Visit with my Sister

Kari and Kathy

Kathy's Visit

Kathy came on Friday morning. Tyler, Rilyn and I picked her and her grandson, Tony, up at the airport right after dropping Kayla, Alyssa and Kyle off at school. They travel light so we did not have to wait for them to get luggage from the baggage claim. I'm amazed that she could come with one duffle bag for 4 days and still manage to dress great the whole time!

We came home and I gave her the tour of my house. That is the norm these days, everyone who comes gets a tour!! We visited for awhile and I made some ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch. I ate some garlicky cauliflower instead since I was saving my calories for dinner.

After lunch we went to the school where my kids were having their field day. We watched Kyle and Alyssa, Kayla's grade didn't have it since they had a track meet the week earlier. It was fun to see the kids doing their events. And we ran into some friends of ours that we met shortly after arriving to Colorado 5 years ago. They told us they are moving to Phoenix (well Surpise, Avondale) so we are sad to see them go!

We came home from the school and put Tyler down for his long awaited nap. Kathy did her homework (she is taking a couple of college courses online) and then I ran back to the school to pick up the kids and bring them home. We all visited for a bit and Laren came home from work early so Kathy and I could take off for our girls night out.

First, we had an appointment to get pedicures. Neither she nor I had ever done that before and it was a lot of fun. I'm glad we did it and my feet look SO much better!! Aside from the girl doing my feet barely speaking any English and from her constantly trying to up-sell, it was a good experience and I will definitely do it again sometime!

Kari and Kathy's feet after our Pedicure's (mine are the ones with the green flowers).

Next we went to dinner at Cinzetti's. It is an Italian Buffet and the food their is excellent! There is great variety and it has a good atmosphere/decor in there. Kathy seemed especially happy with my choice of where to eat. We discovered we have very similar tastes in food. We exchanged some yummy food recipes/ideas over dinner; they were mainly pertaining to eating veggies like summer squash and zuchinni, mushrooms and tomatoes. After filling our faces, we rolled out of there and went to Walmart and Starbucks.

Kathy got some hair color for me to do her hair later in the weekend and some coffee for breakfast on Saturday since I don't have a coffee maker at my house. We came home and showed Laren our pretty nails and chatted a bit and crashed.

On Saturday morning Kathy and Tony got ready for Kallie (my Sister who lives here) to come and get them and take them for the day and overnight. They were going to Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park for the day. Meanwhile, Laren brought work home with him to do and I took the kids to both Kayla and Rilyn's soccer games and then Laren joined us for the Spring Fling at the Kids' school.

They were giving out WHOLE cakes at the cake walk and my kids didn't manage to win anything but a little candy there. But Alyssa did the dunk tank and had a ball getting soaked and then she won this huge container of sour licorice. She won by guessing the correct number of licorices in the container. The number turned out to be 225. She was VERY thrilled with her winnings! Kyle, Rilyn, Tyler and Kayla also played various different games, like the ring toss and the fish pond and went on a train ride.

Alyssa and her bucket of candy she won!

Later that night I planted some zuchinni, summer squash and 2 varieties of Sunflowers. Laren helped me make a flower bed in the front next to our front walk.

The next morning we got up and went to Sacrament meeting in our old ward. We saw many faces we knew and quite a few new faces that we didn't know. That ward is growing like crazy! It fills the entire chapel and clear back to the stage in the cultural hall.

After Sacrament we came home and I put the finishing touches on the Nephi Salad I had made from the day before and Laren cut some lettuce, tomato and onion for the burgers. We gathered the chips and condiments and loaded all the kids up and went to the park where we were to meet Kathy and Tony and Kallie and her family.

The park was packed! Not only were there a lot of picnickers but also it looked like there was some sort of dog show going on. We could not find a picnic spot with a grill so we left and tried another park. No luck. All of the picnic spots had grills but they were either all taken already or reserved. But the third time was a charm and we found a great picnic spot at a park close to our house.

3 Sisters: Kallie, me and Kathy

Laren was kind enough to grill the hamburgers and hotdogs and my Sisters and I set out the rest of the food. We had a great bbq that included the meat and Nephi Salad (jello salad), potato salad, chips, root beer and cupcakes. Everyone but me and Kallie played an impromtu game of kickball (I was putting food away and Kallie is pregnant). I did manage to snap a couple of pictures though!

My family and Kathy and Tony. Tony didn't want to stand still to be in the picture so we had to distract him by asking him if he saw Santa Claus.

We all had a nice visit and Kathy, Kallie and I called out from my cell phone at the park to wish her a happy Mother's Day. The cousins got a lot of playing in and the weather cooperated perfectly.

l-r, Me, Kathy and Kallie calling our Mom at the Park.

Then Kathy and Tony came back to our house where Kathy had another homework deadline on the computer and the rest of us kind of kicked back for awhile. The kids did manage to get themselves pretty wound up though! Then Laren, Kayla and Alyssa made us French Toast, Scrambled Eggs and Bacon for dinner and Eclair cake for dessert.

Tony, Tyler and Rilyn this morning. Like 3 peas in a pod!

The kids went to bed, but not without a "fight"!! :) And then I colored Kathy's hair while Laren called his Mom and Stepmom to wish them a Happy Mother's Day. Unfortunately Kathy's hair did not turn out as good as we had hoped and I do not blame her if she wants to get it redone. Her hair takes the color very easily and it turned out too light. I'm so sorry for that Kathy, I hope you can forgive me!!

We went to bed and I had kind of a bad nights sleep, more bladder/kidney problems and morning seemed to come too soon. I took my kids to school, except Rilyn. I kept her home so I could get Kathy and Tony to the airport in time. We chatted for awhile and then around 10:30 we headed for the airport and Kathy and Tony took off to go back to their home in California.

We were sad to see them go. Kathy and I had a great visit and I hope we can do it again sometime!!! Tony had a great time playing with my kids. He is an only child and so he is not used to having all these kids around to play with!!

I hope everyone had a great Mother's Day!!