Utah Trip

Tuesday morning (May 8th) when we got news that Grandpa was going downhill very fast and would probably pass away within a day or two Dave volunteered himself to drive the family to Utah so that we could be with Grandma and the others.  Isn't Dave sweet?  We started packing, even before the news that Grandpa had passed. Dave had to be on call again starting the following Monday so he thought we should get on the road and up to Salt Lake to enjoy the time with family even if it meant we wouldn't get to stay for the funeral.  Grandpa ended up passing away Tuesday afternoon and we left Wed morning with all of the kids to drive to UT.   AT first we had planned to leave at 4am as we have seen some families do, but as we went to bed Tues night we chickened out of that plan thinking it would be a nightmare because in all likelihood Calvin would never go back to sleep and could possibly keep the others awake. Instead we decided to leave at 7am.

We set alarms to get up and shower and finish getting ready. At 7am everyone was up and ready except Dave who was just starting to pack!!!  :) We left at 8am.  We had to make several stops but none more than 45 minutes. We arrived in Provo for dinner around 8pm and then up to Grandma Ruth's house around 10pm.  Overall the drive wasn't too bad. It definitely could have been worse.

For the first few hours I drove so that Dave could be in charge of the electronic devices. I'm so glad we did it this way. I would have gone nuts trying to get everything working and keep all the kids happy and rotate through the charger in the car, etc.  We got a kindle fire the night before our trip (Calvin will earn it when he has 10 days in a row on the school bus) so we decided to pick it up so we'd have it on the trip. With the Nintendo DS, kindle fire and 2 DVD players we usually had something for everyone. We could be charging one thing at a time in the car so there were periods of time where someone was without an electronic devise. (Usually Clare because she cries the least and can make do the best.)

We had such a nice trip to Salt Lake. I have been wanting to take all of the kids to UT for a long time. The last time Clare and Calvin were there was when Clare was a baby and Calvin was just 3. It has been a long time.

We went to Temple Square and BYU, each for a few hours. Other than that, we were just with family. I loved it!

I will put all the touristy stuff here and then do another post with the funeral and family stuff.

BYU visit-

We walked the kids around BYU for a bit. We showed them where Dave studied - the enginnering building and where I studied - the science buildings. We went inside the Eyring science center where they have a few hands on displays in the lobby area.

 We also met up with the wonderful Uncle Dan for lunch in the cougareat. We had food and then WONDERFUL creamery ice cream.  Then Dan showed us his dorms and Calvin was even able to see his room.

 The girls playing with these little statues outside the BYU bookstore.

 Dave got a call while we were wandering around campus.

TEMPLE SQUARE and visitors center.

Family photo!! :)

 The new mall in downtown salt lake, CITY CENTER, was lovely.

 Lexey loved the Book of Mormon with the Angel Moroni on it.

 A Saturday morning had lots of weddings at the temple which was fun to see.

Sunday morning we decided to go to Music and the Spoken Word instead of church!  IT WAS AMAZING.  I highly recommend it. Calvin was the only kid old enough to go so it was just Calvin and I with Pete and Scott. Dave and the girls went for a little ride up to see the U medical center while we were listening.  On the way home from music and the spoken word we found a super nice camera. Somehow I ended up keeping it even though my brothers spotted it first. We tried to find the owners but looking through photos to see if we could identify any place we could turn it into but most of the photos were from Europe. We also tried posting on craigslist and KSL.com ... if I had lost a camera I would never thing to look for it online but we did our best. I will have a separate post about the camera as well.

We took the kids swimming at the hotel pool where Pete, Scott, Bob, Kari and Shi were staying. It was a fun treat for them!

We also toured the conference center. The entire Salt Lake experience was very neat. I was glad to show my kids all of the wonderful church things there.