Very, very early last Wednesday morning Maisie & I headed to the airport for our flight to visit friends in Salt Lake City.
Though they hadn't seen each other since our last visit in 2010, Maisie, Eliza & Sollie were all smiles & hugs and happy to see one another. Maisie and I were spending the week at Tiffany's home and immediately after all the welcome hugs, the kids happily ran off to play and other than when it was time to go for dinner, we didn't see them until bedtime.
Thursday morning the girls were up early bouncing from bedroom to bedroom playing and then it was time for morning stretch.
And some bridges
Out came the electronics.
Maisie and Eliza spent many hours texting one another, often when sitting just a few feet apart.
I'm sure that this is a preview of teen years. Charlee, Maisie & Eliza sprawled on the bed texting away.
Later in the afternoon Tiffany had friends over to celebrate July 4th. All the children had fun playing and Eliza, Maisie & Tate did some gymnastics and practiced handstands against the fence.
I would share all the firework photos but by the time they started Maisie was stick-a-fork-in-her-done. She had been going strong but to her body it was 11PM and with the previous day waking at 4am to travel and the two hour time difference & late night, she just couldn't stay awake and asked to go to bed. She must have been exhausted as fireworks were going off all through the neighborhood and she fell asleep to them & slept through all the noise. She's not a lover of fireworks and the noise so she didn't feel like she missed out on anything so it was good that she got the sleep she needed.
Friday morning we headed into Salt Lake City to visit Temple Square. Our first stop though was for lunch at The Lion House.
Sol and his ladies, Charlee, Tate, Maisie & Eliza in front of the Temple.
My beautiful Maisie in front of the Temple.
The girls with a statue of Angel Moroni.
Saturday we headed out for lunch at Z'Tejas with our three very well behaved children. Extra well behaved as we promised candies for their good behavior.
Then we headed to Gardner Village where we enjoyed strolling around and did a bit of shopping.
Gardner Village is such a fun and pretty place to spend a few hours.
Sunday morning Maisie wanted to go to Church with Eliza & Sollie so that is how we spent the morning. Three little cuties, ready to go.
Sunday afternoon the kids played at the neighborhood playground then after dinner we headed over to Station Park where the children had fun playing on that playground.
The park had a wonderful fountain which every hour put on a spectacular light and music show.
The girls did some gymnastics and Maisie helped Eliza with her handstands.
Maisie & Eliza doing some splits to end the evening.
Monday we spent a pretty quiet day around the house as we knew that it would be a late evening. Jay & Laurel had invited a big group over for a BBQ that evening. All the children had a blast playing together and the adults enjoyed seeing one another and catching up.
Jay and Laurel have the best yard for entertaining and always have fun things to keep the kids entertained like duck races down the river.
These beauties Maisie, Grace & Pearl have grown so much since the last time they were together.
The evening ended with all the children making ice cream. It was so much fun seeing everyone and catching up, wish we could do it more often.
Tuesday morning I was really tired and slept in but the kids were up early and Charlee & Maisie decided to practice their tagging skills on the wall of Tiffany's garage...with her permission of course
Once I finally rolled out of bed we decided to head over to Snowbird where our first stop was the trampolines.
Then we took the Aerial Tram up to 11,000 feet above sea level, to the top of Hidden Peak.
The views from the top were just amazing.
Not the best smiles as we headed back down in the Aerial Tram but the views all along the route were gorgeous.
We rode the Mountain Flyer and the Alpine Slide numerous times.
Maisie loved racing down the mountain as fast as she could.
After our fun day at Snowbird, Tiffany took us all out for dinner at In-n-Out Burger, a first for Maisie and I. Maisie doesn't eat fast food because of her allergies and I don't eat it because I neither care for it nor like it but because we both got 100% beef burgers (no fillers) and had them "protein style" (wrapped in lettuce leaves instead of a bun) it was Maisie "safe," healthier and quite delicious. The kids all enjoyed their meals and had fun wearing their hats at their own special table.
It had been a long, fun day but unfortunately our time in Utah was coming to a close as Wednesday morning Maisie and I would be flying home. We headed back to Tiffany's where the very tired children all went to bed and I packed and spent my last evening hanging with Tiffany
Wednesday morning Tiffany brought Maisie and I to the airport for our journey home. It really shouldn't have been too bad as we were just scheduled for a brief layover in Chicago before the final leg to Atlanta but things didn't go quite as planned. We made it out of SLC just fine and landed in Chicago a little ahead of schedule. But then there was a plane at our gate which had no plans of leaving so we sat and sat on the Tarmac until well after our scheduled arrival time. Then we were assigned a new gate but when we arrived the jetway motor didn't work so they couldn't extend it to the plane. By that time our short layover time had passed and according to the airport's website, our connecting flight was on time and should have left. By the time we actually got off the plane and into the airport it was about 40 minutes after our connecting flight should have left but we found it was delayed a few hours because of weather. So, good and bad. Good that we didn't miss our flight and we got home Wednesday night but bad in that it was after 10 by the time we got in and crawled exhausted into bed.
Just like all our other trips and visits with friends in SLC, it was a wonderful time and we can't wait to see everyone again...hopefully it won't be three years again between visits.
While in SLC I had my Secret Recipe Club reveal day and this month I baked, making wonderfully delicious Andes Peppermint Snowball Cookies . Check out the recipe over to Cook Lisa Cook by clicking on the link.
Other delicious Secret Recipe Club recipes posted on Cook Lisa Cook include:
Laura Goodenough’s Apple Coffee Cake
Thai Peanut Noodles with Chicken
Fruit, Nut & Poppy Seed Chicken Salad
Texas Chicken with Lime Butter
Pork Belly Soup with Collard Greens
Levain Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies
and
Enjoy!
Love the scenic pictures just beautiful. What a lot of fun and your friend really does have a wonderful yard. I use to do ballet wonder why I cant stretch like that considering I am 24 for the umpteenth year. shhhhhhh ;)
ReplyDeleteerika
Wow, that looked like a wonderful trip. So many fun things for the little girls to do!
ReplyDeleteI have had company since you left! finally getting to catch up! I am soooooooooooo glad you came. It was awesome to see you again in person. YOu are such a great friend. I loved visiting with you.
ReplyDelete