Utah trip. Not a TOTAL bust.

We spent the first 3 weeks of October in the beautiful Cache Valley.

Our "vacation" to Utah started out something like this....

(happy and excited to play with cousins!)

(but also missing their dad....)

And ended up being mostly like this...

My personal favorite.

This picture speaks high volumes.

Poor little guy was miserably sick for a good chunk of our vacation.  I felt so bad for him.  I don't know what nasty stomach bug he caught but it was awful....for everyone involved.

He threw up more times than I care to remember and just when I'd think he was over the worst, he'd throw up again.  It was awesome.  A huge THANK YOU to my mom who happened to be there almost every time he threw up.... she helped in MUCH of the cleanup.  Ugh...lucky her. :)  Thank you Mom!! 

I took him to the Dr. after about a week of him having no appetite and being exceptionally WHINY.  Of course he told me there was a bad stomach bug going around that can last up to two weeks for some kids and sent us home with hopes that it would be over soon....

This stomach bug started on a Friday and he didn't start acting himself again until Tuesday. (12 days later).  Which happened to be 2 days before we were going to head home.  Yep, it was fun.

Somewhere in the middle of that, I also caught the stomach bug.  Fortunately for me, it was a 24 hour thing.  And fortunately for everyone else, no one else caught it.  Thank goodness!

We also got to listen to this all day.

What I thought was only going to last two days ended up lasting the ENTIRE trip.

...and apparently it is STILL going on.  That's some serious road construction....

These machines rattled the whole house until I was ready to pull my hair out.

Trying to look for the positive in all of this and the only thing I can think of....my kids still napped through it all.

Thank goodness for loud fans.

Aside from tending to a sick child and pulling my hair out from extremely loud machines....I was able to do a few fun things.

{Huge thank you to all those who helped watch my sick little boy so that I was still able to do some of the stuff I had come to Utah for in the first place!}

For starters....

Girls night with my besties!

{This luckily was the night before Trey got sick.}

We partied it up for Kelli's one last hoo-rah before her wedding.

We ate lots of food and had fun watching her open her honeymoon gifts from all of us....and she may or may not have modeled a few of them for us.... ;)

It was a fun night.  I'm glad I was able to get there in time for it.

Then came the wedding... which was my whole purpose for coming to Utah so I definitely couldn't miss this.  I left a sick Trey home with my sister, dad, and mom who all had to take turns since they all had stuff going on that day (thank you!).... and took Kate with me to the wedding.

She got married up in the mountains of Provo Canyon, near Sundance Resort.  It was beautiful.

Fitting for the beautiful bride.

Some of us were lucky enough to help with a few last minute touches before the wedding.

We were all crammed in to this little closet.  It was great.

Congrats Kelli!  We love you and are so happy you have found a great guy!

 The next week....

I banked on the fact that Trey was feeling better (I swear I thought he was!) and took my kids to visit some of our best friends from Pittsburgh who now live in Layton.  And also to get Jeff from the airport...

We had a great time visiting our friends that we miss dearly.

I'm sooo glad we didn't get any of them sick since I went home that night with the stomach flu.

I'm not so sure Carlee would still be my friend if I had! ;)

Trey at Na-na's (what Trey calls Grandma Wendy)

Getting some fresh air after being cooped up in a house all day long...

Miss Kate stayed healthy the whole trip.  (THANK GOODNESS!!)  She was a little sweetheart.  As I mentioned before, she didn't cry once on our way to and from Billings.  She makes her mama very happy.  And she slept like a champ the whole trip!

Jeff entertained the kids while I was sick...

 And then again when I went to Time Out For Woman.
This is a picture of Trey throwing a HUGE fit when I left.
 (this truly never happens, but unfortunately happened one too many times while he was sick)
I started having to sneak out of the house.

El Sol with Tony and Kathie

We celebrated Carson's 8th Birthday!

Like I mentioned... I got to go to "Time Out for Women" with my mom and sister.

It was a much needed break and pick-me-upper.

For some weird reason, this is the only picture I got.

Later that night my mom watched the kids while Jeff and I met up with Nate and Laci at Maddox.  They took Jeff to Brett and Carlee's in Layton so Brett could take Jeff early in the morning to the airport, and I came back home to this...  So cute!

Apparently Kate loves reading stories!  I need to read more books to her.

Poor Jeff was only able to come home for 5 days and during that 5 days: I got sick, Trey was sick, Tony and Kathie had to go out of town for a couple days, and then I had plans to go to Time Out for Woman and another friend of mines wedding reception.  So ya, I think he secretly wishes he'd have stayed home and worked. ;)

Trey and his cousin playing games on Marci's phone.

One of the few cousin shots I got since Trey didn't get to do too much of that this trip.

We managed to get the whole fam to go to Firehouse.

Lesson Learned:  Next time leave kids home!

I may have left with my pants and shoes soaked in rootbeer... but hey, the food was good!

Grandma Kathie and Papa Tony got to play with the kids while I ran some last minute errands before we took the long journey home the next morning.

We planned to go home over UEA weekend so my mom could drive home with us.  I'm so glad she did because it would be hard work driving alone when my kids need me to hand them a million things and change the dvd about 20 times.  Not an easy task when I'm driving.

Before we hit the road we made a quick stop to the pumpkin walk..  This is such a fun tradition that Logan does every year.  I haven't been able to go in quite a few years so I'm glad we got to squeeze in a visit on opening day.

My two favorites scenes were Clue pictured in the top left, and then all the rest of the pictures are different scenes from Hunger Games.  They did a seriously awesome job.

And that there is Bob the Builder himself.

My mom drove home with us on Thursday and flew out early Sunday morning.  It was too short of a stay if you ask me but I'm glad she got to come if only for a couple of days!

And that about wraps up our trip.
Despite all the sickness, we still managed to have a good time.....but I'd dare say it's not on the top of my list of favorite trips home.  Although, I don't recall too many trips home where someone didn't get sick.
I must be cursed!!