Thanksgiving 2009 part 4

The day after Thanksgiving (Black Friday) we woke up late, had a bit to eat at our hotel's lobby breakfast buffet, and got in the car for another short drive. We have fabulous friends in Logan, Utah that we were just dying to meet up with. So we braved the roads (which, surprisingly, were completely clear!) and made the 1 1/2 hour journey up north. The Heaps' and Mollers' welcomed us and hosted us for the entire day. The kids played, the adults chatted, and we all had a fun time catching up, telling stories, and eating left-overs. Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures of the adults having fun, but these are the activities the kids enjoyed:
Making new friends(Jane is only grumpy because we made them stop playing so we could take the picture)...

Playing with barbies...

Watching movies...

Goofing around (especially with the balloons)...

and playing Nintendo.

When driving home we asked the kids what their favorite part of the visit was and all of them agreed that the "party" they had at the Heaps' house was the best. Mary Lou arranged for all the kids to watch a movie downstairs complete with popcorn, drinks, snacks, sandwiches, fruit snacks, and desserts. She was so sweet to put all that together while the rest of us lazily sat and chatted.

One more note- James at one point, fell asleep on the exercise trampoline and we were all disappointed we didn't end up getting a picture before he woke up.

We are so grateful for the friendship and love of the Heaps and Mollers. We miss their company down here in CA and wish we lived closer to spend more time with them. Perhaps someday....

The next day we ran a few short errands and then drove the long 13 hours home. At one point we drove through a snow storm that was headed up to Salt Lake. That was Hillary's favorite part of our drive. :) Sean's favorite part was arriving home and seeing all had been well and taken care of while we were gone. Both of us agreed, though, that getting into our own bed that night, though it was really 1:30am was the best!

Thanksgiving 2009 part 3

On Thanksgiving day we picked up Hill's brother, Brad, and went up to campus again to get some pictures of the happy alumni couple in front of the alumni building - Gordon B. Hinckley Alumni and Visitors Center. We were so excited to tour this beautiful building earlier in the week, as we hadn't been back to Provo since it had been built. It is rich in the history of BYU, with old photographs lining the large halls. There was a cozy living room complete with fireplace and comfy couches. I could imagine sitting in there with a good book and comfy blanket, but I don't think I'd dare bring my hot cocoa. Everything was fine and ornate. The kids had a fun time looking at all the pictures and books, and were especially impressed with Sister Hinckley's chair.
Since we had Brad with us we just pulled up to the circular drive, hopped out of the car, and posed in front of the large, grey sign. He's such a character, Brad is, so it wasn't hard to get into a silly mood for some corny shots. What a great time!

After our little photo shoot we traveled a bit farther up the hill to the Provo Temple. By this time James had fallen asleep, which is why all these picture are sans James. Luckily, we were the only ones on the entire temple grounds (that we saw) and the parking lot was empty, so we parked in the "Loading/Unloading Only" zone and unloaded ourselves for some pictures. It was chilly, but we were having such a great time walking around the fountains, climbing the steps, and enjoying the view that we didn't feel our shivers until we climbed back into the car and sat on the cold leather seats.

Now, some of you might be wondering what we did for our actual Thanksgiving feast, since it was just us 6 Monroes + 1 hungry college Wake boy. We had contemplated cooking ourselves a true Thanksgiving feast (for a brief moment) and then we thought about ordering ourselves a Thanksgiving feast (for a longer moment) and then we decided that, to make things truly easy, and to enjoy turkey, mashed potatoes, salad and "every good thing" at the same time we were going to have to find a good restaurant. Then it occurred to us: what better place to eat at than Chuck-a-Rama? For those of you who don't speak Utahn, Chuck-a-Rama is a buffet-style eatery with enough variety to satisfy even our picky eaters: salads, meats, pastry, desserts, and carbs, carbs, carbs! After we gorged ourselves with all sorts of yummy-tummy filling foods we headed back to our hotel to veg in front of the TV with the Disney Channel. Our children now know who Zac and Cody are, and are familiar with Wizards of Waverly Place. Eh. There are worse things.

Thanksgiving 2009 part 2.5

So when I tried to up load these pictures with my last post blogger wouldn't let me - did I have too many pictures? Too much information to post? Or did I spend too much time on one page? Who knows? But these are the pictures of Becky, Jane, Alex and James playing with their cousins, Korben and Karsen. The group shot is classic - I had to post this one because it was hilarious and way better than the one where most of the kids are smiling and looking cute. I love action shots!

Thanksgiving 2009 part 2

The third day of our trip we drove up to Salt Lake City to pick up 2 dozen orange rolls from the Lion House Pantry (yummy!!) and walk around temple square. We saw the beautiful tree at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building...

took the tour at the Beehive house...

and the kids had a great time playing in the little snow they found - in the planter areas and on the 26th floor of the Church Office Building (where we met up with an old friend, Paul Rytting). From there we could see all over Temple Square and Salt Lake City. What a beautiful sight!

After visiting the COB we took pictures in front of the temple...

at the tabernacle...

in front of the Christus....

and at the Conference Center.

On the way back to our awesome Provo hotel we swung by Ian and Melissa's again to let the cousins play together. They had great fun tackling each other and looking through Jane's telescope. 7 year old Korben was hilarious when he came in from looking at the moon:

"Korben, what did you see?."

K - "The moon."

"Did you see anything on the moon?"

K - "Yeah, a man."

"Really? What was the man doing?"

K - "Putting up a flag."

"What kind of flag?"

K- "The Japanese flag."

"What did it look like?"

K - "It's white with a big red dot on it."

Thanksgiving 2009 part 1

Thanksgiving week was a special week for our family: It was a week completely free of responsibilities (school/work/etc) and we decided to take advantage of this rare occurrence by taking a family vacation to Utah. We had an absolutely great time during the whole week. It was a long drive up, and a long drive back, but the kids were great and in the end we were all wishing we could have stayed longer.

Our first stop was in St George where we crashed in a hotel for the night and visited the temple the next morning. Driving up to Provo we swung by Cove Creek Fort to visit the site of President Hinckley's grandparent's home. Brigham Young personally extended the call to Ira Nathaniel Hinckley and he accepted right away. What an incredible family history!

Upon reaching Provo we called Brad to let him know we were in town and ready to hit the BYU bookstore. He met us on campus and we browsed the store for a bit, trying on all sorts of BYU stuff.




Afterwards we met up with Ian, Melissa, Korben, and Karsen for dinner at the Pirate Island establishment in Orem. While waiting our "20 minute" wait time for a table we entertained ourselves catching up with family and watching the kids play in the lobby.

We finally got a table after over an hour wait...

Yep, an hour! The company was tons better than the food, but the kids had fun anyway. We got to our hotel in Provo exhausted! Sean and I relaxed watching the kids watch the Disney Channel.

Marsher those Malos!

Jane wrote in class this week:

"I like to go camping because you get to cook marshermalos."

Michelle Jane Monroe

Welcome to the World, Harley Attwood!

I have to admit I forgot all the details of exact time, but she was (I believe) 7 lbs, 6 oz, and she has amazingly long fingers. She sleeps so peacefully and was an absolute doll the whole time we were there, except when Sean announced he was going to hold her - she put up quite a racket then! hee hee

Mother and baby are out of the hospital and are recovering as well as can be expected. :)

Jane is 8!!

My dear Jane turns 8 today. I have very mixed emotions about this. It seems that every time my children have birthdays I take a closer look at them and see little adults growing up. I'm excited for her achievements and growth, but I'm scared to lose her and realize that sooner than I'm ready for it she'll leave home and have a life of her own.

Jane is such an over-achiever. She loves all sports, all activities, and is ready to try anything, especially if someone says she "can't" do it. Sean and I have a little joke we play on her - if there is something she doesn't want to do we'll just say, "Oh, maybe she isn't old enough/big enough yet. She'll probably have to wait a year or two before she can do it," and then she'll get all defiant and go out and do it. We just laugh because it's like all she needed was the challenge.

She loves science and math, reading and writing. She loves to put on "plays" with her siblings and has the best laugh. We love the light and love she brings into our home.

Lately Jane has taken up swimming and has become VERY good at it. Often her class will have races from one end of the pool to the other and just to make things "fair" for the other kids the teacher will give Jane's foot a tug or the other kids a little push so that she doesn't get too far ahead of everyone else.

As parents we couldn't be happer with the choices she makes, especially the one she made recently to be baptized. We are so excited for this next step in her life. She'll be baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on December 5, 2009, 4pm at the Bloomfield Building.

Thank you, my dear Jane, for coming to our home, for being an excellent daughter, a fabulous sister to your siblings, and a beautiful daughter of God. We all love you so much!

Yes, our fruit is sanitary.

If the kids eat all their dinner they are welcome to a small treat, and they get to choose. Usually it is a piece of candy, a bowl of ice cream, or an otter-pop.

Tonight Alex asks me, "Mom, can I have a Fruit Next to the Foot?"

An Empty Beach

James and I took a trip to the beach with some great friends of ours - Shauna Douglass and her two youngest, Ben and Emma - a few weeks ago. I'm a beach skeptic, but I'm trying to branch out to new things, so when she asked if I'd like to go, I took her up on it.

We ended up on a deserted beach for almost 2 hours. It was so fun to see an empty beach, nothing but waves, sea shells, dolphins, birds, and boats. I don't think I've ever been in a more peaceful beach setting.

We picked a nice spot and started with lunch. Emma and Ben were gracious enough to share their Ritz with James, and being polite, he didn't refuse. He even tasted both, but decided that neither tasted very good.

After lunch we searched up and down the waterline for creative looking shells. JAmes wasn't excited to be on sand, but after a while he got the hang of it. It was hot, though, so we had to make sure we drank a lot of fresh water.

(and yes, he's wearing stripes with plaid! Haha, we SOOO weren't prepared!)

All in all we were very pleased with our beach experience. I am no longer a skeptic, but I've decided in order to enjoy it you have to be or go with an expert.

Costco

I don't know what's the matter with me - for some reason I choose to take all the kids to Costco on Wednesdays after school instead of taking just James with me while the older kids are in school.

But it's fun.

We sample all the samples without buying any of them.

We danced in the aisle to the sample music.

We went down the toy aisle and the kids tried so hard to remember how much money they had at home. I heard a lot of, "Mom! Can you buy this and I'll pay you back?"

We went in both "cold" sections so James could do his "cold" dance while we said, "Brrrrr!" all the way around.

We looked at all the books, movies and music.

And because they went with me they easily convinced me we needed poppyseed muffins and fruit by the foot.

On the way in and out we drove the cart over the yellow bumps ("speed bumps where I come from are yella!") - James was buckled in and the rest of the kids were hanging on the side - and we all said, "ah-h-h-h-h-h" as we bounced along.

Thanks, kids, for having such fun with me.