Memorial Day Weekend

Memorial Day weekend was pretty......well, MEMORABLE for me. 

Our ward here had a ward-temple date schedule for all ages on the Saturday. It dawned on me that we didn't have anything Friday to do.......and I hadn't spent some birthday $ I received........and my husband is SUPERMAN and can do anything.........sooooo, with all those things together I decided I would do something I've never done before:

GO TO A HOTEL BY MYSELF!!!!!

(I know my mom is probably passed out on the floor now having fainted in disbelief, but it's true Mom. Your daughter that would follow you around EVERYWHERE because I never wanted to be alone, NOW LIKES TO BE ALONE. Oh, and now I'm the mom, I'm sorry I followed you around everywhere. Truly.)

Words can't express how excited I was nor can a picture.....but this is getting close.

I was going to drive down to Columbia and stay there then meet the family at the temple in the afternoon. I stopped by Applebee's for their Asian Chicken Salad (I think I actually like Chick Fil-A's asian chicken salad better now though)

and then went through the drive-thru at Chick-Fil-A to get a Lemonade.

As I drove away he said, "Have a wonderful day"..... I just answered. "Oh yes, yes I will. I'm planning on it."

HE HAD NOOOOO IDEA.

The two hour drive to Columbia I talked on the phone with my two sisters. I NEVER get to do that anymore because one of us always has noise/kids in the background (between the three of us we have  23 kids).....imagine THAT!

Then I got there and I TRIED to keep my squealing down. It was super hard to contain.

I got my jelly bellies, sparkling water and charleston chews and I was READY to watch some HGTV.  (we don't have any channels at our house like that). EVERY TIME I go to the hotels with the family we are either watching ESPN, Animal Planet or cartoons. 

The next morning (after I SLEPT IN. EEEEEEEE!!!!) I sat my lazy self in the hot tub and then worked out in the exercise room (without worrying who was watching my kids!!!) and went to the temple to do an endowment session and some sealings. 

Really, to say "I felt like a million bucks" afterward wouldn't even do it justice.

It was nice meeting my family at the temple too. I was even impressed on how Aleeya did Kellyn's hair  (since Brooks doesn't "do" hair).

I really and truly love this group so much.....and to think they are all mine!

Monday we got with our friends and drove a little over a hour to a place called Sliding Rock. When we saw the pictures online, Brooks and I KNEW our kids would love something like that. It costs $2 per person (to cover lifeguard fees) but if you show up before the lifeguards get there at 10 then you get in free. You better BELIEVE both our vans got there around 9:50!!!.

However getting there early ALSO meant the sun wasn't out in full force. And when you are dealing with water between 40-45 degrees, it was kinda something we should've considered. On the PLUS side, we had the whole thing to ourselves.

Just walking down to it (not even stepping in the water yet) I had goosebumps all over my arms. Then when you step in the water it catches your breath for a bit. It took everyone a while to build up the courage to go down (Emerson went first), but it ended up being pretty fun.

When I say "fun" I mean "crazy". 

I decided we didn't drive all this way to not at least TRY it, so I went down with Royce. He didn't want to go down (smart kid), but Brooks said he would give him a dollar if he did. So here is our slide down. 

  (link)

You keep telling yourself as you're sliding down to keep your face neutral when you hit the water with everyone watching at the end, but there is NO way. You are just unable to not look like you're being slapped by a huge iceberg when you're dunked underwater. You really can't even breath for a little while. haha

Brooks grabbed Kellyn and made her go down.  She didn't really have a choice in the matter. Her face at the end says it ALL! (link)

I will have to say, the best part of Sliding Rock was watching other people go down. Other people started showing up and we would just sit up on the landing and watch their faces when they hit the bottom. Brooks seriously couldn't control his laughter. He lost it every time someone went down for the first time.

Here is our freezing group

We ended up finding a picnic place downstream with shallow/warmer water and a few ledges to jump off into the water for the boys. It was probably the best part of our outing, but we STILL wear our figurative badges of honor for braving Sliding Rock.