit Colorado from New Mexico. But here...not so much. Nothing really exciting happened through Colorado. It's always a relief to see the East side of the Rocky Mountains, especially coming up near Colorado Springs and Denver. Fort Collins was a place I spent a lot of time in when I was in high school. And the Denver Temple is our temple. So home we were. We were all very excited to jump on i-25 and head up to Cheyenne. My kids got to peak at the buffalo at the Terry Bison ranch between Ft. Collins and Cheyenne. The only real difference looking at cows and buffalo from a distance is that the bison are bigger black dots.
Between Cheyenne and Laramie is a place called Vedauwoo (vee-da-voo) This is a place that I spent many an hour in my teenage years. Playing, climbing, camping, playing some more.
Sorry my pictures aren't great. It was a drive by photo shoot. And our passenger side window doesn't roll down. But you get the drift. Anyway...
By the time you get to Vedauwoo we're pretty much home.
Laramie was gracious enough to have rain for me. I love rain more than any other weather. There is a difference between Texas rain and Wyoming rain. The smell. TX rain doesn't really have a smell. But you can tell it's going to rain in Wyoming a good 20 min. ahead of time by the glorious smell. It's fresh and clean and nothing like those air fresheners that claim to be the scent of "spring rain." My kids were funny. Looking at the rain falling from the clouds in the distance they commented that it looked like the clouds were throwing up.
blurry sign of mine and my husbands school, they didn't teach me no good grammar. Just kidding, maybe they would have if I had continued to finish my degree instead of having a litter of children.
and finally at my parents house. They had a really snowy spring so we got there in time for the iris's to be in a beautiful bloom.
My Grandmother will be 90 on August 30th. She was in the hospital with pneumonia. So we had to go visit. It was very strange not having her at the house. We have something in common. We both LOVE Smallville. She is looking forward to the new season starting. I hope she makes it.
To be continued...
Between Cheyenne and Laramie is a place called Vedauwoo (vee-da-voo) This is a place that I spent many an hour in my teenage years. Playing, climbing, camping, playing some more.
Sorry my pictures aren't great. It was a drive by photo shoot. And our passenger side window doesn't roll down. But you get the drift. Anyway...By the time you get to Vedauwoo we're pretty much home.
Laramie was gracious enough to have rain for me. I love rain more than any other weather. There is a difference between Texas rain and Wyoming rain. The smell. TX rain doesn't really have a smell. But you can tell it's going to rain in Wyoming a good 20 min. ahead of time by the glorious smell. It's fresh and clean and nothing like those air fresheners that claim to be the scent of "spring rain." My kids were funny. Looking at the rain falling from the clouds in the distance they commented that it looked like the clouds were throwing up.
blurry sign of mine and my husbands school, they didn't teach me no good grammar. Just kidding, maybe they would have if I had continued to finish my degree instead of having a litter of children.
and finally at my parents house. They had a really snowy spring so we got there in time for the iris's to be in a beautiful bloom.
My Grandmother will be 90 on August 30th. She was in the hospital with pneumonia. So we had to go visit. It was very strange not having her at the house. We have something in common. We both LOVE Smallville. She is looking forward to the new season starting. I hope she makes it.
To be continued...
Sunday, July 13, 2008
First leg of the trip
So we started out early in the a.m. on the 23rd of June. Of course when your intentions are to leave at 5, 7 is usually the reality. You know what, I have to back track a week earlier. Oh and first explain why I am writing today which happens to be Sunday. I typically try to have Sunday be the day that the computer doesn't get turned on, but this Sunday I have everyone home due to a small breakout of the lower intestinal stomach flu, (need I say more?) I'm working on an ode to Mr. Clean and Clorox wipes in gratitude. uhhhh... Oh right a week before we left.
So when I lived in Laramie I made some of the best friends of my life. After about 21 years I came out with a handful that will all be living on my block in the Celestial Kingdom, or at least down the street. One of those is Val Pead. She and her sister, Sarah, taught me about something called unconditional love. Which they showed me on several occasions while I was working out some of my many issues during my "growing up" stage as a grown up. They also showed me how to play. Like all good LDS people do. And laugh, harder than I had ever laughed before. Those were some amazing years in college.
Val served her mission, ironically, in Houston. So almost 10 years later the prodigal daughter returned to her mission stomping grounds and to my house to visit my, in her own words, cute family. She is from a family of 12, 8 boys 4 girls. Needless to say she has great sympathy for Sariah. So exactly 4 weeks ago today, I went to pick her up from where she spent the first part of her trip and brought her here to spend the last part of her trip.
Monday we went to Katy Mills and Val treated us to lunch at Rainforest Cafe, in honor of Sariah's birthday (which was the next day.) Caleb had his ears plugged the entire time, it's a little loud, but the rest of the kids enjoyed it.
Tuesday noon-ish we took the kids to Chuck E. Cheese's.
Tuesday night Dallas, Stacey and Melissa came over to play games. My kids were in bed, mostly, and it was tons of fun to have grown-up company. And we all ate way to much junk.
Wednesday Val introduced me and Sariah to pedicures. (pretty toes!)
Thursday we took her to the airport.
Friday we went back to the airport to pick up Jason from work. Did I mention that my little kids think that he works at the airport for three weeks at a time? Saturday we spent trying to pack as best we could for leaving on Monday. Sunday was our Sacrament meeting on music. Sariah sang and did a great job, except for the fact that she tried to back out at the last minute and I had to pay her. She is a natural alto like myself, the song was a little high and she was nervous about how she sounded. I also sang. Everything went just great. Sunday night, my sister came to pick up the dog, she generously said she would watch him for us while we were gone. And Dallas came to pick up the key, she had very generously agreed to come and care for the rest of the critters here at home. I think she even watered my plants. Thanks Dallas! Now where was I? oh yeah...finally. Monday morning we were on the road by 7a.m. Ready and excited to spend the next 12 hours driving across Texas. We went by way of Austin and the "hill country" I was actually impressed. It was very pretty. Everyone did really well. Sariah and I colored for a while in the front seat. The back two rows had movies. Heather had given us an extra screen to hook to our portable DVD player. That was awesome, but I had concerns about the child in the front row not being included in the movies, so I went and bought another set. It worked out great. The older two got to watch a movie and the youngers got to watch one too. So we made it to Amarillo around 8 or 9p.m. and stayed at a very nice hotel. We had talked about swimming, but Jason and I were exhausted, and the kids probably would have all drowned. So they were disappointed but survived.
"Ahhh, what a way to relax after spending the whole day in the car..."
To Be Continued...
So when I lived in Laramie I made some of the best friends of my life. After about 21 years I came out with a handful that will all be living on my block in the Celestial Kingdom, or at least down the street. One of those is Val Pead. She and her sister, Sarah, taught me about something called unconditional love. Which they showed me on several occasions while I was working out some of my many issues during my "growing up" stage as a grown up. They also showed me how to play. Like all good LDS people do. And laugh, harder than I had ever laughed before. Those were some amazing years in college.
Val served her mission, ironically, in Houston. So almost 10 years later the prodigal daughter returned to her mission stomping grounds and to my house to visit my, in her own words, cute family. She is from a family of 12, 8 boys 4 girls. Needless to say she has great sympathy for Sariah. So exactly 4 weeks ago today, I went to pick her up from where she spent the first part of her trip and brought her here to spend the last part of her trip.
Monday we went to Katy Mills and Val treated us to lunch at Rainforest Cafe, in honor of Sariah's birthday (which was the next day.) Caleb had his ears plugged the entire time, it's a little loud, but the rest of the kids enjoyed it.
Tuesday noon-ish we took the kids to Chuck E. Cheese's.
Tuesday night Dallas, Stacey and Melissa came over to play games. My kids were in bed, mostly, and it was tons of fun to have grown-up company. And we all ate way to much junk.
Wednesday Val introduced me and Sariah to pedicures. (pretty toes!)
Thursday we took her to the airport.
Friday we went back to the airport to pick up Jason from work. Did I mention that my little kids think that he works at the airport for three weeks at a time? Saturday we spent trying to pack as best we could for leaving on Monday. Sunday was our Sacrament meeting on music. Sariah sang and did a great job, except for the fact that she tried to back out at the last minute and I had to pay her. She is a natural alto like myself, the song was a little high and she was nervous about how she sounded. I also sang. Everything went just great. Sunday night, my sister came to pick up the dog, she generously said she would watch him for us while we were gone. And Dallas came to pick up the key, she had very generously agreed to come and care for the rest of the critters here at home. I think she even watered my plants. Thanks Dallas! Now where was I? oh yeah...finally. Monday morning we were on the road by 7a.m. Ready and excited to spend the next 12 hours driving across Texas. We went by way of Austin and the "hill country" I was actually impressed. It was very pretty. Everyone did really well. Sariah and I colored for a while in the front seat. The back two rows had movies. Heather had given us an extra screen to hook to our portable DVD player. That was awesome, but I had concerns about the child in the front row not being included in the movies, so I went and bought another set. It worked out great. The older two got to watch a movie and the youngers got to watch one too. So we made it to Amarillo around 8 or 9p.m. and stayed at a very nice hotel. We had talked about swimming, but Jason and I were exhausted, and the kids probably would have all drowned. So they were disappointed but survived.
"Ahhh, what a way to relax after spending the whole day in the car..."
To Be Continued...
Friday, July 11, 2008
Hey I'm back...sorta
So we drove up to Idaho and Wyoming for a couple of weeks when my husband was home. I'll be writing and sharing pictures in segments. We are also contemplating, very seriously, moving to WY again, so a lot of my free (haha) time will be spent painting and cleaning and throwing away and packing. The biggest obstacle will be selling this house in a decent amount of time. It will all work according to Heavenly Fathers plan, so I'm not panicking. There is just a lot of paint required to cover up 4 years of 7 very artistic kids. So in bits and pieces I will take time to drop in a blog or two and share some amazing pictures of some of the most beautiful landscapes I've ever seen.
Good day to ya.
Good day to ya.
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