When the fates align against you...

Can't say I have ever been much of believer in fate, but this past weekend might have changed my mind. We have never had so much happen in one single weekend.

Our purpose was simple. We were headed to good ol' Yellow Pine, Idaho to my grandparent's cabin. We really (and I do mean REALLY) love Yellow Pine. It is a small town located in a valley surrounded by some of prettiest mountains and scenery. Look how pretty this place is!

View of the mountains in back of my grandparent's cabin.

View of the town from the lookout.

View of the main street in the town in the snow.
(Sorry, Grandma, I couldn't find my non-snow pics.)

We were going to spend a long weekend hanging out with my Grandma and Grandpa Morgan, my parents, sisters, brother-in-law (can I just say that I love that I have a brother-in-law on my side of the fam. Now for the nieces and nephews... I kid, I kid... well, sorta.) and my cousins. It was looking to be an awfully fun time with four wheeling, good food, card games, movies, lots of laughter and hanging out.

But it wasn't meant to be.

Deterrent 1

On Wednesday night, John and I headed out with a packed car and two excited little people (Tom absolutely adores Yellow Pine! And Mary Alice absolutely adores having lots of people to give her lots of attention.) But three miles before Snowville, our car died.... as we were driving. After trying to change out the alternator and the battery, it was finally determined that the motor had seized and we were essentially out of luck. The car was effectively totaled. So, we left the car in Snowville and returned home.

Now, we knew that we were going to have to buy a new car sometime soon... but we weren't planning on that right now. And we weren't planning on it being my Buick, a.k.a. the good car. It was always supposed to be John's Intrepid that would go first. But it mostly frustrating right now because we are all set to close on our first home on Monday. (Woohoo!) A new house and a new car sound wonderful.... wonderful, that is, until you start looking at the budget. Then it gets depressing. But budgets tend to be depressing, don't they? Oh, well. We wont' think of that right now.

To this part of the story, though I need to give much thanks to my Dad for helping us tow the car and spending six hours trying to fix everything. And also a humungous thank you to our good friend Ian, who got us all the new parts, traveled up to deliver them, finally figured out what was wrong with the car and towed it home for us the next day. Especially seeing as how he put off a lot of other pressing responsibilities to help us out. Seriously, we feel so blessed to have such generous people in our lives!

Deterrent 2
Thursday after my Mom and Dad had arrived in Yellow Pine with my grandparents, my mom fell down the side of ravine and broke her leg in three spots. She had to be lifted out of the ravine and taken to a waiting truck - and had a four hour, painful ride to the nearest hospital. At the hospital, they had to reset her leg and splint it before she could go home. She is due to have surgery on it on Monday. But she and the family returned home Friday, also having to cut short their Yellow Pine weekend.

Deterrent 3
Friday evening, after much poking, prodding, and a rather uncomfortable CT scan, I was diagnosed with appendicitis and was immediately sent in for an appendectomy. Can we just say yuck! Seriously... just look at this bugger. Triple the normal size of an appendix.

After feeling awful for most of Friday, I was ready for any relief, but I must say that the recovery process is not a really fun one. Luckily they released me from the hospital this afternoon (Saturday) - cause it is a whole lot more comfortable at home without IVs stuck in my arm. (And it took eight tries to get those darn IVs in, too...)

Once again, I feel really blessed to have such a good husband who takes such tender care of me. From walking me around to helping me dress and making me food and going to store to get anything I could even think of needing - and especially for spending the night in those awful hospital chairs just so I wouldn't be alone. If it wasn't such an uncomfortable experience, I would say it was fun to spend some time just the two of us.

Which leads me to another round of thanks for my sisters who have stepped in to not only help out my mom while she is laid up, but who also took on the responsibility of our kids so that John could stay with me in the hospital. Thank you guys! I can't say how much it has helped out.


So, I guess these challenges have shown us just how blessed we really are. And it has also reinforced just how much we really want to get to Yellow Pine. Soon, hopefully soon!

Idaho trip!

Well, a little over a week ago, Utah State University held a "furlough" for all employees - a temporary layoff for one week. Man, we have never been so excited to be layed-off in our whole lives! So, we decided to go to Idaho and visit with my grandparents.

Of course, the day we planned to leave, Mother Nature sent a little gift...



The biggest snowstorm of the year! We had two feet of snow in our yard.


RUPERT!



Tom enjoyed playing at Great-Grandma Bradshaw's house. She has the coolest sword (it has a sheath!) and two awesome rifles - not to mention cowboy hats and stick horses. He was in heaven! (And even managed to play with the kitchen set and the type writer a fair bit!) Here he is sitting next to Great Grandma - trying to feed the doll the same way that she was feeding Mary Alice. Grandma was very good to let him play with all of her toys (and other items that were not toys) and made him feel like one of the grown-ups.

And we, of course, were thrilled to be able to visit with Grandma a bit, too!




YELLOW PINE!

When we went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Morgan, they took us to their cabin in Yellow Pine - and took us snowmobiling. It was great fun! And we just barely got in the last weekend of snowmobiling there (or so it seemed), since there was a bit less snow when we left Yellow Pine than when we arrived.



Grandma and Grandpa Morgan going for a ride!



Here is Tom on the snowmobile. He loved it! He couldn't stay on very long because it got too cold for him. But when we got home, he decided his bike was a snowmobile - so he has been riding around the house on his "snowmobile" for days... he has the sound effects and all!


Grandpa Morgan took Tom for a little spin when he was taking the snowmobiles off the trailer. To our surprise, Tom readily hopped right on the first time. (Usually he has to see YOU ride it around and examine how it works, etc. before he will ride it himself.)


Tom and myself on one of the snowmobiles.


Tom and John on the snowmobile. (Are you noticing a theme here?)

In addition to snowmobiling, we also played cards, visited, watched a couple John Wayne movies, and (of course) ate and ate and ate. (Big thanks to Grandma and Grandpa for spending half of their cabin time preparing and cleaning up meals!)


We greatly enjoyed our trip to see all of my grandparents - and they were all very good to let us come and invade them!



And here's one last picture of the baby....