Day Trip to Provo

All my friends take frequent trips to Provo and when I say frequent, I mean almost weekly. They go for various reasons: need to pick up something they can't get in small town Utah, want to go somewhere different for lunch, change of scenery, need to do some shopping, visit relatives, etc. Our week was going to be pretty slow and I needed a new swimsuit. I didn't want to buy one here or every time we go the pool someone else will have my same swimsuit...it's a small town thing.

So we took a trip up to Provo the other day and hit the Kohl's store for some great swimsuit shopping. Within 20 minutes I remembered why I try to avoid shopping with kids as much as I can and why I never buy anything for myself. As I was trying to pick out swimsuits off the rack Josie climbed out of the stroller and wandered into the endless sea of clothing racks. I called her name but she prefers not to answer. It's a little game she likes to play. I found her not too far off just walking around or looking at some boy, scolded her and put her back in the stroller. She continued to do this 5 more times but I was determined to get a swimsuit that day. I did not drive all that way for nothing.

We headed to the dressing room with a whole bunch of swimsuits to try on and Josie was intrigued by the new surroundings for about 30 seconds. Just as I had finished trying on the first swimsuit, she took off out the door. Oh yeah, here I go, out of the dressing room in a swimsuit that's a little too tight on top to chase Josie around this huge store. The dressing room is smack dab in the middle of the store so when you walk out you can go left or right and which way did Josie go? Who knows! I'm in this swimsuit, hunched over walking through racks and calling my little girls name and people are looking at me like I'm crazy! I was so embarrassed. I finally found her on the opposite side of the store from where the swimsuits are and hauled her back to the dressing room. She thought it was pretty funny and she did it several more times. So, a shopping trip that would have taken me 30 minutes if I had been by myself ended up taking almost an hour and a half with Josie in tow.

I made sure we went to the bathroom each time we entered and left a store to prevent any accidents with my potty-training toddler. She had done really well so far so we headed to Bajio for lunch before heading home. The place was nearly deserted so we picked a table by the windows and sat down to eat our lunch that I had been looking forward to for the last four days. I started into my lunch and she had a couple bites of rice when all of a sudden she opens the flood gates and pees all over the chair! Even better, there are slats on the seat of the chair so all the pee immediately runs all over the floor! FOR THE LOVE! I had prepared for just such as incident so I cleaned up the mess and grabbed the extra outfit I had brought. We headed into the bathroom and cleaned up as fast as we could and when we walked back out they had cleared our lunch from our table! Over $10 worth of food was now sitting in the garbage. I had had enough, time to go home. It's going to be a long time before we go to Provo for a day trip again.

Daddy!!!!

I really shouldn't post this but it's too funny not to. One of those parenting moments that you just have to write down.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about Josie potty training. She's doing so well with the #1 aspect but having a little trouble with #2. She's been holding it for a couple of days but a bath last night helped loosen things up. I was at a Relief Society thing so Mark had the girls for the night. He put Josie to bed in a pull-up and her favorite footie pajamas. A few minutes later Josie was screaming "Daddy! Daddy!" He went to see what she needed and saw that she was buck-naked and holding something in her hand. She said, "Daddy...poop...here" and held out a nice little brown package for him to dispose of!!! OMG(osh)!!! I laughed till I cried when I got home and he told me what happened. I'm still laughing! There was no sign of the poop landing on her blankets, sheet, pajamas or pull-up. I think she caught it! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!

Spring break in Phoenix

For the last 2 years Karen has been hounding us to come visit her in Phoenix. We told her that when we had successfully turned Josie into a movie-watching zombie we would tackle the 12 hour drive and come visit. Josie finally hit that milestone so we took a road trip to Phoenix for Spring Break. What a drive! Holy cow, next time we'll fly.

The second we got out of the car we headed for the backyard pool. The girls stripped down and jumped in and were quite shocked to find out the water was only 68 degrees! They immediately jumped out...and got their swimsuits. The water was cold but they didn't care. They had waited for this moment for months and they weren't going to let the cold water ruin their long-anticipated swim. They didn't brave the pool again until a few days later when their beloved Nana Karen drug them out of the house and threw them in!! You wait Karen, it won't be long until they are bigger than you and revenge will be theirs! Wah-ah-ah-ah.

After such a long, cold winter and a spring that hasn't been much better, it was so nice to sit by the pool and soak up the sun. The flowers were blooming and the air smelled so sweet.

We checked out a huge park in Anthem which "is a planned community developed by Dell Webb in 1989..." Karen told us after Googling "Anthem, AZ" on her iPhone. It was hilarious. Anytime we had a question about the area whether it was size or population or history Karen was all over it on her iPhone. I think she may have given Apple it's "There's an app for that." tagline.

We hiked the Thunderbird trail. I think that was the first time Karen had done this since living there and her house is about two blocks away.

Interactive art in downtown Mesa.

The girls got cooking lessons from Nana Karen. They made homemade OREO cookies, Jello jelly beans and eggs, chocolate eggs and Chex white chocolate snack mix to name just a few. One of my favorite parts of the trip was all the fresh squeezed lemonade, OJ and grapefruit juice that we enjoyed everyday. Some of it even came from Karen's own backyard and it was soooo good.

On our way home, we braved the wind and made a detour to the Grand Canyon. That was the first time Mark and I had been there and it was pretty spectacular.

The picture below cracks me up. Emily and I were checking out the view from the guard rail and I turned around and saw a group of Japanese tourists snapping pictures of Lindsey and Josie. Those two thought they were in a magazine photo shoot. The group couldn't get enough of them and Josie and Lindsey hammed it up pretty good for the camera. Forget the huge hole in the ground. Look at these cute American girls! Click, click, click.