Friday, March 13, 2009

Some peace and quiet

Ben and I took advantage of him having an educational conference in Scottsdale, Arizona last week and made it into a little vacation for just the two of us. Both sets of parents and the boys' God-parents Joel and Mal-Mal watched them for us while we were gone for 5 days.
From the sounds of it, the boys had a blast. It was their "trip" away too. The first day they built a fort, decorated cupcakes and read lots of books with Joel and Mal. I also heard that Joel played with GI Joe while no one was looking. :)

The next day they went home with their Nana and got to enjoy the circus with their cousin Kobe. Apparently Charlie thought the Sheep Dogs were hilarious. He told me they were sliding down their own slide. They also got to spend time with Troy and Megan at Tonagels. They took them for a bike ride and Charlie helped nurse Troy back to good health after having his wisdom teeth pulled. Charlie told me that he gave Troy some orange medicine to help him feel better.

At Sensow's, the boys got to play at the park and visit "The Farmer in the Dell." My parents own a large corn/soybean farm in Union Mills, In. The farm is contracted out through an old family friend who has farmed the land for my parents for years. He just got 2 new John Deere tractors so the boys thought he was the coolest thing ever. They got to sit in the tractors and get their pictures taken with the farmer.

Another highlight of the trip for the boys was a visit from Scott Lane (aka Shrek). He is a family friend of Tonagels. Apparently he stopped by their house EARLY one morning with SIX buckets of cotton candy for the boys. Of course they wanted nothing to do with breakfast after seeing all the cotton candy. Sorry Scott but we are rationing out the cotton candy.


While we were in Arizona, I took advantage of having some time to myself and took some photos of the landscape. I loved using my camera on something other than the boys!


Our resort was wonderful. This was the scene outside of our room. The hotel was made up of lots of little bungalows all connected.

If you walked just around the corner from our room, this was the scene.
While there we ate ridiculous amounts of food! Here we are at the world famous Sugar Bowl Ice Cream Parlor. This place was featured in a lot of "Family Circus" cartoons.

Here we are kickin' back and enjoying some rays by the pool.Old Town Scottsdale had a lot of wonderful statues. This first set was at our resort and the other two were in their town square.

My big purchase of the whole trip was a book to add to my collection. I have a weird obsession/interest in women from the "Wild West". One of my favorite books to read is Soiled Doves. It is a book about prostitutes in the west. I know, I know it is weird! But seriously, it is so interesting! So when I spotted this book, I grabbed it. I haven't had a chance to start it yet since I have so much catching up to do around the house but I can't wait to dive in. I also got a book about "Mail-Order Brides" of the west for my mom. I am going to read that one as well.

We had a very LLLLOOONGGG day of traveling on our way back from Arizona. I had unfortunately gotten a nasty head cold as soon as we got there (which it still hasn't gone away!) and was really sick by the time we left on Saturday morning. We packed up and headed to the airport at about 10am for our 1pm flight. Of course at about 12:30 they announced there was a 3 hour delay. Fantastic! By the time we got to Chicago it was 8pm. As soon as we got off the plane we started running as fast as we could to try and get our bags and head to the bus stop. We wanted to try and catch the bus before it left. Big surprise, we missed it. It kind of felt like we were on The Amazing Race! But... while we were waiting for our luggage, I turned around to see this MASSIVE guy walking towards me with this humongous watch on. I knew he had to be somebody important. Ben whispered, "Do you know who that is????" I had no clue. "It's Brian Urlacher of the Chicago Bears" Ben said in a giddy little school girl voice. (He is a Bear's fan.) Ahhh... that explains the massive neck and bulging muscles! He had been on our plane from Phoenix with his two little girls. While we were waiting for our elevator, Brian (we are on a first name basis) asked me if I wanted to run away with him but I politely declined and warned him that my husband would crush him to bits. (ok, that part really didn't happen. It is kind of funny to picture though!)
Anyway... we had a great time and were ready to tackle being "Mom and Dad" again when we got home. Thanks again to the grandparents and Aunts and Uncles that helped out.
peace out, a

2 comments:

The Van Vactor family said...

how funny is all of that! loved your pictures! YOu'll have to give me some camera tips! : ) xoox

Megan said...

I love your obsession with the wild west prostitues haha!!! It was funny to read that when we had just watched tombstone and had talked about your intrigue with those "soiled doves"... Glad to see that you had funnnnnnn girl!