The Awwww Files

Tessa wrote this note to the boys today, completely on her own:


Translated (because she still spells phonetically, which I think is so cute and awesome but requires some thinking sometimes) it says:

Thanks for being the best brothers ever To Henry and William Signed Tessa

I think she likes them alot more than they like her sometimes.

Road Trip

I have lived in Utah since 1995 and have, until recently, never ventured the few hours north to visit one of the great western vacation spots - Yellowstone National Park.  But with Jay's brother Adam and his cute little family visiting from the Czech Republic we decided it was time to take the plunge and do a full-on road trip.

We were able to stay in a beautiful vacation home in Star Valley, Wyoming with the entire extended Wright family.  We ventured up to Jackson one day and Yellowstone on another (we went through the South Gate, which means that we also went through Grand Teton National Park, which is just as beautiful).  We saw Old Faithful, had a chuck wagon dinner and music show and witnessed lots and lots of wildlife, including a mama grizzly bear and her babies on the side of the road.  We played with cousins and visited with family.  It was wonderful.  I even remembered the camera, although the picture quality on my end wasn't very good.

Tessa showing off her new Jackson Hole shirt:

 She was tired so we waited by the flowers in the town square while everyone else shopped:

 This bear was at the Bar J Ranch, where we had a fun dinner and saw a show:

These bison (bufflo?bison?) passed right in front of us on the highway:

 Waiting for Old Faithful to erupt:

 Front row view of Old Faithful:

 With their cousin Sebastian:

 Henry and William went on a hike around to see the differnet geysers:

 Another stop on their hike:

 Mama Grizzly bear and one of her cubs.  We were driving home though Grand Teton National Park and saw a ton of cars pulled over to the side of the road.  Turns out they were checking out the bears!

All in all we had a great trip!  It was so fun to spend time with the Wrights of the Czech Republic and are anxious to see them again.  The kids had a great time and it was a fun road trip to start the summer.

Field Trip

Yesterday the kids and I took a field trip to Salt Lake City.  William has been begging for a road trip to Vancouver (???) but this is the best I could do for now.  I even took the camera and tried to take a few pictures but kept getting an error.  Sigh.  Even when I try I am thwarted by the photography gods.  Anyway....

We started the day by getting breakfast on the way out of Logan at 8 am.  Since we were planning to be gone all day I arranged to have the carpets cleaned - yay!  I love getting my carpets cleaned and was so excited to pull out of the driveway and know that my house would be all fresh and lemony smelling when we got home.  We went to Village Inn (again, ???) and saw one of Tessa's kindergarten student teachers who is waitressing there this summer.

The drive to SLC was uneventful until about Bountiful when Tessa got car sick.  Sigh.  She has been doing this off and on during longish car trips (an hour or more) since Christmas so I keep towels handy but still!  We stopped at KMart to buy a few more cheap towels - she chose purple (and once again, ???).  Once we got situated we were on our way again.  Next stop - Gateway.

We only stopped at Gateway because Tessa had saved her money and wanted to get a new stuffed animal at Build a Bear.  She chose Rainbow Bear and had enough money left for an outfit and a cell phone, which she used all the way home to text me (???).

After Gateway, we went to the new City Creek Center.  It is lovely and I wish I had all day to window shop and look around a bit.  The kids tolerated a quick stop at Gymboree and then we went to Fanzz for the boys to spend their hard earned money.  We have a Fanzz store in Logan now but for some reason they figured the City Creek store would be cooler (???).  I really wanted to try a fun place to eat lunch but we were pressed for time so we settled for Chick Fil A.  After lunch we made stopped at the Disney Store - which is awesome and makes me want to buy all kinds of princess stuff for Tessa - and then left, because we had a date to pick up Jay at the airport.  Where was Jay, you ask??? 

China.  Again.  For two weeks.  Remember last year's trip to China in June?  Tessa's broken arm?  The start of an obscenely long bout of the stomach flu?  Yeah, me too.  This year no one got sick or broken.  We picked Jay up at the airport and headed back to our little house in Hyde Park.  Just in time for two baseball games on a lovely June evening.

And nice, clean carpets.  We'll see how long they last.