Spring Break Baby!!!

This year I had the whole week of April 14th off for spring break and I had no intentions of staying home - I wanted to get out of town and have a fun and relaxing time. Who better to do that with than Kristin, Libby and Mallory? Kristin had to work on Tuesday so I babysat the girls and then we headed to St. George for the rest of the week after picking Kristin up from work.

I believe I could have won $10,000 from America's Funniest Home Video's had I captured the following event on film. While tending the girls on Tuesday I went to pick them up from preschool. It wasn't far so we just walked but it was extremely windy. Libby and Mallory were walking behind me and I turned around to make sure they were still coming. What I saw was the cutest and funniest thing I've seen in a long time. They were huddled together crying, "Aunt Kath, Aunt Kath we need help!" They couldn't walk against the strong wind with their tiny little bodies! It was adorable!

On to St. George! We stayed at the Wyndham Resort where Kristin and Shawn have a timeshare. We got there rather late on Tuesday so pretty much just went to bed when we got there. We slept in the next morning (well I did, the girls didn't let Kristin sleep in much) then leisurely got ready and then drove to Zion Nat'l Park. I love Zion's and it was so wonderful to spend time outside in such a beautiful place. We took the river walk along the Virgin River that ends at the beginning of the Narrows. It's a 2 mile round trip, not too far really and it's a paved trail so we didn't think it would end up being a day long affair but alas, we had no idea how long it could take a couple of four year olds that had to stop and look at every bug and stick along the way and had to stop and draw in the sand every 2 feet. Even though it took us quite a while we sure had fun along the way!

Hey! Let's watch this caterpillar for the next 10 minutes!

Libby was quite the adventurer when it came to climbing the rocks. She scared Kristin and me several times.

This picture was taken in a little market there at Zion's. The girls found these sunglasses and walking sticks and when I saw them I just cracked up. Don't they look like cute little blind girls!

Mallory dancing on the furniture at the condo.

Mallory and Libby being silly. :-)

Mallory and Libby on the steps of the St. George Temple.

Playing at the condo pool. This of course was the kiddie pool.

A Walk on the River Trail

Let me just say for the record that I am so done with winter and so ready for spring! Today was such a beautiful day and we got out of church early because it was stake conference so we had a barbeque then went for a walk along the Provo River Trail because the weather is finally warm enough to spend time outside. Yeah!!!

By the way, for those of you wondering how my talk in stake conference went, I ended up not having to speak. I received a call from the stake executive secretary yesterday asking how my talk was coming for that evening. I told him I was supposed to be speaking in the Sunday session and he said he was afraid of that. I explained that I wasn't attending the Saturday session because I was babysitting my nephew (thanks Jake & Steph!) :-) that night and he had special needs so I couldn't just pass him off for someone else to care for. He said he would call President Heperi and see what to do. He then called me back and said that President Heperi appreciated my efforts and they would catch me another time. Whew!!! I know I shouldn't be so happy to get out of speaking but it really was a relief because I was so nervous. Who knows though, I may have to be nervous all over again in six months when stake conference rolls around. Oh, and just so you don't all think I'm a flake, they realized it was their mistake and they had actually asked me to speak on Sunday.

Anyway, I digress. Back to the river walk on this lovely spring day. Here are some pictures from our walk that Lisa took with her cell phone (thus the fuzzy, grainy quality).

Kathleen and Dorian resting at a park along the trail.

There is a huge tree along the trail with a swing and we had a lot of fun playing like kids again!

This last picture is of Dorian trying (and succeeding!) at looking like a big nerd! :-)

Rascal Flatts Concert

On March 7 I got to go to the Rascal Flatts concert in Salt Lake and the tickets were free!!! My roommate, Karen, had won 2 tickets to the concert from a radio station and I was the lucky one that she asked to go with her. :-) She had also received gift certificates for dinner at Chili's so we went there for dinner first and then rode Trax up to Salt Lake.

So here's a funny little story that I hesitate to write but I'll go ahead anyway. A week or so before the concert Karen emailed me to say she'd picked up the tickets and they were on row 17. I emailed her back and said those were great seats because they were close enough to the stage for my bra to actually make it up there when I threw it. So the night of the concert I put a bra in my purse to show Karen in the hopes of freaking her out and getting a laugh. I did get the laugh but when we got to the Delta Center I realized that security was going to search my purse before letting us enter. I am the one who freaked out (just a little) because I didn't want them to find my smuggled bra! I managed to discreetly move the bra from my purse into my pocket and thankfully I was not found out.

Here are a few pictures from the concert. Unfortunately this is the only picture of me at the concert and it's not a good one! To document that I was really there I'll include it anyway and it is a good picture of Karen. There is also a picture of Kellie Pickler from American Idol. She was the opening act and was a lot better than I thought she would be. The whole concert was tons of fun!!!