Grandpa Val's Cabin and the Roberts Reunion

We went up to my dad's cabin for a reunion with my siblings while we were in Utah. Everyone had a lot of fun. I remember when my dad first bought that property. I thought he was CRAZY! But 15 years later, I'm finally seeing his vision.

 Sara is one of my favorite people on the planet. It's so cool seeing her grow up. William and Kate absolutely adore her.

I love this picture of my handsome husband. I'm glad that he got to come for part of our trip.

Travis let Jared get his hair cut in a "fauxhawk" and Jared was pretty excited to pose for the camera every time he styled it.

Absolute proof that I was there too (because you can't fake a background in Photoshop or anything, right? No really. I was there. I was! I promise!)

All the cousins loved being together. They were a wild bunch but I'm glad they got along so well.

Auntie Charlotte gave William his firsts graham cracker while we were having s'mores one evening. He hasn't been interested in eating babyfood at all, but he LOVED gumming that cracker.

 Kate loved climbing on everything in sight. And jumping off. And climbing back up. And jumping. And climbing. And jumping (I'm sure you get the picture!)

The older cousins opted to sleep out in a tent instead of in the crowded cabin. They were good sports about letting Kate help them put it up.

Rebecca, David, and Megan in the old teepee. 

Kate really had fun with the big boys. Here's Ben spinning her around while she shrieked and laughed.

And here's Josh tossing her up in the air while she shrieked and laughed.

I actually caught one of her quiet moments on camera. It only lasted a few seconds and then she was off again.

A Mother's Influence

A mother's influence extends not only to her children, 

but to all those her children reach.

In addition to the parade, we had a special gift for Grandma Greenland's 90th birthday. Back in January, Rachelle asked each family to do 90 acts of service in grandma's honor.

While we were all together at Bear Lake, Rachelle presented the big jar to grandma. Each color represents a different family. Each slip of paper represents an act of service.

We had the best experience keeping track of all our service! The kids loved it. They went out of their way to help everyone - they did each other's chores, helped me with the babies, made and delivered cookies, picked up trash, carried things for their teachers, just to name a few. The project really kept service at the front of our minds and in our conversations. We were always thinking and working. It was wonderful. I'm so grateful.

Bear Lake 2013

We spent almost a week up at the Mansfield cabin at Bear Lake. Lots of swimming, tubing, and playing in the sand.

 Megan didn't get to spend the whole time with us (it was the same time as Grandkids Camp), but she had a blast with her cousins while she was there.

 Kate is fearless.

 This was Jared's first time on a tube. He was a little nervous in the beginning (especially after seeing the wild ride Kasey and Amy went on right before his turn!) but he had a lot of fun.

This was also Kate's first time on a tube. It was about the calmest ride imaginable (because I'm paranoid). She probably would have liked a few more bumps, but that will have to wait until she's a bit older.

One of the very funniest things that happened at the lake was when we got back from riding on the boat, Rachelle and Amy (Trimble) played a prank on Amy (Greenland) and I. We both have baby boys who are similar in size, complexion, and temperament. We left them on the beach in the shade while we went out on the boat. When we got back, "Gabe" was in the carseat where he'd been when we left. And they handed "William" to me, all swaddled up in a big blanket. It took us a couple of minutes before we realized that they'd switched clothes and babies on us and I was bouncing Gabe and Amy was rocking William.

You can't go to the beach without getting COVERED in sand. You just can't.

Even good old Grampa Gustman was there in good form (at the cabin. We didn't take him to the beach.)

We had a great time and are so glad we got to go!

Age only matters if you're cheese

We celebrated Grandma Greenland's 90th birthday while we were up at Bear Lake. We had a float in the Paris Idaho 4th of July Parade. It was so much fun! And we won first place!

We love you Grandma!

Things every mama needs to hear sometimes

I found myself sitting in the corner of my in-laws's cabin ugly-crying. Not pretty sweet tears. No, this was more the curled up in the corner sobbing with snot and sweat and tears all mixed together. Not a good look for anyone.

It wasn't even anything major that set me off. Just a combination of too much vacation and not enough sleep, for me and for the kids. Most of the kids were going swimming and I said Kate could go, even though I knew she needed a nap. She was behaving like a typical two year old - she wanted to go, but she was throwing a full on temper tantrum because her swimming suit was still wet from an earlier swimming adventure. I was trying to force her to get dressed so she could go and "have fun" as she was crying and flailing about when I finally snapped, scooped her up, pulled her regular clothes back on, and deposited her in bed. She was asleep in about 2 minutes, but I sat in the corner and cried because I felt like I was depriving her from fun. It's those little kinds of moments that get to me as a mom.

As I sat there crying, my sweet, wonderful cousin Amy came down to find me. (Okay, she's not actually my cousin. She's Travis's cousin's wife. Close enough.) And she did everything right. She let me cry. And she told me all the things that I know but couldn't remember at that moment. I'm a good mom. Being a mom is hard. Heavenly Father loves me. And then she told me to go take a nap. And she made sure William was okay while I did. And when I woke up, I felt better. A little foolish, but better.

So I guess the point of all this is to remind all of us, when we are having one of those days, of a couple of things.

You are a good mom.
Being a mom is hard.
Heavenly Father loves you.
And a nap makes all the difference in the world.

Who can say if I've been changed for the better...but.....

I have been changed for good.

Wicked!

 

I'm so grateful that our wonderful friends Toby and Amy and Jen and Paul went to see Wicked with us when it was playing in Houston this summer. Without getting too sappy and sentimental, I know that their friendship has made me a better person and I'm so grateful for them. None of them had ever seen Wicked, so it was really fun to see their reactions. Especially since it's one of my very favorite musicals.

The production was really well done - probably the best cast since we saw it in Chicago. I haven't ever loved Fiyero's character before, but he was one of my favorites this time.

After the show, we all came back to the house and Travis grilled steaks and fingerling potatoes. It was better than any 5 star steakhouse meal.

All in all, it was a good day - a good show, good food, and best of all, good friends.

The Great Texas to Utah Migration, Part 2 (How to Make Friends With Strangers in a Hurry)

Let's see. Where did I leave off? .......Oh yes. Landing in Denver.

Like I said before, the flight itself was pretty unremarkable. The kids were good, nothing eventful happened. We got off the plane, found the train to take us to a different terminal, got some lunch, found our gate, and sat down to eat. Sitting on the chairs across from us was a mom waiting with her 11 year old daughter, who was about to fly all alone for the first time. We visited with them for a little while, and then we boarded the plane. We sat for a LONG time. First, they were having trouble with their numbers, somehow they had more people on the flight than they should have, so there weren't enough seats. I had three different flight attendants ask if I was absolutely SURE that Kate wasn't a lap child. I had to keep showing them the paperwork with her ticket information. Super annoying. But whatever. They finally got that worked out, and we were good to go, but then I noticed something weird. The flight attendants started asking groups of people to get off the plane. They weren't taking their luggage, just purses. Just standing up and hurrying off the plane.

When it was our turn, I didn't know what to do. Kate was sound asleep and Megan and Jared were panicking. I couldn't carry William and Kate and the diaper bag, and they weren't unloading the stroller. That's when I started making friends really quickly. The lady that Jared had sat next to on our flight from Houston to Denver was actually a couple rows behind us, and she and the lady sitting next to her jumped up and came to our rescue. One took William and one took the diaper bag and I carried Kate and herded Megan and Jared. As we got off the plane, the mom that we had met during lunch was still there, waiting to see her daughter take off, so she and her daughter joined our group. It was a tornado warning and they were directing everyone to take shelter in the bathrooms. The first two bathrooms we came to were completely packed, but a airport worker saw us and directed us to a stairwell that was also used as a shelter. It was already pretty full, but we found a place on a landing about two flights down. We all sat down on the floor and waited.

After a while, some airport workers came rushing through, directing everyone to get lower, so we picked up and went down two more flights of stairs. We ended up in the huge cavern of a basement. It was bigger than a gymnasium, with pipes on the ceiling and concrete walls and floor. I think most of the people in the airport ended up down there eventually because it got pretty crowded.

We found a spot and sat down. By this point, a couple other women had joined our group, and they all took turns holding William and entertaining Megan and Jared. My phone was dead, but they let the kids play games on their phones, and just helped keep them calm. The alarms were so loud and constant, I really don't know how Kate slept through the whole thing, but somehow she did. I just sat and held her and tried not to cry. Not because I was scared, but because I was so grateful for all of these kind strangers who took care of us. I truly couldn't have managed without them.

All the while, I wasn't too stressed about the actual tornado - we get tornado warnings in Houston fairly often, but no one really worries about them. I was more tired from all the travel and worried about making my sister wait so long for us at the airport in Salt Lake City. After seeing some of the news coverage and photos from outside the Denver Airport, maybe I should have been more concerned about the tornado...

Here's some pictures from the outside: http://www.weather.com/news/tornado-reported-near-denver-airport-20130618

When we finally landed in Salt Lake (about 3 hours late), I left the kids and carry-ons with Charlotte while I went to round up all our checked baggage. Charlotte said that several people came up to her in the airport to check on the kids because they knew that she wasn't the one traveling with them, and wanted to make sure they were okay.