Tuesday - March 24th
We left to St. George on Saturday, March 19th. It took us a while to get on the road, but when we finally got going, I texted my dad and told him we were on our way. I also told him what time the GPS said we would get there, so he would have an idea of when to expect us. The GPS said that we would get there at 2:00pm. We stopped once or twice on the way. The funny thing is, we ended up pulling up in front of my dad's house at exactly 2:00pm. When we stopped, Roger pointed out how crazy it was that the GPS had been right on about what time we'd get there. As, we got out of the truck, the first think my dad said was, wow, your GPS sure is accurate. I thought it was funny.
We unloaded our stuff and relaxed for a couple hours before heading to my cousin's house for a BBQ. It was a lot of fun to visit with my cousins. My cousin, Cassie's boyfriend is my good friend, Jenny Springman's cousin. It was fun to get to know him a little better. We took a selfie of us with Cassie and Casey so we could send a picture to Jenny Springman. While we were waiting to take the selfie, Roger took some selfies of me and him. It was shortly after this, that my cousin, Kylie informed us that we are taking groupies, not selfies. Mindi wanted us to take a big groupie. Roger has long arms and his phone takes good pictures, so he took the groupies for us. We took a lot of groupies.
When it started to get dark, we watched a movie in the backyard. We watched 'Big Hero 6'. Alissa has been begging us to see that with her, so she was excited. It was really fun. They had yummy popcorn and candy to share. We ended up not being able to stay for the whole movie. Roger worked all night on Friday, then came home, helped load up the truck and drove us to St. George. So, he was really tired. He was having a hard time keeping his eyes open, and I had a headache, so we headed back to my dad's to sleep.
We didn't do too much on Sunday. We were really tired, so we all slept in. Once we got moving, Roger took Parker and I on a bike ride (We only had 3 bikes, so we had to take turns). After our bike ride, Roger took Brinley and Alissa on the same bike ride. It was fun. Roger thought it was funny taking the girls compared to when Parker and I went. The girls, walked their bikes down the hills and went slower. With Parker and I, Parker went fast and kept yelling, "Woo hoo!" I went slower than them, but they didn't have to wait for me for too long. Roger thought it was a lot of fun and planned on taking Parker again as soon as they could.
On Sunday evening, we went and visited an old mission friend of Roger (The Harkers). They were really nice. We had a lot of fun visiting with them. They have a really nice house. The kids had a lot of fun playing. Brinley didn't have as much fun, because she said she was tired and she felt bad that she didn't make a friend. Alissa and Parker made friends. They kept asking if we were going to go back. The Harkers gave us a lot of good ideas of places to go while we were in St. George. We ended up with a long list of ideas and things we wanted to do. I already had a list of things to do, then we added their ideas on top of that. It was hard to decide where to start. After our visit, we went home to my dad's to go to bed.
On Monday morning, we slept in a little. Not as long as we had on Sunday, but it was still nice. My dad had a drawer of pictures, report cards, homework, family history stuff, and other things that my mom had saved. He said all that stuff had been sitting in a container and he felt inspired recently to look through it. He thought it looked like stuff that we would all enjoy having. so, he put it in a drawer in his room, so when each of us come to visit, we could go through it and take the pictures and things that are ours. I was so excited to go through that stuff. I spent all morning looking through it. I only got through half of it, but it was so fun to go through that stuff and be reminded of fun things from my childhood. I'm glad that my dad found that.
While I was going through that stuff, the kids were watching TV and taking turns riding the bikes. Roger went to the house next door with my dad to help him sheet rock.
When they were done with that, we ate some lunch, then went out adventuring. On our way out to adventure, we walked with my dad over to a house nearby that was the colors he wanted to paint his neighbor's house. He had us come over and compare the colors to his paint samples so we could help him figure out if he had the right colors. It was hard to tell, but we thought we figured it out. Dad went back home to call the painters and get that figured out. Roger really wanted to take Parker biking on that trail again. He wanted to go farther than they went when I was with them. So, they got ready and went on their bike ride. The girls and I decided to just go out and walk around. I was thinking it would be fun to walk over to Quail Lake. We took a nice slow walk and spent time looking at everything. This is the house at the entry into Harrisburg.
This is the house near the entry to the KOA.
We waited in this area for a little bit because we wanted to get some pictures of Parker and Roger as they left on their bike ride. It took them a long time to come, because Roger was teaching Parker things he needs to know about mountain biking.
Parker and Roger went by and the girls and I went on our way. We were having fun, up until we turned on to this small dirt toad that led to the lake. That's when Brinley decided that she was too tired to go on. she wanted to quit our adventure and go back to Grandpa's. we really hadn't gone very far, so that was frustrating. Brinley was funny though. She just stopped, put her head down, and just stood there. We eventually convinced her to go a little farther. she didn't like it though. so, we turned around and headed back.
I took 2 more pictures of the house by the KOA. I wanted to walk up to it, but Brinley said she was too tired. So, we didn't stop. We just headed back to my dad's.
These are the pictures that Roger took on their bike ride.
When we got back to my dad's, the girls and I fixed ourselves some food and watched 'The Phantom of the Opera' on Netflix. Parker, Roger, and my dad eventually joined us. While we were gone, my dad came up with another way to get the paint color he wanted. He needed to go to a store in Washington to see a sample of what it would look like. We were planning to go swimming at the Washington Rec Center, so we figured we could stop and get it on the way. We turned off the show and we all got ready to go.
We like swimming here. Our favorite thing is the lazy river. I think it is a funny lazy river, because it moves really fast. Here are the pictures I took of our swimming fun. My cousins, Kesha and Mindi acme and met us at the pool. It was fun to visit with them for a little bit. It was hard for them to have too much fun, because they both have little ones. It is stressful to go swimming when your kids are little. I was glad that they came though. I don't get to see them enough.
Parker was funny. He got in the pool and let the water go up to his waist, then he turned around and got right back out. He decided the water was too cold and he had no interest in swimming anymore. He sat in a chair on the side of the pool watching us play and playing games on my phone.
Roger and my dad swam with us for a while, but then they got bored and decided to get out also. My dad needed to go to another store, so the boys got dressed and left to run some errands while the girls and I stayed and swam.
Not too long after they left us, the life guards made everybody get out of the pool while they checked thing. That's when my cousins decided to leave. We called Roger to see when they would be coming back. He said they would still be a while, so Alissa and Brinley got back in ans swam for a while. I decided to stay out, dry off, and take some pictures of Alissa and Brinley's swimming fun. They pretty much spent all of their time in the lazy river. I din't know what game they were playing, but they had a lot of fun.
On Sunday night, Roger had gotten a text from the Search and Rescue about a missing man at Willard Bay. Roger was bummed that he couldn't be there to help. While we were swimming, he got another text. This text said that the man is still missing and they really need people to come help find him. They were calling off the search for the rest of the night and planning to meet at 6:00am the following morning to resume the search. Roger felt bad about not being there the first time and with this second text saying that they really needed people, roger really felt the need to be there. So, we talked to the kids about it on our way back from swimming and we decided that we would end our trip early so Roger could be there to help with the search at Willard Bay. The kids weren't fond of leaving early, but they knew Roger needed to help and I told them we would go to the jump zone and get some ice cream.
We went back to my dad's, ate some pizza and continued watching 'The Phantom of the Opera'. We relaxed for about a half an hour, then we got busy packing up our things and loading them out to the truck. We ended up leaving my dad's house around 9:00pm. The kids all fell asleep right away. They all slept the whole way home. We made really good time, because there was no traffic and we didn't have to stop once. We ended up getting home around 1:45am. We were happy to be home and climb into our own beds.
Roger didn't get a ton of sleep, since he had to wake up at 5:00am, get ready, and head to the Search and Rescue building to help with the search.
He said that they walked the beaches of Willard bay for a few hours. They didn't find much. They are sure the guy is dead. They found his boat on Sunday morning. It was running and he was no where to be found. After hours of searching the beach, they sent the guys walking the beach home for a while. They asked them to come back at 5:00pm to search the beach again. They were thinking that maybe his body would have floated up and reached the shore by then.
So, Roger went back at 5:00pm. He didn't get home until around 9:00pm. He enjoyed this search a lot more because he got to ride a 4-wheeler. It's illegal to ride 4-wheelers at Willard Bay, but they got to because they are part of the search and rescue looking for this man. He thought it was kind of fun that the rules didn't apply to them. They weren't able to find the guy.
Roger said that the man's family was around and it was really sad.
He said he has more stories to share, but he is exhausted from lack of sleep, so he will tell us later. They are planning to have them come back and search the beach on Friday night and Saturday morning. Hopefully they will find him soon.
Before Roger left to go searching at 5:00pm, we took the kids to get some ice cream. We got vanilla and I let each of them pick out their favorite ice cream topping. Then we stopped at Redbox and got the movie 'Big Hero 6'. We all enjoyed our ice cream and the movie. roger had to leave before the movie ended, but t was nice to get to spend a little time with him before he left.
I really liked that movie. The girls had been telling me about it. They watched it with their friends. We all really loved it.
