Home Sweet Home

I thought I was going to get the chance to blog every day of our vacation. Hmmmm, I sure had a high opinion of my abilities!! As it ended up, we stayed very busy our entire vacation and I did not get much time on my computer!

We loved Indio, but all too soon it was time to move on. We drove to Rancho Vistoso near Tucson the day after Jake's birthday at the water park. It wasn't too long of a drive and it is very pretty there. Ton's of huge cactus everywhere! It is a bit like an alien planet compared to what we are used to. Anyway most of the trip was a painful time for me. My ear did not get better with the use of the drops. In fact it got much worse. On Sunday Richard again took me in to Urgent Care so I could get a prescription for antibiotics and something for the pain to help me sleep at night. For two nights I had awoken crying and had very strange dreams. I am glad to say within a few hours of taking the first antibiotic, the pain started to subside and just got better and better from there! I have a better appreciation of what Annalina went through this past winter!

We visited the Pima Air Museum one day in the early part of the day. We saw TONS of planes and lots of neat exhibits. Richard and Joseph were in airplane heaven!! We ventured outside a bit late and didn't make it all around to see all of the planes, but we saw quite a few before we started to melt. We even got to go in the first Air Force One. I took tons of photos, I'll include a few below!

On another day we went to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, which is really more of an outdoor zoo. We saw lots of desert critters and the kids got to search for treasure in the rocks, dig for dinosaur bones, crawl through caves, etc. It was great fun until Joseph had a melt down. It was so hot by this time I really felt for the little guy. He cried and didn't want to go anywhere, was tired at looking at things and had big red cheeks. Richard took him in the bathroom and put a wet paper towel under his hat going down his neck. This seemed to help for a while, but before long he was unhappy again. So we did not see the entire place, but maybe someday we will find ourselves that far south again, perhaps during a cooler time of year, you just never know!
Several evenings in Arizona we got to see the famous lightning storms that Richard has always told us about. For about two hours the sky would light up every 10 seconds or so. Sometimes we would see the actual lightning strikes, sometimes the whole sky lit up. It was an incredible site to behold. Jake and Annalina were a bit tentative about it, but Adrienne and I really enjoyed watching Mother Nature's show! We had a deck above our back porch and felt very safe watching from below! One night we were driving and it started raining, Richard tells me it is monsoon season. It poured down rain on us. Richard had to drive around to find alternate ways back to the resort when certain roads were not passable due to flash flooding! I really enjoyed our time in Arizona!

This past Monday we left AZ for Utah. What a LONG drive that day turned out to be! We left about 5am, and did not arrive in Wolf Creek Utah until about 8pm. Again, we loved the accommodations. The resort is in the Ogden valley near the town of Eden and we drove through a narrow canyon to get there. Perfectly named since it was so beautiful It was a two story which helped spread us all out a bit.

The first day we drove into Salt Lake City and spent a good part of the day at Temple Square. The visitors centers are fantastic and we enjoyed our visit. We also go to see the movie called Testaments which is about Christ's visit to the America's. It was a very moving film and I was grateful we got to see it together. I am always struck by the beauty of the grounds around the temple. As you can see from the photos below, the flower beds are bursting with beautiful flowers and plants and it is truly breathtaking.

The next day we went to Lagoon, which is a fun amusement park just 30 minutes from where we were staying. We went on some rides together then let the older kids loose for a few hours on their own to enjoy the really terrifying rides. The little kids had a great time riding the kid rides. Annalina was a bit fearful of the fast bigger rides, but Joseph adored them and went with Daddy on many of the larger rides. On the HUGE ferris wheel, I was feeling a bit nervous about being so high, but Annalina really enjoyed that ride. It was a fun day!


On Thursday Richard and I got up at 4am and went back into Salt Lake City to go through a session at the Temple. What a wonderful experience that was! It is such a beautiful temple inside and out and the spirit can be felt very strongly! Afterwards we went on a tour of the Conference Center. We got to go on the roof garden that has beautiful fountains, flowers and trees. It is a garden with a spectacular view of the entire valley.

We left Utah on Friday and stopped in Twin Falls Idaho to tour the new temple there. Since it has not yet been dedicated, they were having an open house for the public. The kids were especially excited to get to go through the temple. It was beautiful inside and out. Afterwards we drove on to Boise and stayed the night there. Richard got to shop at the Caballas right near our hotel and we had a nice dinner at IHOP. Joseph was wiped out and went to bed when we got back and Annalina, Jake and Adrienne played at the indoor pool for a couple hours. It was a nice break from all that driving. Today we made it home and it is so good to be here! The weather here was nice and cool and the sky was cloudy, it was a stark contrast to the past couple weeks of heat, sun and more heat! We had a wonderful vacation and everyone did so well during those long days of driving! My family is so cool!