Palmyra, Kirtland and an Eight Year Old

We have had one fun filled week. It all started last Saturday when we left for Cheyenne. We stayed with Brandon's sister, Nicole, and her family. The girls had fun playing with their cousins and we were well fed (cooking is a little bit more than a hobby for Doo Sung). On Sunday we went over to Grandma and Grandpa's for a birthday party! That's right, Sophie turned the magical 8. She opened some gifts and then ate cake and FRUIT! But then we had to head off to Denver for we had a very early flight the next morning. We were up Monday morning at 3:45 AM. We flew to Rochester and then drove to our hotel near Palmyra. We stayed there for three days -- seeing all the sights and watching the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Of course, every day we spent some time at the pool.

On Thursday we left Palmyra and drove to Niagara Falls. When I first saw the "Maid of the Mist" boat tours I was so excited, but Sophie was extremely scared and since this was her trip I wasn't going to make her do something she didn't want. But then the week before we left I was talking to some people at church and they told me we HAD to do it. They told me I could blame them if Sophie was upset. So, then I was all excited again and thought I couldn't pass it up. After telling Sophie I really wanted to do it she relented -- as long as I promised to hold her the entire time. She was still pretty scared up until the minute we started to get wet. And suddenly it became fun and amazing. She took her rain coat off and laughed through it all! Well, there's another lesson learned.

After Niagara we drove to Kirtland, Ohio. We just hung out at the pool that night and then went and saw all the sites the next morning. We did all the "Historic Kirtland" stuff, then went and had lunch and finished up with the Isaac Morley Farm and the Kirtland temple tour in the afternoon. Saturday morning we drove an hour out to Hiram to the Johnson farm. We tried to find something else to do to kill a little time afterwards, but the one place we went was closed so we just went and grabbed lunch before heading to the airport. We flew in to Denver at 9:30 (but we were still on Eastern time), then drove to Ft. Collins where we had a hotel reservation, but we had to go do some shopping first to stock up for our drive home. It was a late night, but we were used to a crazy schedule. We drove home Sunday and had a few hours to relax a bit -- while we waited for the air conditioner to kick in and cool our house back down.

Then this morning we were up bright and early again, as I had to send my girls off to their first Activity Girl's day camp. They're growing up, and going off to places without me.