Saturday, January 24, 2009

Morfar Visits Ohio

For Christmas this year, we gave my dad a gift he couldn't return. It was actually more of a gift to ourselves, but we were feeling selfish. We spent our frequent flyer miles, and brought him to Ohio for a week! He had to work the 4:30 am session at the temple, but was able to clear the entire week and come! What a great grandfather. The kids were so excited, and asked everyday for a week if he was coming that day. Finally, he arrived, bringing gifts! WOW!
Here is Emily modelling her new princess dress from Morfar. This is quite the dress. We caught her staring at herself in the mirror in it. She did look awfully beautiful! Benjamin got new Pokemon cards, and Joshua got Diesel #10. They were all pretty excited.


We left on Monday to spend 2 days at Great Wolf Lodge, one of our favorite places to go as a family. Fun for everyone!



After a long day of swimming and waterslides (not me, of course, they don't let people that are so obviously pregnant on the slides), the kids went down for a bedtime story with Wiley the Wolf. They all met him, although Josh wasn't willing to get very close.




Here we all are, enjoying the good night animal show.


My dad got me out of the house, and I did 3 things I had never done before in Dayton while he was here. The first was to visit Charleston State Preserve. They call it the "miniature Niagara." It is certainly tiny in comparison, but it was beautiful, and a fun winter hike. We only took Joshua, while the other kids were in school.

As you can see, the falls were frozen. It was really beautiful.


Another new things I saw was Mendelson's Liquidation Outlet. If you know my dad, you'll understand that he spotted this place from the car on our way to the Children's Museum one day, and absolutely had to see what it was. It was mostly junk, but interesting none the less. We also visited the Dayton Institute of Art, which is free to the public. We didn't see the grown up exhibits because we had kids with us, but in the basement they have the "Experiencenter" with hands on activities for kids. Mine loved it. Dad and I had fun, as well.


Mostly, I enjoyed seeing my kids play with my dad. He did a lot of reading, snuggling, and playing. He repaired some things around the house, took my car into the shop, and even suggested a trip to Hobby Lobby (which I took him up on, of course).
Thanks for a great trip, dad!