New Years in Utah!

A week before Christmas our family made last minute plans to fly to Utah for New Years. It had been a year since we had last been to Utah and we were excited to see many family members during this quick trip.

First of all it is quite the experience to fly as a family of 6 around the holidays. We checked in 11 pieces of luggage, and one stroller. I was so nervous we would lose something, because believe it or not I really did try to pack lite.

First we stopped at my sister's family house. My kids love playing with their cousins. Here some of them are right before they were pulled behind a four wheeler in the snow.
Later that afternoon we went bowling. Zeke says he doesn't have very good luck bowling with the Findlay's, he always does awful.
Landon and Mason brought their new Nintendo DS to Utah, Cameron also got one for Christmas. They had fun emailing back and forth to each other on the DS. It was their first taste of texting--oh no!
Jack is such a fun cousin for Lydia, he loves to play Polly pockets has much as she does. They played Polly's non stop.
I don't allow my kids to have sleep overs except with family members. So my kids had a blast sleeping in the same room as their cousins. It was so hard to go to sleep.

After a few days with the Finlay's we headed south to be with Zeke's family. First we enjoyed an afternoon sledding. Wow it was so beautiful!

My kids were excited to see some of their Evans' cousins and go sledding with them.

(Here is Landon and Spencer)

Lydia and I had fun sledding together. This was taken right before we went down a large hill backwards. After that run, Lydia only wanted the smaller hills, which was fine with me.

Zeke of course is never to old to be crazy. He and his brother Nate found a jump and had a ball going off that.

That night we rang in the New Year with yummy food, games and lots of laughs.

It's always fun to play games with the Evans, they just love to be silly.

For Uncle Dan, a party isn't a party without some Martinelli's. I will never forget a time he came to our house to watch a football game with Zeke and he brought Martinelli's for the drink. He was generous enough to share some of his drink with Zeke and I this night, too bad it only made all over our shirts-Thanks a lot Dan!

At midnight the kids gave us a concert, using pots and pans.

New Years Day we went bowling with the Evans.

We also spent a day up in Providence visiting my Grandparents. It was so good to see them. This was Jacob's first time meeting them.

Jacob loved both of them!

Our family had so much fun visiting so many love ones. When our plane started to leave the SLC airport Lydia turned to me with tears running down her checks and said "Mom, I really didn't want to leave". Then she cried softly most of the flight home. We are so grateful for all our family members and we look forward to seeing them in again this year!