A Trip to St. George With the Littles

I definitely wanted to get away over UEA. I needed a break from all of the nagging about homework, practicing, getting ready, doing jobs and so on. I was desperate to have some different conversations with my kids, but Shawn wasn't sure if he could get another day off of work, and my older kids weren't totally enthused about the idea of spending too much time in the car. I wasn't enthused about trying to convince people to go with me, so I took the ones that wanted to go as much as I did. (OK, Peter probably didn't care, but he likes to be where I am and leaving him home wasn't an option. Plus, he's pretty good company.) So, it was me and the littles off to St. George while the bigs stayed home with Shawn.

It wasn't a totally relaxing vacation since I had the neediest kids with me, but it was a change and the weather was beautiful. I got to watch several plays that always ended with bows by the cast (and enthusiastic clapping by me, of course.)


There was lots of riding scooters and bikes around the driveway and park.

We had some nice picnics outside on a blanket.

We played a little "Superhero."

We spent lots of time creating masterpieces in chalk all over the driveway.

We went on lizard and rabbit hunts, where we found tons of lizards, not a single rabbit, but a huge caterpillar, (probably 4 or 5 inches long.)

It always cracks me up to see Peter's organizational tendencies. (Probably because it's exactly what I would do.)

We lounged around watching TV. (It's pretty rare for that to happen at home, so that was a real treat.)
We went to the pool a couple of times. (Granted the second time was mostly for the purpose of taking a hot shower because the pilot light had gone off at the house and we had no hot water. I re-lit it, but it wouldn't stay on. No worries, though, we had fun.)

And we found some time to go out for ice-cream, too.

It was a much needed break from the craziness of regular life. I think Jonas and Samantha enjoyed not having me around nagging them all weekend, too. I think they spent the whole time doing next to nothing, which is nice to do sometimes. Either way, I don't think they missed me a bit.