This probably should have been Utah Part 1 since we spent the first portion of our trip in Salt Lake. As a special treat for Ezra (who LOVES trains) we road Trax from Sandy to downtown. He was so excited. See that cheesy smile in the picture with Brad? That occupied his face the majority of ride. I, like the nerdy mom I am, took like 500 pictures (and maybe a few videos). If this is overboard just wait until he goes to prom.
I did more than half of my marathon training last year on the trail around Lloyds Lake. It’s our favorite Monticello hangout. We’ve seen tarantulas, horny toads, snakes, fish, cranes, deer, chipmunks, and a porcupine up there. The boys love it. It’s beautiful. And it takes Memphis all of two minutes before he’s out cold. Maybe from the serenity of it all?
In other news, Ezra overcame his overwhelming fear of the 4 wheeler. Last year he refused to get within 10 feet of it. This time around it took a little coaxing, but he agreed to get on it if it’s destination was the playground. Then BAM! all day everyday: “Can we go on the 4 miller? Please! I want to ride on the 4 miller!”
If you follow me on Instagram you know we’re on an impromptu road trip. Brad’s mom called him up a few weeks ago to ask when we were coming out this year to visit. (Remember last year when we went out there for six weeks as part of our 4 month travel extravaganza? That’s a long trip, folks.) He hemmed and hawed and confessed we weren’t planning on coming out this year. Apparently he felt bad about it because when he hung up the phone he informed me we needed to pack; we were going to Utah. So off we went. Just 3 weeks this time. Then two weeks in Tennessee to visit my sister and my newest nephew.
Here’s Ezra running the “bridges” in Grandpa’s garden. I feel like I only get the back of his head in pictures these days.
The boys have been enjoying the cousin time. Morgan is the best. Such a sweetie.
We also enjoyed the local 24th of July (Pioneer Day) festivities. I wasn’t expecting much with Monticello being such a small town, but wow! Pretty impressive.
Ezra kept his parade candy stash safe in Daddy’s pockets.
Tractors were Memphis’s favorite part. “Tac-tuhs! Tact-tuhs!””
They handed out popsicles to all the kids at the parade. What kind of dye did they put in these things??? Memphis dripped all over my foot and even after washing it I channeled Elphaba (or at least her foot anyway) for the rest of the weekend.
My favorite part of the day was snuggling up under quilts in Brad’s parent’s driveway for front row seats to the evenings fireworks.
On a side note, our last trip ended up being like 4 months long so I packed a ridiculous amount of clothes for the 4 of us into one enormous suitcase (which despite the size still had to be sat on in order to close). Trying to find anything in there was maddening. Searching for socks in particular would turn me into a fire breathing monster. So this time I swore things would be different. Let’s just say I overcompensated. 5 shirts (one of which I sleep in) and one pair of capris for 5 weeks. I do laundry every. freaking. day. and wear Brad’s pj bottoms at least three days a week. Ugh. I need to go shopping.
I married my best friend.
And now, if you’ll excuse me, the boys are FINALLY asleep and I’m going to have an at home movie date night with my husband. I’m thinking The Notebook or Pride & Prejudice. Maybe both.
I was digging through the archives on the Time Capsule and came across a few oldie but goodies of Ezra in Photo Booth from a long since dead laptop. Since I shared some Photo Booth last week I though I’d share these, too. Apparently he was fascinated with his tongue for a long time. 🙂 He’s two in this first set and still has some of that cute baby chub. Where did it go?? His expression in the bottom right picture cracks me up. (Lets ignore my weird geographical tongue.)
This last set is from a different laptop which is also dead. I’m telling you we burn through these things! Actually, the kids killed both laptops. Ezra puked on the first one and Memphis yanked the screen back on the latest and somehow killed it. We’ve been a one computer family for a few weeks now, but we’re going to do have to something about that soon if we want to travel this summer. These are from last fall. He’s showing off his Buckaroo football from Monticello’s homecoming game.
I also found a really funny video of us as a family, but it’s embarrassingly nerdy. (I may or may not have broke out in the robot dance for no apparent reason.) Maybe one day I’ll share… maybe…