utah love

Summer 2003. Ogden, Utah.

Almost every summer my whole family would pile inside the largest vehicle we had and drive to Utah. I remember a couple summers when we had two mini-vans that we'd divide up into. We'd take out the middle seat and have SO MUCH SPACE. We'd bring walkie-talkies and have one in each car so we knew when the other car was stopping for gas or bathroom breaks. Even though we had the whole middle of the van full of games, endless supplies of snack foods, and a TV strapped to the console, those walkie-talkies were the highlight of any trip. 

The drive took two days. We always stopped in Sidney, Nebraska, to visit Cabela's. It was exactly the same every single time we saw it but we loved that place and really, really looked forward to it. All those taxidermied animals! Every child's dream, isn't it? They also had a pretty big aquarium with local fish. You know, bass, trout, catfish, the ones that people normally pay big bucks to see swimming around in a tank. We got so see it for free. Our other favorite part of Cabela's was seeing all the fully equipped campsites set up through the whole store. I think it was a really good tactic for them because how can you resist buying every part of the campsite when you can see it all right there? You can crawl inside that tent, snuggle up in that sleeping bag and really see what it would be like to camp out in "campsite ensemble #3". 

When we finally pulled in to Ogden it was dinner time on day two. We knew Grandma and Grandpa would have soup for us and we couldn't wait to get in the house (and out of the car). It was always soup. I don't know why we had soup waiting for us every time but it was always soup and it was always delicious. Grandma made us wash our hands before every meal so that first hand-washing was torture because we could smell the soup and didn't want to wait another second. Besides, we weren't eating the soup with our hands so why did we have to wash them!?

I can still remember how that house smelled. It smelled just the way it should and it made me happy. Our family took over the basement when we stayed there. We basically dumped our stuff and sprawled out. We had a couple bedrooms and a sofa-bed, and our own bathroom (which means one bathroom for 9 of us). After dinner we would all walk outside to see the yard. My grandparents had a little creek running through it, and about a million fruit trees that they were really proud of. We got pretty good and knowing how many dried apples or pears you could eat before you got sick. 

That backyard is one of my favorite places ever. I remember every little thing about it: the creek, the laundry hanger-thing, the fruit trees, the irrigation ditch, the roar of the river on the other side of the fence, the bridge over the creek that we were constantly dropping things from and racing to the next bridge, the swing that hung from a metal frame that was probably about 100 feet high, the birdbath, the patio table, the thermostat, the slugs (many of which ended up with salt on them...), and the rose bushes. Iowa doesn't have very many rose bushes so seeing so many roses in one place was magical.

In the picture we had just finished dinner. We were sitting around the table just talking. Blair was about 18-months-old then and hadn't quite warmed up to Grandma and Grandpa. She must have been wandering around and Grandpa picked her up. He knew he had to quickly distract her or she'd realize what was going on and get out of there. Napkins. He somehow distracted her with napkins and she sat on his lap for a long time carefully placing the napkins from one pile onto the table, creating a new pile. Over and over. One napkin at a time, using her tiny little hands with her newly refined motor skills. Grandpa loved it. I think they sat there for some time before anyone realized that we hadn't heard from Blair in a while. We all quietly got each other's attention and tried to maintain the same noise and activity level while watching the napkin phenomenon so Blair wouldn't notice that we had noticed.

Of course we had to capture the moment so we all carefully piled over to one side of the table and snapped the picture before Blair noticed anything unusual going on. I don't think she noticed a thing.