Fun Times in Phoenix

Until last week, my experiences in the state of Arizona were as follows:

-Passing through the corner on the way to Las Vegas

-Going to Four Corners

-Crossing ten minutes over the border to go to Glitter Mountain

-Stopping at Pipe Springs National Monument on our way to Bryce Canyon

Basically, when I’d been to Arizona, I’d barely dipped my toe in. But last week, we went on a trip to Phoenix…ish (we were actually in Glendale, AZ, but it’s right by Phoenix) so now, I’ve really been to Arizona! 

My sister-in-law, Amber (of piñata and deer fame) invited us to stay at an Air BnB with her over New Year’s. Her motives were warm weather and a private pool… but we’ll address how that turned out shortly. 

Allow me to first recap the part where we had to get to Arizona. 

The weather leading up to our trip was iffy. We weren’t sure if we were going to be able to go. Scotty watched the forecast for days. We were originally going to spend a night in Kanab, but we decided to go a more weather friendly way and stay in Saint George instead. 

Climbing around in Saint George

We spent a little time exploring the rocks at Pioneer Park, and then we went to Thunder Junction. Everywhere was really crowded, so we kept our visits short. We ate dinner at Chuckarama (which we refer to as "visiting Uncle Chuck"), and then we checked into our hotel. We took advantage of being the only family at the pool, but then Nicky sliced his leg open on the pool grate, and other people started showing up, so we went back to our room and hung out for the night. 

Eva woke up puking in the middle of the night, and that's all I'll say about that. The next morning we had to decide if we should continue on to Phoenix or go back home. We only had a small window to make it home without hitting a snowstorm. We called Amber and had a chat and decided to carry on to Phoenix. 

We stopped in Las Vegas for a while. We went to the atrium at the Bellagio, and then we went to Caesar's Palace for a little bit. Then we headed into Henderson for lunch. There were a lot of places that sounded good but we decided to go somewhere called the Steamie Weenie, simply based on the name (and the 4+ star reviews).

Scotty and I wanted to be adventurous, so we got three dogs to try - the most interesting of which had peanut butter and jalapeno jelly on it! It looked terrible, but it was really good! (We had faith that it would be - having had peanut butter on burgers before).

The PBB & JJ: Peanut Butter, Bacon, and Jalapeno Jelly

From Henderson, we headed to Phoenix, and lemme tell ya... that was a long and boring drive. Cacti... more cacti... and a random junk yard here and there. For hours. 

We stayed at the Air BnB with our hosts, Tim and Amber ("Timber"), my father-in-law (Craig), and my brother-in-law (Jared). The weather was nice but not "pool" weather (high of 58) and the pool was frigid, much to Amber's dismay. That didn't stop my family from getting in. I can't say any swimming happened, but there was some polar bear plunging on the daily. 

Daisy taking the plunge

We arrived at the house in the evening on Thursday. On Friday, I wasn't feeling well (Eva passed on her tummy bug), so I mostly lounged about, but after dinner on Friday, I finally started feeling better and was able to enjoy New Year's Eve. We ate first and second dinner and stayed up playing games and doing fireworks. 

Cheers to new years!

Fireworks: 10 p.m.

At midnight, Jared wanted to eat twelve grapes for good luck. Then Scotty, Nicky, and Jared all jumped in the pool. 

Good times and much laughter ensued. Mostly courtesy of Jared who jumped into the pool like a toddler who didn't trust his mom to really catch him. 

The house was within walking distance of the Fiesta Bowl, so on Saturday, Craig and Nicky walked over there just to check things out. They ended up going through security without tickets and getting free breakfast burritos at the tailgate party. They had a blast. 

Nicky at the stadium with his breakfast burrito

We spent the day hanging out and watching football games - first the Fiesta Bowl, then the Rose Bowl. I'm not much of a football watcher, but there's a University of Utah fan inside of me that resurfaces every once in a while. When I was younger, my mom and step-dad both worked for the University of Utah, so I was raised going to all the sporting events. I admit, I mostly went for the food, but I also enjoyed the swag and rocked a lot of University of Utah gear. I was more devastated than I expected when the Utes lost on Saturday. 

Amber took my girls on a few shopping sprees (the brave soul) and taught my kids how to do scratch-off lotto tickets. 

Shopping with Eva is something else

Lotto tickets

We had a birthday celebration starring me and co-starring Tim and Craig (whose birthdays are the 3rd and 4th).

Tim, Craig, & me - the birthday kids

Please note the insanely purple kitchen in this Air BnB. 

Anyone else think he looks like a minion?

I'll throw in this photo of Nicky being a dork so you can admire the orange wall as well. 

By Saturday night, we were all pretty tuckered out. We have a tradition with Amber when we go on trips - it's kind of like our Family Home Evening: Vacation Edition. We always gather together and share "two goods and a bad" from the trip. So we had our FHE on Saturday night. Zoe cried and whined because she didn't want to go home. Then we got all of our stuff packed up so we could be ready to leave at 5:00 Sunday morning. 

Everyone else flew for this trip - it was just our family that drove. We spent all day Sunday driving, but we took the route through Flagstaff and Kanab rather than Vegas and Saint George. I liked it much better as there were significantly fewer cacti to feel resentment toward. 

We stopped for lunch in Panguitch at the only place we could find that was open. It's called Desert Grill, and it was delicious (I had a brisket sandwich - thankyouverymuch). We got home just before 6:00 p.m. 

So now I can say I've been to Arizona - like really been to Arizona... if it counts that I arrived after dark, didn't leave the Air BnB a single time, and left in the dark.