Cousin Love

Utah Part 3: Sickness and Snow

I forgot to mention that the morning that we met Elder Oaks did not start off well.  It was about 7 a.m. and Owen was sleeping in the bed with us.  He started stirring a little bit, and then it happened.

He lifted his head up ever so slightly, turned to the side, and VOMITED all over his shirt (and Rick's!) and his hair. 

 I still don't know how he managed to get it in his hair.  Then he laid back down and continued sleeping as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

 Dis.Gust. Ing.

Immediately a million thoughts were racing through my head.  I decided pretty quickly that if Owen continued to be sick that I would forfeit going to meet Elder Oaks and let Rick go since he had been the one to write him.

Luckily, that was the only incident of the day and Owen acted completely normal after that. Go figure.
However, two days later, we were going about our day when Rick tells me,

 "Ya know, my stomach kind of hurts." 

I didn't want to admit it, but mine did too.  It'd been trying to ignore it.  Well, neither of us could ignore it for much longer. 

For the next 24 hours, we were S-I-C-K.

Thank goodness for Aunt Cyndie and Hailey who helped out with Owen.  I don't know what we would have done without them.  Thank you again for all of your help.

On the bright side, about the same time we got sick, it also started to snow.  So while we were warm in bed and recovering, we got to watch the beautiful falling snow outside. 

A few days later when we were better we ventured outside for Owen to experience his first time in snow.  He had mixed feelings about it at first.  He was excited because there was white stuff everywhere.  He was sad because it was really cold to touch.  But then he made peace with the snow and decided to like it from then on.  Here are some pictures to document the experience.

Utah Trip Part 2: Meeting an Apostle

So I mentioned in the previous post that while in Utah, we got to meet with Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Twelve Apostles.  For those who don't share my faith, let me emphasize how big of an honor and privilege this was for us.  It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime event.

How did we get to meet with Elder Oaks? 

Well, it's kind of a long story.  I'll write another post about it if you're curious enough.

To sum it up, Rick has become a pen pal with Elder Oaks over the past few years.  Rick wrote him and told him we'd be coming to Utah and invited him and his wife to lunch.  Elder Oaks replied to his request and said that because of his busy schedule he couldn't do lunch, but gave him his secretary's phone number and invited him to make an appointment for a short visit at his office. 

So Rick called Elder Oak's secretary.  Her name is Margie.

Let me just say that Elder Oaks was incredibly nice and made us feel very comfortable in a potentially intimidating situation.  He is a very humble man and was very easy to talk with.  We asked him questions about his life and he asked us questions about our lives.  It was truly an amazing experience for all of us.

However, we realized AFTER we left his office that we'd forgotten to take a picture with him!  Ugh!!

There's always next time, right??

Afterwards we walked around Temple Square. It was so beautiful with all of the autumn leaves everywhere.  Here are a few pictures of our day.

Utah Trip Part 1

Last week we drove up to Utah for a business trip. We've been keeping very busy since we got here visiting with family and friends, and including Elder DALLIN H. OAKS of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Yes, we got to meet him. But that story deserves it's own separate post. We've been enjoying the beautiful autumn leaves and then this morning we woke up to snow!  I know the Utah folk probably aren't enjoying the early snow, but it's making our trip more interesting.  For now, here are pictures of our trip thus far.

Here's Owen at a rest stop somewhere near Vegas.  He definitely needed to get out and run around.

Rick at the New York Life office in Sandy, UT.

Playing in Aunt Cyndi's backyard. 

(Notice the yellow and orange leaves everywhere.  Now everything is covered in a few inches of white.)

More of our adventures in Utah to come!

Halloween

We started off the day by going to Tanaka Farm in Irvine.  Owen had a blast hanging out with most of his aunts and uncles.  We had fun looking at the petting zoo and walking through the corn maze.

After a fun afternoon at the pumpkin patch we went home and Owen took a much needed nap.  Then we geared up for Owen's first trick-or-treating adventure.  He was very good and wore his costume without any complaints.  I'd say he had a great start to his trick-or-treating career.

And of course, Owen had to check out his loot before going to bed. 

Hope everyone had a wonderful Halloween!