Fall Utah Trip 2013

 The new expanded Allred family made the trek out to Utah to debut the beautiful Caroline Anna and to see our beloved family and friends out west.  We had so much fun. Here are some pictures from our journey. 

Thomas absolutely adored spending time with his cousins, Pete and Johnny. 

These three amigos can sure create a high pitched, loud symphony of shrieks. Here they are in a more quiet reflective moment at the Thanksgiving Point dinosaur museum. Sarah and the boys treated us to a fun day there. They all really played very well together. They are just automatic friends. I love seeing him have so much fun with these boys. 

We stayed at Papa Mackay's "castle" as Thomas called it. It was fun to spend a little more time with my Dad. Thomas jsut idolizes my dad. Well, all of his grandparents really. It is so sweet to watch his connection with them. He would wake up and say, "Papa MACKAY???!!" I tried to tell him that Papa Mackay was asleep and he would stomp on the floor saying, "I'm going to stomp him awake." The first night that we got there, I was up unloading our stuff and Thomas was sitting at the table with my dad and my sister Emily and there was a quiet moment. Thomas said, "So, Papa Mackay how was your day?" He cracks me up.   Oh and no Papa Mackay doesn't have a replica of the moon at the manor. Suprisingly. Don't give him any ideas! This was at the Clark Planetarium. We went with my Dad and Rhonda and Emily. Thomas loved it. He is really interested in space and rockets. 

Uncle Jeremiah loves to munch on babies. "She's the most! She's so big, but so little. I could just chew on her..." Insert your favorite Jeremiah quote about babies here. 

 Baby Grant had his 1st birthday. He is such a cute and curious little guy. So glad we got to see him at this fun stage.

 Aunt Emmie is everyone's favorite. Thomas loved going in to her apartment and taking 2 lemon drops. He didn't ever finish eating them though, so his hands would just get very gross and sticky from carrying around half eaten lemon drops. :) Thomas would frequently say, "Where Emmie go? Where's emmie?" I think he had fun hanging out with her, and so did I. I miss hanging out with her.

 While we had fun staying at the manor, we missed spending as much time with my mom. She took a day off from work and we went to the zoo. Thomas loves his grammy Joey so much. She is always the first person he asks for when we get back to Ohio. :) It is hard for a little man to conceptualize the distance between us. He always wants to go to Grammy's house as soon as we get home.

 The chunky little beauty just hanging out at the zoo.

 Grammy loves this lady.

 My step sister, Kellie had a baby girl in May. Caroline is about the same size as her.

 The little lady was so tuckered out she took a nap on Thomas' Lightning McQueen bed while I was putting on my make-up. What a little angel.

 Clint's mom, Barbara had her 60th birthday celebration, and Clint's brother John was able to come up for it. It was so nice to visit with him. Clint hadn't seen him for 4 years.

 Papa Allred took us on a hay ride to see the cows.  As a side note, we had absolutely perfect weather while we were there. It was gorgeous.

 The lady getting a hug from Papa Allred.

 This little man loves to throw rocks in buckets!

 Papa Allred took Thomas out to see the cows. Thomas wasn't nervous at all....Until one of the cows took a bite out of the hay bale that Thomas was sitting on. It knocked him over and scared him pretty good. He didn't get hurt, just startled. Little man was talking about that incident for days. :)

 I'm pretty lucky to have such nice in-laws. We had a great time with them. Thomas always loves visiting the farm.

 We took advantage of the nice weather and took a tiny jaunt to the canyons. We miss the mountains so much.  Here are the boys

 And the girls! I love having a little girl :)

 So, on the way out, I flew out with the kids alone. It was NOT. FUN. AT ALL! Luckily Clint met up with us and flew back with us to Ohio. It was so much better. Not to say it wasn't without its stressful moments, but I didn't want to burrow into a hole for a day afterwards, so I'd say it was a success! Papa got to hold the little girl as she napped on him for the entire 2nd flight. What a sweet girl. I just want to hug her just from looking at this picture. I love her so much.

 And luckily Thomas took a nap too! That is no small thing, let me tell you!

We are so fortunate to have so many wonderful people who love us and care about us, and it was so fun to spend a little bit of time with everyone. We were also lucky, because my brother Nephi flew into town the last day of our trip so we got to see him for a tiny bit. I miss him. He always makes me laugh. So it was so great to be together with all of my siblings, and all of Clint's siblings! That hasn't happened since our wedding. We have the greatest families. It always makes it hard coming back to Ohio. We love our home and life here, but we sure miss our family.