Day 3 & 4 of vacation

Wednesday morning we headed up to Snowbasin.

  Derald(Tori, Alex, Tanner, & Britton) 

& Mark(Makayla, Abby, & Dallin) 

met us up there.  It was so much fun having cousins to ski with each day!  School accomplishes a lot of good things.  However, it does nothing for building relationships with family that lives 1/2 way across the country.  Thanks for sluffing to have fun with us!  Our kids LOVE spending time with cousins, aunts & uncles.  We love taking vacations with family.  More and more I lean towards doing/running less to open up our schedules to do more with family.  Porter & Dallin had a ball in their class... the jumps were their favorite.  Porter would come down the hill fighting imaginary villains.  Wed. was the 2nd day I lost Porter.  While waiting for everyone to take their turn on the jumps Porter decided he didn't want to wait & caught the lift by himself.  As we are looking... here comes Porter, skiing down, hits the jumps, & off to the lift again.   What a nut!  Wed. evening we all met at Grandpa's house for dinner.  Shelly(Mark), Kathryn(Neal), & Derald put together a great dinner.  The kids ate & played all night.  Tressa & Alicen came up with the little girls, including Victoria.  At one point Victoria had had enough & went to sit on Tressa's lap wanting to go "home" to Jared's house.  Again... no separation anxiety here.  Thanks to Tressa we had a built in babysitter.  Felicity is only 10 days younger than Victoria so they had a blast.  However, I'm sure the 8.5 hour drive with a 3 year old and infant wasn't the most enjoyable.  I'm so grateful to her for making the sacrifice!  Not only for the babysitting but for the time I was able to spend with her.  Anytime with a sister is cherished.  I can't explain how much fun the kids had with their cousins.  The sounds resonating from the basement were music to my ears.  The night ended again with a little basketball.  Thursday we hit the slopes one last time.  This time Alicen & Kirk met us.  I have to say I am so grateful for all the aunts and uncles that took a day or two off work to come spend with us.  It meant so much to both Ryan & me.  The kids have always loved skiing with Alicen.  She is so fun & young at heart.  It was a bonus with Kirk along.  

At 3:58pm (the lifts close at 4pm) Sam & Casey came flying down to take Ryan on one last "cool" run they found.  Off they went.  The rest of us headed to the car.  Porter was ready for a break after running into & getting wrapped around a "ski slow" sign.  

Plus racing Rebekah down to the fence that separates the lodge & ski area wasn't his brightest idea... he landed on the concrete with a very sore backside.  This was also the 3rd time I lost him.  This time was by far the worst.  He had just gotten hurt.  After comforting him & calming him down I sat him at a table & told him I was going to film the girls coming down.  I was only 20 feet from him!  He took off  in search of "the" snowbank!  10 min. later after a heartfelt prayer I headed to the parking lot... there he was playing on a snowbank!   I am buying him a leash for future outings!   Rebekah & Isabelle entertained themselves on a few snowbanks.  

I loved watching Ryan & Sam walking to the car after a great day of fun together.

  Casey looked so content with life as he walked towards me.  

It was a fabulous day!  Victoria was waiting for us with Tressa when we arrived at Wilford's.  Ryan took Sam & Casey to Tanner's basketball game.  We finished the night with Chinese take-out then Dawn arrived from Montana (7 hour drive) to spend Thursday evening & Friday with us.  Family is everything to me.  At times in my life it's all I've had.   It meant so much to me for so many family members to make sacrifices to spend time with us.  Dawn's family slept over with us as well as Tressa & her girls.  Tressa, Dawn, & I finally hit the sack at 4AM!  We laughed so hard.  It just feels good to laugh like that.  Thanks Ryan for getting up in the morning with all the kids.