Utah trip

We got to go on nearly a week-long vacation to Utah to visit friends and spend time together as a family. I was pretty excited to get Max for a whole week, and to visit old friends. I was pretty worried about how the car ride would go with my two busy little boys. We decided to leave at 5am. Miles fell asleep quickly in the car but Charlie was awake and happy. I drove first so Max could sleep. I can't sleep in the car but I figured he should get rest in case I became too tired to drive. I loved driving through the Columbia gorge as the sun was rising. Even on the days I do get out of the house, it is never before the sun. Anyway, We made it 200 miles before Miles needed to eat and Charlie needed to stretch his legs. Our first stop was at a gas station where Max got Charlie a rubber band gun and they had fun shooting it around. 

During the next stretch, Max had to sit in the back and do some entertaining for the boys to stay happy but overall they were pretty great. I was happy to drive more too because I would get utterly carsick sitting in the back trying to please Miles. 

We stopped again in Caldwell Idaho for lunch. After we filled up our tank we went to a local high school and Charlie got to ride his bike around and play on the playground. Miles and I sat in the grass. We then went another long stretch with a shorter break then we made it to Layton Utah and found a Cafe Rio to stop at for dinner. Yum, we have been wanting some good Cafe Rio for awhile. 

After a quick dinner we continued on our way to Centerville UT and we pulled in the driveway right around 9pm, when it was nearly dark. In Centerville we stayed with Lori Mann who at one point had been my Young Women's leader from church but she also has a son the same age as Max and they were excellent friends. Max has stayed close with her over the years and she even brought him to the MTC when he left for his mission. 

We weren't able to visit too long with Lori because she was sick and getting up early the next morning for some meetings, but we made ourselves comfortable in the basement and got the boys to sleep then fell asleep ourselves, pleased with how well our travels went. 

The next morning we all slept until nearly 9, then cleaned up, ate breakfast, showered, fed the baby several times, played a little ping pong and took this picture of Miles. 

Around 11am (I know this is getting very detailed with times and everything...but that's just how my mind works.) we started our drive down to Thanksgiving Point to meet with Anna, and Buck, and June, and Hazel. A little history about them, Anna and I served as companions twice in Armenia, and Buck served there too. We lived in Utah at the same time for not enough time but our children are all close in age and have arranged marriages. Oh yeah, and Anna is an amazing photographer who did our wedding photos and I must mention that all the good photos on here are from her, and all the amateur ones are from me.

Moving on...We met at the new Curiosity museum, it was a little stressful getting there with Miles screaming, getting lost, and me suddenly feeling very car sick but we made it

Oh yeah, Charlie wasn't wearing shoes because he ran into the fountain with them.

Somehow Anna tricked me into climbing the rope bridges in sandals with a baby strapped to me.

June and Charlie played well together. I was pleased, they haven't seen each other in over a year. 

The museum was amazing and and I wish we had more energy to explore more but we eventually decided to head back to Anna and Bucks house to have a slower evening, It was nice that we seemed to be on the same pace as we both have newer, nursing babies. Slower days at home were okay with both of us. That evening we ordered pizza, and Anna and I had an impromptu trip up to Salt Lake to pick up some food from the Armenian store. This was somewhat spastic as Anna can't be away from Hazel for too long since she wont take a bottle and we got stuck in traffic (that was caused by rain..what?)  We made it and got the supplies needed for an Armenian feast you will read about shortly...if you bear with me that long. We were able to speak to the employees in Armenian, Anna was more brave than me. I was a little shy to use my Armenian that has been depleting. I was pleased that I could understand everything they were saying though.

While we were gone, the babies seemed to do fine and apparently Max and Buck watched My Little Ponies together.

We stayed for a little while then went to stay at Anna's grandparents house who live close by. Charlie instantly loved Grandma Pew when he met her and was disappointed when he realized she wasn't going to sleep downstairs with us.

The next morning, The Pew grandparents made us an amazing breakfast. Then we got all ready and went over to Buck and Anna's house. We spent some time cleaning a little flood that Max had somewhat caused while trying to fix a leaky faucet.. I'll spare you the details of that but Max still feels so bad. We then went to pick raspberries.
For some reason, Charlie had woken up with pain in his ankle, He have no idea of what caused it but he was limping and it made me sad.

When we got to the raspberry farm, Miles and Charlie were both sleeping so Max stayed in the car with them and slept as well .It was probably for the best because I didn't want to wake Charlie up and make him walk on his ankle.  I was able to go pick raspberries (Or what was left of them) and get some photography training from Anna.

We got some raspberries and I ate some raspberries. Then, before we left, I nursed Miles and Max picked some flowers for me that were on the farm (and it was encouraged that we pick them) 

On our way home we drove through Provo and we were curious about the new temple there so we pulled over to see the progress, it was pretty neat, it still had the original architecture of the tabernacle that bunt down.  We drove a little bit more through Provo and by the Riviera which is the apartment complex we lived in when we were engaged. We then went back to Anna's house so we could get ready to have a campfire in the canyon. 

We were somewhat impressed at how well these kids shared.

When we got back, we prepared for tin foil dinners in the canyon. We went up to the canyon and built a fire and roasted our dinners. 

June and Charlie downed the majority of a bag of marshmallows. I nursed Miles in the car with the heater on for a bit and we enjoyed our tin foil dinners and smores and banana boats. (Which I was surprised Max had never tried)

Charlie was blabbing on about something to June!

and she acted very interested.

June danced in the smoke

These two had a great time!

When the sun started going down and we were getting pretty cold, we called it a night and headed back to Grandma Pew's house

The next morning the Pews made us a delicious breakfast again then we went back over to Buck and Anna's house. They didn't have church until 1pm so Anna and I prepped the Dolma for our Armenian feast and Max gave June awesome braids...which for some reason, haven't been documented.

We had a rambunctious church outing as is the norm with toddlers and nursing and pooping children but it was fun. On our way home we went around the block a couple times to get the kids asleep. Charlie had been getting pretty grumpy from getting a lot less sleep. Both boys fell asleep and transferred in to the house.

That evening we finished cooking the Dolma and several of our mission companions came over and we had an Armenian feast with Dolma (cabbage rolls), lavash (flat tortillaish bread)  cucumber and tomato salad, Armenian bread and Armenian cheese. We had spearment and moorabai tea and wafflie cookies for dessert. It was an excellent feast and it was so fun to catch up with some of the most wonderful mission companions.

The queers (sisters), Noelle had already left. 

As dinner was being cleaned up and babies were being fed, We heard a painful scream from Charlie coming from June's room. Charlie has a pretty high pain tolerance so when I heard this scream I knew he was hurt. Luckily Max was with him. I was on the couch feeding Miles. but I then saw Max carry Charlie to the dining room table with quite a bit of blood on his shoulder. As Charlie was crying Max immediately checked out the wound on Charlie's head. We felt blessed that we were surrounded by loving people that really cared about us. Most of which were very educated about injuries and helped contribute to Charlie's immediate care. I was the one who sought out candy to ease Charlie's pain. I have a hard time with blood. It turned out that Charlie was just playing on a riding toy and was trying to back up when the toy tipped backwards and Charlie hit his head on a shelf corner. Anyway, the cut looked pretty deep so Max took Charlie into the ER and after it was evaluated he ended up with two staples. He handled the staples pretty well and was acting like his normal self in no time. They were back in less than an hour then we headed out for the night back to the grandparents.

The following nights Charlie had a tough time sleeping because of the staple which led to some long nights.

The next morning, the Pew grandparents made us breakfast once again. For Monday we planned on meeting with our friends, the Hodsons, who were traveling from Sacramento to DC and were planning on stopping in Utah for a couple of days. They had an unfortunate encounter with UHaul who broke the latch on the hood of their car and "forgot" to inform them. Then, when Corbrett was driving on the freeway, the hood flew up and shattered the windshield. Luckily everyone was fine, the girls weren't even in the car, but because of the repairs, they weren't able to get to Utah while we were still there. It was quite the bummer because Madeleine is one of Charlie's best friends.

So Monday we had a nice slow morning playing in Anna's backyard.

Rapunzel made us vegetables

Then we went to BYU campus to the Bean Museum which is a bunch of taxidermied animals. Charlie was usually pretty eager to hold June's hand.

The kids ran around like wild animals when we got inside.

It seemed that the majority of animals were displayed eating other animals...a little weird but interesting I guess.

Then Anna went home with her girls and we stayed on BYU campus for awhile reliving the glory days. Actually we just went around the bookstore then got ice cream from the creamery. 

We came home and had a great dinner and the kids played well together. Max encouraged Anna and Buck to go on an impromptu date while we watched the kids which has been rare for them with their anti-bottle baby!

Charlie and June had a nice long tea party and I kind of think it was the best thing ever! They are even wearing matching attire. They were so happy and so good at sharing!

It was a fun evening.

Tuesday morning we didn't really make any plans except for sometime Anna was going to take our family picture and we were going to leave sometime around 6pm to go up to Lori's house for the night. So we had another fun day of letting the kids play together.

At one point I asked Charlie if he would kiss June, I was curious if he would do it. He was about to until he got closer to her then stopped and they gazed into eachothers eyes. Haha!

And just because I'm a fan of comparison photos...here are a couple. 

This was taken of Charlie and June in June 2012. 

 So we tried to recreate the toe-touching picture.

Then we tried to re create it with Miles and Hazel. 

Then there was this picture taken of June and Charlie in February of 2012. 

So we tried to recreate it with Miles and Hazel...I can't even handle the cuteness and the fact that we both had clone babies!

And more of June and Charlie playing well together!

and then here are more comparison photos. In November 2012, Anna did a 1 year photo shoot for Charlie in her yard. Remember these amazing photos?

So then I tried to take some of Charlie against that same wall, we wasn't cooperating very well.

 I finally got him to smile at me and this is what it looked like.

When Buck got home from work we kidnapped Anna and went to the lake for a quick family photo shoot. Charlie had just awoken from a nap really grumpy (I'm assuming from the pain of his head wound.) So probably not the ideal time for family pictures but Anna still was able to capture some great ones

The 2 year old life is rough!

But Daddy knows how to cheer him up!

I think this is one of my favorites!

We then took Anna back to her house and said our good byes and thanked her for entertaining us for 5 days. Then we drove up to Centerville to visit with Lori again. Luckily she was feeling much better and we were able to have a little party with her. 

She had prepared fruit and chocolate fondue for us. 

We then got to make Doughies!

What are doughies you ask? Delicious. 

You put Pillsbury biscuit dough in this contraption and cook it over a fire, you can stuff the dough with whatever you want or not stuff it and roll it in butter and cinnamon sugar after they are cooked. 

The doughy maker in action!

Charlie liked helping Lori!

Then Lori gave us our very own Doughy maker...so if anyone wants to come over for a doughy party...please do!

We all stayed up way too late catching up and chatting with Lori and her youngest son Sam. 

We decided that we couldn't leave super early because we needed to sleep, so after packing up and eating breakfast it was about 11am when we left. I ended up driving most of the way again which was okay with me. I love our new car and that it has cruise control. We took a couple stops to release energy but got home to Portland by 11pm which was way better than we expected. 

And these are some photos from our stops.

Charlie was running laps between our car and that little tree. He got super sweaty before we hit the road again.

Overall it was an exciting trip and we were especially grateful for Anna and Buck's family for playing with us so much and I'm glad that we are able ease our children into their arranged marriages. We are also so grateful for Lori and our Pew grandparents for the amazing hospitality they extended to us. I love my little family and I think it's so great that Max and I can plan and carry out adventures for our little family