Stalking

So this weekend I begged Jeremy and Henry to go to the Dinosaur Park with me on Friday. Henry was a push over and was easy to convince with it being his favorite place and all. I sealed the deal with Jeremy when I mentioned there would be a cheap barbecue there with other people hanging out to visit with. Reese was up for anything and on my side from the start.

What I didn't tell the rest of my family was that I was secretly fulfilling my need to stalk my favorite morning show DJs and that they were hosting a "Family Mixer" at the Ogden Dinosaur Park. Technically it was a single parent mixer so I offered to have Jeremy and me act estranged and distant while there. They assured me that 75% of those responding to the offer were married couples so I felt better. When I told Jeremy this he then asked me if it would be a "swingers" party. No chance of that.

Here's one of my favorite radio personalities, Bill, as he cooked up some hot dogs and hamburgers for all the families and the few disappointed single parents actually hoping to meet someone.


That photo was taken from so far away. I'm not really a good stalker.

Henners was so preoccupied by the short bus that the radio people drove to the park.


He insisted over and over that he get to ride the short bus. Oh, those words!

I did muster up enough courage to go talk to Gina, another one of the DJs but I didn't get photographic evidence. It would be kind of weird to ask for a picture of us together while we're talking and while she's feeding her infant. I may be a stalker, but I'm a polite one. She did comment on how cute our children were and she was especially taken with Henry even before she knew he was mine. Gina and I talked for a good ten minutes and she was impressed/scared by all of my Radio From Hell knowledge. Oh, yes, Gina, I DO know where you live, I DO see you at lunch all the time and I DO recall the name of your first gig on that radio station almost 16 years ago. (cue crazy psycho music....now!)

After I had accomplished my goal of becoming BFFs with Gina, the rest of my family decided it was time to view the Dinosaur Park for the third time that month. THIRD time, people! That's amazing considering it was only the 7th of June, don't you think?

Here's Henry's favorite thing at the park this month. It's a prehistoric crocodile. We always pretend we don't know where it is and that we need his help to find it. He loves showing us the way. He might also think we're a little bit daft.

Here's Henry gloating to himself about once again successfully finding the croc. He's also hoping he doesn't inherit our poor memory skills.


Stopping to look at the pond now.

Now we're digging for dino bones.


Still digging. But something just to the right has caught the Manster's eye. What could it be?

Bunnies! When you think dinosaurs, you think bunnies, right?

Henry loves to visit and feed the bunnies.

After Henry successfully fed the bunnies and I had somewhat successfully stalked my DJs, we decided it was time to leave. Actually, the rain decided it was time to leave. On our way out, Henry discovered revolving doors.


He also discovered they only revolve one way.


And no matter how hard he pulled, they wouldn't turn the other way.

More trying.

Even more revolving.

You may have won this time, door. But Henry will be back. In about two days, or so if we stay on this record pace of visiting the park. And we'll have the last laugh. Or not.

Why So Early?

Easter Greetings From Us
Oh, Easter. Why did you come so early? We're still reeling from St. Patrick's Day.


Eastery Things
Happy Easter everyone. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and shared your time with people that you love, or at least people you tolerate. I was fortunate to spend my weekend with people I love. Since you've obviously checked in on our blog, you must be dying to know all the exciting Eastery things the Glass family did on this most Eastery of all weekends. Hold on, cuz here's how it went down...

We did Eastery things with 2 dozen eggs, a handful of cups and some dye.


The Easter Bunny found Henry and Reese.


Henry and Reese found the Easter Bunny (plus an awkward encounter with his side kick at a dollar store)

Reesie scored Eastery, yet attractive swimwear (tankini, everyone!)

Henry and Paul engaged in the Eastery tradition (3rd year in a row!) of demonstrating feats of strength on our front lawn. This year Henry challenged Paul to a wrestling match. Henry totally won, but Paul claims some cheap shots were used. I say Paul is just a sore looser.


Michelle (Paul's wife and Henry's love interest) looked on with excitement at the annual lawn match as did her dog, Stuey


Later, Henry took some time to have serious thoughts about Easter.

So did Reese.

But then she thought better of it.

A new Eastery tradition started this year. Guns!

It is a well-know fact that Grandparents love Eastery things. Here's Reesie experiencing Eastery love from Grandma Lauri and Great G-ma and Great G-pa Young. (Other Grandparents offered Eastery love too, but I failed to capture those magical moments on film)


Dinosaurs are Eastery Too. Aren't They?
On Saturday, or as we like to call it, "Eastery Eve", we headed up to the Eccles Dinosaur Park for Eastery fun. Also, Henry's body is finely tuned to know if he hasn't been to the park in over three weeks. It's weird, but he seriously knows if too much time has gone by and he begins to become slightly unruly unless he gets a dinosaur fix.

Anyway, we went to the Dinosaur Park for their annual Easter Egg Hunt. We did it all wrong though. Our game plan was to arrive early and get a good position for all the egg hunting that Henry would be doing.

Here's what Henry looked like in the car on the way to the Eastery Egg Hunt.

By getting to the park so early, we definitely secured a good place in line, but we also had to wait for quite a while for the festivities to begin. This is what we looked like waiting in line.

Henry waits by a wall.


A teeny-tiny Henners and a giant Jeremy wait by a wall.

Reesie waits warmly in her stroller, but she looks surprised. Am I mistaken?


Nope. She's surprised.


Jeremy and I think we make waiting in line look awesome.

Here's what Henry looks like when he asks for the 6th time "Momma, when are we going to start?"

Here's Henry's face when we finally got moving!


Henry found a sweet egg hiding spot and hit the jackpot of 10 eggs in one place. He didn't even have to run all over to find them. Jeremy was so proud. Here's what Henry looks like retrieving his eggs.


Henry said he didn't want the "lady colored eggs" and dedicated all the pink ones to Reesie. I asked him why he gave all the pink ones to her and he said because it was her favorite color and also the color of her room.

We hiked this hidden path into the museum before we left the park.


There, Henry's head was nearly eaten by a giant dinosaur.

Henry wanted me to pose in front of the talking Triceratops. He was disappointed that the dinosaurs weren't talking this day. He asked me to make dinosaur sounds for him instead. Just as I finished up, I saw a family of five come strolling around the corner to see what all the loud noises were. Henry immediately sold me out and pointed at me and said, "It's was Momma." Thanks for ratting me out, son.

The Longest Post Ever You Guys!

March (And a Car) Hit Us Hard
So far, I could really do without March. The first day of March started out just fine (that's later in the post), but the second day and third day in March have not been kind to the Glass family. Sunday, March 2nd, the four of us were just returning from a baby blessing event in Morgan when our car was T-boned on the passenger side by a girl turning left who wasn't paying attention. She hit Henry's car door (driver's side), broke our rear axle and wheel clean off and sent us into a one and-a-half times around spin. Jeremy and I remember seeing her turn left coming from the opposite direction and we did the best we could to avoid the collision. We even veered out of her way, but her SUV managed to knock us over another lane of traffic. I recall feeling our wheel break off and seeing our wheel and axle bounce away from us. We have been told the car is most likely totaled.

Please know everyone in our car was and is safe. I can't write about specifics, because of the chance that we might need lawyers involved, but I did post a few picture of some of the damage below.


We spent well over an hour in the ambulance getting the kids checked out and waiting for family to arrive to give us a lift home. After Reesie took her bottle, she pretty much just hung out and looked cute for the EMT staff. Once Henry had calmed down, he thought he was pretty cool hanging with the policemen and firemen. He even walked away with parting gifts...


I told the EMT staff that Grandma and Grandpa Young would be on the scene. I told them to watch for a couple in a green Buick that look too young to be grandparents. I also told them that Grandma would have on glasses and be fairly frantic. Once they got there, Henry told everyone that "our wheel fell off our car and we are sad."

Lighter Moments
There were some brighter moments that came from this experience.

1. G-pa and G-ma Young bought Reese a brand new car seat and Henry had fun converting the box to a fort. (Thank you!)

2. Henry also reenacted the policeman at the crash scene taking down information. Henry issued me and Reese these citations the next day.

3. We explained to Henry that we were going to have a temporary car for awhile until they figure out what to do with our white one. Henry insisted that we get a blue car. To our surprise, the Hertz hooked us up with this sweet, blue ride. (manual locks and manual windows in the hizows!)

4. I asked Reese to give me her best "I've been through a personal tragedy, but I'm not gonna let it get me down look". This is what she gave me.

5. When the insurance agent asked Jeremy to state his relation to me he simply said "wife". I was surprised and a little hurt to hear he didn't refer to me as "soul mate".

6. Also, when recanting the story to the police officer and to the insurance agent, Jeremy peppered the conversation with "We had just returned from church" or, "We had just left a baby blessing at a church" or, "This is so crazy. One minute you're at church, then next your car is totaled." I told him to give it a rest. We went to church for the first time in over 3 years and look what happens to us.

7. We figured we are safe because we spent 30 minutes in a church that day. We figure we were in an accident because we also left church 30 minutes early. (shouldn't we have just broke even then?)

One Final Word
Thanks to all the people who helped us at the scene. You won't ever read this, but you were in our prayers that night and will be for many nights to come. So many people comforted me, my husband and my children. They offered us coats and warm cars to collect ourselves in. Thanks to the EMT staff for being patient and kind with my children and my frazzled mind. Thanks to G-ma Lauri and G-Pa Wayne for breaking the speed limit to get to us in record time. Thanks to Jake and Riley for coming so soon too. (I won't thank you for breaking the speed limit as I'm sure it's your typical practice). Thanks to my Mom and Dad for letting me just spend a few minutes crying on the phone. Thanks to angels that were watching over us and kept our family safe!

Before Our Personal Crisis (Sunday Edition)
(BTW- that's how the insurance company refers to accidents. A personal crisis)
Saturday and Early Sunday before our personal crisis, we had wonderful time. The four of us jet setted around three northern Utah counties in a day! In hind sight, I'd like to think that on some level we knew our little Ford Focus was about to meet its doom and we used that day as a "sending off" party, if you will.

Here we are at Derrick, Traci and Jocyln's baby blessing after-party just before the crash, I mean personal crisis.


Here's a deer head we looked at during the party just before our personal crisis.

Here's proud Grandpa Jake and Jocyln. Jake, look down at Jossi.

Now look at me.

Before Our Personal Crisis (Saturday Edition)
Saturday, also before the personal crisis, I took the kids to meet Zoe, Isabella, Kimberly and Crystal at the Dinosaur Park for fun, adventure and aparently rain and snow. Here are some things we learned at the Dinosar Park.

Girls have hats with two points.

Sadly, boys' hat's only have one.

Cousins are happy when they swing in unison.

Dinosaurs had bones.

Cousins are afraid to stand close together in pictures.

Two Cousins turn and face the camera please!

Now let's try it with just one Cousin facing the camera.

Cousins like to put their heads through holes.

Henry looks good even with a headwound. (more on that later)

After the Dinosaur Park, we all drove up to Grandpa Wayne's and Grandma Lauri's for pizza and more togetherness. I didn't take pictures of the pizza or the togetherness, but I did get a picture of the Grandparents and the Cousins standing as close together as they would. (It's funny, once the camera is out, the kids treat each other like they have cooties. But once the camera is put up, they're all over each other!)

See how happy everyone is just 24 hours before our personal crisis.

Before Our Personal Crisis (Dog Party Edition)
Also on Saturday, was Maxie's (black lab) birthday. I thought it would be awesome to throw him a surprise party. Jeremy insisted that any party we threw for Max would be a surprise.

Happy 6th Birthday Maxie!

Here's the cake we gave to the dogs to celebrate.

Here's the dogs celebrating and enjoying the birthday bones.

Here's the run-in with the concrete Henry suffered when he took the cake to the dogs.

Aparently, cowboy boots and icy conditions do not mix. We warned him to stay on the dry part, but Henry got excited and made a run for the dogs and didn't have his footing. He was okay and only fussed for a minute. He was more concerned about being able to make his Dinosaur Park date that day. Here's Henry after he just got the green light from Mom to go to the park.