Utah Trip Spring 2018: Part I

Video of the full trip

For Tyler's spring break we took a drive down to Utah to visit our extended families. It started off pretty well. Allison traveled way better than she ever has. She fell asleep fairly quickly and napped nearly two hours, much better than she usually would in a car (last trip her naps never exceeded 45 minutes).Tyler was a bit more challenging. He was clearly tired and trying to sleep, but he couldn't get comfortable and became very loud, whining, and wiggly. We tried to encourage him to nap by telling him he couldn't play the Ipad until after he'd slept, but it didn't work. Since we'd put all the toys in the trunk expecting that both kids would sleep until our first stop, he was super restless with nothing to play with for over two hours.

Tyler was also very difficult at our first stop at the Yakima Burger King. After hating being stuck in the car, I thought for sure he'd want to move around, but he didn't want to play and was scared of the other kids, none of whom were bothering him in any way. Being tired, even if he seems full of energy, brings a ton of anxiety out of him. He did improve after some food and eventually played enough to wear himself out.

Allison couldn't climb up into the play area on her own, so she found some older girls to help her out. She's such a charmer!

The Burger King stop was enough to zonk out Tyler for about an hour. After that he colored and did activity books and we finally let him have some electronics. He really liked a new Lego game I'd downloaded for him. He'd get super excited everytime he won a new Lego piece. Allison was worn out from the stop and was happy to play ponies and read books in the car along with a little stickers and iPad. I used electronics only as a reward for playing well with other toys first so it wasn't an expectation the entire drive. They both had one at the end of the drive, which helped them stay awake until after we got to the hotel. Last time they'd both fallen asleep by the time we arrived at our hotel then woke up wired when the car turned off. The transition went about as poorly as it could go. This time it went pretty smoothly.

Kiddos playing on the hotel bed

The hotel was nicer than I was expecting and they had a pack and play for us, which Allison fell asleep in immediately. She sleeps in a toddler bed now and can easily climb out of a pack and play, so I didn't know how she would take to one this time. I was delighted to see her excited to watch me "building a bed" for her. She associated it with sleep far more than the two double beds in the room, similar to how she reacted during her night in the ER last October. Tyler had to be separated to help her settle down since he was a bit wired. It was nice that they had a lobby with a bathroom so Oscar could get him ready for bed while I put Allison down. We swapped off when it was Tyler's turn for bed. My own getting ready for bed was keeping him from settling down, so I went down and used my phone in the lobby while Oscar got Tyler to sleep.

Allison needed some middle of the night cuddles, but otherwise she slept well. Oscar cuddled her on his chest then put her down in the bed with me and hopped in with Tyler. She woke up 10 minutes later and sat up looking around confused. She just doesn't associate adult beds with sleeping areas. I held her for a minute before putting her back in the pack and play where she fell immediately back to sleep.

The next morning we set up Oscar's computer to amuse the kids while we got everything ready to go (they did have a TV but there was nothing on the kids were interested in). We got breakfast and drove to Boise to hang out for a bit with my friend Emma and her daughter Kaylee. After getting to bed late and playing with a friend, Allison then napped in the car all the way to Jerome, Idao. She might have slept longer but we'd forgotten to fill up on gas in Boise and couldn't go any further than Jerome. Tyler didn't sleep, but this time we told him he couldn't play any electronics until Allison fell asleep, which effectively kept him from making loud noises and bugging her.

In Jerome we found ourselves at Burger King again, and their play area was also too difficult for Allison to climb. She had to pull out her charms again.

And around 5pm we made it to Granny's house! We ate dinner and chatted while the kids had fun in the backyard and on the baby bouncer.

Saturday was spent with lots of cousins. After helping granny make cupcakes Emily's kids came over for a day of just running around the house. Allison really liked spinning around the load bearing pole in the basement. She's my little pole dancer! Wait...

The kids shared their sticker books with their cousins and enjoyed getting good and messy when it was time to eat their cupcakes.

Allison liked "climbing the mountain" of gravel Grandpa keeps in the front driveway.

From there we drove down to meet up with Mike's kids at Thanksgiving point. Their children's museum is open until 8pm daily, which gave the kids a great place to play for the evening. Tyler was a sleepy boy in the car. 

My cute dancing girl!

She also loved blowing out the bubble window

Dad and I chased around miss Allison while the others stayed in the building room. Allison can't stay in one place with so much stimulation around her.

Their jungle play structure is awesome! I had fun climbing around with my girl.

 Eventually we caught up with Tyler and Ethan

Sweet climbing girl. She was fearless on those ropes!

Oscar, mom, and dad watched us from below.

My sweet little pilot!

All the kids reunited to play the projector games. There was whack a mole, soccer, and more. I love this idea! It's relatively cheap and incredibly entertaining.

And we finished up the outing at WaterWorks. Ty built tube structures while Allison had fun splashing around. We tried putting her in a cover at first, but then it bunched up so much in the water table chairs that it became pointless, so I took it off of her.

She's getting a bit too big for these chairs, but she still looks adorable in them.

After that we had some awesome ice cream and Mexican food at the Midvale Leatherby's before getting back to Mike's for bed. Their guest room has so many pillows!