Fun in Utah...

Last week we went up to Utah since the kids were out of school for fall break. We decided to do stuff we normally don't do, so on the way to Utah Valley we stopped in St. George the first night and we took the older boys to see Les Miserables at the Tuacahn Theater. Our good friends the Testers just moved to St. George in August so we called Vanessa to come watch the smaller kids at the hotel. It was great to have her there!

The Tuacahn is an outdoor ampitheater nestled in a red rock canyon and I was so excited that they were doing Les Miserables. I loved Les Mis the book, it's such a powerful story of forgiveness and redemption and hope through all of the little stories that intertwine surrounding Jean Valjean's life. I love the priest at the beginning and his act of kindness that changed Jean Valjean's life. I love Fantine and even though her story is tragic Jean Valjean gives her so much hope at the end of her life. I love Jean Valjean and Marius and Eponine. It's such a good book!! Anyway, I have always wanted to see the musical. All of my family (meaning my parents and siblings) had seen it years ago and loved it. My parents and brothers got to see it in London, but I was happy to settle for the Tuacahn just to finally see it. It was fantastic! The great thing about it being outside was that for the war scenes they fired real cannons and fireworks exploded over our heads. I am a total baby so I cried through a lot of it...the story just gets to me. One thing I had forgotten about in my excitement to finally be seeing it was the song "Bring Him Home". That song has some history for me. Scotty, my youngest brother, loved Les Mis when they saw it and when he died a few years later that song was sung at his funeral. I'm surprised I had any make up left at the end of the evening, but it was a great experience. Even my teenagers liked it!

The next day we made our way up to my sister's house in Lehi. My little ones ADORE their cousins. When we were getting closer to their house Jack and Ally recognized where we were and got excited...then Julia started yelling, "Mommy, I luf cousins!" They all had so much fun. Wendy has fruits trees and the girls thought it was great to pick the apples. (What? Apple don't just appear in the grocery store?)

Julia actually ate all of the apples to nothing...seeds and all!

Matt and Wendy have a projector in the basement so we watched the newest Indiana Jones movie on the big wall. It was like the drive in, but warm and comfy! Then little ones got to "camp out" with the cousins downstairs. The popular snuggle spot was the huge bean bag...I think it's really called a Love Sac, I could be wrong.(?)

Thursday we went to Lagoon. Jackson finally got up the courage to go on the big rides with the big boys so it was me and the girls with Wendy, Jordan and Ethan. Jordan was Ally's ride buddy most of the time.

Jack, Ethan and Alyssa were pondering how fun the day would be infront of the pumpkin pyramid when we first got to Lagoon.

Friday we headed home but stopped to see my Aunt Jody and Uncle Scott. Katie, Rachel and Elna came too. We love our family! Just in case no one noticed, Ally is the sassiest little thing. I'm a little affraid.

We took another detour getting home and drove out through Enterprise, Utah to see the Mountain Meadows Massacre memorial. What a sad thing. It was neat to see though. Rich is the history buff so this was more for him. He loves this stuff...the kids probably think it's boring, it's good for them though. They just don't know it yet.

We finally got home at 1 am. It was a fast trip but we had a lot of fun and got to see our family and some neat things. Next time we'll have to make more time for all of our friends we didn't have time to see.