*I am so far behind in blogging, and I want to blog about this, but will never get to it. So I totally just copied this from Shantel's Blog. So this is written by Shantel. Thanks for blogging for me this time! Love you! *
By:Shantel
Around Christmas-time, Melissa started talking about getting everyone together to go on a Walker Family trip. Things were a little complicated because Matt and Brooklyn live in California, Jenna is getting ready to move to Iowa, and we are planning for a baby to join us in June and couldn't commit to a solid summer date. Thank goodness that Melissa kept pushing, even though the rest of us were being fairly non-committal (even though we all thought it would be great!). We finally found a weekend when most of us could make it and we decided to just go for it. Instead of going somewhere big, we just decided to escape the cold for a little bit and head down to St. George for the weekend. It was perfect! Exactly the escape that we needed. David wasn't able to come #busyseason - but maybe that's why it was extra needed in my case. We've had a fine busy season, but it's starting to drag, and this was exactly the thing that I needed to get us through the rest of the way.
Our trip wasn't incredibly long or fancy, but it was just SO nice to spend some time with my family. We left on a Friday morning and caravanned down, stopping at the Cedar City temple for a couple of minutes. (We were planning to eat lunch there but it was still too cold.)
We spend the rest of Friday playing at a super-fun park in St. George where the weather was beautiful! Then we headed to a little house just outside of St. George that Melissa and Blake were able to rent through Blake's work. It's like an Airbnb but Blake's work keeps it for employees to rent. It had plenty of bedrooms for all of us and was the perfect place to stay on our trip! The best part about this day was that Matt and Brooklyn surprised us by coming! We didn't think that they were going to be able to come (California and all that) - but last minute they decided to take the days off of work and just come. It was such a happy surprise! They just walked up to us while we were at the park and we could hardly believe that they were there. We spent the night playing games and eating lots of food.
The next morning we got up went exploring for a little bit and then went out to breakfast at Hash House a Go Go, which has pancakes that are literally the size of a steering wheel. It was such a fun place to eat. Going out to eat with three kids (plus their three cousins) isn't exactly peaceful - but they did well for the most part and the food was delicious so I will chalk it up to a win. We went on a hike, went swimming in the afternoon, went exploring around some cool rock formations close to the house, and played games together. It was a perfect sunny day, minus the brief time when I almost ran out of gas in the middle of nowhere as I drove along an abandoned back road trying to get to the nearest gas station. (#reallife)
Hiking at 26 weeks pregnant while carrying my 2 year old in the carrier - go me! I was also the one who made everyone turn around and head back before the adults were really ready to be done because if I have learned anything as a mother it is the fact that you have to make sure to save enough energy to get your kids back. You have to stop before they are halfway tired because they have to walk all the way back and getting back often takes more energy than getting there. It worked out though, we all had fun and the kids only started dragging at the very end - so pretty much perfect timing.
Exploring the rock formations near where we stayed. Melissa and Blake came with us to walk around before bedtime.
My dad had already committed to helping my Grandpa on the ranch this weekend, so he wasn't going to be able to come either - but then right before bedtime, he surprised us by showing up, too! It was so neat to have all of my siblings, both of my parents, and all of their spouses there.
The only person who was missing was David. I missed him a lot, and I know that he wanted to be there. He felt so bad that he couldn't come, but he really just couldn't make it work. Even though he couldn't come, and I missed him badly, I was so grateful all weekend that he was so supportive of me coming with the kids, both emotionally and financially, even though he wouldn't be able to come and enjoy with us. It means a lot to me that he was so encouraging to me and the kids even though he had to stay home and work. I am grateful every day that I married that man.
Sunday we got up, ate a delicious breakfast (I made aebleskivers and Matt and Brooklyn made homemade bagels, yum!) and then went to a local ward for Church. Then we went to the temple grounds and walked around and took pictures.
I love my family.
I am so grateful for the relationships that we share. We had such a great time on this trip and I'm just still basking in the glow of the summer-sunshine (which is just so needed in March!) and the glow of spending the weekend with some of the people that I love most in life. (The only thing that could have made it better is if David had been able to come, too.) Pretty soon Jenna will be off in Iowa, Matt and Brooklyn will be back in California, and things will be a little different. But this weekend was wonderful and the sunshine will be coming to Lehi soon, and after such a great weekend everything feels like it's going to be okay. (And thank heavens for Marco Polo that will be able to keep my family connected no matter where they are.) Huge shoutout to Melissa for making this happen, I'm incredibly grateful to her because this weekend was exactly what I needed.
(Also, of note - I made a video of this trip using small clips that I took throughout the weekend. It turned out so great and was so fun. I'm not uploading it on here because it won't transfer into the book - but it's been so fun to watch because it really captures the feeling of this weekend.)
