Weekend Trip to Idaho

In Gone with the Wind, selfish Scarlett seems to really only care about one thing: Tara. There is something about that place that strengthens her and helps her keep going. For some reason, no matter how old I get, I find myself needing my own Tara, the small corner of rural Idaho where I grew up. A piece of my soul will always be there, no matter how much distance separates us and no matter how much time has passed since I lived there. As October progressed, I found myself homesick for my Idahome like I haven't been homesick since probably my freshman year of college. I ached for the smells, to see the cottonwoods turning on their fall colors along the Snake River. I wanted to look out across the acres and acres of farmland, take a deep breath, and somehow draw extra strength to keep on going. This hip thing has been harder than we ever imagined, and I just needed to go and recollect myself. We have busy, busy lives between our kids' activities, jobs, and church responsibilities, but we finally figured out how to sneak away on the second weekend in November.

Michael loves looking at my Dad's Navy books, as well as his World War II books.

 We spent a lot of time at my Grandma's house. I had a project I wanted to work on and so did my mom. So, Grandma busted out her jumper.

 Rachel wanted someone to go and push her on the swings. Everyone was busy doing something, including my Grandpa. He was sitting out on their back porch, trying to read, and she kept coming and asking him. She had her sandwich out there with him.

Her pleadings finally won him over. He always was a sucker for little red-headed girls. 

 Brian said that at one point, my Grandpa was sitting next to her in the other swing, but Grandpa got up before Michael, who took this photo,  could get a picture.

 Best part of Idaho? Huge yards for running free:

 Brian and my dad made a custom raised-panel door for our media cabinet downstairs. Grandpa joined them too, and Michael watched.

 Michael loved riding this bike while we were there and became absolutely convinced that his bike at home was too small.

 Gabe continued being his amazing self, earning praises from all his grandparents.  

 Hanging out at my Mom's house:

 He kind of looks like he's asleep, but he's not. Wouldn't that have been cool?

 Hugs!

 The door:

 Sleeping Gabe.  

 We went to church on Sunday in the ward I grew up in, and for the first time in my life, I had the thought, "This isn't my ward anymore." It was kind of strange. Church was rough because, thanks to my calling in Primary, I'm not used to sitting through 3 hours of church. It was really hard! After church, I got my mom to take our family pictures by the silos in town. I love this one:

 I took these of the kids:

 My dad found a railroad spike on the ground. Gabe tried to eat it.

 Gabe wasn't his normal smiley self at the silos, so I took this one after dinner at my Grandma's house:

 And the ones of Brian and Rachel were over exposed because I forgot to put the camera on auto mode for my mom, so I re-shot some back at my Grandma's house.

We had dinner at my grandma's house and my kids got the coveted spot next to Grandpa.  

 After dinner and some final cuts on our door, we were ready to go. We took some farewell pictures:

 The next morning, Brian realized that he'd left his laptop in Idaho. Thankfully, everyone was heading down this way to help my cousin with a project. I quickly called my grandparents to see if they had left yet (my parents came down to Utah the same night we did). Miraculously, they had just left and were close enough to home that they could turn around and retrieve the laptop. My grandma told me, "I wondered why we were dawdling so much. Now I know." My grandparents got the laptop to my Dad in Logan, and he drove the rest of the way down to our house to give it to Brian. While he was there, he helped Brian install the door on the cabinet: 

 Now we just have to paint it. Our trip to Idaho was way too short, but it helped me so much. Thank you, Brian, for taking me to my other home.