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Hitting the Road. Again.
We had a wonderful time in Colorado, and are sad that it’s over, but we are glad to be home.
We started the week off with Kira helping drive her sister’s family of 9 to the airport, so she was gone for most of the day doing that. I took the kids to the park with two of my siblings, but on the way we had a funny experience. I noticed what looked like a little Yorkshire terrier wandering around in a yard by the street, but there was nobody nearby. I saw that the gate to the back yard had fallen, and wondered if that led to the dog’s escape. I parked the car and ran over to check the house, but there was a sign that said it had been found to be abandoned, and a peek through the window confirmed that it did not appear occupied.
I checked the dog’s tag, and found a phone number, but got no answer when I called. We decided to pick up the dog as it would likely just keep wandering farther from home, and we were concerned for its safety, then I tried texting the number. The owner called me back, horrified that the little guy had escaped, and arranged for her husband to come get him at my mother’s house. He was a very friendly little dog, and got in the car a little too willingly. Avey fantasized that we might end up keeping him, but luckily for us all, he has a good home already. It turns out that he did not live at that house with the broken gate, but he lived just a block or two away from my mom’s. He was quite far from his home when we found him, though.
We moved all of our stuff over to Kira’s parents’ house in preparation for the arrival of my brother’s family from a trip in Florida, and because visiting Kira’s dad was the main reason we made the trip. That took up most of the rest of the day.
Carver got very interested in the board games at their house, incessantly looking for others to play with him. His favorite was Trouble, but he also found a new favorite in Chutes and Ladders. He even liked to play all by himself, or if someone would just agree to play, he would do all of their turns for them.
Tuesday, Kira took most of the kids in the late morning to check out a restaurant that her mother had heard was entirely gluten free. It turned out to be closed on Tuesdays (weird schedule), so they had to go somewhere else. Avey and I stayed home because we had arranged to go see Ant-Man and the Wasp with my two siblings. Half of us had already seen it, but enjoyed it enough to go again. Then, that night, Kira went out to see a cousin who was in town for a little while before coming home to help get the kids in bed.
Wednesday started off with a fun morning while we all went mini-golfing. The challenge was that there were so many of us: 8 total, 4 kids. We were moving pretty slowly, and Merritt was very picky about when he was ready to move on to the next hole. We let three smaller groups play through, but others still caught up to us. The worst part was when we got to a hole with a water trap. Merritt badly wanted to chuck his ball into the water, and didn’t understand why we would be opposed to such an awesome spectacle. He finally moved on, satisfied enough with how many of us did lose our balls in the water. Carver was thrilled to get a hole-in-one on a par 2. I got a messy one on a par 3 (random luck), and then Kira’s dad got a hole-in-one on a difficult one, impressing us all. Kira’s mom won the day with the lowest score, making for a fun day for all.
In the afternoon, Kira went to spend some time with her best friend while I took the kids to my Mom’s house and Kira’s parents packed for their own road trip. We had plenty of fun over at Nana’s, mostly involving her sandbox and trampoline. Merritt started playing with some cars, which we thought to put on a ramp, and then that escalated into taking them to run down a slide from the trampoline in the back yard. They played with that for a long time. After we got the kids to bed, I went back to my mom’s to chat with my older brother and his family who were back from their trip to Florida.
On Thursday morning, we said goodbye to Kira’s parents who were off to another family reunion in Utah, and then we dashed over to my mom’s so that our kids could spend some time with my brother’s kids. That was a nice, albeit brief, visit. When they left for home after lunch, Kira went back to her parents’ to start packing us up, and I managed the kiddos with the help of my mom and siblings. My sister and I took them to a duck pond and park not too far, where we had a lot of fun watching the ducks, seeing a turtle in the water, checking out all of the colorful dragonflies, and even watching a hummingbird hunting for insects.
Friday and Saturday were spent traveling. The kids did well, considering how they had been waking up in strange beds for so long. We’re making today a low-key day so that they can just have some fun. Kira was feeling quite ill with a head cold on Friday, but we all slept well at our hotel that night, even sleeping in and getting back on the road late the next morning.
Saturday was a shorter travel day, but we were at wit’s end by those last couple of hours. Merritt was in a strange mood then. We had stopped for a late lunch, and my sister was in the passenger seat where Merritt could see her. Merritt got so angry each time she took a bite of her food, it was as if he found it personally offensive that she would eat in his presence.
We are so glad to be home, and all slept wonderfully last night in our own beds. We’re glad also to have my sister join us here for a few more days. We’re planning on making a trip to the beach that’s 5 minutes away, and finding some other fun things to do.
Next week begins school for the kiddos, and I have got a ton of work to do to get ready for my new semester at the end of August.