Over the past several years I’ve gone on quite a few trips for work to the East Coast.  Back before Ashley was born, Kathryn met up with me in DC for an awesome trip.  Other than that, the family has stayed on the Western side of the country.  I’ve found myself wishing that Kathryn could come on some of my trip and see the countryside and enjoy the food with me.  This was the impetus for our Carolinas trip.  My cousin Nancy and her family live in the Raleigh North Carolina area, and Kathryn’s brother James and his wife live in the Charlotte North Carolina area.  WIth a destination in mind, we started pricing out a trip.  We were excited when we found direct flights from SLC to Raleigh for under $300 a ticket.  The icing on the cake was I could get all our tickets for free with our skymiles I’ve been accumulating.  Over the course of time, the trip evolved.  First, Kathryn’s family decided it would be fun to come out as well for the James and Marta part of the trip.  Then a stop in Charleston South Carolina was added to the itinerary.  It was a great trip with lots of fun, food, family, and adventures.  If we don’t count Eliza being up frequently in the nights, the girls did awesome.  Here are some of our adventures.

Getting to the airport was a very stressful adventure.  We left with plenty of time for a normal day, but we didn’t take into account two huge wrecks and delays on the freeway.  We were the last ones on the plane, and they called our name over the local intercom.  Luckily we weren’t to the point for the airport wide intercom.

It was a 5 pm flight out, so that makes for an 11ish pm arrival EST.  Then we had to get our rental car and drive for 30 minutes to Nancy’s house.  We made it though.  Thank goodness for navigation on our phones.  It’s hard to imagine a trip like this without it.  Driving through the winding countryside in the middle of the night is challenging enough.

Check out these two little buddies.

Ditto

Nancy has this great museum / kids place call the Museum of Life and Science.  It was awesome and had so much fun things to do like a giant treehouse village, a fun stream to splash around in, animals, puzzles, a space section that I loved, and so much more.  You could spend days there.

Check out this hands on toy.  It’s one of the most amazing things I’ve played with at a place like this.

After the museum, we went to a fun BBQ place then after that, Nancy and family went home to put the kiddos in bed and  we went to a popular local creamery for some delicious ice cream.

DId I mention that Eliza didn’t sleep well?  She had a bit of a stuffy nose and couldn’t breath very well while sucking on her binky and we were in new unfamiliar places.  Anyway, it made for terrible nights.  On Friday morning we were planning to head out for Charlotte after having breakfast, but Eliza woke up at 4 in the morning and we decided to just go for it and get a jump on our day.  So we quickly packed up and threw everything and everybody in the car.  Both the girls slept for several hours of our 5 hour trip to Charlotte so that was great.  We finished listening to the Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell on the drive.  Great book and very thought provoking.

We met up with the Hawker Clan at the hotel in downtown Charleston and in no time we were off on another adventure.  We visited the Magnolia Plantation and Gardens.  It was very pretty.  Lots of different plants than we’re used to.  It was hot and humid too!  Really a fun place though.

What better way to cool off after a hot afternoon than to go swimming!

“I get you mom!”

The next day we went on a carriage tour of the city by Palmetto Carriage Works.  It was fantastic!  We had a native Charlestonian retired college professor as our tour guide.  He was very knowledgable about the city and had lots of fun stories and facts to share.

After the carriage tour, we split from the group and headed off to the beach.   We crossed the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge on our way to the Isle of Palms beach.

The water was a perfect temperature.  This was my first time swimming in the Atlantic.  I’ve walked on the beach several times, but never made it in the water.  We all had a blast playing in the waves.

When we were done at the beach, we packed up and headed out for James and Marta’s house in the Charlotte North Carolina region.  The next day we had a great Sunday with them enjoying food, fun, and family.  Ashley really loved her uncle Adam.  He was so great with her!

The next morning we were off again on another adventure.  We got breakfast at a little boutique waffle place.

Then we stopped at Lake Norman.  It’s a large man made lake for hydro power, water for the surrounding cities, and lots of beachfront property.

“Seriously Mom!?  Another picture?!  Ugggg”

The next adventure of the day was pretty awesome!  We drove out to the Lazy Five Ranch in Mooresville NC.  It’s a drive through zoo where you can feed the animals.  It was a really fun experience.  The emus were particularly creepy when they’d come right up to you and stare you down.  It seemed like at any second they would start pecking out your eyes.

Here is a video to get the full experience.

Here was our sweet ride for the trip.  Now it was time for our final adventure, the trip home.  We worked our way back to Nancy’s house that evening and had a fun time with them.

We really appreciate their generosity in hosting us twice, especially since we disappeared on them twice in the wee hours of the morning.  We were out of there and off to the airport before dawn again.  Ashley was a little loopy in this picture 🙂

Wahoo!  Toe touch!  We made it back to Utah!  “I’m sooooo glad to be off the plane!!”

This whole luggage rack was our stuff.  We had quite the system to move all of it through the airport.  Luckily most of it was checked.

We had a fantastic trip.  Thank you to everyone that made the trip possible and so much fun!

This is a random smattering of fun pictures from the last little while.  We love our family.

Kevin’s graduation.  Woot woot.

Last rides before we sold the bike.

Tim’s first concert.

Work trip to Hood River.  Such a pretty valley.

I’ve been to Multnomah Falls many times now, but this was the first time I’ve hiked up to the top.

First ever painted nails!

We love these guys.

First dirt bike ride of the season.

ATV ride up to the top of Powerhouse mountain overlooking Springville.

Tin foil dinners.  Things were going so well until Eliza decided to fall out of her chair and split open her head.  We threw everything back in the car as fast as we could and made record time getting back down the canyon and to the Instacare.  Sorry sweety.

As you probably know, Kathryn is a member of the TSO.  For their grand finale of this season, they had a concert and then kicked off their world tour.  It meant quite a bit of orchestra time, but I’m happy that Kathryn has the opportunity to share her talent and to have so much fun doing it.

Thursday, rehearsal night.  We decided to go on a drive up Hobble Creek canyon.  This is one of the meadows at the start of one of the dirt bike trails.  We hiked up to it and took some fun pictures.  Such a pretty place.  We continued to drive up the canyon intending to do a big loop and come out Diamond Fork canyon to Highway 6.  However, near the very end of the road almost to Highway 6, the gate was locked and we had to turn around and go all the way back home.  We didn’t get home until 10 pm, but the girls didn’t seem to mind too much.

Saturday, another rehearsal.  After watching the girls in the morning, Kathryn was gracious enough to let me go dirt biking with Devin.  It was the first ride of the season.

Monday, concert night.  Kathryn did amazing and looked great!  Thanks to Gina, Tim, Suzanne, and Adam for the support!

On Thursday, Kathryn set off on her world tour.  Kevin was awesome and drove Kathryn and the other Springville-ites to the orchestra rendezvous point.  Thursday was Tooele, Friday was Brigham City, and Saturday was Nephi.  So more of a Utah world tour.  Kathryn had a great time and had way way too much fun with her friends.

Thursday morning Suzanne came down and picked up the girls and took them home with her.  They had a great time staying the night with her.  Thanks so much for the help!  On Friday afternoon, I headed up to SLC to meet up with them.  We went to the zoo and had a great time there.  Ashley absolutely loved the merry-go-round!  When she saw it, so jump in front of me and put her hands up to stop me.  She made sure I was paying attention then started saying “turn” repeatedly as she grabbed my hand and drug me over to it.  Once we were on, we passed several animals before she declared that the zebra was the one she wanted.  So fun!

On the way home, we decided to skip the hustle and bustle of rush hour on the freeway and take the scenic way home through Park City.  It took a little while longer, but it was really pretty and well worth the extra drive time.  This picture doesn’t do any kind of justice to beauty of the canyon, but it’s the best I could do driving along.

Daddy hairdo.

On Saturday night, Kevin was awesome and watched the girls so I could go to Kathryn’s last concert in Nephi.  They played movie music.  It was lots of fun to listen to and be there to support her.

Here she is with the first violin section and the conductor.

When we got home, Eliza was so happy to see her!  It was a fun trip and I’m glad that Kathryn is a part of such a great orchestra.  I’m also really thankful for the summer break before the next orchestra season starts 🙂

Good bye Black Bomber.  70 thousand miles and 7 good years of service.  After my mission, it was time to find a car.  After lots of research, I decided on a Honda Accord.  Gas was over $4 a gallon at the time so fuel economy was important, as was safety and reliability.  Dad also said I’d be wise to get a car that could be used as a family car, that it would help out winning over my future wife.  In the end, it wasn’t the 4 doors that Kathryn liked, but the black paint, window tint, and the spoiler.  Her brother had a gold Honda Accord without a spoiler, and my car was so much cooler even though they were both Accords of the same model.  I digress.  So I went to the bank and pulled out $8k of cash and stuffed it in my cargo shorts lower pocket, hopped in the car with Josie, and headed down to Salt Lake with the ultimatum of buying a car in order to get home.  We stayed with some family friends in Salt Lake and looked around at cars, test drove a few, and made a couple of offers.  When I made an offer, it was being completely honest when I’d say, “I can only offer you this much.”  I had my eye on Black Bomber, and on the late afternoon of the second day looking, the people selling it finally got back to me and we made an appointment.  I basically knew I was going to buy it before we even got there.  It was everything I was looking for and more, and the price was right.  After taking it for a test drive, I was ready to go in and offer asking price, but Josie convinced me to at least offer something less.  As luck would have it, they accepted the offer and that basically covered sales tax and registration.  Thanks again Josie for the help on the trip.  I hopped in my car and drove home.  It felt good.  I loved looking in the rear view mirror and seeing the spoiler as I drove away that day.  It felt good.

Black Bomber was actually named by Grandpa Gerald.  One day when I was down at Grandma and Grandpa’s house visiting them, and we were out washing the cars, he asked something to the effect of hows the Black Bomber treating you and the name stuck.

Many good trips, dates, oil changes, a timing belt, tires, etc., later, it was time sell Black Bomber.  The family was growing.  After 6 months of talking about buying a new car, we finally decided to pull the trigger and do it and soon we found ourselves with three cars in the driveway.  We got it all cleaned up, and took our parting pictures.  The following is a copy of the ad we posted on KSL.  Long live Black Bomber, may you serve your new masters well.

For sale is a very nice, well cared for, clean, 2000 Honda Accord with 183875 miles. We’ve got four brand new Goodyear tires installed. The front brakes and rotors were redone within the last 500 miles. The rear struts were recently replaced as well. The air conditioner runs cold. The black paint, window tint, rear spoiler, moonroof, and custom rims give this car an edge over the competition. I bought this car with 105000 miles on it, and it has served me well. Oil has been changed regularly, and any needed maintenance has been performed. Our family has grown and we’ve recently added a larger car to our family, so it’s time to let this one go.

On to the story of Marvus.  Like I said, we’ve been thinking of getting a little larger family car for many months.  That subject basically occupied almost every conversation we’d had while driving.  We wanted a car with three rows to give us more room to expand in the future and to haul around the substantial pile of gear it takes to go on a trip with our two kiddos.  We test drove several different cars of various makes and models, and eventually settled on a GMC Acadia.  Once that difficult decision was made, we began looking for one in earnest whereas before we were casually watching the market.  We made an offer on one but it wasn’t accepted.  Then we found Marvus.  She came out of Moab.  She’s a 2010 GMC Acadia with lots of life left that we got for a fair price.  We don’t have a lot of time in the seat, but so far we’ve really enjoyed having her.  The reason behind the name is that Kathryn’s CRV is called Darbus, and we bought the Acadia from a lady named Marva.   Put the two together and we have our portmanteau name Marvus.

Next up, the XT225.  We bought this bike two years ago with the intent that it could be Kathryn’s dirt bike, and if we had visitors come, they could ride it.  The XT225 model motorcycle has a special place in my heart.   I’m going to get nostalgic for moment here and explain why.  “Old Whitey” was the first bike I ever owned.  I bought it from James’ dad.  I got quite a bit of use out of it on and off the road.  It did quite well on the trails due to it’s very low stance, and it was quite fun to put around on on the road.  I had it up at school Junior and Senior year.  It was my daily ride ride to class.  I got a couple of parking tickets for parking in faculty motorcycle parking, but it was totally worth it.  Old Whitey was definitely a bonus when dating Kathryn too.  On our first official date I offered to walk her home from my apartment.  Upon passing the motorcycle in the parking lot, I offered to give her a ride home on it, (she lived in the next comlex over).  We hopped on and what do you know, Old Whitey didn’t wasn’t ready for the most amazing first date ever to be over, so it just kept going right on past Kathryn’s place.  We ended on a fun ride up to the Y parking lot.  Cliche?  Not at all, this was our first date, not the fifth so we didn’t kiss.  That’s a whole other story.  We just enjoyed the ride up.  She held on tight and it felt good.  We enjoyed many fun rides together on Old Whitey.  No you can see why I have a tender place in my heart for the XT225.  Back to the new XT225.   In the end, Kathryn decided that she’d rather stick with a 4-wheel machine.  We enjoyed having it, but it just wasn’t getting used enough.  We put 70 miles on it in two years which just isn’t much.  When Kevin decided to head out for the summer, we decided it was time to sell.  So, we posted it on KSL and ended up selling it to some nice folks from Moab.  Yes, Moab again.  But that’s not all.  I actually bought my dirt bike from Moab so that’s three Moab KSL experiences.  We’ve had great luck with those Moab folks.  New Old Whitey That’s Blue, may you serve your new masters well.

2006 Yamaha xt225 ON/OFF road. Street legal dual sport enduro trail bike. Just changed the oil. Electric start, with a brand new battery. Tires in great shape. Bought for my wife but she didn’t end up using it. Ready to go.