Days of '47 Parade

 

Friday was the Days of '47 Parade downtown.  We all went down to support Els.

This parade is on TV.How fabulous is Andrea?

The kids were somewhat less than impressed with a parade that didn't throw candy.  There were lots of impressive floats, however.  And the pioneer theme, and horses, and marching bands were great.  

Abe took George and Peter and Greta to the zoo this week.

The kids are really into reptiles these days so they spent a lot of time in the Reptile House at the zoo.

A mamma and baby gorilla.

Greta looks a little unsure...

I love this picture of the sister performing missionaries and Sister Jones, the seamstress, and Sister Crockett.

One of the highlights of the last couple weeks was going to see Guys and Dolls at Hale Center Theater.  Several years ago Clark and Bethany LOVED being a part of Bluffdale Arts production of this play.  Ever since then it's one of our favorites.  Hale Center did a great job and we loved it.

Monday evening we caught the closing night of Herriman's Newsies.  If you recall, Bethany, Cannon, and George were all originally cast for the summer of 2020.  But Covid happened and schedules didn't work out for this summer.  We felt pretty spoiled getting to see so much live theater in one week!

Four of the Fox sibling couples enjoyed a wonderful dinner to celebrate Stuart's 50th birthday.  I've said this before and since we're heading to the reunion right now, I'm sure I'll say it plenty more, but it has been so enjoyable to get to strengthen these relationships over he years.  When in-laws marry into a family there area whole lot of new personalities to get to know and love.  It takes time and can be uncomfortable at times.  These relationships are so treasured and are well worth any time and effort they've taken.

Hurting and Healing

George got out the convalescence wagon for Greta because she got her five year old shots the day before and she had sore legs.  Faith and Cannon also got their first Covid vaccines and they had sore arms.  And to be honest, lots of us were pretty "sore" from some heavy life stuff the last couple weeks.  

Clark and Alexa have parted ways and have filed for divorce.  I'm not going to go into details, but for multiple reasons we all think this is for the best and we're grateful for the timing.  It wasn't a healthy or happy situation. While it is terribly disappointing for all parties involved, we support this decision.  We are doing our best to love and support Clark as he navigates these unexpected life choices.

We also recently learned that Abe was let go from his job at eHealth.  I'm not one to dwell on life's unfairness-- and I'm not going to do that now-- but I will say the reasons are highly questionable!  With the pay scale the company has in place, he was a very expensive employee.  He was also consistently one of the best, but the reality is, they could pay three people for the same productivity and still pay markedly less than they were paying him.  The company hadn't been doing as well as they expected and there had recently been management changes.  Sadly, decisions were made that we aren't very happy with.  

Faith underwent a little surgery last week.  It was a success and she's recovered quickly, but anytime you are going under anesthesia, it's at least a little unnerving.

Thankfully, he wasn't as grouchy as she was when she had her oral surgery a while back.  Remember THIS?  Ha ha ha!

 

So you can understand why things have been tense at our house since getting home from our trip.  This takes nothing away from our dream-come-true trip.  The memories we made are buoying us up during these challenges.  And very much like George getting out the convalescence wagon for Greta when she wasn't feeling well, we have been buoyed up by kind friends and family.  They've listened and talked and visited and loved us.  

In hopeful news, Abe already has a position lined up with a great friend at an All State Insurance office very close by in Riverton.  Clark has an apartment lined for the fall and work and school.  Life goes on and we're all doing our best to live and learn.  This is life-- the good times and the bad times.  I love the thought from Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin-- "Come what may and love it."  

And now we're on the road to Spokane for the annual and beloved Fox family reunion.  At least we don't have to worry about Abe using up all his vacation time.  That's something, right?  

And in much happier news-- THE OLYMPICS HAVE BEGUN!!!!

We got out our Olympic flags! 

And we made a lot more.

We do the flags because we enjoy it, but it also assuages any guilt I feel about not doing much by way of arts and crafts with my kiddos.  Also, we can check geography off our list of subjects to cover.  We're basically world flag experts!

Faith and I really went to town making flags into the evening while watching Olympic trials, because the actual Olympic competition hadn't begun.  

I feel quite grateful for the distraction of the Olympics rights now.  The Olympics have always been a happy place for me and I love that the kiddos are onboard.

The Rolling Foxes Summer Tour Day 11-- Coming Home and Happy Birthday, Greta!

 

Our final day of our trip was Greta's 5th birthday!!!  

We went birthday shopping at one of the numerous souvenir gift shops.  

It is surely one of Abe's crowning driving achievements that he so successfully maneuvered this fifteen passenger all around the streets of Manhattan.  And he didn't even get stressed about it-- rather, he quite enjoyed himself.

We drove by the Manhattan Temple-- that was cool.  Another interesting thing is that there were a lot of street banners advertising The Book of Mormon musical.  I completely understand that they think they are making fun of our church and our beliefs.  And that's fine, because you know what?  The Book of Mormon is being advertised all over the streets of one of the great cities in the world.  What would Joseph Smith have thought of that?!  

Ha ha ha!  You have no idea!

We ate lunch at Vito's Slices and Ices.  

George declared he preferred Little Caesar's pizza-- a highly questionable opinion.  Many others declared Vito's the best pizza they'd ever eaten.  

Oh, yum!

That's a good birthday meal!  She ate the whole slice.

A little blurry, but still pretty cute.

And before we knew it, it was time to head home.  

We left our cooler at the rental car return.  She was a good cooler and I believe Abe and I got her as a wedding gift.  She served us well.  The little kids were incredulous that we would just leave the cooler behind, so we took a picture so we could always remember the cooler.  

Pretty impressive, eh?  That's all we took home.  Well, we try to get one more thing home-- a wooden, toy slingshot George got as a souvenir in Nauvoo.  Maybe it would have made it through security, if he hadn't also packed in his backpack slightly larger than marble size magnets.  The two items together did appear suspicious.  So, that was confiscated and that was upsetting to him.  For the record he could keep the magnets-- so that's something.  

Greta's first plane right on her 5th birthday!

She was impressed and she treated us to one of her stream of consciousness singing times all about the plane and the little TV.  

We got into the Salt Lake airport about midnight which was 2 AM New York time.  Greta and Faith's faces are about how we all felt after the especially turbulent descent and landing.  To our kids  (Faith on down) who were flying for the first time, we kept telling them, it's not usually this bad!

And then we came home to such a kind surprise-- some anonymous soul mowed and edged our lawn and it wasn't burnt to a crisp.  We were so appreciative.  Plus, our cat was still alive and our house didn't flood in our absence or smell weird.  That's about all you can really hope for upon returning home from a long trip.  

Final thoughts on The Rolling Foxes Summer Tour:  We've got a lot going on with our family-- of course, with a family our size, there is always a lot going on.  Yeah, there is A LOT of heavy stuff going on.  I'll probably go into it more in a coming post.  This trip happening when and how it did has been a huge blessing.  My testimony of the restoration of the gospel and Joseph Smith being a prophet of God has been strengthened.  I have felt God's peace and comfort and felt encouraged to go on in "so great a cause".  We all enjoyed one another's company, we listened to audiobooks and music, we played the license plate game with great success -- curse you Alaska and South Dakota!  We worked together to take care of everyone's needs and tried to be patient when we were tired and/or hungry.  We shared eleven days of experiences that I pray we'll learn from and lean on for many years to come.  It was wonderful and I am grateful.

The Rolling Foxes Day 10-- Foxes Take Manhattan

 

I cannot believe we did what we did... but we DID IT!  We dared to take on the Big Apple and I'd say it was a smashing success!

When in New York, do as the New Yorkers do---- ride the Subway!  We were fans.  Sure the stations were hot and stinky and slightly confusing and I was paranoid that a child was going to fall onto the tracks-- but they were convenient and not too confusing and we had lots of big kid helpers who were ready and willing to hold the hands of the littles.  

We were fairly cooperative, but we were not fans of wearing masks again.  It had been a while and we hadn't needed them anywhere else on the trip until the subways.

The first stop of Day 10 was Ground Zero.  Clark and Bethany were born, but so young they have no memory of the day.  These memorials are so breathtaking.

We didn't go to the museum, but I am so glad we got to see this.

I hadn't realized how close Ladder Co. 10 was to Ground Zero.  No wonder they lost so many.

Next up we took the Staten Island Ferry there and back.

And even though the day started quite overcast, we got a great view of the Statue of Liberty.

I must say, the whole team was remarkably cooperative for family pictures.  I realize it was a little much, but I am grateful they humored Abe and I.

Next up was lunch at Fraunces Tavern-- built in 1719 it boasts it is the oldest building in Manhattan and it was a hang out for Revolutionary War big wigs including George Washington.  Oh, and most importantly, about four years ago I ate here with my dear friends Andrea and JL and I ate the best sweet potato fries of my whole life.  I really needed them again.  

So we splurged on a meal that was so satisfying to every single person.  I had those beautiful sweet potato fries I'd been dreaming of and they were NOT A DISAPPOINTMENT.  They were glorious!  And the watermelon salad was not like anything I'd ever had before, but it was divinely refreshing. 

Generally speaking we have not eaten a lot of great food on this trip. Way too may hamburger fries and chicken nuggets.  Which truth be told, is what the kids chose to eat here, but they did say they were very good chicken tenders and and fries:)

Once we had full, happy tummies, we headed for the Brooklyn Bridge.  It's just cool.  We got about halfway and decided to just go all the way to Brooklyn and then catch the Subway from there.

It was blazing hot and sunny by this point.  I mean, the temperature isn't as hot as it is at home, but the humidity is really something.  Truthfully, I kind of like the humidity, but most of the family didn't feel the same way.  I love this picture and I'm so glad we walked across the whole bridge.

When we caught the Subway in Brooklyn, Greta needed a rest.  Fortunately, it was a nice long ride out to Coney Island.

Excepting that the kids wished they brought along their swimsuits, Coney Island was one of the best decisions we made on this whole trip.  The kids happily played in the water and on the beach.  Faith and younger had never been to the ocean beach before and they were thrilled.

George is showing Elinor the little crustacean he found.

Greta got so wet and sandy, but she was so happy playing.  For so much of the this trip the little kids have had to sit still, or stand still, or be quiet, or stop doing that, or stay by us, etc.  It was so nice for them (and for us) to get to run free and play for a while.  Abe and I just sat together and marveled at all we had done on this trip.  It's been a dream come true.

Shortly after this picture was taken we spotted four white-shirted missionaries.  We had hoped to see some missionaries in NYC because we'd seen so many missionaries already.

We paid way too much money so these four could ride the Cyclone roller coaster.

Meanwhile we comforted these two distraught souls who were too short to ride.  Life can be disappointing sometimes-- especially when you're exhausted after traveling for 10 days and a big day in New York City.

Hot dogs at Nathan's Famous Hot Dog stand made it better.  I happily give the credit for a lot of the activities we did in New York to Andrea and JL because we did a lot of this same stuff several years back and it was awesome, so I suggested we do a lot of the same stuff again.  Our gang was happy with that.

Another long Subway trip including a couple transfers back to the hotel.  I believe George is still traumatized from the roller coaster ride.  He wasn't a fan.  I told him maybe roller coasters were an acquired taste and he'd like them better when he got older.  He said he didn't think so.

When we finally got back to "our neighborhood" we need more refreshment.  We got Italian Ices at Vito's Slices and Ices.  Once again, the troops were contented.

We have watched a LOT of Shark Fest and Shark Week on this trip.  It's either that or Cartoon Network, which I loathe but the kids love.  But I must ask-- what is up with all the shark shows?  And why is it ALWAYS Shark Week whenever we're on a trip anywhere, anytime of year?  Is it always Shark Week somewhere?  I am confused.  Please explain.

 I am typing this post on the airplane on the way back to Salt Lake City.  We have been playing the license plate game throughout the whole trip and we are now only missing South Dakota and Alaska.  We are really hoping to snag them at the airport or on the drive home.  If not, we'll have to use our wildcard Canadian plates we've spotted.  But we'd rather not have to do that.  Come on South Dakota and Alaska!!! Show yourselves!!!

The final 7 of 14 states we actually, however briefly, visited during

"The Rolling Foxes Summer Tour 2021"!!!!