Saturday, November 15
I left to get to the Las Vegas Airport at 4:10AM. Trey's flight left around 11:30. We were both meeting in Minnesota to go to the Vikings game the next day. Trey landed in Denver about the same time I landed in Minnesota and then he arrived in Minnesota around 5:30PM. We got our rental car and headed for the Mall of America to eat at Bubba Gump Shrimp. I made a reservation for 7:00 but we got there early at 6:30 and saw if we could check in early, which they allowed us to, I ordered the Salmon and Shrimp and Trey got the chicken Linguini. Trey tried one of my shrimp too and really liked it. After dinner we shared a dessert - "Gooey bucket of boat trash" which was a chocolate brownie and vanilla ice cream. After eating we walked all the way around all three floors of the mall and even went to the 4th floor to look at it also. Trey got a Vikings blanket - we actually went in the store about 30 seconds before it closed - and then headed to our hotel - the Prime Rate Inn - at 9:00. We got checked into our room (#157) and went to bed.
Sunday, November 16
We woke up early so we could go to Fort Snelling State Park and hike the 3 mile Pike Island Loop trail. It was around 32 degrees in the morning but once we got walking in the sun, we warmed up. It was fun to hike with Trey in Minnesota on a type of trail that we don't normally hike on. We finished the hike in about an hour and a half and then headed for the game. We got to our parking garage in a government parking structure (545 5th Street S) and took the skyway (elevated indoor walk way) to the stadium which was really easy and efficient. It was really cool to see the stadium for the first time when we walked in and I could tell that Trey really thought it was cool. We got in the stadium a little more than an hour before game time and we found our seats which were in section 312, row A, seats 28 and 29. It was a great spot to watch the game from. We then walked around the whole stadium and Trey found a really cool military style Vikings hat that we got him. We also got a pizza to eat and watched Will Reichard kick a few field goals before the game started. The Vikings played pretty bad for the first 3 quarters with JJ McCarthy badly overthrowing or underthrowing the receivers and when he did make a good pass, the receiver dropped it. Still, the Bears played equally as bad and only wad a 16-3 lead going into the 4th quarter. We scored 2 touchdowns to take the lead, the second of which came wiht only 50 seconds left to play. But the Bears had a good kickoff return and made a 45 yard field goal to win the game. It was such a fun experience to have with Trey! When we got back to the car in the parking garage, we noticed that someone had gotten into it and had spread all the contents of Trey's bag all over the front seats. Fortunately nothing had been taken. We were in heavy traffic to the airport but got there about an hour and a half before our plane took off. We sat in the second to last row on the flight to St Louis and had the row to ourselves. We had a 2.5 hour layover there and there were only 30 passengers on our flight to Las Vegas which was really awesome. We watched Rogue One on the second flight. We ended up getting back to our house just before 3:00AM and Trey wanted a bowl of Ramen so I made us some ramen and we went to bed.
Monday, November 17
We slept in for a while, with Trey waking up a little after 11:00am. We ate breakfast and then looked at the Disney room and went outside to look around and play some catch with the football. We came in and I showed Trey my Minecraft world and watched a couple of episodes of Modern Family until Judi got home from school. Trey and I walked Nana to meet Judi at the mail box on her way home. When we got home, we went to the back yard to feed apples to the sheep on the other side of the fence. We also threw the red ball over the house which was a fun game. We played catch with the football and played a little volleyball too. When we came in, Judi wanted to play the Cantina song on the piano that she has been learning for about 6 months. She did so good and Trey was impressed. We then all played minecraft together and then I started making dinner. We had spanish rice and watched a few Dude Perfect trick shot videos while we ate. We also watched Fox and the Hound while we ate some ice cream and then got ready for bed.
Tuesday, November 18
I got Judi off to school at 7:15 and then got ready for the day and played some Minecraft while I waited for Trey to wake up. Trey got up around 10:15 and was looking at his Disney pins when I came out of my room. We ate breakfast and then decided to do a couple of hikes at Zion National Park. It was a rainy, overcast day which actually ended up being great because there were no crowds and it was fun to see the waterfalls at Zion National Park. We started out by taking the shuttle to the Weeping Rock trailhead and did that hike. We then took the shuttle back down to the Court of the Patriarchs and did that one too. We thought about also doing Canyon Overlook but decided to save that for our next time since we were running low on time to get home before Judi got home from school. We got home just in time to give Judi a ride for the last 20 yards down our street. Trey and I made hot dogs and Judi got our Minecraft game ready for us to play. We played for a while until I had to take Judi to her mom's house. When I got back, Trey and I watched a couple of episodes of Modern Family and then I heated up some mini pizza's for dinner and made Grandma Judi's chocolate chip cookies. We watched Lost while we ate dinner and finished 6 episodes of it before going to bed.
Wednesday, November 19
Trey woke up around 10:30 today and we ate breakfast and then decided what we were going to do. We decided to hike the Three Falls Hike. It was raining again and we figured that it would be fun to see the waterfalls on the hike. When we got to the trailhead there was a lot of construction going on and we started up what we assumed was the new trail because there was a bunch of fencing up around where we would have normally started the hike. After a while we realized that we were probably on the wrong trail but we decided to continue on and see where it led. First we came to the "H" on the hillside overlooking our town of Hurricane. We decided to keep going because we figured the trail would probably take us to the cliffs above Gould's Wash. We were right and on the way we found a fun small crevasse that Trey explored. We got to the side of Gould's Wash, enough to be able to look down on the 3rd fall which had water flowing down it. It was really pretty especially with the storm clouds rolling in in the distance. We could tell they were headed our way and that they were bringing a lot of rain so that, coupled with wanting to be home when Judi got home from school, helped us decided to turn back. We headed back the way we came but decided to bushwhack our way down a wash to connect back with the trail below. It was slow going down a steep downgrade over a lot of loose talus. It started to rain reasonably hard on us for a while also but we made it back to the car after quite a fun adventure. We got home and unloaded our gear and made some lunch just as Judi got home. Trey was still a little chilled from our hike so he decided to stay inside while Judi and I went out to feed the sheep some apples. We came back in and played some Minecraft for a little while and they we all went outside and threw the frisbee with Nana for a while. We came back in so I could make dinner and Trey and Judi wrestled around in the living room. Judi's loud screams were eardrum shattering but it was fun to hear them having fun. We watched a few episodes of Dude Perfect while we ate hamburgers, french fries, and spanish rice. I then took Judi back to her mom's house since they are leaving for New York in the morning and Trey and I went to Walmart to pick up some ingredients for a recipe that we're going to try out. We got home and Trey called Olivia, his girl friend and showed her our house, and then we watched 3 episodes of Lost before going to bed.
Thursday, November 20
We woke up early because I had a pickleball tournament to play in. When I first told Trey about it before he came out to Utah, I wasn't planning on playing in it because I didn't really want to take time away from the time I had with Trey and because I didn't know if it would really be interesting to him. But Trey said that he would actually like to watch me play, so I ended up signing up for it. We got to the Little Valley Pickleball Complex at 9:30 and I played until about 1:30PM. My partner, Brian, and I won the gold medal in the 4.5 division (they ended up combining us with the 5.0 division too). It meant so much to me to be able to play in front of Trey. We stopped by Walmart on the way home and then went out to the back yard to throw the football around. I threw some from the pit and Trey would run "go" routes. We then threw a few "post" routes on the lawn. I love doing that with Trey. We also played "disk" with Nana and then came in and watched a couple of episodes of Lost before I made some Pasta Roni for dinner and we watched more episodes while we ate and before we went to bed.
Friday, November 21
Trey and I woke up early to head out on a long hike. We decided to try the 11.7 mile hike from the Chinle Trail to the Coalpits Wash trailhead. We had to take 2 cars so Trey drove Grandma Judi's car and I drove the Santa Fe. We left Trey's car at the Coalpits Wash trailhead and then drove together to the Chinle Trail where we started our hike at 9:20. It was perfect temperature and we quickly shed our light jackets that we started off with. Because it has rained so much this past week, the trail was muddy and we continuously picked up mud on the botom of our hiking boots which made them a lot heavier and us a lot taller! We found some petrified wood on the trail and had really pretty views of the west side of the Zion National Park mountains. We finished our hike around 2:30 and I stopped to get gas on the way home and met Trey there. We got cleaned up after the hike and then we had pot roast for an early dinner which was so good after a long hike. We watched episodes of Lost while we ate and up until the time we went to pick up Lizi from the St George airport at 11:11pm. Lizi's flight was just a few minutes delayed and we got home and Lizi got unpacked and we all went to bed.
Saturday, November 22
Lizi was the first one up at about 10:00 and we ate breakfast. Trey woke up around 10:30 and we left at 10:45 to go Tour Utah Tech University. Our tour was at 11:30 but no tour guide showed up until about 12:30. We saw the campus and then came home. Lizi and I then went outside for a while and saw the sheep and fed them apples. We also tried some grapes and wen to the front yard to check out where we are going to put Christmas lights. Trey stayed in and hung out on the couch. We then had some lunch and put up the garland over the windows and in the kitchen. Lizi then worked on some homework and Trey and I watched a Lost episode. I then made tuna and noodles for dinner and we watched Ant Man while we ate. After the movie, Trey called Olivia and Lizi had a shower so I watched the BYU football game. Trey then came out and watched the last quarter of the game with me and Lizi read a book for school. After the game, Trey and I watched a couple more episodes of Lost and then we all went to bed.
Sunday, November 23
Trey woke up first and came out just in time to see the Packers score a touchdown to go ahead 7-3 on the Vikings. We watched the game for a little bit and Lizi came out to eat some breakfast before we headed to church. It was a really nice day so we walked to church. It was fun having Trey with me in Elders Quorum. When we got home, Lizi and I went outside and played disk with Nana and then had such a fun time feeding the sheep which was made extremely humorous when I went to the apple tree in the pit and started hucking apples over the fence for the sheep and accidentally hit an unsuspecting sheep on his snout as he was eating another apple. Lizi gasped which made us both start crying because we were laughing so hard. I guess the apple just exploded on this poor sheep's snout. We came in and I put on our 2014 family videos dvd which we watched. Trey then went into his room and talked with Olivia and Lizi had a nap on the couch. I then warmed up some leftovers for dinner and we watched an episode of The Chosen while we ate. After chosen, Lizi went to her room to read scriptures and Trey and I watched the Monday night football game and watched an episode of Lost. Then we all had ice cream and Lizi and I watched Saving Mr. Banks and Trey went to his room and played a version of Minecraft. We then all went to bed.
Monday, November 24
Lizi woke up about 10:45 and we started getting ready for breakfast when Trey came out of his room and joined us. After we ate, Lizi went to her room and started working on school work while Trey and I went outside to throw the football around. As we were throwing the football, Judi came over (she got home late from New York so her mom kept her out of school today) and showed Trey and Lizi her dog Tucker. We then all went into the back yard and fed the sheep. Lizi and Judi fed them at the wall and Trey and I threw apples over the wall from the apple tree in the pit. It was a lot of fun. We then all played football, running routes and throwing the ball to each other. It was a lot of fun. We then started setting up Christmas lights in the front yard. Trey and I worked on the ones hanging from the roof and Lizi worked on the ones on the bushes. Judi helped pull some weeds. We came in and had some lunch and Lizi and I finished putting the lights on the Texas Sage bushes. We came in and Lizi and Judi watched some tv while Trey and I started getting dinner ready. We wanted to try a new recipe from a Disney cookbook that Judi brought home from school. It was a lot of fun working on it with Trey. He's actually really good at cooking! At 4:00 Judi went to activity days so Lizi worked some more on school and Trey and I watched a little bit of Lost. When Judi got home, she played some Minecraft and Trey and I worked on dinner some more. in a little bit, dinner was ready and we all dished up some spaghetti from Tony's Town Square, and watched a few episodes of Lego Masters and then went to bed.
Tuesday, November 25
Lizi woke up around 10:00 and ate some breakfast and then went to her room to do some school work. Trey woke up about an hour later and we watched some Lost until Lizi was done with her school. Lizi finished before our last episode was over so she went outside and threw the "disc" to Nana. It was so cool to see how excited Lizi was when Nana caught one of her throws. Lizi came in and she and I worked on her mini lego coyote and Trey played Minecraft on the couch on his computer. We had some lunch and then went to the front yard to set up the candy cane lights, fix the Texas Sage lights, and set up the pomegranate tree lights. After setting up the lights we came back in and just talked in the living room while trying to figure out what we wanted to do. Lizi suggested throwing the football through the frisbee so we did that for about 20 minutes. At 5:00pm I had to leave to pick up Shelby from the Cedar City Airport but it was a surprise to Trey and Lizi that she was coming so I had to disguise it as going to the store. Shelby landed about the same time I got to the airport at 5:50pm and we talked as we headed home. Shelby mentioned that she wants to go on a mission now and will probably leave after the summer. It was so good to see her again. Trey saw on his phone that Shelby had landed in Cedar City so he wasn't surprised but Lizi was and started crying. We had dinner and watched a few episodes of Lego Masters. We then all had such a good time just talking with each other in the living room for about 2 hours before we went to our rooms - Trey talking with Olivia, and Shelby and Lizi talking in their room.
Wednesday, November 26
Judi came over around 9:00am this morning and played minecraft while I went to the store to make sure we had all the things we needed for Thanksgiving dinner. I got home around 10:50 and everyone was still asleep. Trey woke up just after 11:00 and we ate some breakfast. After we ate, we all watched Judi show us different game types in Minecraft until Lizi woke up. When she got up, we went to the back yard and noticed that the sheep had been taken away from the neighbors house. We got the football and played catch and Trey tried a few field goals while Lizi held the ball for him. I couldn't believe that Trey would kick the ball barefoot - that hurt me to watch!! After a while we decided to go in and have lunch and Shelby got up. After lunch, we went back outside and played "disk" with Nana and Shelby tried a couple of apples from the apple tree. We also went to the front yard to fix a couple of the candy cane lights. We came in and I showed Shelby Grandma Judi's silverware that she's getting for Christmas. She loved it and I know Grandma Judi would be so happy to know that she will be using it. We also found some really cool gold silverware that Lizi, Shelby, and I went through. We then all came out to the living room to set up the nut crackers. Lizi's favorite was the drummer and Shelby liked the chimney sweep and the golfer with the sweater. We then had dinner and watched all the rest of the Legomasters episodes. After dinner Judi and Lizi painted rocks, Trey played on his computer, Shelby played the Ukulele and I just sort of enjoyed watching everyone in their elements. Shelby then went over to the table with Lizi and Judi so Trey and I watched a couple of episodes of Lost. Shelby then came over and watched an episode with us and Lizi and Judi played Minecraft. Judi then went to bed and Shelby, Trey, Lizi, and I talked for a couple of hours (until a little after 2:00am) which was so much fun! I wish I could have talked all night but I still had to do dishes and start the turkey cooking in the crock pot for Thanksgiving dinner so I did that and then we all went to bed.
Thursday, November 27
Nana barked quite a bit in the morning which made it hard to sleep and Judi ended up getting up around 9:00 so that's when I got up too. I got ready for the day and Trey and I watched the football game at 11:00 while Judi played Minecraft. I love how into football Trey is now. It is so fun to be able to have someone to watch games with. Lizi got up and ate breakfast and then came to the couch and watched football with us. At half time we all went outside and threw the football around and played with Nana. We came back in and watched the last quarter of the game and as the game was ending, Shelby got up. We all started working on Thanksgiving dinner. It was so much fun having everyone helping - Lizi and Shelby got the Christmas plates out and decided which ones to use. Then as Lizi set the table, Shelby also made the gravy. Trey made the mashed potatoes and Judi picked and seeded about 6 pomegranates. The table looked so good and the food tasted really good but the best part was just being with all of my kids. This was probably the last time I will be with them all for who knows how long. After dinner, we watched Home Alone and then Trey, Lizi, and Shelby helped me hand wash, dry, and put away the Christmas plates. Then Judi painted a dog on a canvas while Trey talked with Olivia and Shelby and Lizi talked in the living room. I then put on Home Alone 2 and we watched that before making a plan for tomorrow and heading to bed.
Friday, November 28
We woke up (earlier than normal for some) and went on a hike this morning. Actually before the hike, Trey, Lizi, and I spent about 15 minutes raking leaves in the back yard. I'm so grateful for their help. We decided to go to Aspiration Trail so Lizi and Judi could place the rocks they painted a couple days earlier. The hike was fun and we had fun recording it for Trey and my Youtube channel. There were so many trails that criss-crossed eachother that at times they were hard to follow but we finally saw the summit where we needed to get to and headed toward it. Lizi and Judi both put their rocks near the top. After the hike, we went Black Friday shopping to the St George Walmart. I got a few bathroom rugs and we bought the Minecraft movie. When we got home, we took a family picture in the back yard and we fixed hot dogs, salad, apples, and pumpkin bread for lunch and then Shelby, Trey, and I went outside and threw the football around. It was so much fun and it always amazes me how good Shelby can throw the football! I also threw a few balls to Trey as he ran routes. That's one of my favorite things to do! While we were outside, Lizi and Judi were painting. Lizi painted an amazing picture of a couple under an umbrella in the snow and Judi painted a cool Burneese Mountain dog. We then heated up some leftovers for dinner and watched the Minecraft Movie while we ate. Lizi went back to painting after dinner and Shelby played the Ukulele and watched Harry Potter on the TV. Judi and I set the volleyball back and forth and then Judi got on the switch. Trey went to his room and packed and talked to Olivia. I went in there for a while too and talked with both of them. Lizi then put some laundry in and we all sat in the living room with Harry Potter on while her laundry was going. Once it was done, we all went to bed.
Saturday, November 29
I woke up just before 3:00AM to take Trey and Lizi to the St George airport for their flight back to Texas. It was as hard as always so see them go but I also know that we made some really good memories that will hopefully last a lifetime. I saw them go through security and then disappear behind the wall as they went to their gate. I got back home around 4:30AM and was ready to go back to bed but I stayed awake until they let me know they were in the air. I slept in again until about 9:45AM and then got ready to go to Barnes and Noble for Shelby and Five Below for Judi. We all ate breakfast together and then got on our way. I secretly took pictures of the books Shelby said she was interested in or "heard that they were good" so I had a couple more ideas of what to get her for Christmas and ended up buying her two books. We then walked the mall and ended up spending some time in Bath and Body Works smelling the different lotions and candles. We then left the mall and headed to Five Below where Shelby bought a small $5 book and Judi bought a soft blanket and an "obese" ball for Nana. We got home and had lunch and then went outside to play with Nana and her new big ball. She LOVED it and played with it for so long that she actually laid down in her pool 3 times and its almost December (kind of cold outside). Judi also shoed Shelby her Volleyball skills and then all three of us played for a while, sometimes just Shelby and I as Judi would take a break to play with Nana. It was fun to see how good Shelby is at pretty much every sport even though sports aren't necessarily her thing. She throws the football really good, played Volleyball decently, and then we also played catch with the baseball which was so much fun and, again, Shelby amazed me with her natural talent. We came in and Shelby helped me make Grandma Judi's cookies while I got dinner ready. We watched The Great Mouse Detective while we ate and then watched Rescuers and Rescuers Down Under. I then got Judi to bed and went to talk with Shelby in her room for a couple of hours. It is so enjoyable talking with her and hearing how wise she is. After talking we decided it was time to get a little sleep so we went to bed.
Sunday, November 30
Shelby, Judi, and I woke up around 7:00 to take Shelby to the Cedar City Airport so she could fly back to Salt Lake City and be picked up there by Katherine, her roommate at BYU Idaho. Although we were all tired, I enjoyed talking with Shelby on the drive. We got to the airport about an hour and 15 minutes before her flight and just waited for a while in the waiting area before we finally decided that she probably better go through security to get ready for her flight. Where the passengers wait once through security was separated from the waiting area by just a glass window so Shelby, Judi, and I texted each other while we waited for Shelby to board her plane. Judi and I watched as Shelby got on the plane and then texted her that we would race her home since the flight to Salt Lake and the drive from Cedar City to our home are almost exactly the same time. In fact, when Judi and I got home, we took a picture of us in the garage by the car and as I was getting ready to send the picture to Shelby, she texted me that she landed! It was such a fun time spent with the kids this Thanksgiving.
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