thanksgiving in utah

on saturday november 22 we had woken up early, got the kids ready, threw them in the car and then headed for utah. they did pretty well on the way down and the roads were good except in the passes. 

we got to erda in the middle of the afternoon. i think everyone was excited to get out of the car! we hung out at the house for the afternoon. 

papa read to the kids their bedtime books. 

nancy made sure that everything was put away, but carlee made sure that the house was ready for grant and esther, who would be coming later that week.

the kids played at the house or the playground down the road. church on sunday was at 1. it was pretty rough. that is normally our nap time at home. we came home, had dinner and then got the kids ready for bed. 

i can't remember what quincey is crying about, but this is a great picture. on monday, nancy and i took the kids to the library in tooele. andrew wasn't feeling well so he stayed home with carlee, who was sleeping. the library had a nook with toys and puppets in the kids section. they played there for a bit and then they played some kid games on the computers. we then went to lunch at carl's jr. we went home so that quincey could have a nap. that evening we went swimming. mandi, patrick and nancy (garr was working nights) were all suppose to come with us, but they all backed out last minute. the kids were super excited so there was no not going. all the kids had a good time. quincey loved going down the slide. the currant was so strong in the lazy river that it pushed it around. which was great for carlee in her floatie. 

on tuesday we went to the zoo with mandi and nancy. 

after seeing the lions and hearing one of them roar, sterling and quincey showed us their roars. quincey's roar was pretty short, and these are the looks on her face after she was done. 

                                     

she reminded us of samba!

the elephants were quincey's favorites. 

the alligators were sterling's favorite.

we stopped at the ape building on our way out. the monkeys are nancy's favorite. there was a zoo worker there and so we stayed there longer an we would have otherwise. carlee took a little nap. quincey pretended to a gorilla. 

on the way home we stopped at trader joes to pick up a few treats. that night we watch sherman and mr. peabody. most of the jokes were lost of the kids, but we thought it was pretty funny. if sterling watched it more than once, i think he would find it funny. 

Wednesday came bright and beautiful. it was in the 50's! the kids played outside without coats. i actually got hot standing in the sun. it was wonderful!

andrew helped his dad with some chores…cleaning out the gutters and chipping wood. i got everything packed and loaded into the car again. 

after lunch i took the kids and we went up to centerville.  andrew stayed in erda. his brother's were suppose to be arriving from logan so i'm not sure what he did. we stopped by grandma norma and grandpa jay's house. we visited for a bit, the kids played with some toys. then grandma really didn't feel well so we left and went to the parrish house to unpack. i fed the kids dinner and then i took them over to geep and beav's house. they were going to supervise the babysitters (it was one large group effort). i think sterling and quincey had a good time. carlee had a hard time with it. 

i left to go see mandi's play "how the grouch stole christmas" at the desert star in murray. it was a great play. this is the 3rd play of hers that we've seen. i met andrew, jay, aubrey, austin and garrett there. the play was done and our kids were asleep! awesome! so we stopped by mandi and patrick's house. we visited with him for a little over an hour or so. it was a late night, but we enjoyed every minute away!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

we spent the first part of thanksgiving with the hainsworth's in centerville. we went on a hike around a lake per tradition. we haven't been to this location before. it didn't last as long as normal even though we fed the ducks and hung out a bit after. when we got back to the house, carlee took a nap and i helped my mom get ready for thanksgiving dinner. i made sure the tables were set and cups filled with water. andrew took sterling and quincey over to grandma norma's to play. 

we had a wonderful dinner. all the normal food. my favorites were the sweet potatoes and the orange rolls. once dinner was done and clean up was well under way, we packed up the kids and headed to erda. 

mandi (about 4 mo pregnant) and partick

the kids were excited to meet their cousins. carlee and esther didn't play too much together, but next time they get together i'm sure they will. sterling, quincey and grant got along fine. they also fought fine too. 

the cars were a big hit and the case of most of the fights.

quincey is sticking the little people in her socks.

from the left: aubrey, garrett, garr, nancy, andrew, jay and austin. quincey and sterling are in the front.

the boys enjoyed each others company. 

the jensen's love playing games. they played don't eat pete! with the kids. they thought it was pretty funny!

the renters needed some quite time, so i got the iPad out. when i went to find the boys, this is what i found. i think sterling is playing angry birds here. 

we left erda about 10pm. we got the kids into bed once we got back to centerville and i'm pretty sure we fell into bed ourselves! 

on friday, we hung out and then mandi and patrick picked us up to take us to one of their favorite restaurants, zupa's. my sisters watched the kids and put carlee down for her nap. we had our pictures taken by caroline's roommate, emily. those went pretty well. carlee had a hard time but i think they turned out good. what do you think?

i think quincey has grown or her tights and dress shrunk a little when i washed them. i thought they fit better. 

after pictures we had to get ready for the parrish cousin reunion. i helped a little bit with this, but my mom did most of the work. it was good to see the edward's and the furner's. i haven't seen many of them in years because we stopped holding the parrish sister reunions because the families were huge and it was getting too big. my children did well and sterling loved the performances done by the family members. he thought everything was super funny. we got them into bed close to their bedtime, which was good considering that the party was still going on! andrew and i helped with clean up and then headed to bed ourselves. 

on saturday we woke up, got ready for the day and then headed to erda. we went bowling with the family to celebrate austin and aubrey's birthdays. it was fun to see the jensen's one last time. the kids- sterling, quincey and grant enjoyed bowling. quincey kept asking if it was her turn, so i let her take my last turn. i spent some time following carlee around since she doesn't have a whole lot of patience for holding still. andrew thought that his brothers would bowl better than they did. 

we got back to erda about 2 in the afternoon. everyone was doing whatever they wanted to do. my sisters were doing their cousins christmas shopping, my mom shopping with her sister in law and so i just went to the parrish house. we had nap time and just hung out until everyone came back. we had pizza at grandma norma's house and then we went to temple square to see the nativity and the lights. it was pretty busy as expected. we had to park blocks away and it was nice to see, but hard with little kids. when we got home we put the kids to bed and then packed the car. once the car was packed we went to bed. 

the drive home was pretty uneventful. it only took us about 8 hours. i think we were all pretty glad to be home!