Last Minute Road Trip

At the end of August, Jennie Barney and I started texting and it came up whether or not we were coming to Utah during Fall Break.  We had thought about it but planned a family trip to California later in October so Matt couldn't take more time off.  But once Jennie mentioned it, I couldn't get it out of my head.  It had been nearly two years since we've seen the Barneys and we've both had babies since the last time we saw each other.  I asked Britt if she was interested in tagging along with me; she has friends that live near where we'd be traveling to.  She was onboard so I made a plan to spend Fall Break in Utah with the Barneys!

It's a 12 hour drive from our home to theirs, which was pretty daunting with five kids in tow.  I busted out all the stops.  I prepared a travel bag with new pads of paper, mini markers, brand new crayons and colored pencils, Color Wonder, new reading books, trivia books and grade appropriate Brain Quests, travel Bingo and new DS games for the older three.  The iPod touch was charged for Preston and the DVD players were all hooked up.  I started the trip off by handing out a laminated License Plate Game sheet with stickers and that kept the kids occupied for a good while.  I promised them that if they found 20 different states, I'd get them an ice cream cone.  Surprisingly, we saw 28 different license plates just between here and there!  I was amazed at how well they traveled.  We made several stops for gas, food, potty breaks but we made good time considering.

The weather was remarkable and a welcome change from our 90 degree "Fall" weather!  The kids played outside for hours and hours!  

We were able to meet up with Trenda Tuesday night for a yummy dinner at Zuppa's.  We chatted and laughed til the place closed down!

The next day, we met up with the Poulters again at Gardner Village to hunt witches!

A little nibble for the baby girl

It's hard to believe that we met 8 years ago when optometry school started-  we just had the twins, the Barneys just had one kid and the Poulters were pregnant with their first.  Look at the crowd we have now!

It was so fun watching Hayden and Josie play together!  They were born just three weeks apart!

Thursday afternoon, we headed over to the rec center and spent a couple hours swimming.  Hayden was a mad woman, splashing and crawling all over the place!

Friday morning, we woke up to an overcast, rainy day.  We decided to drive up to Salt Lake City to the This Is The Place Heritage Park, hoping that the rain would subside.  Once we got there, it was evident  that that was not happening, so we decided to spend the rest of our day indoors at the Gateway Children's Museum.

Preston said some pretty funny things while we were there.

While at WalMart picking up some groceries, just him and I:
P- "Are we still in Utah?"
Me- "Yes, buddy, we are."
P- "This WalMart is in Utah?!?"

P- "I want to move to Utah.  Can we pick up our house and move it here?"

P to Jennie, while helping her dig potatoes in the garden- "This one has a weinie!"  I think that was a bit of a shocker to a mom of all girls! haha

P to Weston- "You guys have like a hundred temples here!!" (true!)

The week went by way too fast and it was time to head home.  We picked up Brittney from her friend's, then stopped to visit Grandma & Grandpa Sorensen in Payson.  Just before getting there, we did have a little barfing episode with Preston, poor buddy!

We also were able to stop in Cedar City and visit with Aunt Charla while she made us lunch, which was nice.  As we drive up through Cedar Breaks, we started to see patches of snow and Brooklyn begged to stop so they could play in it for a minute.  Being the fun mom that I am.... (Preston was asleep)

 Finally got their ice cream reward on the way home!

(we also saw Alaska, not marked here)

It took 16 hours to get home with all our stops and visiting with family.  My buns hurt from sitting so much and I pretty much fed the baby and crashed for the night, leaving Matt to unload everything from the car and make sure the other kiddos were in bed.  It was kind of a little confidence boost to drive that kind of a trip!!   We're already planning on going back again next Fall, when Matt can join us and hopefully squeeze in a couple sessions of General Conference too.