SWIMMING & EATING & GOOD PEOPLE.

On tuesday, July 5th, we went to Lagoon with a lot of my dad's family. It's a fun amusement park in Utah. And guess what. I took about 4 pictures there, none of them containing any hint of Lagoon. Jane had a blast going on some kiddie rides, and we went to the water park area for about 20 minutes until she realized that being trampled by kids bigger than her while trying to go down a water slide was not her cup of tea. 

Lunch break in the pavillion. Aka the only time my hands were available to pull the camera out :)

I think Jane's favorite part of the day was partaking of her first ever ICEE! She thought it was the most hilarious thing in the world that her tongue was red!

We left Lagoon and the kids a little R&R on our drive down to Provo to have dinner with Tim and Lauren! We got Cafe Rio (YUM! it's embarrassing how much this week ended up revolving around alllll the good food Utah has to offer) and brought it to a splash park so Jane could play while we ate.  I teared up driving into Provo again, that place has such an extraordinarily special place in my heart.

Jane had expended an insane amount of energy that day and was completely exhausted. Her way of demonstrating her exhaustion was turning into a frenzied little ball of energy. She was so hyper! My brother Brendon was also with us, and he ended up dealing with most of the hyper-ness because she had decided he would be her main victim that evening. You can tell in the picture above that she is squirming around, and probably licking me.

We had so much fun with Tim and Lauren. They are such a fun, awesome couple and are so SO sweet with the girls. 

The next day, we woke up and played outside again for a little bit. My brother's car that I was borrowing wasnt starting so I called my Grandma and Papa Rogers to come bail me out, or give me a jump. Well they got here, my papa got in the car, turned the key, and OF COURSE it started. It made me feel like an idiot but we decided to go to breakfast with them at The Original Pancake House, so it ended up being a blessing in disguise because that place....THE best breakfast I've ever had. The pancakes, the waffles, the breakfast sandwiches, the hash browns. I'M SALIVATING thinking about it. Really if you haven't been there and you have the great fortune of living near one- you need to run there right now and eat your little heart out!

After breakfast with one set of grandparents, my other set of grandparents came to spend some time with us. We walked around the lake near my dad's house where Lyla became acquainted for the first time with some of my favorite people in the world! Jane was giddy to be reunited with Grandma and Grandpa Deedock (Murdock...sadly she says it right now, but she used to say Deedock and it was adorable)

We set out with a bag of bread to feed to some ducks. My sister said she had seen some around the lake. Well we looked and looked and couldn't find any ducks. Finally we found one. Jane was elated, started throwing pieces of bread at it, and the duck immediately swam away. Jane's furrowed little brows expressed her deep disappointment in the matter. It's a tough market for duck-feeders around there. 

 Lyla pointing, probably to the runaway duck.

After walking around, we went to lunch with them to Kneaders. Rachel and I were still too stuffed from breakfast with the other set of grandparents so didn't eat much. But greatly enjoyed their company! 

 Jane had another energizer bunny moment, this time my grandma was the recipient of her wild, crazy mood.

 We loved seeing them.

Now, remember when I mentioned that we were nonstop GO-GO-GO, always had back-to-back plans of visiting people? Well I think this is starting to be very clear. After lunch with the grandparents, we drove straight to my sister-in-law Laura's house. My good friend Marissa and her 2 cute kids came from Provo to hang out too. And then Tim & Lauren as well. It was a party! We all went swimming together and had a blast. This was Jane's first time swimming with her floaties and it was a game changer. She was all over the place, and had a blast playing with Tim. All the fun games he was playing with her are the things she misses the most when she is away from Jeff so she was purely delighted!

 It was so fun to see Ian all grown up now. I had to explain to Jane that Ian wasn't a baby anymore and she was SO confused because last time we saw him, he was just a little babe!

 Realizing I pretty much only got pictures of Tim and Jane...whoops. But we did attempt to take a group picture right before we left (and after marissa had left unfortunately). Aaaaaaand the end result is quite the let-down. Tim and Tom, you boys just need to be 5 inches shorter and this picture would be golden. Can't say we didn't try...

----------------------------

Now, on to thursday! Thursday morning, my cousin Madie met us at our dad's house. I was SO happy to see this girl! She is completely like a second sister to me, and Jane absolutely ADORES her. She came so she could ride down with us to Provo to go to Seven Peaks (water park) with Brendon and his girlfriend Kacee (who I LOVE). We got our swim bag all packed and were on our way. Before we met up with Brendon and Kacee, us girls went shopping. Okay, I went shopping while madie and rachel tried to keep the girls happy by feeding them mall pretzels. I think it worked, because how can a mall pretzel NOT make someone happy? It was fun for me to go try on and buy some new clothes, kidless. A rare treat! We then went to lunch at chipotle. So a whole lotta goodness packed into the first half of that day.

The stars were just not aligning that afternoon, because we ended up getting there an hour later than we wanted. Then, to appease an anxious-to-swim toddler, I go to dig Jane's swimsuit out of the bag and realize it wasn't there! I had packed it earlier but Jane got it out to suck on the tag, and didn't put it back. (TYPICAL, JANE) So, I had to buy her a swimsuit at the little shop they had. It was a watermelon swimming suit. She was elated. I was not. I also forgot sunscreen because I was just really on my game that day.

So, once I forked over more money for a new swim suit and sunscreen (in retrosepct, I should've run with the punches a little better with a smile on my face, because really- what an awesome fun day this was!), we were finally ready to play! (btw, the sunscreen actually was in the back pack. I found this out while going through airport security where they found it, and promptly threw it away.) Rachel, Brendon, Kacee, and Madie were gracious enough to take turns taking Jane down some of the big slides with them. She felt so cool. We all had a blast and my girls were sound asleep about 3 seconds after I put them in their carseats, a sure sign of a fun day! Another not so fun sign; a killer sun burn. (for me, not for the kids. I actually remember to put sun screen on them!)

What a buncha cool people that we got to hop around Utah to visit. More to come!