Mike and his mother and I traveled to Reno to visit our kids for the long Harvest Holiday weekend. It's a long drive, so requires a LONG weekend, and we made ours EXTRA long. We drove over on Thursday the 15th and got there about 4 pm. We got to visit with Katie and Hayden. Casey came home from work and we enjoyed dinner at home together and Hayden warmed up to us fairly quickly. He's such a cute little kid.
Friday, we did a little shopping. If you call going to Costco a "little" shopping. Even the regular-looking shopping carts are huge! Yep, everything is big in Costco. We enjoyed all the samples. ;-) Katie did her shopping while me and her grandma hung around and watched. We're such good helpers. ha. We also had lunch with a friend of Berenice's from Hawaii who lives in Reno now. It was fun to visit with her at the nearby Hawaiian restaurant. Here's a picture of Berenice with her friend, Easter.
Saturday, Mike nursed a wounded knee all day and enjoyed watching college football games. Katie took me and her grandma and Hayden to run some errands and then we went visiting. We went clear out to Genoa and it was a beautiful drive. We didn't find the friend that Berenice was looking for, but since we were so close, we stopped in to see Casey's grandparents who live in the Carson Valley. They are nice folks and have a lovely home. Hayden enjoyed playing there . Turns out, the lady that Berenice couldn't find attends the same ward as Casey's grandparents! Small world. Of course, they knew who she was and gave Berenice the contact information that was more updated than what she had from before. They enjoyed a nice chat on the phone.
Hayden is very flexible. Here he is chewing on his toes, just to get a reaction (don't puke, Tandy!)
Sunday, Katie left around 10-ish for California. We knew she was going to be gone with some girlfriends before we came, so since it was their stake conference, Mike, his Mom and I headed out to Carson Valley again so Berenice could actually SEE her old fried from the mission field oh-so-many years ago. And we wanted to attend a regular meeting, not stake conference. I mean, they are nice and everything, but we tend to run into a lot of those when we vacation. Ask any of our kids. It's kind of frustrating and silly at the same time.
Katie and Casey's house has a circle in it like ours. Hayden and I were crawling around in circles. I finally caught up with him. It was a fun game (but hard on old knees!)
So, our Sunday was full of visiting. Casey was home with Hayden having quality "guy" time together, Kate was off with her girl friends on an over-nighter, and we had yet more visiting to do. This time it was a cousin of Mike's. I believe Berenice said this guys grandma and her mom were cousins. Or her dad, maybe. Yes, definitely. her dad and Ron's grandma were cousins. I don't know what that makes Mike and Ron. Ron and Helen live in Sparks. They are a delightful couple, a little older than Mike and I, four grown children. They had family history photos to share with Berenice and even had copies for her of things they had found when at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City! What was really interesting, though, was that Berenice was able to positively identify many of the subjects in the old photos they had and they were very pleased about that. We spent almost 3 hours visiting with Ron and Helen.
Just snuggling on a Sunday morning. Katie, Hayden and me.
Then we came home to a nice crock-pot dinner of roast and trimmings. Hayden is such fun to play with. He's so expressive. If I ever get any pictures to download to the Blog, they won't show any of the great ones, just casual snapshots. You'll just have to take my word for it.
Monday morning it was windy and clouding up, so we decided to head home that day. Katie was getting back way later than she'd originally intended, Casey has Mondays off to tend Hayden, so we said our goodbyes and tried to beat the storm home. Only, I had one stop to make before we could leave and it took much longer than I'd anticipated. I had Hayden's portrait taken at Kiddie Candids photo place in the mall. She's never had one done of him before, and I figured it was way overdue. And since I had him, I took care of it myself. Also, we got a mile down the freeway and I realized that I'd left my wallet in Katie's diaper bag when I'd gone with Hayden to the photographer. So, we turned around to get that. It's a good thing I discovered it that soon! I'd hate to have noticed when we were clear in Ely or someplace else! Yikes.
We were rained on all the way home, but made it back safe and sound before 10 p.m. Long drive, good company and we listened to a couple of good books on tape during the drive. That's the only time we ever listen to books on tape is when we drive to Reno.
Paddle only with your hands. It is from one end of the pool, touch the side and paddle all the way back. Can you say tired arms?? Even after doing water aerobics! Ouchies. I could hardly use my computer mouse when I got back to work.
And a fun time was had by all. This was my first time on a raft-style craft. Next year? Possibly pontoon-style, sort of like a "ducky" in kayaking and river rafting terminology. Maybe. Depends on the time we have. I got absolutely NOTHING done at work today, between adapting the boat, adding more duct tape, racing, recovering, dressing and coming back. Yes, it was a very long day. And different.
