Adventuring {St. George Getaway}

January was long and oh-so-snowy and our little fam was in dire need of some sunshine and time at the playground.  Enter: St. George.  It's the perfect spot for so-over-winter folks like us and we picked the first weekend in February to get away.  Gregg's parents were in mission-call-waiting mode and we decided to invite them along for the trip.  Paul was on a work trip to North Dakota and planned to meet us down there on Friday evening, so we stuffed Kim in the back seat between two car seats (what a trooper!) for the ride down South on Thursday (the 2nd) afternoon.  The kids were SO good on the drive down, thanks to constant attention from their doting grandma.  (We should always have a grandma in the back seat on all our long car trips!) After a quick stop in Fillmore at Costa Vida for dinner, we headed to our rented two-bedroom condo (thank you, HomeAway) in Washington, where we set up our home base.

Our agenda for the trip was simple: spend as much time outside letting the kids run around and play and explore as possible.  And that's exactly what we did.  Friday morning started out a little cool and cloudy, but we found a nearby-ish park and ran around and walked along a bike path and played on the playground and rode Cal's bike anyway.  Then we visited Wal-Mart for some groceries before heading to the temple visitor's center.  After touching all the touch-screen features in the visitor's center and walking around the grounds, we walked over to a nearby park for some swing and slide time.  By now the sun had come out a bit more and it was quite pleasant.  The kids were in heaven and so were we.

Sam went up . . . 

. . . and down this last step over and over and over,
working on his newfound solo stair skills.

This is why we came to St. George for the weekend.

bonus video!

sammy loves to swing

Back "home" we went to eat some lunch, and take some naps, and read some stories (depending on who you were).  Later that afternoon we explored on the red dirt trails right next to our condo and basked in the sunshine that finally felt almost hot.

I want to remember her squinty eyes, mismatched
clothes and sunny smile forever.

My two handsome boys.

The rest of the afternoon and evening was filled with more lounging, more reading, more red dirt exploring, more walking around the complex/neighborhood.  We had Papa Murph's and Phineas and Ferb for dinner and Grandpa arrived late after we were all in bed in his new ride (he had purchased a used company vehicle on his trip and drove it home and beyond).

This was growing right outside our front door.
Heaven.

Saturday morning we were back at the Friday morning park for some more biking for Cal.  She is getting so good at the balance bike, lapping this little hill over and over and over.  We wanted to check out Snow Canyon State Park next, but after driving all the way out there found that the road to enter the park was closed!  (I was bummed because I had checked online and it said that road work would be starting the next week so I thought we were good to go - drat!)  On the way we passed the big red rock overlooking St. George that has DIXIE painted on the side.  Turns out, it's a park - Pioneer Park - and it's a great little spot to climb and hike and scramble and squeeze in and among the rocks and caves and crannies.  Sam fell asleep in the car on the way there, so Grandpa volunteered to nap in the car with him while we explored.  I never expected Sam to sleep so long in a parked car (it's never been done before!), but they both napped (Grandpa was tired after all that driving the day before) for about an hour before venturing out to find us among the rocks.

That's us on top of that giant rock, if you couldn't tell.

Be still my heart!  Her smile and her eyes!  What a girl!

We headed back to the condo for lunch and quiet/nap time.  And then we hit up another park on the way to dinner at a Hawaiian BBQ place in town.  After the kids were in bed we got a bonus date-night of wandering through the outlets (Gregg scored a $10 button down shirt) and ice cream from Arctic Circle (hashtag highrollers).  Sunday morning we packed up and dressed up and went to church.  The timing was such that Gregg's parents got a message from their stake president that their final interview in the mission papers process would be that afternoon.  They snuck out of Sacrament Meeting early to hit the road to make the appointment, and we followed a few minutes behind them because Sam was so cranky and ready for a nap.  We broke up the drive home that afternoon by stopping for about an hour in Fillmore at the Territorial State House where we picnicked on the sidewalk (it was warmer than the picnic tables under a cover), riding bikes on the ramps, and sliding at the playground.  The kids napped for the second half of the drive and our journey home was smooth sailing.

It's a St. George miracle - both children happy
and smiling and looking at the camera for a photo
- and the grandparents did a great job, too!

This was taken about 2.3 minutes before he was
out like a light.

another bonus video!

ramp ridin'

and one more bonus video!

sliding sammy (and callie, too)

(Sam's fancy footwork is my favorite - turns out getting from a standing to a 

sitting position is harder than you remember!)

Trip = success!  And we may turn this into a mid-winter blues-fighting tradition every year.  It was the perfect weekend of sunshine that we were craving!