Vacation Day 2 –
Today started bright and early with the kids roaming around at 6:30
am. Of course, with the time change the
boys felt like it was 7:30 and that they had slept in but I was hoping to sleep
a little longer. In the end I guess it was
a good thing because we were trying to get to a 9:00 am church on Easter
Sunday.
We got everyone showered and bathed and dressed in their Sunday clothes. It took some searching but we were able to locate everyone’s clothing. Michelle and I showered and dressed after the boys and with only about 15 minutes to go before we had to leave I was finally jumping in the shower. As I was dressing quickly I finally realized that, although the boys were all dressed and ready, I had forgotten to bring my Sunday shoes! Oops, I feel sheepish…
At least my sandals were black and my socks were mostly black so they didn’t shout my incompetence too loudly. We didn’t even come close to being on time. We left the resort at 9:00 and started the 10 minute drive following the instructions on the phone GPS. Unfortunately they lead me astray. But having glanced at a map previously I felt confident that heading straight instead of pulling a “U” turn would still get us there just fine. Well, my phone freaked out and the GPS quit working. Michelle pulled out her phone and the GPS loaded up in time to make the next turn which was only about 2 miles further south than we were supposed to be. As we backtracked up the other (parallel) road we saw a friendly church so we stopped. It wasn’t the church we were originally shooting for but we didn’t really know any better and we were already late so we stopped.
We waited in the foyer for the baby blessing to conclude and then we filed all the way up to the front row (our usual second row was available so we sat there). Normally I would have thought that a family of 8 filing into church late would have drawn a little attention. Not that my boys were bad. In fact, they were very well behaved. But only one person bothered to talk to us after the meeting and it was a nice lady sitting behind us. Not one other person bothered to greet us! We stayed for all three meetings and the only people who talked to Michelle or I included a second lady in Relief Society Meeting (welcoming her to the class) and several of the High Priests (welcoming me to group meeting).
After church we returned to the condo and changed clothes. We ate a light lunch (cheese and bean burritos). After lunch we took a quick walking tour of the resort and then loaded up in the suburban to go for a drive. We drove over to the airport. On the south side of the airport there is a parking strip where anyone can stop and watch the planes land and take off. The boys thought it was great to see the planes so close. However, after about 25-30 planes landing and taking off the novelty of it all wore off and they were ready to go.
From the airport we drove across town to the Las Vegas Temple. We were grateful that one walking gate was
opened and we were able to walk around the grounds. We took a moment to talk about the temple,
about covenants and family bonds, and the Holy Ghost. Each boy was able to at least feel the
influence of the Holy Ghost while we talked on the temple grounds. The boys were quite reverent on the grounds
and remained unusually calm; it was great.
The temperature in Las Vegas was in the low 80’s but considering that
it had snowed in Provo on Friday the 80 degree temperature was feeling quite
hot to us. The boys started complaining
about the heat and about being thirsty so we started heading back across town
to our condo. Even with the GPS guiding
the way I still managed to take a couple of wrong turns. But we made it back without any serious
incident. We did get to drive under the
tunnel at the airport which proved a small highlight to the trip.
Back at the condo Michelle went to town preparing our Easter
feast. I helped peel the potatoes and
set the table. Michelle did just about everything else. Considering that we didn’t have most of our
usual cooking tools and we were dependent on the condo’s equipment, we still
managed to get everything prepared just fine.
David enjoyed his food so much that his was nearly done with his food
before the rest of us even got started.
After dinner the boys started playing some shoot game, running through
the condo and shooting at each other with their fingers. I’m not sure what the point of the game was
and Aleky ended up ”gravely” disappointed because he kept dying; he said the
other boys were being rude. During a
lull in the activity I jumped in and started my own version, trying to equal
the odds since poor Quinten was trying to outshoot his older brothers. This twist in the game added new spark and
soon everyone was involved trying to shoot me!
Yes, even Michelle planned a surprise ambush on me, taking me to the
ground with a boy dog-pile on top. I was
laughing so hard I almost had trouble breathing! It was too much fun and we played for a long
time (since I feel out of shape it was probably only about 10 minutes but it
felt closer to an hour!).
After the challenging shoot-out was done we sat down as a family to
play UNO. I won the game just before
Donovan. Then everyone took a few
minutes to write in their journals. All
were safely tucked into bed by 8:30 pm (9:30 Provo time). It was a long day but we had a great time
hanging out as a family!
