Surprise!

As you may have noticed from the tone of my blog lately I had been feeling pretty blah for a couple weeks. The only real cure for that showed up at my door on Friday afternoon. Ian had told me he was expecting a package on Friday afternoon that I needed to sign for, so I wasn't too surprised to hear the knock at the door, but when I opened it and saw my sister, Mel, standing there I was shocked! Apparently she had been plotting this surprise visit for almost a month and Ian and all my family managed to keep the secret. I was so excited to see her! She came at just the right time and we had the best time together. I was sad to see her go today, but she'll be back at Christmas, so it won't be too long.

Anyway, Friday we just talked and played with the boys until it was time to go to Chuck E. Cheese's. We had already planned to go there since Weston had earned the outing by doing all his morning jobs in the month of October. It was just extra fun to have Auntie Mel with us. The boys played games galore and earned over 1000 tickets (with which they bought balls and bugs). After playing we all went to dinner at Costa Vida. Davin scarfed all of his quesadilla and half of Weston's. That kid just loves cheese!

Saturday morning we got up and all got ready and headed to the Hogle Zoo. We had amazing November weather. It was mostly sunny and about 70 degrees. A perfect zoo day. It wasn't very crowded either, especially for a Saturday. Davin was so excited to see the animals. He hadn't been to the zoo since he was about 4 months old. Poor deprived child. Unfortunately the zoo outing is about the only thing I got pictures of from the entire weekend and I forgot to grab the ones off Mel's camera before she left. Hopefully she will post hers and I can steal them soon. :)
Davin was super excited to see the elephant. Luckily all the animals were pretty active while we were there. We got some great up-close views of the monkeys, elephant, rhinos, giraffes, tigers, meerkats, and lots of other fun animals. The kids also really enjoyed their ride on the carousel and playing on the playground.So the zoo was a blast. We were all tired when we got home though. Mel and I sacked out on the couch while trying to watch a movie. The nap was worth it.
That night we hung out at our friends, the Miller's. We played games, ate dessert, chatted and laughed, and got adjusted (Jared is a brilliant chiropractor). It was a fun, but kind of late night.

The time change threw us all off a bit. Daylight savings time with kids is such a cruel joke. Davin was up at 5:30, Weston was up by 6, and the rest of us slowly staggered out of bed when we couldn't block the noise of the kids playing, fighting, and coughing any longer. It was still a pretty great Sunday. Ian didn't have any meetings, I skipped choir and didn't have to teach or anything, so I read the paper, we had a pancake breakfast, and all got showered and dressed in time for 12:30 church. By the end of church Davin was so exhausted he was barely coping. After some quiet time on his bed though he made it until 7pm. We spent most of our afternoon/evening watching Prince of Egypt and eating our dinner "picnic" style in the living room. Seriously it was probably the most relaxing Sunday we have had since Ian was called into the bishopric last November.

Today we dropped Weston off and school and then shopped! Mel had some stores she wanted to shop at that she doesn't have in Rexburg and I had some sales I wanted to check out. We were pretty productive and successful. Plus it's fun to have a shopping buddy. We met up with Ian for lunch at In N Out. Then Mel had to hit the road to drive back to Rexburg. It was kind of hard to say goodbye. Too bad she has a job and a husband she had to go home to otherwise I might have kidnapped her and made her stay with me all week. I'm so glad she decided to make the trip out to see me and to make it such a fun surprise too! I love me some sister time and it definitely was just what I needed. Now I can face the rest of my busy month. Thanks Mel!