A week in Missouri

When I first told my Missouri family that we wanted to come for a visit in June, in between basketball/tennis camps and FSY for our teenagers, my younger brother said he knew a guy who was going to start renting his big house on AirBnB or VRBO. It has lots of bedrooms, a big kitchen and a pond on plenty of land just north of Liberty, in Excelsior Springs. Next thing we knew, more and more siblings were able to come.

My sister and her husband flew in from England, a brother and his family flew from Seattle, two brothers and their kids also drove from Utah, five siblings in Missouri/Kansas came (sometimes sleeping over, sometimes not). In the end, there were 20 grandkids and 16 adults playing, eating, talking, kayaking, swimming, etc.

The pond was the biggest hit. The kids were in it just about every day. 

The other big attraction was getting turns driving and taking rides on the property.

JB walked every morning and often saw the cows in the pastures.

Cousins with Uncle Peter

I thought before hand that my parents would be able to come to the big house as well, but it would have been hard on my mom and her health. So on Tuesday, a big group drove to Chillicothe and visited them.

That morning we also stopped by Adam-ondi-Ahman and the spot where JB and I got engaged.

Then we drove through Jamesport, where I went to a small K-12 school my senior year. We stopped at some Amish stores and bought good treats and saw a hat that fits JB.

We took the road past my family's old house and then the route on 190 to Chillicothe, which is the home of sliced bread, as the mural shows.

We played at a park but mainly stayed in the shade in the hot humidity, then ate dinner at the buffet in town (kids are 99 cents on Tuesdays, wink wink)

James ate these mini corn dogs.

Millie had her dream treat - pink ice cream with gummy bears.

These cousins were inseparable all week.

On Wednesday, some of us went to see more historic sites, like Liberty Jail 

And the Independence Visitors Center.

The sister missionaries do an incredible job.

Then we went to Joes KC barbecue

One night my brother Michael showed my boys the stars.

Another night Aunt Sarah helped everyone roast S'mores

Friday we went to the Gladstone Municipal Pool. Two of my sisters live in Gladstone and this is a very fun pool. Millie was in heaven. She had been begging me to get into the pond all week, but I (and many other mothers) did not really want to get into the "wild water" and walk on mud at the bottom. So I played and played with her at the pool.

Ben and James (under the blanket) got chilly and sleepy. The cloud cover was deceptive -- several of my siblings got sunburned, and even with sunscreen my back turned a little red.

Look how happy cousin Kaylee is behind my tired boys

The boys got new Chiefs shirts. Max misses his cousin Nathanael a lot -- we are hoping for another chance to see them before missions.

Uncle Joe was always the tallest, but Max is catching up

Uncle Joe paid the kids to catch frogs. They went on a massive frog hunt for him Friday night when he went to the Royals game.

Saturday morning at 6 a.m. we drove away. That was sad! We had so much fun. 

We drove all day and made it back to our house in Salt Lake City at 9 p.m., so it took 16 hours with the time change and a long wait at the Chick-fil-A in Cheyenne, Wyoming.  We listened to "Endurance: Shackelton's Incredible Voyage" and that helped JB keep going. We have to plan the next family reunion!

Summer road trip

We had an epic road trip and family reunion in June! 

On Friday, June 17, we started driving west at 6 a.m. The three younger kids watched movies in the van's DVD player, while JB and Max and Ben and I listened to some podcasts and started an audio book called "Pirate Hunters."

We made it to Martins Cove, Wyoming, in the afternoon, and stopped in to see the visitors center. JB and I did three pioneer trek reenactments with our stake there.

Here JB is pointing out the name of Franklin D. Richards, an apostle who helped the Saints, and his 3rd great-grandfather.

Then we went over to Independence Rock, Wyoming, and some of the kids climbed up with JB.

My view of Max with Millie, and the little dot higher up is James, and the dots at the very top are JB, Andrew and Ben.

Here's JB's selfie from the top

We kept driving northwest, and pulled into my Aunt Bonni and Uncle Doug's house (my mom's brother) in Custer, South Dakota, by dinner time. They were such great hosts! We were comfortable and well-fed and learned so many stories about my grandparents and aunts and uncles.

That evening we went over to Mount Rushmore, not very far from their house, to see the impressive monument -- I saw it when I was 10 or 11, but JB had never seen it. It is worth seeing for sure. We also saw the summer time 9 p.m. patriotic flag lowering ceremony. I loved it. My uncle as a veteran was called up to help. 

Our kids didn't get settled into bed til close to 11 p.m. But they were up early the next morning to play with the sweet Dexter.

Saturday Doug and Bonni showed us sights around Custer State Park like some over views and Legion Lake.

Then we drove on Iron Mountain Road, which has tunnels with views of Mount Rushmore, and not just switchbacks -- pig tails. These are curves that go quickly over themselves with a bridge, to rise faster or descend faster. James got carsick and mad.

This was on the porch of a barbecue place off Iron Mountain Road.

We went to Crazy Horse. I saw this monument on that same road trip when I was 10-ish, and I think maybe some more work has been slowly done on it since then. 

It started to rain, so we abandoned plans to go over to Wind Cave, and therefore we didn't see any bison! But it was fine to go back to the house and eat a great dinner and chat more.

Sunday morning at 6 a.m. we started driving west on I-90 across South Dakota. We listened to our sacrament meeting over Zoom, and the "Follow Him" and "The Scriptures are Real" podcasts, and more of the audiobook (We really wanted them to find that shipwreck!) I wished we could have gone north a little to see De Smet, home of the Ingalls family, but it would have been too far out of the way. The views were pretty though of the Black Hills, then the badlands, then the prairie. We got to Sioux Falls and turned south on I-29, getting to Winter Quarters, Nebraska, in the afternoon.

We also stopped at a Casey's gas station in Iowa to get pizza (my brothers love it so we had to have our kids experience it). 

Then we made it to the big house we were all renting from Monday-Saturday in Excelsior Springs, Missouri (just outside Liberty) that evening around 7 p.m. and it was a great time of greetings and hugs for all my siblings I haven't seen in a while! And the cousins became fast friends.

More about the fun week in the next post.