California

We were excited when we made it to California, 2,230 miles away from home.  I was excited to be able to clean out the van which was the first thing I did once we got there.  We took our time in California to relax and not do too much since we knew that our time in Utah was going to be very busy.  Some of the fun things that we did were, Grandpa taking the kids for a ride on the Four-wheeler.

Josh and Grandpa took the kids fishing while, Linda, Christy & I went to their stamping group.  It was a lot of fun making cards, and getting crafty with them all week.  Thanks to them I have learned to make cake pops and oreo balls. (my friends love you!)

The kids had so much fun fishing with Grandpa.  They went to one spot and was having no luck, so they packed up and headed to a new spot and the fish were biting like crazy.  The kids caught fish after fish coming home with 10 fish. 

We couldn't go to California without visiting Great Grandpa Kelly.  We went a couple days before he got his new chickens, but we still enjoyed hanging out talking to Uncle Ron & Aunt Allison & Grandpa and letting the kids swing, pick cherries and oranges, swim and play with the dogs.

4 Generations of Kellys!

Having fun swinging, eating oranges & watching the fish.

We were so proud of Bryson who was so scared to go down the slide and after Josh "tricked" him to go down by having him go up with him but sending him down the slide before him, he realized that it really wasn't that scary and he wouldn't stop going down the slide.  Megan had so much fun going down the slide, jumping off the diving board and getting thrown up in the air to grab a ball. Connor took awhile to get in to the pool and wouldn't try to go down the slide, but enjoyed just splashing around.  We had a lot of fun at Grandpa's playing around and listening to stories. 

We spent a lot of time hanging out around the pool.  Again Bryson surprised us when the Shumways were over and all the kids were lining up to jump off the diving board and Bryson lined up and didn't even hesitate when it was his turn and just ran and jumped off all by himself.  Connor wasn't as daring and would just keep to the little kid pool.  Megan loved swimming and as usual did awesome.  She was so good playing with the younger kids and helping them around the pool.

We were very excited to catch up with a couple of our friends while we were out there.  I don't know what got into me and I forgot my camera when we went to visit our friends, the Morgans, but we had a great time hanging out with them.  We had sent the kids out back to play with some bubbles and squirt guns and at the end of the day Connor ended up naked from getting soaked, Bryson was half dressed and Megan somehow came out with all her clothes on.  So much fun.

Josh and I also were lucky to go out on a date with our friends, I was treated to a new hairstyle and we just enjoyed our time relaxing, hanging out with Grandma, Grandpa, Mike, Christy, Ava & Jack.  Thanks for letting us crash the house for a week we loved hanging out with you guys.

Trek West to Colorado

So blogging to me lately has been very overwhelming.  I have this whole trip out west to write about, and as much as I don't want to forget any of it, life is still moving forward, which seems to be very rapidly.  It's now been a month since we have been home and I am just now getting to writing it down.  Yet, I am sure I won't get it all in today since Connor can only nap for so long, Megan & Bryson's movie will end at a point, and dinner does not make itself (but I wish it did some days) So our long trip will be broken up and spread apart but I will eventually get it all down.

*******************

We left on June 2nd to start our long car ride.  We drove about 11 hours the first day.  The kids were surprisingly good so we were able to make it a little further then we had planned. I just have to write about at one of the rest stops that we stopped at there was a little trail that we walked on for a bit and before we got back into the van the kids were looking at a butterfly and it kept coming close and landing on them and flying away.  Connor started to chase it and it seemed like it was playing tag with him.  We were all laughing so hard.  Our next day drive was only 9 hours until we reached Matt & Stacie's home in Colorado. 

We spent a day there of not driving before we headed off to UT.  We loved seeing Our 3 nephews, & Matt & Stacie.  That one day we were there we took the kids to the park and had a picnic and played some baseball.  Our boys loved it and had so much fun.  After the park we went to the pool to cool off.  Everyone loved it except Connor who wouldn't go into the pool.  I finally made him get in at the end and of course when it was time to leave, he didn't want to get out. 

Josh and Matt remembering their "glory days" of baseball, way too many years ago.

Just for the sake of easiness, I am also writing about our trip once we came back at the end of our trip, on our way home.  On our second visit we planned to spend 3 days with them instead of 1.  We went to Water World and spent a day there playing in the water and staying cool.  Megan & Bryson loved the kids area where they have smaller water slides for them to ride on.  They would have gone on those rides all day if we let them.  We went on a couple of bigger rides that you do with the whole family sitting in a tube.  After the first one that was more like a Disney Land ride that took you inside with the robotic dinosaurs and down little hills, sort of like Splash Mountain, minus the big drop at the end.  Connor kept saying "no, no, no" when we would go to ride another one, he didn't like them.  He did enjoy just playing in the little pool that they had.  He didn't like the lazy river unless he was being held and he would go into he wave pool until the waves started then he would get out.  Josh enjoyed going on all of the rides that he and his brother, Matt could do.  It was a very fun day, we all came home very exhausted from having so much fun in the sun.

The kids all loved playing together, they spent a lot of time playing computer games and watching TV, but loved to play with their cousins.  Megan always wanted to hold Tysen if she could, even though Tysen isn't easy to hold, he likes to wiggle.  Connor was very terrified of their dog (any dog really), Fenway.  We knew he didn't really like dogs going in to the trip and was hoping that he would start to like them more.  On our way out he did not want to be put down when the dog was near by.  He was obsessed with knowing where the dog was at all times tho.  By the time we came back and he had spent some more time with other dogs, he did a lot better and he actually would sit next to Fenway and even pet him.  I really like the bread of dog Fenway is and would love to have one someday. 

It was also fun to be able to see some friend of ours, Brandon & Michelle, that just moved from Kentucky to Colorado.  They were one of our first friends when we moved to Kentucky.  Megan and Rylee enjoyed playing with each other.  And I was looking at the above picture that we took of them and was realizing how much they look alike, crazy.  We had a lot of fun hanging out in Colorado.  Time always goes by fast and we always wish that we could spend more time with family, especially since we don't see family too often.  But thanks Matt & Stacie for letting us crash, twice at your home, sorry about all the missing gumballs that my kids loved getting in to.  We hope that it won't be 4 years before we see you guys again. 

The Sweet Life

Josh & I were privileged to go to Cancun with his parents at the end of May.  We had some wonderful friends, whom the kids love, come and stay with the kids so that we could go.  We left Friday morning after we sent the kids off to school and arrived in Mexico in the early evening.  We found Josh's parents in the long immigration line and after we got through the airport, on our long shuttle ride we arrived to our wonderful hotel, the Aventura Spa Palace.  We were welcomed with a cold wash cloth that smelled really good, but I didn't know what to do with it.  We dabbed our faces and washed our hands and left the towels.  We were then welcomed in the VIP check in as they brought us ladies a flower and all of us the "welcome drink" (which was really good) After we met Enrica who was our personal concierge during our stay who helped scheduled our activities we were taken up to our beautiful Presidential Suite    

The room was wonderful, we had an amazing view of the ocean which was great to wake up to.  Our first morning there we decided to try some room service, but after they didn't show up an hour late we canceled it and decided to do the tour to earn some credit to do some activities.  We didn't luck out with room service too much, not only did they mess up our first day but a couple of other times.  We opted to eating at the restaurants on the mornings that we could.

Speaking of food, everything there was YUMMY!!  All of the restaurants that we ate at were delicious and the part that I liked was coming back to our room at night and having a little plate of treats waiting for us, my favorite was the chocolate covered strawberries.  On top of all the great food we were able to order drinks wherever we went.  We had a lot of Miami Vices while we were there, stopped in to the Smoothie bar a few times too.  On our last night (all together) we had a "romantic" steak and lobster dinner that was wonderful!

Besides all the great food, there was also a lot of great views.  Everywhere you looked it was just beautiful!  All but 3 of the corner pictures were taken at our resort.  The bottom 2 corners were at another hotel that had a beautiful beach.  We had fun collecting sea shells on that beach.  The top left corner was the extra night in Cancun that Josh and I had (which is a later story).  But how could you go wrong seeing this view every day.  AMAZING! 

I don't know if I could pick a favorite thing of the trip since I loved everything, just picking a few pictures was hard and this isn't even 1/2 of them (or maybe 1/3 of them)  But I would say that all the pampering was quite fun.  We frequented the spa.  We were given $1500 credit for each room and we were able to use as much of it as we wanted on spa treatments.  With the package we already received a free manicure & pedicure (which Josh & his Dad did do too) and a 25 min massage.  On top of that, Linda & I did a "Relax Package" which included a body scrub, facial & aromatheriputic massage.  That was so great that I went back and did a hot stone massage (which was very relaxing), then Linda and I did a sea weed wrap, which I just felt disgusted all slimmed up and wrapped, I don't think that I will ever do one of those again.  Then for my final treatment I got a scalp treatment, which really was more of a glorified head massage.  Wouldn't do that again either.  But doing all of these treatments and doing the hydrotherapy before hand were all very relaxing.

We also had great entertainment at the hotel.  Every night there was a different show, we had karaoke, break dancing, fire dancers, magic shows, Michael Jackson show, volleyball in the pool, water exercises, arcade room & even serenades during dinner.

Xcaret

We went to a park called Xcaret (esh-ca-ret) for the WHOLE day.  We left at 8:30am and returned home at 10pm.  At the park we swam in an under ground river, snorkeled in the ocean, saw sea turtles, sharks, fish & dophins.  We rowed on a boat around a river, saw wart hogs, deer, mushrooms, lillies, and of course iguanas.  We saw some old ruins, a cemetary which was really interesting, there were little houses, cars & animals.  We relaxed on their beach, got confused trying to find our way around the park, but the part that I will remember most was meeting a dear lady, Tanya.  She rode over on our bus and once we left our group she started following us around, we didn't know what to think at first.  She is originally from Russia but is now living in Wisconsin near her son.  She had a really hard time understanding the people and so when she saw us she asked if she could hang out with us.  After some confusion and we found out that she didn't want to swim in the underground river that we were going to swim in, we went to find her some help and left her.  We later reconnected and she spent the rest of the day with us.  She made our day there different then it would have been, but we were blessed to have met her.

After our lunch/dinner meal we walked around a little more and headed over to the evening show that they do.  On our way over they had people dressed up and we had a lot of fun taking pictures with them. 

The evening show was very hot, but very entertaining.  I like that we all given a candle when we came in and we all lit them at the begining of the show.  They went through the history of Mexico, they showed the Mayan Ball Game and a fire ball game that is played like hockey.  All the different outfits were very interesting and fun to watch the different dances.  It was a long hot day, it was great to experience but I don't think that we would do it again.

Zipline

Josh and I went on a ziplining tour.  This was my first time zip lining and I was very nervous about it.  It was a lot of fun though. We weren't able to hold our camera so we didn't get to take any pictures so we had to buy their pictures that they took of us.  They allowed us to go upside down 2 times on the course, I never dared to, but Josh tried it.  This is definately something that I would do again it was a lot of fun.

Tulum

Josh & I went to Tulum, it was another hot day, but it was beautiful there.  We had a great tour guide & we learned a lot about the history of the Mayan's, their culture & traditions.  I found it all very interesting, what it would be like back then not having much knowledge about life and why we are here and trying to make sense of everything. 

The view they had there was very beautiful and the sea breeze was very refreshing.

We had a wonderful time in Cancun and weren't excited to get back to the real world, but I was anxious to get back to our kids.  We had our last Miami Vice and stopped for a welcome drink before we checked out.  It was sad when they cut off our braclets taking away all the privelages.  But little did we know, this was not the end of our stay in Mexico.  After sitting at the airport both our flight and Josh's parent's flight were delayed.  Ours due to weather & Josh's parents from mantainace.  We were told that we wouldn't be able to make our connections and that we would either have to stay in Mexico or in our connecting cities.  We opted to stay in the U.S., but as we were waiting longer and longer they ended up canceling our flight since the crew had worked too many hours and couldn't fly.  Which really was a blessing cause then they had to pay for our lodging and food.  So after the hastle of the airport we made it to our second hotel.  E-mailed to get a hold of our babysitter to let them know that we wouldn't be flying in that night and we would be coming in the next evening.  After eating and making sure our kids were taken care of we went to bed early so that we could wake up and go through the airport fun again.  Except this time we were able to fly home, there was one last hiccup.  When we got to Louisville they had left/lost 1/2 of the planes luggage.  So we had to wait another hour to report our luggage, and when it finally showed up it looked like someone tried to rip it open.  We had to take it down to the aiprot again and they were nice enough to replace it with 2 new bags, since he couldn't get the smaller bag out of the bigger bag.  It was great to be home and especially to see our kids.  I don't think Connor knew what to do.  He looked at me and hugged me then he just looked and touched my face as to say "Is it really you?"  He did the same thing with Josh.  Thank you to Josh's parents for the great vacation and we are looking forward to going again (hopefully with everyone!)