March: Disney World, Grand Canyon, and a Triathlon Sprint

We made a trip out to Arizona to see the Grand Canyon! This was quite the ordeal to plan for and pack and get everything ready, especially because we had so many other things going on, but we did it and I'm so glad! It was one of my 30 things to see the Grand Canyon, because although I camped at the bottom in Havasupai for a few days I never actually saw it from the top. The first day we spent in the car, but we did make a wonderful stop at Horseshoe Bend! It was just as beautiful as I thought it would be. I LOVE it here. We got there when it was already getting dark so we had to run to the viewpoint but we made it and I'm so happy we saw it. It was dusk and the sun was already down, but we had a little bit of time to see it before we had to leave.

The next day was Friday and we woke up, had breakfast, and then did the Desert View Drive and stopped at some viewpoints along the way. Our first stop was the Desert View Watchtower. Then we stopped at some more lookouts and had a picnic at one of them. There was no fence there and I was a little nervous about one of my children falling, even though we were so far from the edge haha.

The kids loved playing on this tree. They pretended it was their horses.

After that we headed over and did Bright Angel Trail. I knew that it was a steep one, but I didn't account for the snow pack that would still be there. We didn't go very far down because it just didn't seem very comfortable or safe haha. We came back up and then did some of the rim trail that goes past the trail head.

To end the day we went to a viewpoint (Mather Point) to watch the sunset. It was really pretty, even though I feel like this point isn't the best because it faces the other way haha. Then we went back to our campsite and our friends Katie and Cody were there! We hadn't seen them in so long, it was so much fun! 

Saturday we woke up and met the Thompsons to do some more hiking along the rim trail. It was a great hike beause you got beautiful views the entire way, it was paved for their stroller, and it was fenced on parts so we weren't scared of the kids falling down haha. We went and saw a little visitor's center too.

After our walk we went back to our campsite to roast some hot dogs and s'mores. These beautiful elk just walked right through our campground! It was so fun to be that close to them. The kids were pretty amazed.

After dinner we went back out to watch another sunset, this time at a different point. It was really beautiful and was totally worth going out. The girls were asleep in the car so we kept it running and just watched it from the view.

Sunday morning we woke up and took down camp. We met the Thompsons in a little town that Cars is based on. Then we went on to stop at two native ruins on our way home. Our first stop was Walnut Canyon. We got some lunch and ate it in the bed of the truck in our camp chairs before we set out to do a little one mile loop that ended at being able to see across a canyon at some of the cliff dwellings that are still there. It was really cool to see that, and if we had had more time we would have gone over and done a hike that took you right underneath them! 

Our next stop was at Wupatki National Monument, and it was so cool! It was amazing because we were actually able to walk through the ruins and go inside them. Henry and Della had a great time playing pretend in the house. There were multiple “houses” there and they each had different rooms and windows, and even “basement” areas where it would stay cool all of the time. It was really cool!

One of my bigger goals for 30 before 30 was to complete a Triathlon Sprint. I had been trying to train for the past few weeks to be ready for it, but with just having Amelia it was kind of hard. The main goal was just to complete the race, and if I could do it in under 2 hours that would be great. I came in at 1:47 so I was happy! I got there early and registered and then put my bike on a rack. Next to me was another girl that was doing this for her first time, and the couple behind us had done these a million times. They were so nice and gave us some pointers and some of that nasty electrolyte gel. The husband said, “Have you lubed up?” And I was like, “Umm… excuse me?! Haha” Then he told me that I needed some lube so I wouldn’t chafe, and gave me a squirt from his bottle and told me to go to the bathroom and take care of it haha.

The kids and Rusty came to be so supportive and it was wonderful! I do wish that they had picked somewhere other than the biggest hill to wait because it was really hard for me to look awesome while I was dying on that hill haha.

After the race we got some lunch and then went back to the house and ate the cheesecake we got from the Utah Taste Off and watched Big Hero 6 with the family all together. Rusty got me the cheesecakes as part of my birthday and it was so fun to taste a bunch of different kinds and just relax. 

For my birthday I woke up to a beautiful breakfast in bed! And a bunch of balloons that Henry blew up haha. I requested that we read books in the bed and just relax for a little bit. We drove up to Salt Lake to have dinner with my parents at a fun little Italian place and it was delicious and so fun to get out for lunch together!

For my birthday Rusty got me a weekend away in Las Vegas that we get to hopefully go on this fall, and a sweet little journal full of reasons that he loved me or was grateful for me. It was so sweet and is my favorite gift I've ever gotten I think. I love this man!

In the afternoon we went for a bike ride on the same route that I was going to do for my tri sprint. I pulled Adeline on the little trailing bike, Rusty pulled Amelia behind him in the trailer and Henry rode by himself. The WHOLE THING. 12 miles! That kid is awesome and I am so proud of him. He killed it. We stopped at the top and played at a park for a little bit, and then Henry got a flat tire on the way down the hill on the other side so we stopped at a little grassy area and laid around while Rusty fixed the tire. It was a low key and perfect birthday. Welcome to 30! 

The next week, as part of a birthday celebration and also a last hurrah before Rusty’s surgery to take out the hardware in his back, we went paintballing! We invited some friends and all got together to play and had some cake at the end. I’ll be honest, at the beginning I was like “why do people like this.” But by the end I was loving it! I think it was way more fun when the workers just let us do our own thing and we played capture the flag and just had fun instead of just trying to shoot people haha. I wanted more of a game than that. I also got better at hiding and not getting out right away. I had on three layers of pants and three layers of shirts/jackets and I still got some welts ha! And we even did the low impact paint. Yikes. Rusty wore his Carhart jacket and would not let me wear it even though I asked so nicely! I think that is the only time that he has refused me something like that haha. Don’t get in between him and his Carhart. 

Story time continued to kill it this month. The kids met Cinderella and Prince Charming, The Mad Hatter and Alice in Wonderland, and then also saw the Easter Bunny and did an Easter Egg hunt! They also learned all about dinosaurs and dug some toy dinosaurs out of a sand box. I love these activities so much!

We went on a hike with the Barrus family, and my kids were so excited to meet little Maybelle! We ended up just kind of wandering around and letting the kids run wild. We found a jaw bone from a deer and the kids pulled the teeth out and decided that they wanted to try to trick the tooth fairy and put them under their pillow haha. But she didn’t buy it at all and left them there. I love having the chance to get outside and Lia had this time where she was just giggling and blowing bubbles and so happy. I love days like this!

FLORIDA! We went to Florida this month and it was EPIC! Our flight left so, so early and so we all had to be at the airport before anyone should ever be awake. We definitely cut it too close with parking and riding the shuttle in, and I did not account for the new layout of the Salt Lake Airport because it is huge and the gates are so far away. We also brought an insane amount of gear and didn’t account that the two of us literally could not carry it all. Luckily some strangers helped us load and unload the bus and then Jessica came down and helped us carry it up to the baggage claim. We will never fly with that much stuff again haha. NEVER.

The plus side of an early flight is that we got to Florida relatively early and had time to switch into swim suits and go swimming before we checked in to the condo. There was a cool splash pad, little park, pond with boardwalk around it, and a pool with a pirate ship inside.

 

Our first full day in Florida we spent lazing around in the morning and then going on a fan boat ride through the Everglades! I did one of these when I was younger but honestly this was so much cooler than I even remember. And Rusty had never done it and I was so excited to do that for him. We saw a few alligators, and even a mama with a ton of little babies. She ducked down under the water when she saw the boat coming closer and all her little babies were just swimming around up above her. Even though it was so loud and I was nervous about Amelia’s little ears with the ear muffs on, she slept for the entire hour ride. After the boat ride we went around the park area and saw some of their shows. They fed the alligators and we saw them jump out of the water. Henry got to hold a caiman and boa constrictor, but it cost like $30 for a picture so we opted out of that. Adeline was not interested in doing that haha. We finished the night off by seeing the animals there, eating some pulled pork sandwiches, alligator bites and frog legs, and looking out over the Everglades.

The next day, Sunday, Mom, Dad, Jessica and I woke up super early again and drove over to Crystal River to swim with the manatees! We did their little introduction course and learned about manatees before we went out onto the boat. We watched the sun rise and drove around looking for manatees. In one area that had really, really clear water they found some, but one of them was a little baby that was just a few days old. They didn’t want us to go in there because the little babies sometimes get too interested in humans and will follow them back to their boat and then follow the boat when it drives away. Then they get too far away from their mommies and can’t find their way back! So sad! So we kept driving around and eventually found some manatees that we could swim with. The visibility was so poor that we couldn’t see anything at all. I jumped in and started swimming, basically blind, and then all of a sudden a giant manatee fluke came up and hit me in the face haha! We were right on top of them but because you couldn’t see anything they would just pop up randomly and startle you. I never got to actually see the face of one of them, but in a video that the company took you can clearly see a manatee looking right at my face and I’m looking right at it… but I can’t see because we’re like two feet apart haha!

After the manatees we went and picked everyone up (shout out to Rusty for staying home with the kids so I could do that) and drove to the beach. The one I was trying to get us to didn’t end up working out, and then we were like super far from all the beaches because you had to go around to get out there by bridges. We ended up going to a nature preserve that was amazingly cool! Henry spent all of his time in the very cold water (no thank you). Della loved building sand castles and burying Jessica, and Amelia loved playing in the sand and touching the water with her toes! 

MONDAY FINALLY CAME! It was time for us to go to Disney World and see the Magic Kingdom. Seriously, I was so excited to show the kids and also just to be there. I totally get now why adults go to Magic Kingdom just for fun because the whole place feels like straight up magic. It is such a happy place! My parents got Henry and Della a Cinderella and Prince Charming costume (Della stayed in hers the entire day and Henry promptly changed after the pictures haha) and we took some pictures of them in front of the castle. They were still in their costumes when we saw the two step sisters and we talked with them for a little bit. They are absolutely hilarious! They had us cracking up and saying the funniest things. They told Della that she was more beautiful than Cinderella, and Henry that he was more handsome than Prince Charming. We got there right at opening and everyone got in line for the 7 Dwarves ride while I took the kids to do some other rides. Because everyone was in the lines for the popular rides we were able to go on three before we went in line for the dwarves ride. It was awesome! We did Dumbo, The Little Mermaid, and Winnie the Pooh. Then we rode the 7 Dwarves ride which was awesome! After this ride Della decided she didn’t really want to ride big roller coasters anymore haha.

We knocked out so many rides today, like seriously way more than I thought we would and everything we wanted, and ate every item of food that I wanted to. I was nervous about seeing the characters because they aren’t doing parades anymore, but they are actually doing these little mini parades and I liked that better than doing just one big parade. It was way less crowded and you got to see them more than once. Adeline got to see all of her princesses she wanted, and Cinderella even waved at her from her float and blew her a kiss after acknowledging Della’s matching dress. I thought sweet Della was going to die she was so pleased with herself!

Della saw the Prince’s Regal Carousel and was sure she had to ride it. It had such a long wait time that I tried to convince her to skip it and do something else, but she was adamant about it. When we got closer she picked out a horse that she really wanted to ride and I tried to tell her that we don’t get to pick, we just go wherever they tell us to go. When it was our turn, the attendant was telling everyone to go the opposite direction of Della’s horse, but then she told us to go to that exact horse! She crouched down low and told Adeline, “The horse with the ribbon on its tail is Cinderella’s real horse. You get to ride that one! The one next to it is the Prince’s, and that can be for your mommy.” Della FLIPPED OUT. She was so excited and the entire ride kept talking to me like I was the Prince. “Ok Prince. Me Cinderella. Let’s have a picnic by our castle. See that castle? That’s my castle. You’re my prince.” It was so magical and perfect and I loved seeing her just light up like that.

Henry got to go over to these go karts with Dad and Rusty which was one of his favorite rides ever! I think my favorite ride was Big Thunder Mountain, but they are all so fun! We spent the whole day riding awesome rides and eating delicious food. On Pirates there was a big drop and I was terrified because Rusty was holding Lia on the edge and I thought he was going to drop her. We did It's A Small World and it was very nice and low key, I nursed Amelia on it haha. Mom said that she remembered that ride from when she was younger.

We were going on Space Mountain, which is a pretty intense ride, but Henry had done so good on all of the rides that we believed him when he said he wanted to go. In fact, when we went down the big drop at Splash Mountain Henry turned to Rusty and yelled, “I AM NOT OLD ENOUGH FOR THIS!” Hahaha! That kid. Anyway, when it got time to get in for Space Mountain he got a little nervous and was unsure about it because it was the first ride that he would have to sit alone because you sit single file. He got in but was scared, and then the attendant realized that Henry was in front and needed to have an adult in front of him so they made us get out and then get back in. The people in line saw Henry getting back in even though he was nervous and they all started cheering for him! It was the sweetest thing and made Henry so proud. We ate so many delicious things today, and one of my favorites was this Nutella waffle with berries in Sleepy Hollow. YUM. And it had a great view of the castle, and the view of the castle was great!

As we were leaving the park we had literally done everything on our list, except for seeing Mickey and Minnie. That was important to Henry and I felt bad that he hadn’t got to see them but there was nothing I could do about it. And he had had a great day! Then right at the exit to the park everyone was lined up on the balcony waving! Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Goofy, Pluto, everyone! It was like the perfect ending to the perfect day. I love Disney World. 

The next day we spent lazing around. The first part of the day we just played in the pool, well the kids and I did. Then Mom, Dad and the girls stayed at the condo and Henry, Rusty, Jess and I went back to the beach. It was chillier today, but we still had a fun time playing there. It is crazy to have Henry all by himself because watching him run and chase the sea gulls I was hit by how small and little he really is. When he is always with his sisters I think of him as such a big boy, but he is really just my small little Henry. It was a good reminder to be easier on him. I know that I am too hard on him and that is part of being the oldest child, but I try to remember to settle down and let him be little. It was fun to have this day with him. That night we were supposed to go to a pirate dinner show but they cancelled it because of Covid. So the kids took pictures in their pirate clothes anyway haha! That night after the kids went to bed we got to go down to the hot tub just us and Rusty even made some pina coladas for us! Hooray!

Wednesday we spent back at Disney World, exploring Animal Kingdom! We had a different game plan this day. Instead of going to the big line we decided to do some of the other ones while everyone was over there. So we went to the Everest ride and we rode that like 4 times haha. It was a blast! Henry liked it but thought it was scary, and I thought so too so there’s that! We enjoyed the park and went on a safari, little walks to see animals, rode a train out to a petting zoo, and ate lunch at the Rainforest Café. We also got a bunch of different food that was on my list for here and all of it was so delicious. A big highlight was riding the Avatar ride. It was a virtual ride and you ride like a big dragon. I hadn’t seen the movie yet (I watched it after we got home) but it was still really cool. Dad, Rusty and Henry particularly loved it! Della was too short for this one so she didn’t get to ride it. I took the kids to the little kid area while Dad and Rusty rode that one, but turns out all but one of those rides was shut down so that was a bust haha. We looped back around and met up with the guys, switched so Mom, Henry and I could ride Avatar and then went home. Another great day!

Thursday was our last full day here, and we spent it at Universal Studios so that we could see Harry Potter World! YAYAYAYAYAYA! I have been waiting like my whole life to see that haha. Jessica wasn’t going to be able to stay for today because of work, and I was so bummed. She got all packed up yesterday and left to the airport with dad. Then about an hour and a half later someone knocked on the door and then I opened it and she was standing there! Best surprise ever! So today we got to experience Harry Potter World together and it was magnificent. We got our wands from Ollivander’s, got Griffyndor robes, drank butterbeer and ate lunch at the Leaky Cauldron, walked through Diagon Alley and Knockturn Alley, and just loved every minute of it. We rode every ride we could except for the Hippogriff one because a big storm came and shut all the rides down. Mom and Dad were great and took the kids back so that the adults could play for a while, and Rusty was over HP so he went and rode Hulk a few times and was so happy about that.

 

 Friday was the day that we had to return to real life. This trip was definitely busy and not at all relaxing haha, but it was a blast! Each day was filled with fun and busyness, and I hope my kids remember this trip like I will. When we got to the airport Henry lost a tooth! Then we had a crazy long flight with weird layovers that ended up taking us the ENTIRE DAY to get home. It was probably my worst travel day ever haha. But we made it and that’s all that matters. Hooray for Florida and family vacations!

Henry's Highlights:

• He was carrying a book and came up to me with it and said, "Want me to read something I read in the 80's? From a long time ago?" He is such an old soul haha! Where did he come from.
• Della was ahving a hard time unbuckling herself from her carseat so I asked him to do it. He HATES doing it and is pretty stubborn about it. One day he said, "Why do I have to unbuckle Della?!" I said, "Henry, why do I have to feed you breakfast?" "Because I wouldn't survive! She can stay here. We can bring her food and warm clothes." Such a loving brother haha.
• Henry still really loves cooking and has been taking more responsibility and independence with this. He made scrambled eggs all by himself and was so proud!

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Adeline's Adventures:

• Always gives thumbs up
• She got a haircut! It really became a problem to be brushing her hair every day, and I just couldn't do it any more. She just screams and throws a fit every time. So we decided to cut her hair so that she didn't have to have so much hair to brush
  

Amelia's Updates:

• She blows bubbles ALL the time. I am constantly covered in milk or her food haha
• Loves to drink water from a cup
• She LOVES her mobile

• Loves crunchy toys
• She is six months old!

• She always scoots and ends up with her head in the top part of her crib
• She twists and turns and tries to grab the gold stickers off the wall while I change her diaper

Extra Pictures: