Home! Days 1-4

Our first trip home in 9 months! Our 3 week tour back home was much busier than we had anticipated, but busy in such a good, such a we-needed-that-family-friend-fix, that every bit of craziness spent was worth it!

Our trip started off with a bang as we dragged our sorry bottoms off of our long Istanbul-Chicago-Salt Lake flight. We purposefully didn't ask anyone to meet us at the airport, but 5 of my sisters suprised us and showed up at the airport after all! That was a GREAT SUPRISE and made me feel SO GOOD! In the words of Joe March, "I could not love anyone as much as my own sisters!" Mom & Dad actually tried to make it up from Mt. P but the weather was pretty bad and they turned back for home. But the girls all sufficiently doted on my kids, took funny pictures and escorted us to our hotel. It would have been worth the flight home just for those few hours together! I loved watching my little nephews that night (Emmett & Enzo)stirring it up in the Marriot lobby...such cute little guys!

The next day we rolled out of bed (way too early I might add...Ryan rolled out at 6 a.m.) and took the kids downstairs for breakfast. This would not be worth mentioning otherwise, but Ryan and I got a good kick out of watching our kids pile their plates high with bacon, sausage & cold cereal (all of which we cannot get in Turkey...pork products aren't available, and not much by way of cereal). We spent the next few weeks eating similar breakies...had to get our fill I guess. But we had a great time with cousins that day, swimming, ice skating, Cafe-Rioing & going to the lights on Temple Square. I have never seen my kids as tired as they were that evening...they were truly falling asleep standing up. Josie fell asleep at 6 p.m. and slept until 8 a.m. the next morning. I was pretty tired and awnry myself (I'm sure Ry's family did not fail to notice), so we tried to scoot our way back to our hotel as quickly as possible. We spent the next day or so with Cody, Jess, MaShay & Jason at Cody's house. We especially had fun getting to know new baby Hank...he and Mia really hit it off!

Sadly, the only pictures I have of days 1-4 are of Ryan and Thys making a snow-wall on Cody & Jessica's front door (our camera was packed away and it took me a while to unearth it). So, I guess that will have to be sufficient.

I guess Thys & Ryan didn't think their prank through very thoroughly. Cody was gone for the next 3 days and Jessica had to track down a neighbor or two to help kick their "ice wall" through.