June 17th- June 22nd

>Well, my Dad came and went. Jeff went and came. Overall it was a really filled week.

Tuesday the 17th, is when my Dad flew into town. We didn’t do anything that day because we didn’t realize all 5 of us would fit into the car. Then Wednesday morning, Jeff got picked up by his old supervisor -who was 15 minutes late- and he left to Chicago. And while he was up in the air and flying, my dad and I took the girls and went down south to Lehi to visit an outdoor sportstore called Cabela’s. If you have never been to Cabela’s, you’re seriously missing out. It’s an awesome store that sells EVERYTHING for enjoying the outdoors. Fishing rods, hiking boots, dog collars with radios attached to them, swimming stuff… they have it all. There’s also a little eatery place, and they’ve also got fish aquariums and even a museum type room as well… called the game room; its got stuffed game like deer and whatnot. I took some pictures while we were there.

Here’s a catfish. Yes it’s white, but it’s not albino. I wasn’t able to get a good picture, but the catfish has regular colored eyes. Instead it has a condition called Leucism, which is REDUCED pigmentation, not LACK OF pigmentation. It was fascinating.

Here is a spawning trout of some kind. You can’t tell very well since I didn’t have the flash on, and therefore the picture came out super dark, but it’s got brighter scaled and the mouth is a bit hooked, which is what happens when they spawn. Anyway, this one was a HUGE fish, had to be at least two feet long.

Here is a display thing that was in the middle of the store. It was HUGE and it’s only the center half of it. What’s crazy is that my Dad’s been to a few other Cabela’s, and he said we have the smallest store he’s been to. It’s nuts knowing that there’s stores bigger than ours.

Anyway, after going to Cabela’s we decided to head further south into Orem since I wanted to check out a scrapbooking store called Archivers. It’s the only one in the state and the next closest one is in Denver, Colorado. I was extremely surprised it was actually in University Mall. I went into the store, got some stuff and then we mosied around the rest of the mall, and got some smoothies from Orange Julius. At that point the girls were getting grumpy so we headed home. We had left around 11:30, and didn’t get home until after 6:00. I tell you they are NOT used to being out and about all day like that. I also got a really cute video of Ruthie trying out Butternut Squash for the first time! I don’t think she liked it very much, but we can try again later!

The next day on Thursday, we went to IKEA. We ate in the cafe -I had the meatballs and mashed potatoes with lingonberries and my dad had the salmon- and I bought a little highchair with the tray and an inflatable support for smaller babies, a package of paper for Zoe to color on, and some cardboard storage boxes. Ruthie is no longer in 0-3 month clothing, so we’re at the point now that we can start packing the smaller stuff away. Then afterward, we went to Old Navy since Zoe needed a new swimsuit, and I also had a “10 bucks back” coupon from using my store card and earning points. I also got Zoe a pair of shorts and two shirts, and Ruthie got a cute little spagetti top bubble shaped one piece suit, and she also got a pair of shorts and a top. It cost me around $30, but I saved about $65 between the $10 off coupon and the fact I got everything off the clearance rack.

After going home and resting for a while, we went back out to eat dinner at Tres Hombres. And unfortunately, the food wasn’t all that great on Thursday for some reason. I actually got really sick from it, which is a first. Then after Tres Hombres, we went to Robert’s Arts & Crafts, but they didn’t have what I was looking for, so we had to drive to Michael’s. I found what I was looking for there, and we went home.

On Friday, we attempted to take the girls to the Zoo. I say attempted because one or both of them were crying the whole time we were there. We did spend maybe an hour there, 1.5 hours tops. Zoe did like looking around at the animals, but she eventually got too hot and cranky so we left before seeing the whole Zoo. I don’t plan on ever taking them back again in the middle of the summer. And besides, it was packed to the gills, we were SO lucky to get a reasonably close parking space. I did however mange to take some pictures!

This elephant must have been really bored because she -all of the zoo’s elephants are females- was pulling the wood off of the enclosure and started tossing the wood around. It was making a lot of noise and Zoe started freaking out, so my dad said “We better leave before somebody gets killed.” Leave as in the elephant area, not the whole zoo.

So, this alligator is on loan until around September first. And again, it’s not albino, but leucistic. It was really boring and just laid there, but it gave a good photo opportunity. I was surprised at how small it was too. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get the whole head into the picture, Zoe wasn’t feeling like cooperating with me, since she was crabby from the heat.

After going home and resting, we went to Jeff’s parents house to visit and ate pizza for dinner. Wendy was watching my BIL Andy’s kids, and Melissa and Devin showed up with their son, so we had a full house with all 7 grandkids. It was nice, and my Dad and John had fun going back from the current War to Iraq and back in America’s warfare history. Thankfully, I was able to cut them off before they started talking about the Korean War.

Then on Saturday, we went to Fashion Place mall, and I went into Nordstrom’s to buy some BareMinerals makeup. We ate lunch, walked around and then went home for a while. Then we finally decided it was time to go swimming! So I strapped Zoe into her new bathing suit, and put Ruthie in Zoe’s old one and we went out. Zoe clung on me for dear life the whole time, mostly crying “Mama hold Zoe.” and “Want Dora Towel.” and “Zoe sit down.” while she was pointing to the chairs. My dad swam around with Ruthie who actually fell asleep! Unfortunately, we forgot to put sunscreen on the girls and Ruthie got sunburned a bit. But she’s fine now. Zoe did however warm up to the idea of the swimming pool which is good. We’ll have to take her out there more so she can get used to the idea of swimming. After drying off and whatnot, we went to Walmart, where my dad bought some stuff to Grill. We had chicken drumsticks and some Pork ribs, which came out great. Zoe finally got some large legos and she was having a blast with those; they even had them in pinks and pastel blue for little girls.

Sunday was when Jeff came home! It was so nice to have him back. Because we were so busy, I didn’t really miss him too much, but it did get lonely at night, not having him in the bed with me. My dad drove to the airport to pick him up of course, and I stayed home with the girls. Zoe was really surprised to see him; I can’t really say she was super excited to see him because she didn’t at once ask where he was or anything, but she did hug him and sit on his lap. Funnily enough, she didn’t show any interest in him until he said “Zoe, I got you something.” then that’s when she came running over. After that, we went to dinner at Jeff’s parents’ house for our customary Sunday dinner, and we played a bit of Wii and just sat around and talked some more. I got a super cute picture of Ruthie and my dad; seeing how she was the only one of the two that let him touch her. Zoe never really did warm up to my Dad, which I know bothered him.

There’s really strong family resemblance here!

There’s more to the week, but I’d rather get Jeff’s narration for Monday’s fishing adventure! It was exciting I can tell you that, but I’m really glad I didn’t go.