We Made It!

Well we did it. We traveled from Miami to SLC and made it without major incident, with a lot of laughs along the way. I'm grateful my mom was with us - it really made it much easier and a lot more enjoyable.

It was nice to see Todd in Dallas for a couple of days - and go to the first movie as a family in two years: Kung Fu Panda. Samantha slept in Todd's arms and Brian did alright with a few little exploring trips around the theatre and a trip to the toilet right at the end of the show. (He does great now at the toilet bit - except when he is outside. It's too much trouble I guess for him to come indoors, so we have accidents outside - but at least the clean up is easier.)

In just the few short days we have been here with my sister Julianna, Brian and Samantha have been living it up playing with all of their adoring cousins. We've spent some time with Alex and Ella too, as well as a couple of visits to Aunt Janeil's and Grandma and Grandpa Tanner's house.

Julianna, Mike, David and baby Jessica left this morning for their Hawaii trip, so the kids were excited to start the party. They aren't exactly sure what kind of 'party' exactly Aunt KT had in mind... and it started out with cleaning their Mom and Dad's room for them. Just call me Mary Poppins. But we had plenty of the so-called spoonfuls of sugar and had a blast. Jackson even said that he wanted to clean the WHOLE house!

We had a nice visit this afternoon with AJ and made cookies, played outside and really had fun. AJ loved it, I think. The kids about ate her out of house and home - goldfish, chocolate milk, crackers, oranges, apples and a few of the cookies we made.

Brittney made a great dinner and it was cool for me to see all of the kids lined up at the bar with full plates and happy smiles. As I told Julianna, as for Day One they have been angels. We chuckled as we wondered what my comments would be on Day Ten.

Brian said to me today a couple of cute things: "Thanks Mom for bringing me to Julianna's house." Samantha echoed the same. He also said "I can't find my daddy. I miss him." We all miss him.

Yesterday I took Brian and Sami for a hair cut. Brian wouldn't, but Sami had her first! She was really well behaved and with the baby hair trimmed off her hair looks thicker- it is just really cute.

Samantha did her first poopies in the toilet today. The other two toddlers had just gone and Samantha said "I need go toilet." So I took her for fun, and what do you know, she did go! She has some nasty diaper rash right now so it would be a great time for her to start going in the toilet.

With everyone bathed and in PJs we're starting our Pajama Party!