Grace and Andrew's wedding: trip to Utah Day 1 and 2

Our trip to Utah started up bumpy yet we pressed forward and had so much fun.

The night before we left.  I stayed up till midnight packing.  When the alarm went off at 5am I knew I wasn't ready to drive 13 hours so I layed back down to get some more sleep.  But I was so excited to go see family sleep didn't come.  10 minutes later I was up and dress.  I packed the car and got the kids in the car.  Then we said goodbye to James as he left for work.  We said a family prayer and off we went.  

We reached Granger WA around 10 am and decided to get out and explore the small dino town.  The kids where in heaven.  I grabbed my camera so I could get some fun pictures but I also grabbed my phone so I could take some instagram pictures too.  At the moment I had the thought.  "Maybe I should put my phone back in the car because I won't be able to juggle both."  I quickly pushed the thought aside and took my phone with me.  Of course I couldn't hold both so I set my phone down for a minute and started taking pictures.  

Then Everet had to go to the bathroom.  I tried to get him to go pee on a bush but he wanted a toilet.  So We quickly got back into the car to go find a restroom.  

    

At the gas station we went potty and picked up a few snacks.  then we went to see more dinosaurs.  At this moment I realized I didn't have my phone on me.  So I quickly looked around the car but couldn't find it.  I thought maybe it was in the trunk.  When I did see it I figured we'd need to go back to the first stop since I probably left it on the lawn.  

off to explore more dinos

wait for me

I'll feed him

making wishes 

tummy rub

When we finally made our way back to the first stop.  My phone wasn't in sight.  So we drove back to the gas station.  I kinda recalled having the phone in the rest room so I was hopping I may have left it there.  As I was walking back to the gas station door the clerk who had assisted us earlier was coming out,  She gave me a strange smile and I thought I should stop her and ask her if she had seen my phone.  But I didn't.  I walked into the store and asked the new clerk if she had seen it.  Of course she hadn't and then I was stumped.

There was a chance my phone was still somewhere in the car and since we had wasted an hour of our time and the kids where getting restless and hungry we continued our journey to Utah.

Finally around Baker City I pulled off the road and found a place where I could unload everything in my car.  and I mean EVERYTHING.  it took us about 45 minutes to search the entire car, change out of PJs and reload everything.  Still no phone in sight.

At this point I started to panic a little bit.  If anything happened to us we'd have no way of contacting anyone.  Yet we were driving on busy roads and if something did happen I calmed myself down by knowing we'd be able to get help.

We managed to get to Mt Home Idaho around 7pm at night.  Thankfully Lara and Chris where home and welcomed us in with open arms.  I called James to let him know we where all right.  and then I called my sister to let her know we where still on our way.  Since I needed a minute to unwind we played with friends for another hour.  Everett pooped all over their carpet and made a big mess everywhere.  My moment of relaxation was over.  Thankfully Lara and Chris where super cool and helped me clean up everything.  We said our awkward goodbyes and told them we wouldn't be pooping on their carpet during futrure visits.

As we drove out of Mt. Home we grabbed some dinner at Mcdonalds and realized we still have 4 more hours to go.

We ended up making another stop around 9pm right before the I-15 junction to fill up on gas and caffeine.  My patients where completely gone by this point and I may have yelled at my kids one or two times before they finally fell asleep.

We reached Laura and Mark's home around 1am in the morning.  The door was unlocked and our beds already made.  Thank you Laura and Mark.  I septin that morning and then we just hung out at Laura's house while she ran errands and took the kids school.

Grace made a giraffe store 

finally around 2pm we packed up our belongings, said goodbye to Laura and drove down to Provo to stay with Auntie Grace.  Not having a smartphone made navigating Utah a bit more difficult but we managed to get everywhere we needed to go.  We first arrived at Auntie Grace's work and she gave us a tour of the Food Bank she works with.

Then we drove back to her house where we met up with (near future) Uncle Andrew.  I needed to get some groceries for my kids so I ran a few errands and picked up some pizza for dinner.  Then Uncle Andrew watched the kids while Auntie Grace and I got Pedicures.  ahhh finally some nice relaxation.

When we got back, Andrew took of to visit his family and Auntie Grace let the kids sleep in her bed.  They where very excited.

The next couple of days would be all about family and we where excited to be there.