What a rollercoaster of life this week was. We kicked it into high gear Monday morning taking Gram and Pop to the MTC and dropping them off! WAIT! Whare are Grayson and I? Well, Gram and Pop were dropped off at the MTC to start their mission Monday morning, and I think Monica and Melanie enjoyed the reversal of dropping off their parents. Also, they live close enough that they actually go home each night... but a drop off is a drop off! Ooh, and everyone is dressed like they're ready for Hawaii as well!
As for Grayson and I, we were at home. Why? Because Grayson was sick. How sick? I hear you calling out. With what? I hear echo through the halls. Well, he threw up a good solid at least 8 times in the night, and I was awake for a good solid 3 hours straight helping him through it and cleaning things up. I got him into the bathroom with minimal mess, and he actually did a really good job, but just kept getting a little on his pajamas, and then after ~15 minutes I'd think "we're done, let's get you changed" and he literally went through EVERY pair of pajamas he packed that night. Also, with sitting in the bathroom waiting/getting cleaned up he just could not stop touching EVERYTHING, so once I finally got him back into bed I had to sneak through the house and start some laundry and find all the REALLY good cleaning supplies. Sheesh! Later in the day on Monday he ate like normal and just seemed completely fine again. Oh, one more mini-story, and then we can move on to what healthy people did. After all the turmoil, I finally got him back in bed in his last pair of pajamas, with his bed/pillow wrapped in towels and a bowl right next to him for just in case. He laid down on his stomach for maybe 5 seconds, curled up a little, threw up a little, and stretched back out and went to sleep, and you better believe that at this point I just let him sleep. I'll spare you the details of how one makes an informed decision like that, but it seemed like the best course of action at the time, and honestly, what was I going to do next, wrap HIM in towels?
Back to the morning. Monica, Melanie and the kids all took a tour of BYU after dropping off Gram and Pop. I don't have a lot to say about these pictures other than what's obvious in them, and that I wasn't there, and that it looked fun. That's a pretty awesome Christmas tree.
I'm honestly not even sure where this is on campus. This BYU wasn't there when I attended, but from the backdrop, I'm guessing it's by the Wilk/library area.
All the kids chillin' with Mecha-Cosmo. I don't know if I have ever mentioned this to anyone, but look at the sculpture's feet. I don't know what it is about it, but those people feet just unnerve me a little every time I look at this statue.
The campus tour finished at the new creamery where everyone got Cougar Paws to eat when they got home. After some ice cream (and me driving back over to campus to get one for Grayson who was feeling much better and wanted to eat) we packed our things to head out. Since Megan and Alan live so close, we stopped by to say bye to them before heading out.
Grayson mentioned at some point how much he loved the mountains, and wanted a picture of them for his room. We saw a school with a park next door which had a field that would definitely be big enough to clear the sight line to the mountains. I grabbed a few pictures, including this panorama. Very pretty.
The rest of Monday was getting up to Niki's house, getting ready for bed and resting a bit. I also went to my parents house to print a few things we needed, but it was mostly just relaxing and recovering. On Tuesday we headed to the SLC aquarium in the day. They were having some big exhibit outside with some fun sculptures you could take pictures inside.
And they had this big set of wings, and they lined up on Brooke the best.
There was a lot to see inside. Obviously mostly fish and water animals, but they had a South America section that even had a sloth and some birds. Grayson really enjoyed climbing on this orca.
And he gave me an idea, so I got to whale training before we moved on!
Up in the South America part, there was this cool rope bridge that you could cross. It didn't go anywhere special, just a fun thing to do.
The komodo dragon was not out, but the statue still was!
And I saw this guy practicing sketching at the shark tank. Takes me back to college and Jarom with his sketch book he carried around everywhere. Seemed like a smart idea to me though if you wanted to work on drawing sharks.
We were able to go touch sting rays, and somewhere around this point I just got overwhelmingly tired and felt like I was going to pass out. All I really wanted to do was lay down and go to sleep. I asked Monica if she had any snacks, and luckily she's the most prepared kind of boy scout, a mother, and was able to hook me up. A few minutes later I was doing much better, and enjoyed touching a ray or two myself. Also, inadvertently, when I reached in and touched the first few I scared them away from the kids hands... so I guess I'm that kind of dad!
We headed to Nielsen's for lunch after. My family always came here to get concretes (a frozen custard) growing up, but I never knew how good the food was until college when I came up one time and ate here at Jarom's recommendation. Lunch was terrific, and the ice cream was the best!
After Nielsen's, we went and met up with Jordan and Liz and their kids at a park. The kids had a lot of fun playing together (until Grayson started playing his favorite game, which is aggravating everyone else as much as possible) and I had a great time catching up with Jordan! We do send Marco Polo's, so it wasn't a 20 year catch up, but it was still so fun to see him again! Sadly, I didn't take a picture.
That night Monica and I swapped going to the temple, and we took the kids up to my parents house while we did so. My parents just live at a much shorter drive than my sisters, so it made it a little easier to get us both in quickly. At my parents house, the kids had a great time playing with their favorite toys. They have a few things they always immediately want to get out whenever we go to grandma and grandpa's house, so it was a great way to keep them entertained as well. At the temple, boy was it CRAZY! It was the last day the temple was open for the year, and I guess a lot of people were trying to finish off their 2025 resolutions or something. It was NOT the night to be a walk-in. That said, the wait really wasn't that bad either, and there are definitely worse places to be waiting than the temple.
After the kids went to bed, I headed for the airport to pick up my sisters! The next morning we let the kids all watch a Christmas show. We watched the Ice Age special, and all the kids just refused, because it was going to be so boring, and as soon as we turned it on they were laughing and their eyes were glued! Also, I do need to be fair to Brooke, she said she would be happy with anything.
After the movie and breakfast and whatever else we did, we opened up our gifts to and from my sisters, and that's when everyone found out about our surprise plans that afternoon. We got everyone tickets to Frozen the Musical! It was at the Hale Center theater, which is a theater in the round. I love theater in the round. We got a whole box up at the top, and that was perfect, because it gave Grayson a contained space to be able to move around a bit. The show was incredible, and even while Grayson insisted he wasn't enjoying it, he just couldn't look away. The sets and stage were constantly changing and it was just fantastic! Also, when Olaf came in, he walked in right next to us and chatted with Brooke before the spotlight came to him and he went down on stage!
We stopped and posed for a picture after the show and I'm honestly so glad we did, because by the time we got out, there was no traffic at all!
The kids headed back with my sisters to get ready for the night (this is New Years Eve, I haven't mentioned that yet), and Monica and I went to Mumbai House to pick up dinner. It was CRAZY there. Turns out, takeout on New Years Eve is a popular idea. It took maybe an extra 30 minutes past our pickup time for our food to get ready, but no big deal (especially because we had no kids with us), and then we headed back to have dinner with everyone and play New Year scratch off truth or dare.
After dinner, Niki had sparklers for us in the backyard.
I played around with my phone and figured out how to do a long exposure, so we could get some cool pictures like this! 2026 baby!
And Monica and I encased in a heart.
We busted out the DDR mats that we gave the kids for Christmas and everyone had so much fun dancing. Honestly, I didn't expect us to dance for all that long, but next thing I knew someone said it was 11:50 and we should turn it off and get ready for midnight!
During the dancing we also had a chocolate fountain and snacks. Yum!
And the neighbors did some fireworks that we ran out to watch when we heard them around... 9pm probably. Maybe it was 10. I think this might have been the neighbor that invited Niki over for her party. She said she was having soup, and that she probably wouldn't make it to midnight, so I'm guessing it was her with the earlier-than-midnight firework show.
Poor Monica thought the fountain looked like a refreshing spot to wash her hair, and then realized that chocolate is not fun in one's hair! Just kidding, something just fell off her fork when she was trying to eat it, but it did get in her hair.
And then midnight! We had a toast, and EVERYONE made it! Even Grayson. I guess when New Years is too much fun, you just can't sleep.
The next morning, Grayson found out it was really fun to play with a balloon and Niki's fan. OH! And Monica cooked bacon in the morning, and the fan has an air filter and a number to show how "dirty" the air is, and the fan started going crazy after the bacon was cooked. It was at 1-2 when we woke up, and 600+ when the bacon finished cooking. But really, the best part was letting it blow balloons in the air, and then swatting them away.
Alyson invited us all over for lunch on New Years Day, and we basically woke up, ate breakfast, and had to get ready to head to her house. Some of my cousins where there and my Uncle Danny, and it was fun to catch up a little bit. Grayson wanted to be outside mostly, and so I went in the backyard with him and we walked along these rocks. This really took me back to when I was a kid. Up by my parents house there are a lot of large landscaping rocks between houses, and I would climb up and down and all over them to go from house to house in the neighborhood. Grayson was also keeping an eagle eye out for cool rocks he could take with him.
And Grayson and Alyson got along wonderfully! They were having a great time together snuggling on the couch.
That afternoon everyone played some clue together. I actually sat this one out as I wasn't feeling the best, but I enjoyed watching. Monica made some pretty stellar early guesses and was able to figure it out really fast. Also, this is a new version of clue where there is a deck of cards, and as you play additional people can get killed off, and potentially no one wins. It seemed like a good addition to the classic formula.
And after clue we all had some ribbon candy together! I don't think I wrote about this last week, but when we went to get Winry her scriptures (maybe I didn't mention that either...?) I saw ribbon candy there. That was always my Grandpa Hansen's favorite thing, and I remember we used to get him big packages of it for Christmas every year. Well, on the side of the package it said something about breaking it and sharing it. I thought about getting it and sharing it with my kids and I literally started crying in Deseret Book holding ribbon candy! It was just the idea of getting to share a piece of my grandpa with my kids, who never got to meet him. Well, no one cried when we ate it, and it was cinnamon, so super tasty. My grandpa was on to something with this one.
The next morning we flew home. It was sad to leave everyone, but we'd had a really great trip! We ended up flying back on Friday to save a bunch of money, and Friday afternoon was pretty chill. Saturday morning Grayson woke up with blood all over his face. Looks like he got a bloody nose in the middle of the night. I helped him get it washed off. Oh, Jerusha also sings a cereal song with the kids often while we're out in Utah, and the kids all really love it. Grayson this morning also informed me that he wrote a new version for Niki. Yeah, you just replace "cereal" with "Niki."
And then Saturday night Grayson threw up again! I think he made it to the toilet as I don't have the same PTSD from that night. You know what, he actually might have thrown up in the morning now that I'm thinking about it, because I was supposed to sub in primary, and I felt really bad not letting them know I wouldn't be able to make it until like 9:30 am. Fortunately, this time it was just that once.
Ooh, and Jelly did not forget Brooke! Jelly was very happy to have us back home and was very snuggly when we got here. Fun story about her. While we were out, we checked in to see how she was doing, and the Reichner's response was that she liked them a whole lot more when we're not around! She definitely craves our attention, and I think she has a hard time when we're gone, but we're definitely trying our best to make up for it now!
And that's a wrap on this week! A pretty crazy week, staying in Orem, Woods Cross and back in Leander! Hopefully the year ahead is kind to us, and we're able to get back on TX time quickly! School and work start again tomorrow!
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