Vacation Part 2

I am a blogging slacker, and I should hang my head in shame, but luckily several of my friends (and family!) are slackers too, so I figure it could be worse right? We've just been really busy, and I'm enjoying my packed schedule for a few more days before Jeremiah starts school again *sniff* I'm okay, I'll survive.

We were blessed with the presence of my mother-in-law Josette and my sister-in-law Amy for a week towards the end of July, first part of August. It was daunting to have family visit our house, we've only ever had Carissa and Adam and they don't care how messy our house is, but we were adament that our house would be spotless for my in-laws (if you've ever been in Josette's house, she's sort of a clean freak, I wasn't about to let her show me up!). Besides the need for our house to look nice, I was determined to make some great food to show off my cooking skills. Hopefully I impressed them a little? My favorite recipe that I made for them is Tyler Florence's Ultimate Cheesecake. No really. It's amazing. You really have to try it sometime. Or use it to bribe someone, I guarantee it will work.

Anyway, they arrived here on Sunday afternoon and we spent the evening letting them rest from their flight...oh wait, I guess "rest" isn't the word since both of my kids were crazy excited to see more family and were super hyper. Hayden had been asking for Nana Lafranca since he learned that she was coming, and it was nice for him to finally see her so I didn't have to hear "Is Nana Lafranca coming today? Tomorrow? The next day?.." and so on. Roman was a big fan of "Mamy" (Amy) because she was, as always, full of life and he loved her energy, probably because right now energy is not even in my vocabulary!

Monday Jeremiah took Josette and Amy to Kirtland, both the temple tour and the LDS sites tour. I took the kids to Carissa's house for naps and to hang out with her a little bit. I knew that taking them to Kirtland would just mean me chasing them around and trying to keep them reverant for the others on the tour, and they enjoyed seeing their cousins a little more. After Kirtland, Amy - in all her kindness - treated us to an overnight stay at the Great Wolf Lodge. I thought the kids were going to jump out of their skin they were so excited! We went up to the room to unload and went to one of the hotel's restaurants for lunch. It was great to see them eat their dinner, all we had to do was threaten not going swimming and they'd take huge bites =) Needless to say, we all got our swimsuits on in record time and went to the huge indoor waterpark. I can't begin to explain how excited the kids were. They have a great toddler area with slides and water toys, but my kids even took it a step further and braved some of the waterslides (Jeremiah had to push him down one of the larger ones, but it's okay, he survived). Roman was most surprising, because just a few weeks ago at the YMCA he wouldn't let go of me in the pool, and suddenly he's running for waterslides and the lazy river. Jeremiah and Amy went on some of the adult waterslides, but mostly we all hung out together and watched the kids play in the water. The next morning we ate at the hotel and Josette and I took the kids back to the waterpark for another few hours of play while Jeremiah and Amy went to Cedar Point with Adam for the day. I almost took the kids but I'd have to pay full price for me, which would have been pointless, I don't even think they let pregnant women on the kiddie rides! Besides that, the heat was horrendous and I wasn't about to deal with that the whole day. After the waterpark, Josette and I drove back home with the kids for well-needed naps and errands.

Our only family picture at Great Wolf Lodge. The rest are, as you probably guessed, all of the kids!

Here's a video of the kids going down the slide at the toddler area. The waterpark is bigger than this, but being by myself with the kids the next morning, the toddler area was the only place I trusted to keep them safe.

The rest of the week was just as busy. We tried Tony Packo's for the first time, Jeremiah doesn't even like hot dogs but he said Packo's hot dogs were delicious. I opted for a chicken sandwich so I can't really tell you what I think of their hot dogs. Maybe next time. We also went to the zoo on what felt like the hottest day ever. Amy bought us little fans attached to water bottles so we were misting away most of the day, so much for straight hair! We had a lot of fun taking the kids around to the different animals, the zoo finally opened up the petting zoo area, and Amy and Jeremiah took the kids into the aquarium. We were more than happy to get back in the car and turn up the air conditioner.





We took the kids to see Wall-E. Amy had seen it before but she was a good sport and saw it again anyway. Hayden actually enjoyed it and sat in his chair or with Nana for the entire movie. Roman, on the other hand, lasted about 45 minutes, and after that it was shoe-throwing and attempts to run up and down the lighted stairs. But he is still a Wall-E fan and recognizes him when he sees him.


On the last day here, we took Josette and Amy up to Frankenmuth, Michigan. It's a little Bavarian/German town about 2 hours north. It has the world's largest Christmas store, and after an hour and a half we left with just a few purchases but could have bought a lot more. It is huge, and that is a complete understatement. We finally drove into downtown Frankenmuth and got really excited. There are little shops and restaurants everywhere. They had a little princess/fairy shop that I got Olivia's birthday present at, and where I will probably splurge on a few dress-up items for our little girl next time we go up. We shopped around for a good part of the day, walking up and down Main Street, and ate at Zenders, a place famous for their fried chicken. It was a little pricey, and I found out I'm not a huge fan of German food (nor am I fan of eating at restaurants when my kids have not had naps!). It was a lot of fun and we can't wait to go back there again next year. They even have a huge outlet mall, now that we know that we can somehow incorporate that into our itinerary...and believe me, we will find a way.








We had so much fun with Josette and Amy. It was sad for them to leave, we won't see them again until the winter (if Amy would only commit to a Utah Christmas!).