Thanksgiving Adventures

Last Wednesday afternoon Sam and I decided we should pack the kids up in the minivan and head on down to California.  It was a last minute decision because Sam wasn't sure if he'd be working on Black Friday or not.  Fortunately he didn't have to, so we made the trip. 

We left American Fork (that's where Sam's office is located) at about 6:15pm and drove directly to Claremont.  We arrived at about 2:30am Thanksgiving morning.  We made pretty good time and had a pretty smooth trip.  It was so nice to have Thanksgiving dinner with my family.  Especially since every year my mom goes crazy and makes 8-10 different kind of pies, all homemade.  She rocks!

After eating with my family we drove down to Chino to surprise Sam's family.  They had no idea that we were in California.  This is starting to be a really fun Knecht family game, surprising out of state relatives by showing up on their door steps.  It really is the best, give it a try.  We got to Casa de Knecht around 4:00pm and sent the boys to knock on the door while we hid by the garage.  It was the highlight of the trip to see everyone's shocked expressions.  We had just had all of Sam's family here in UT a couple of weeks earlier, except for Lindsay and Rachel.  It was especially great to see them.  We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening hanging out there.  It was fabulous.

Saturday the boys, several of the boys' aunts, my mom, and I all went to see Tangled.  We loved it.  It was cute, funny, and not scary.  (I'm kind of chicken, I don't do scary.)  Then the boys went down to Chino with their aunts while I went shopping.

Sunday morning we left Claremont to drive back to Utah at 5:00am.  I don't mess around when it comes to driving home.  I like to leave early.  We got into St. George at about 10:45 am local time and had to make a stop.  The whole weekend Ben had been running a fever, but he was teething and getting in his molars, so I didn't think much of it.  By Saturday night he was complaining of immese pain in his ear.  By Sunday the pain was unbearable for him.  We stopped at an urgent care and sure enough, he has an ear infection.  That delay took us about 3 hours.  Just before 2:00pm we got back on the road.

The roads driving up past St. George were ridiculous.  There was heavy snow, slushy/icy roads, tons of drivers, and too many accidents.  After driving for almost 4 hours and only getting to Fillmore we decided to cut our losses and stay at a motel over night.  I'm so glad we did.  Although I wasn't in my bed last night, we were safe, and we slept well.  I've never driven in such poor conditions.  And that's saying a lot, because I've lived in Idaho and made it through the worst winter of my life Nov '07- Mar '08.

We finally got to our house around lunch time today.  I felt so blessed as we pulled into the driveway in one piece.  There were a couple of times driving yesterday that I thought we were not going to make it home alive.  Boy am I glad we did.  We had such a great time visiting with our family, it made yesterday's drive almost worth it :)   

Sunday Best!

This morning we woke up to about a foot of snow. It was beautiful.

This is our house and Sam's work truck.  Fortunately my new minivan is parked in the garage.

This was the view from our front steps looking over our front yard.  That's my wonderful husband, Sam, shoveling our sidewalk.

After church today we took pictures of the boys in their new Sunday clothes.  Aren't they handsome!  We could not convince Ben that his tie should go inside his vest.  He kept it out all day.

I was proud of the boys for not jumping into the snow.  They were sorely tempted.

It started snowing just as we were finishing and this was the last shot I got.  I don't know if Tom got snow in his eye, or if he's trying to be Pop Eye.

Happy Sunday and Happy Birthday to Aunt Gina!  We love you Aunt Gina!

I love my boys...

This morning Tom was carrying as many toy tools around that he could manage.  Then he came over to the table and attempted to get up in his chair while holding all of the tools.  As I watched him struggle to get up I mentioned that he should put the tools down to get up on his chair easier.  He looked up at me and said "I'm building the temple, mom."  Then he took all his tools into the living room and started "working and building" on the couch, while repeating over and over "I'm building the temple."  Of course I had to join in with my rendition of "Let's Build the Temple" (hand motions included).  I didn't realize how much our trip to Temple Square last week really made an impression on him.  He's so cute.  I love my boys!

Fun Things

The past couple of weeks have been busy and very fun.  The first weekend of the month Sam's work paid for one night's stay, dinner, and game night at a beautiful resort in Park City.  It was a really fun night to celebrate the completion of the latest project that Kiewit had been working on.  Here are a couple of pictures of our room. 

The hall way leading from the front door into our 1300 sq. ft. suite.

The living room area.

Looking back from the living room fire place into the kitchen area.

Our large and spacious bedroom, which also had it's own fire place and flat screen TV.

The huge bathroom, with walk-in shower and jetted tub.

The suite also included another full bathroom, several storage closets, private patio with hot tub, and washer and dryer.  I was tempted to stay forever.  It was luxurious.

Casey and Kylea were the super heroes of the weekend for taking care of the kids.  Thanks guys!

The Wednesday after family came to town.  Woo Hoo!  Ginger and Katie flew in Wed. evening and came to our house.  Thursday morning we played with Katie while Ginger went to visit family.  Thursday afternoon Ginger came back and Sam and I took off for another get away.  We went to a B&B in Midway called Johnson Mill.  It was great.  What a lucky break to have two seperate nights away within 1 week's time.  Friday morning Sam and I went and bought a minivan on the way home from Midway.  We found exactly what we were looking for, a Kia Sedona with about 70k miles for a really great price.  It's so nice to finally have a vehicle that fits comfortably.  I felt so cramped in our little put, put car.  Friday afternoon Ginger, Katie, Tom and I all went to see the new exhibit at the South Visitors Center in Temple Square about the temple.  It was fantastic.  If you haven't seen it yet, it's definitely worth the drive up there.  That evening we picked up Scott and Camille from the airport and we all went to dinner.  Saturday morning we headed down to Provo to hang out as a family at Gina and Chris' place.  It was such a nice time being all together, minus Rachel and Lindsay.  (We missed you guys tons.)  I love having family in town.  It's the best.  We always have such a great time being together.  Thanks for coming guys!