'Tis the season

...Baseball season that is. And since that means Ben is working 14-16 hour days when there are home games, Kiara and I decided to take our second annual "Dad's working so let's go play in Utah" trip.It was a jam packed two weeks but we had a blast! We were running from the minute we landed until the minute we left (except for the two days that she got sick--only the second time she's ever been sick and of course it happened while we were there! At least she didn't throw up on the plane...I don't think I would have ever recovered from that)!

Our first day there my parents watched Kiara and I went to Park City with my three best friends, Allison, Audrey, and Tiff (Tiff's kind of a loser and doesn't have a blog!). These girls are my sisters and together we have weathered divorces, miscarriages, health scares, money scares, trials of faith, family drama, car accidents, and bad boyfriends and we have relished in first kisses, first dates, shopping sprees, new cars, new kids, new jobs, good grades, board game victories, and so so much more. In the end we always come up laughing and making each other stronger and this weekend my girls made me feel strong once again.

We even got matching pajama pants and stayed up way too late laughing and crying and eating. It was a good old fashioned sleep over and I think we're going to have to make it a tradition every time I come to town!

Some other highlights of our trip included a photo shoot of Kiara by my good friend, Kim. If you haven't checked out her blog I strongly encourage you to do so. It will change your life! Here's another link just to make sure you go! Anyway, despite being an all around fabulous person, she is a crazy talented photographer and offered to grab a few shots of Kiara while we were there.
Poor Kim had no idea what she was signing up for with my little diva. Let's just say that an early and short nap, combined with not eating dinner yet, made for a challenging shoot. Kiara made sure we knew she was in charge and only cooperated for a couple of shots. Knowing Kim though, I'm sure she'll still be able to work her magic and get at least one decent pic out of the whole ordeal. Thanks again, Kim! You are the best!

The rest of our trip consisted of a lot of time with family. We went to the zoo, swimming, the movies, and played at everybody's house at least once.
Kiara loves being with her cousins more than anything and always asks for them once we're gone. It is definitely the hardest part about living out of state.
One of the best parts about our trip this time was that we got to see most of Ben's family too. The timing worked out that we were there for Ben's brother's graduation from BYU and his parents and two youngest siblings flew in as well. They live in New Hampshire so we don't get to see them as often as we do my side so we decided it would be worth it to fly Ben in for the weekend to be with them. We had a great time and Kiara loved playing with her aunt and uncle. We decided to not torture them (or me) by making them sit through the three hour graduation ceremony so I took them to a carnival at Tiff's school.

They all had a great time and wore themselves out completely. I think it's so great that Kiara has an aunt and uncle only a few years older than she.
So all in all we had a great trip and a big part of me didn't want to come home. A bigger part of me though couldn't wait one more minute to get back to Ben and be a complete family again. We definitely won't be leaving him again any time soon!