Memorial Day

Monday May 25th

The real reason we took a vacation at this time was Jessica's wedding. It was like hitting two birds with one stone when we learned that it would be right around the same time as Cami's mission farewell. We knew the trip would be filled with one family event after another and there wouldn't be much relaxation time, so we decided that we should stick around for memorial day after all the wedding stress was over and try to get some fun time in before getting back to Arizona and normal life. 

I am so glad we decided to spend memorial day with the family! My older sister and I have similarly aged kids and they have tons of fun together. My sister's in-laws were also in town for the weekend, so we decided that our family (our mom, dad, and the brother still at home) should do a picnic at a lake with us and her in-laws. Caleb and I realized that his mom would be without the girls on that day and would just be sitting at home on a day off. We invited her to come along and join in on our activities, and she agreed that it sounded like fun. 

After discussion amongst the men, it was decided that we would go to Lucky Peak for our picnic and lake playing. My dad knew just the spot to go! I hadn't been to that spot in a while, but when I saw it, I immediately knew it was perfect. We got there shortly before the crowds and got the perfect picnic benches by the sand, but still in the shade. The kids immediately took off to the water with their uncle Joseph!

The kids played hard and we all had a picnic and relaxed. 

 My sister had some super cute pictures of my little family on her camera as well that she shared with me: 

After lots of playing time, my kids were worn out! Connor informed me he was "all done swimming, mommy" and ready to go in "gampa's truck".

 I can tell he was almost as worn out as his sister was, because they both fell asleep on the ride back. 

We all cleaned up and relaxed a bit after our return. Caleb and I got the majority of our packing done while the kids played together quite nicely. Melinda and her boys came back over for a little while and the cousins enthusiastically ran around outside waving flags! We thought it was too cute, and snapped some pictures of them on my phone. 

We ended our night spending some time with Caleb's mom and sisters so they could all say goodbye to the kids before our departure the following morning. 

Although my little family didn't make it to any cemetery to leave flowers, my parents and my sister's family both went. We had an absolutely wonderful memorial day and are so grateful for the many men and women who sacrificed their lives to protect our county and give us the freedoms that we have!