"______ Makes the Heart Grow Fonder"

What is it? Is it really absence? Taking off for an evening with the ladies? Is it Thai food? It could be that sticky rice with mangoes! Is it just coming in out of the rain? After standing outside the closed restaurant, chatting, huddling under the eaves and shivering in the pouring rain, it did feel good to come inside my warm, dry house. Maybe it was a combination of all these factors and more (like the peace and quiet of my dark house, and knowing that I can climb in my cozy bed as soon as I click the button to publish this)...



Whatever the cause, I'm smiling tonight, peeking in on all my girls and my husband sleeping peacefully, and thinking how lucky I am that they are mine, and how blessed we are in so many ways.

It's a Jolly "Holladay" with you, Erika!

Today I spent the day with my BFF since childhood.

Every time I get together with Erika, it's clear to me why we've been friends for almost 30 years. She is just so much fun to be around! She makes me laugh, and you know how I love to laugh.

Put the two of us together, and we act like kids and giggle like school girls, even though we both have children of our own now. Our youngest babies are about 3 weeks apart.


Look how baby Kate smiles for the camera. She's a natural. You know, she started modeling at just one week old!


"Psst...Hey, Kate! Did you hear what I did to my dad to get out of the last hour of church on Sunday?..."


"...Sure wish I could think of some way to get out of taking all these pictures!"

Teens

After our wedding anniversary yesterday, Doug and I have now been married for 13 years. We've entered the teens. And speaking of teens, funny enough, I was actually still in my teen years on our wedding day. Shocking, but true.

Another thing I find shocking is that my sisters thought the bridesmaid dresses were atrocious. (Now you tell me, Sarah!)

What do you all think?

To be honest, there are a few details about my wedding that I might change if I were planning it today. But thankfully, I have no regrets about my marriage to this guy. If the biggest disappointment of that day was a peach dress...I can take it. :)

Very Curious

The other day after dinner, Hannah pointed to "something gross" on the back porch. It was a dead animal (a squirrel?) that looked like it wasn't very fresh. We all saw it, including Doug, who I assumed was going to take care of it. The next day, it was gone. It was also garbage collection day, so I was glad that I didn't have to think of it in the can every time I took out the trash. But that night, Doug asked me if I had taken care of the dead thing. Apparently, neither of us did. I don't know how it came to be in our backyard, or how it came to not be there anymore. Very mysterious.



And while we're pondering mysteries, answer me this: Why is it that today's disposable diapers can hold gallons of liquid if someone pops a water balloon into them, but if a baby poops into her diaper, the mess bounces off the absorbent surfaces and shoots out of the diaper at every angle? Doug and I will both be pondering this mystery as I pay to have his suit dry cleaned tomorrow. :)

Olivia's rolling on the floor with laughter.

She doesn't really laugh yet, but I bet she wanted to today!

Olivia at 3 Months

Smiles freely

Coos often

Drools quite a bit, and blows lots of spit bubbles

Looks good in blue

Sleeps well at night, but not so well during the day, unless we go someplace crowded and busy!

Still loves to be swaddled.

Tolerates sisterly "love"

Takes comfort in sucking on her fists/fingers/lips

In love with "Froggy"

As Emily put it, "I can see the look of love in her eyes. Olivia smiles more at Froggy and talks more to Froggy than she does to all of us combined!" The duck and the turtle are ok, but Froggy is her favorite little friend.

The Details - More Pictures and Words

1. FAMILY AND FRIENDS

The hardest part about leaving Utah four-and-a-half years ago was leaving friends and family. So we have to go back (often) to visit them. Ironically, or maybe coincidentally, the thing we miss most about home while we're on vacation is our friends and family back here!

4 Generations

Doug's Grandparents

Sarah & Olivia

2. GRANDMA'S HOUSE

No matter how old I get or how many children of my own I have, whenever I visit my parents (or Doug's parents), I find it very easy to be spoiled like a child, and let them play the roles of parents and grandparents at the same time. Just about every morning, my mom would take the early risers and play with them and feed them breakfast, while she let me sleep in late.

Oh, how I wish our house could have a basement playroom!

One day when I took the girls on an outing by myself, Lauren commented, "Mom, you're turning into your mother. You are sweet, and kind, and you give us anything what we want."

I had that same kind of grandmothers when I was a kid, so I can relate. We spent time at my grandma's house every summer, too. Now my cousin owns my Grandma's House, and she invited us over to play there one afternoon. My kids got to play in the backyard playhouse Grandma set up for me and my cousins when we were my girls' ages. I found one closet that smells just like I remember my Grandma's House smelling, and it brought back a flood of good memories. I'm so glad that my girls are blessed with several living grandparents and great-grandparents that they will associate with happy childhood memories, too.


3. THE FOOD


My mom's orange rolls (thanks, Mom!); Cafe Rio (only one taste this trip, darn it!); Nielsen's frozen custard and Iron Port with cherry (familiar to only a few - goes great with pizza); BYU Creamery ice cream (I've never tried a flavor I don't like, although I don't bother with vanilla); and Apple Beer (thanks, Scott!)

Pace Pops

Plus, corn on the cob (corner stands are almost as frequent as church buildings)

and fresh produce from my parents' own garden. I love the smell of tomato plants. Beets are the best, greens and all! Eat your beets!

4. GAMES


We enjoyed playing a few games during this vacation. One night Sarah invited us to her apartment to play Rock Band (we rocked), and D.D.R. I thought I was decent at that one until I went up against my sister. Yeah, she made me look pretty bad. But I think I proved my skills at board and card games. I guess I should stick with what I know. :)

Passing on the competitive nature

5. BOATING


SO MUCH FUN! We can't get enough! Doug told me that what he would really like for a birthday or Christmas gift is one full day of being towed behind a boat, all to himself. We both enjoyed skiing, wake boarding, and tubing with the girls.




Lauren learned to ski this time, and Katelyn and Emily refreshed their skills on skis.

Lauren got breakfast with Dad at McDonalds for her success on skis.





Emily's favorite is the knee board. She accepted my challenge to do some tricks on the knee board and earned a quick 20 bucks from me.






And Katelyn got up on skis for the reward of a new book,
but really she'd rather spend all her time hanging on to the tube while Grandpa tries to throw her off.
Hannah and Olivia think the boat provides a great place for napping.

I bet she's dreaming about the day she learns to ski, too.


6. LAGOON

Another tradition that started when I was a kid. Every summer my mom takes the grandkids to Lagoon. This year, Kaelyn hooked us up with some stake passes, and the girls had a blast riding with their cousins. It was a hot day, so they got really excited about the water rides.

Hey, this is fun!

Fun just ended.

7. DAY TRIPS


Swimming at the local rec center




Visiting BYU

I showed them the apartment we lived in when Katelyn was born.

They were more impressed with the view from our back window.

Unplanned (but serendipitous) sleep-over with friends



Living History Museum & Farm


My grandma's family reunion and hometown

The Logan Temple, where my grandparents were married

Liberty Park

Roasting hot dogs and marshmellows in the canyon

This is where Hannah asked me, "Mom, are we in Utah or Washington?"

8. SLEEPING

One night, Doug got 12 straight hours of sleep. I already mentioned how often I slept late. Olivia got some good sleep, too. Her favorite places to sleep were the noisy places: the pool, Lagoon, Grandpa's boat, and the car. When she's at home and it's quiet, she doesn't like to sleep all that much during the day. But she sleeps well at night, so there's not much to complain about.
And now I know that if I get desperate for Olivia to nap well, I just need to invest in a LoveSac.






9. DOUG

He missed half our vacation because he had to be at work, and at Girls Camp. But he didn't miss any of the traveling. He drove us to Grandma's house, and then he flew back home for a week. At the end of that week, he flew back to Utah to join the party. And then, after half the vacation time we had, he drove us all home again. He is always so much fun to be around, the second week with him there went by much faster than the first week without him.




10. THE SUN


What can I say? I love it. The girls, however, are used to the cool temperatures here in the Northwest. Temps from 90 to 100 are torture for them. And I must admit, the heat made us all feel a bit lazy. And I'm not very good with the sunscreen. A few of the girls got quite red (thankfully, not the baby, who is still so little that I can't forget to protect her) during our last day on the water. Even for me, it got pretty hot a few of our days in the desert. But I still was sad to see the outside temperature dip down below 60 as we got close to home yesterday.


I did learn a lesson about attitude during this trip, however.

I have learned to expect the worst when it comes to vacation weather. Whenever I escape the gray and anticipate beautiful weather, I seem to be followed by rain clouds. Last year, I went to Utah in May (the time of year when I'm really starting to need a change in the weather around here), and it poured rain the entire time I was there, with sunny, 80 degree weather the day before I arrived and the day I departed. When we cruised in the Caribbean, our most anticipated excursion was cancelled because of rain. Last summer during our family vacation, the one day we planned to go boating, there were thunderstorms, cutting our day short. So this time, I wasn't surprised that both of our boating days were cloudy with chances of thunderstorms. The lesson I realized? See the glass half full.


Our first day of boating, we hoped for the best and headed to the lake despite the overcast. And we had a fantastic day. Because of the cooler temps and muted sunshine, I wasn't too worried about having the baby out in the boat without shelter, and we all enjoyed some time on the boat together. The water (speaking of glasses) was like glass, which made for great skiing. And there was hardly any other boat to avoid on the lake.

A few days later, when we planned to return to the water, it was raining pretty hard. I was "this close" to calling it off, not wanting to waste the trip (and the fuel) to the lake, just to turn around and come back. But halfway through our hour-long drive, we left the rain behind and had another fantastic day on the boat. In fact, we had so much sun that I let my kids get sunburns, and probably cancer. But wait, I'm forgetting my lesson. See the glass half full. Perhaps they just got their yearly dose of Vitamin D?

Anyway, if we had let the imperfect boating weather discourage us, we would have missed out on a ton of fun!




Lesson learned....again.

Familiarity

Two weeks of vacation is long enough to forget some of the details of my normal life. When we got home last night, I felt as if I'd been gone for a very, very long time. But it's all coming back to me now!

If only I could be on vacation permanently. We had such a great time! Here are a few highlights(And of course I'll have more to say about each of these things in the near future):

1. Visiting family and friends. There's nothing we miss more about Utah than the people we love who live there.

2. Grandma's house. Any place that can be called our "Grandma's House" is among our favorite destinations!

3. The food. I have to schedule specific meals and snacks into our itinerary, so that I can savor all the flavors I miss when I'm at home.

4. Playing games, of course!

5. Grandpa's Boat, a.k.a. The Twin. (It needs a name, and I'm just trying that one on for size.)

6. Lagoon--with cousins!

7. ...And other fun day trips.

8. Catching some ZZZZZZ's

9. No work/commute/meetings for this guy for an entire week!

10. Did I ever mention how I love the sunshine?