St George- Part One

We just got back from a family vacation in St George, UT and had a fabulous time! We have so many stories to tell and photos to share, so it might be broken down into a few posts. There are so many people involved, I thought I better list them all for you...

Cast Of Characters:
1. Rick, Anna Marie & Gwen (you better know who these rockstars are)
2. Bob & Cathy (Rick's parents)
3. Harry & LuJean Lundin (Cathy's parents)
4. Tom, Laura, Rebakah, Ryan, & Tanner Bean (Rick's brother & Family)
5. Andy & Jessica (Rick's brother & wife)
6. Kirk (Rick's youngest brother- totally single if you know somebody who's looking)
7. All sorts of cousins & aunts and uncles
8. Shadow and Fluffy (Tom & Laura's cats. They won't be mentioned again, but I wanted to send them a shout-out)

We have been wanting to go to St George for quite some time. Cathy grew up in St George and her parents still live there as well as most of her siblings and her siblings' families. Tom's family has also settled there. With so many people to see, we have been itching to make a trip. Grandma Lundin suffered a stroke about 7 years ago and her health hasn't been great lately. This has increased our urgency to go.

This past week was the perfect opportunity for a trip because Rick's cousin Vince was getting married and Rebekah (Tom and Laura's oldest) was getting baptized. This meant everybody would be in town, plus a few extras were making the trip to join in on the festivities. Bob and Cathy flew into town and Andy, Jessica and Kirk drove down from Provo. Rick's whole family was there except for Jeff and his family. (We missed you!)

So the basic plan was to fly to Vegas, and then make the 2 hour drive to St George to stay with Tom and Laura. Rick's parents, plus Andy, Jessica and Kirk would all be staying with Grandma and Grandpa Lundin. The trip started out great (insert sarcasm) with leaving 20 minutes late for the airport, making a few wrong turns while trying to find the Park n' Fly, and Gwen peeing through her diaper (we had to dig through her suitcase in the middle of the airport for clean clothes). These setbacks were all undeniably my fault, which was sad because I usually try to blame these types of things on Rick. We waited nervously for 25 minutes to get through security. After we finally made it through, we were running "Amazing Race" style to get to our gate. Running through the airport carrying a 24 pound toddler isn't easy, but Rick didn't have it much better with our huge backpack and Gwen's carseat. Once we saw we were getting close to our gate, we were able to slow our pace to a walk. We actually made it on board 10 minutes before they closed the door. Fortunately, this rocky start was not an omen for things to come; the rest of the trip was great!

Gwen did awesome on the flight and the rest of our journey was uneventful. We managed to get our rental car and find our way to St George. Before getting on the interstate, we made a brief detour through the Las Vegas strip so Gwen could take in all the sights. Although her view from the car window was limited, she really enjoyed it! We got to town so late (about 1:30 am) that we basically just got our PJ's on and went to bed.

The rest of the trip was filled with all sorts of fun activities. We spent a lot of time at a really cool park by Tom and Laura’s, went four wheeling, ate out a lot, and spent lots of time with family. We are so glad we stayed with Tom and Laura. They were awesome hosts and we really enjoyed just hanging out with them.

More stories and photos coming soon!