The Decker Family

ROAD TRIP RUNDOWN:

We got home yesterday and are trying to get back in the groove. Here is an update of our road trip, which I can not even really give all the details, it would take forever. This will be long, but it is the only way for me to document it all. Overall, it was a very hard week, but it had its rewards!

FRIDAY: (miles traveled: 400)-
This was the start of our trip, we started the week long trek in our car. The boys were excited, but they didn't know what they were getting themselves into. Grayson was not feeling well and had diareah and was getting all four top teeth, so it wasn't the best case scenario.

The start of it all....happy boys.
Finally some silence, Bennett's famous line...."how many minutes until we get to _?" "A LOT"
We went as far as St. George that first day and spent the night at my parents. It was my mom's bday the previous day, so we celebrated with cupcakes.
The boys were excited to play outside and get dirty after being in the car for a long 7 hour drive.

SATURDAY: (miles traveled: 10)-

Thank goodness we came a day earlier than everyone else so we could rest before getting back in the car. I started the morning off with a 12 mile run, which was the most I had done in my training, it went surprisingly well. It was super hot in St. George, so my mom took the kids to a water park that they have there in town. It was pretty cool, it was a bunch of fountains and rocks and pools that the kids could wade through. While they were playing my dad drove me up to see the route for my marathon in October. It was such a long drive that it made me sick. I'm scared now.

This was at the water park.
Once the rest of my siblings got into town we headed out to the pool to try and cool off, which wasn't really possible in that heat.


We ate icee's and otter pops all week to try and stay cool. We ended that night going to bed early for the next days long drive.

SUNDAY: (miles traveled: 430)-

Another long day in the car. We got up early and headed up to Preston, Idaho to see my grandma Bennett, which was the whole reason for this road trip. It had been a lot of years since a lot of my family members had seen her and we thought we needed to take some time to spend with her.

We stopped in Brigham City to eat at Sonic and stretch our legs, yummy food, why do we not have a sonic close by?
Sadly, this was where we spent most of our time.
My Grandma Bennett with all of her great grand kids. She is a funny old lady that doesn't like to leave her farm and the kids thought it was cool to be there.

All of my siblings and I with our grandma.
The kids wanted to explore and find any animals that were still on the farm, they have recently sold most of their animals. They found some cows to bug.

Grayson was a nightmare that day. He still had diareah, he wanted me to hold him the entire day, but there wasn't much I could do. He was finally happy to sit in the dirt for a few minutes. It was also 100 degree out, so that made matter worse.

After spending the day there at the farm we headed into Logan to stay in a hotel and get ready for Monday.

MONDAY: (miles traveled: 140)-

We got up Monday morning and headed back south to my aunts house in West Point, Utah. That day was so needed and probably one of the highlights of the entire week. My kids were in need of some fun and that is what we had. My aunt Jamie went above and beyond as usual and made us feel so welcome. They had blown up pools in the back yard, gotten so many water balloons for the kids, fun games, the best food ever, just good old fashion fun. It was such a relaxing day, my kids were both in heaven.

This was our group (except my sis Monica) on our way out of Logan. Bennett is trying to show us his boob I guess!

My cousins and their kids came over to play too, the kids had a blast all day in this awesome back yard.

Grayson thought he was so cool to have gotten his own ice cream cone.

We didn't leave my aunts house until late that night, we were having too much fun, but once we left we headed up to Park City to a condo that we rented for two days. It was super hard going from place to place with all 12 of us and our stuff, by this point I was really needing Wade!

TUESDAY: (miles traveled: 10)

Another rest day (sort of). We got up and headed out to have some fun in Park City. We went to Olympic Park where we had a blast. If you are ever in Park City you should go. We watched people practicing their ski jumps into water and then went on the alpine slide, and I did the extreme zip line, which was so scary, but ended up being so much fun.

This was outside of our condo, it was another HOT day.

There were guys practicing ski jumps on this, it was insane. I would NEVER dare.

Bennett and I had to ride a ski lift up to the top of the mountain to ride the alpine slide. I was scared, but Bennett wasn't. He was so brave.

My mother-in-law Charisse and sister-in-law Jenisse joined us for part of our day since they live near by, they are the ones that talked me into doing the zip line.
That was me going 55mph down the zip line, it was fun, and totally out of character for me.

WEDNESDAY: (miles traveled: 315)-

This was mid-week and I was getting really tired by this point. We had already slept in three different places, and by this point i was just letting Grayson sleep with me in my bed so I didn't have to deal with him waking up crying in the pack-n-play. Bennett was sleeping good, only because he was exhausted by the end of the day being in the heat all day. This day our goal was to make it back to St. George by evening. We got up and headed into SLC and met Wade's mom and grandma and aunt and cousin. We had lunch with them at the new Gateway mall, which was fun and then let the kids run around in some fun fountains they have there. After spending about 3 hours there I had to leave and take my sister Tara and brother Chad to the airport as they decided to fly home (which I wish I would have done). Then the only people left in my car were me and the boys and my sister Shalise. We started on our drive to St George and both of my boys zonked out. When we got as far as Nephi i decided to push it a little further to get gas because my car was telling me i had 65 miles left to go and there was for sure another city closer. WELL, not much further down the road my gas light went on and only 2 miles after that we ran out of gas. YEP, I ran out of gas in the middle of no where and it was over 100 degrees outside. No bueno! Luckily my dad and his car load were only about an hour ahead of us, so they were able to turn around (sucky for them) and get us gas and rescue us, but we still had to sit and wait in the heat. Lesson learned, this is also out of character for me. I am usually really cautious.

Us stranded on the side of the freeway, 3 highway patrol cars passed and never stopped. Lame huh? We finally made it to St. George in time to go to bed that night.

THURSDAY: (miles traveled: 10)-

Finally a day to just chill. How sad, the whole trip should have been relaxing, but it really wasn't. This day we were re-cooperating from our week. The kids played in my parents back yard, I got away for the first time all week and went shopping alone for a few hours, then we went back to the water park that night and took pizza and let the kids play in the water until bed time. I considered driving home early that day, but we wanted to be there for the 4th so we stuck it out.

Grayson is actually a pretty good baseball player! Who knew?

This is the thermometer in my car, if you can't see it it says 128 degrees, NASTY huh?

FRIDAY: (miles traveled: 10)-

4th of July...we had a fun day. We got up and got ready and headed over to the city fair. It was hot so it was a little uncomfortable, but the kids had fun while it lasted. My boys were wiped out and took a nap after instead of going swimming. Then my sister Shalise and I got some more shopping in and then back to the house for dinner. My dad took all of the kids on a ride on his 4 wheeler after dinner, which was a highlight for them. We then headed back into town for the firework show, which is so good every year. They have a country singing contest in a stadium before, which is always fun to listen to. They don't start fireworks there until 10pm, so that is hard to keep the kids up and happy, but we managed. My mom got all of the kids a 4th of July outfit.

Bennett having fun on the swing, even though he was over heating.
This was so painful, there was a tiny board for me to sit on which was giving me a splinter and could barely hold me, I was squating for the whole 5 minutes of the ride!

Grayson was so scared, but eventually warmed up.

Bennett and Payton waiting for fireworks.
Bennett was excited that we brought glow braclets.
And finally the fireworks started, Grayson didn't love it, but they were a hit.

SATURDAY: (miles traveled: 400)-

Seriously is this vacation still going? My sister Shalise and I woke up at 5am and got on the road. Thank goodness. We made it home before noon, and the boys have been Wade's problem ever since. I need a vacation now.......

Glad we are home.