Near the end of March my 14 year old brother Tanner crashed his ATV and it miraculously only resulted in a severe concussion after a life flight to the Salt Lake City Children's hospital. It was a scary couple of days. I decided to go help out and especially just go spend a little quality time with some of my siblings. CJ and I headed out onto the road together. He is a great travel buddy and had a really great week and a half in Utah.
We drove the northern way through Tahoe National Forest and Donner's Pass. We always stop at the Donner's Pass rest stop and this time there was plenty of snow (not on the road) and very chilly! CJ loved the snow and begged to play in it. We weren't equipped to play in it exactly (several families had sleds and snow gear) but we walked around for quite a while. (I put a warmer jacket on after this picture was taken)
As we drove into Utah on the I-80 the scene was much different than usual. It is usually just sand and dirt for miles on each side of the road. This time it was water for miles. We drove through a lake for miles and miles! I have never seen this on this road before. It was beautiful and so unusual.
We are always VERY warmly welcomed into the Murray home. The kids are always overly excited to see us, especially CJ. There is lots of running around and hugging and noise! The next morning I found Karissa reading to CJ. This was so sweet and my parents were shocked because Karissa does not like to read. Throughout the week CJ was read to or played with by all! He LOVES Grandma Linda's house and all his "friends" at the Murray house. These pictures make me so happy.
My mom and I always have some project to do while I visit, which I love. This time we created a photo gallery wall made up of my ancestors. This was so much fun to create and mostly it was great to get to know my ancestors better and who fits in where.
I spent lots of time with these two teenagers. We played lots of board games to keep tanner entertained and keep him away from being on electronics too much since he has had traumatic brain trauma and his brain needs to rest from too much stimulus like electronics. Tanner rested a lot but was so bored and highly irritable the rest of the time. He got headaches from just slightly too much noise or activity and had all signs of a bad concussion. Even though he was highly irritable and whiny it was fun to spend so much time with him and Kenzi.
The last few days were spent at the Zion House where we celebrated CJ's 4th birthday! He specifically asked for a number 4 race car cake. He loved it. Karissa and Keyana helped out decorating the house as we blew up lots of balloons and put up lots of streamers after CJ went to bed. He woke up to a great start to being 4.
I tried really hard to get a good picture of him that day and they all failed. This was the best I could get.
We did a few activities and coloring race cars was a big hit.
CJ loves to be outside and he spend most of his birthday outside digging and playing in the dirt with Karissa.
My dad and I went out for a hike near the Zion House. It wasn't exactly on a trail but my dad was sure it led up to a certain road (I wasn't so sure) and it certainly did, my mom met us on the dirt road to pick us up. These small adventures are always fun with my mom.
One morning we drove down to into Zion National Park to hike a short path to some ponds/stream. CJ took his fishing net he got for his birthday and was sure he was going to catch a frog or fish. Unfortunately we didn't see either but he still had fun playing with it in the water.
Grandpa Mike and CJ enjoying sack lunches together on the rock.
Grandpa Mike is always good for some ice-cream after a hike in the sun. CJ thoroughly enjoyed his chocolate ice-cream cone.
Jeff was unable to come with us and he missed CJ's birthday and to add more thing we missed his birthday while we were gone. He enjoyed his birthday regardless as He and his mom went to a Giants game together and had some amazing seats. He won't forget how he made Bruce Bouchy, the Giants manager, laugh when he said, "You the man Bouch!"
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