Holiday Travel, Part 1

Well, the holidays are behind us and not a single blog post to show for it. There are primarily two reasons for this: 1) I am still getting used to life with three children and managing their schedules and my own and making it to the end of the day with even one iota of energy left to do anything that I want to do, and 2) holiday travel.

For Thanksgiving we flew to Las Vegas with the Mumfords and met up with Josh, Heather, Berkleigh, Hudson, Grammy and Tyler. Makenna had a soccer tournament there and the rest of us came for the sunshine. Unfortunately it was in the 40s and 50s the entire weekend. Fortunately we ended up in the presidential suite at the JW Marriott, so the kids were able to play together, run around, and basically act like they were raised by wolves while not driving the rest of us completely insane.

Layla and Berkleigh play so well together and had a blast doing just about anything. Weston and Hudson aren't quite at the age where they play together, but they liked throwing things, eating, running around, and occasionally hitting each other or their sisters. Both boys are very advanced in their own way. Weston has the brain of a five year old and Hudson has the coordination and athleticism of one. It makes for some funny situations. Once the kids were racing down the hall, and after ten seconds Hud was about a block in front. Weston, huffing and puffing, turns around to Josh and asks, "Why is Hudson so fast?"

Auntie Kenna with Dylan

Crazy Cousins with matching jammies from Mimi

From Vegas the kids and I drove with the Mumfords to Salt Lake to spend some time with my side of the family. What should have been a six hour drive turned into almost eleven hours due to a blizzard starting in southern Utah. My kids could not have been better. As the trip waned on and the roads got worse, I kept bracing myself for a meltdown from at least one of them, but it never happened. Now, whenever I'm having a particularly hard time dealing with them, I remind myself that, when it really counted, they were angels.

The upside of the blizzard was that there was snow on the ground in Salt Lake and the kids were able to build a snowman, eat icicles, and have snowball fights with their aunts, uncles and cousins.

Layla loves the snow.

Weston eating an icicle.

Posing in his monster hat (yep, I made it!)

As always, the kids LOVED spending time with Grandma and Grandpa, Uncle B, and Auntie Courtney. Even Uncle Sam drove down from Logan to meet Little Miss Dylan and hang with Weston and Layla. We were also able to meet up with the Chases, a must for any SLC trip. I love that we have stayed close with their family, and that my kids look forward to playing with Etta and Gibby as much as I look forward to catching up with Traci. I remember when Traci and I were pregnant with the girls at the same time and we used to take the dogs for long walks every day and drag our husbands out to sports bars every night to feed our cravings for greasy bar food!

It's sad for me to admit it, but gone are the days when I was free to fly to Salt Lake every month or so, for every holiday, event, or whenever the fancy struck. Not only does it now require three plane tickets to get the kids and I there, but I have three little people to travel with, and that is not easy, my friends.