Spring Broken

Miste and boys just set off on the return trek to Washington. We decided that spring broke would be a more apt description of what it feels like at the end of the week and heading back to school. I think I must concur as it seems like we try to pack so much into the week that we are exhausted at the end. This pic is just before they loaded into the van. Miste had decided that she could live with just traveling in her comfy clothes with a headband to deal with her hair. I think she looks terrific first thing in the morning.
As noted in the pics Cooper is VERY much a morning person while the other two are much more reminiscent of my boys in their teens, heads bowed over their cereal bowls shoveling in the Capn Crunch not wanting to really talk for at least another hour or so.



When you don't get to see kids for 6 or more months it's always interesting to see the changes . When they're babies it is phenomenal how quickly they change. At certain stages of adolescence it is also pretty amazing. I have to say that all three of these boys had changes a LOT since I saw them last summer. It was really fun to be able to spend a little time with them and get to interact with them a bit.
They came over on Thursday evening and spent the night. On Friday while Chuck and I were at work they went and did a little dress slack shopping, as it seems that Seattle is a little less equipped to deal with Sunday dress attire for "youth" than we are here. Apparently they met with success as all three were sporting some nice slacks when we headed to the Saturday afternoon session of conference.
We came down Friday and spent some time with Tyson and Angel. They graciously allowed us to invade their space Note Cooper checking out some of the little souvenirs that were on an end table. Cooper spent a fair amount of time playing with the RoboDinosaur Tyson has that makes lovely mechanical regurgitation sounds. He also really enjoyed pumping up the air mattress shown in the foreground. As we prepared to leave Sat. morning we spent some time searching for his gameboy which we KNOW was in the house at one point but it didn't surface before we left. Cooper seemed pretty resigned to it all. It will show up "somewhere" I"m sure. Hopefully a "bit" sooner than it's taking for the elusive lily painting I did for Miste a couple of YEARS ago.
We rode the trax from Murray into temple square and made it into the conference center in enough time to be the very first people in our section which was in the first balcony right about center. So, after we secured our great seats, with an hour and a half to spare, Spencer, Cooper and I went for a walk around the center to look at all the paintings, sculptures and architecture. It was good to stretch a bit before sitting and great to see the art.
We traveled back in good time and once we got home Tucker and Spencer watched movies while Miste and I played UPwords. We were going to quit after one game but Cooper wanted to play so we decided to play a "fast" game. We said that instead of limiting the tiles to 5 high we would go to 10. Yeah, that wasn't such a good idea. Late at night, two tired women, giant stacks of tiles and math...bad idea. But, it was fun anyway. Cooper is very enthusiastic and always wanted to put down some "creative" words. But Miste helped him to work those into some more traditional ones.
All in all it was a lovely visit and I'm glad I got to spend some time with them. (Some of the pics are not the best as lighting was sketchy, but hey at least I HAVE a camera eh Kels?)