Work Hard, Play Hard

Before we got to do any of this...we endured 3 1/2 hours of this:

For 2 months we had been building up to our mini 2 day vacation at Silver Mountain Resort. The car was packed, we were headed out the door in 5 minutes,

...and then someone accidentally shot himself in the hand with an airsoft gun.

He hid it from me because he thought it may cancel our trip, but I caught him digging in the medicine cabinet and his face looked like he was in shock. His hand looked incredibly bad, torn up, bleeding, swollen like it got hit by a baseball bat. We couldn't tell if the BB was still in there, so we headed to urgent care on the way out of town. An ultrasound, x-ray, doctor exam, and 3 1/2 hours later, the doctor still couldn't give us an answer. So we wrapped it up and headed to the resort many hours late.

How I kept my cool during a 3 1/2 hour wait in a small doctor's office by myself with 4 grumpy kids whose long awaited vacation was wasting away and hundreds of dollars going down the toilet and a trunk full of groceries...I have no idea!

Just go with the flow.

We finally made it! My favorite part of any vacation is the screams when we first get there as the kids check out the place! Chad gleefully said it was worth the pain of the delay at the doctor when he saw the room.

First night we swam. Then in the dark and pouring rain I roasted marshmallows with Alyssa and Ava. I loved every minute of it.

Bed head is my favorite! Later, she watched a movie and there was a scene where the parents had a little fight. I overheard her say, "Mom and Dad would NEVER do THAT!" Awww. I'm glad she thinks that. ;)

Flowrider was everyone's fave and Russ busted out several barrel rolls that made the crowd cheer.

A little 4 year old drama

Chad read for 2 hours...at a water park???
Ava's strategy...catch it on fire as quickly as possible, blow it out, eat the black stuff, repeat 50 times.

We wore ourselves out having so much fun swimming for hours and hours. But the fun didn't stop there!

We headed to Mom and Dad's where they fed us a steak feast and good company.

Having been raised in a game playing family, I love coming home to my roots. I thoroughly enjoyed playing Scrabble against 2 of the smartest people on the planet. Somehow it was almost a 3 way tie!

We tried to have a patriotic Memorial Day program in the car on the way home, but the melt down of a tired kid, um... teenager, made it almost impossible. We tried!

I LOVE creating these family memories. We grow so much closer as a family when we leave all of our cares behind and get away to just be together. Sometimes we splurge and I usually try to be cheap, but it's all priceless really. They'll remember this forever.

*On a side note...today when I was cleaning up some stray dog's poop in our yard, Ava says, "That is SO yucky. I REALLY don't like eating dog poop."
I didn't know that was ever an option!