2015 Road Trip: Utah

We recently got back from a road trip to Utah and Montana. On the drive home, J said that it was a "concentrated" vacation, and I think that is a good way to describe it. We didn't have time to visit with any friends while we were in the area (in truth, I wish that I could have spent more time with my extended family), but we did get to see a lot of family. Within just a few days, we had a wedding (the S side of the family), an extended-family reunion with the Pax family on J's side (including cousins), and also a family reunion with J's immediate family (and their families). Here are some pictures with highlights of the Utah portion of our trip:

Our kids immediately wanted to try out the new DVD players that we bought for the car. This picture was probably taken just about two hours into our trip. Lucy liked watching Sesame Street and Blues Clues. Sam could watch a separate show on his own screen - I think he's watching the cartoon Robin Hood in this shot.

We arrived in Utah just about an hour before my sister L played a cello recital in my Grandma's backyard. It was fun (and impressive!) to see her play. 

Lucy at the Manti Temple grounds with Aunt V. 

The bride and groom! 

After the wedding luncheon, we had a break for a few hours before the ring ceremony began. I was excited to visit the Stewart Sculpture Garden at the Springville Art Museum, since it was under construction when I worked there as a fellow.

Lucy with her Uncle C in the salon-style portrait hall of the Springfield Art Museum. 

Besties at the wedding! I didn't get to visit with any of these ladies as much as I would have liked (especially Zillah, since she was busy with behind-the-scenes help), but it was still fun to see them for even a little bit.

Riding on a tour bus throughout Provo. We visited historic sites and homes that are meaningful to the Pax family, and then also visited Aunt M's grave. Different people took turns narrating with the tour bus mic, but it was especially fun to listen to G Pax speak.

We visited Aunt M's grave, and also saw the nearby headstone for G & G Pax (which they have already purchased and put into place, in anticipation!!!). Lucy loved putting pinecones in the little flower vase.

J designed the t-shirts for the reunion. They say, "Oh, wonderful!" - which is an exclamation that G Pax typically makes. 

G & G Pax with the great-grandchildren who attended the reunion.

Lucy and Gram on the train! The Pax family members told jokes, family stories, and held trivia while we rode on the train. We had an entire car reserved for our family! 

 Sam on the Heber Creeper.

After riding the Heber Creeper to Vivian Park, Sam and I got a ride back to our car and met some of my extended family members at Seven Peaks. Sam had a blast playing with my sister L. He kept saying, "We need to come back to Seven Peaks the next time we come to Utah!" 

I love this picture of Sam with his aunt!

While Sam and I played at Seven Peaks, Lucy and J visited with cousins at the cabin. Lucy played with pinecones (putting them in and out of a basket) for an hour!

After Seven Peaks, we went back up to Wildwood for the talent show. J's brother N wrote a song about Wildwood, and the three B brothers performed together. 

Before we left our hotel the next morning, we went to visit my Grandma S. She fell earlier that week and broke her leg (on the day of my cousin's wedding!). We visited her in the hospital, but she only recognized me for a few seconds. A nurse was in the process of administering valium to Grandma, and she was pretty incoherent and loopy after that point. Even though I'm smiling in this picture, this visit left me pretty sad. I hope Grandma is able to recover. 

After the hospital trip, we headed back to Wildwood for one last visit. We left for Midway with the B family after we left the cabin. 

Cousins! 

Cousins at the resort pool! We definitely made use of all of the resort amenities. I think the kids went swimming almost every single day we were there.

The resort also had a little carousel, which was fun for the kids to ride.

Cousins at the park! 

Sam really wanted to ride the Gravitron. I had no idea how he would react to this ride, but he had a fun time. J went on the ride with Sam, little J, and D. And luckily, there was no drama, although I don't think that little J liked it too much.  

I love little J's pose in this picture! These are the prizes that the kids won at the fair.

We also did some fun hikes with the B family, but I'm going to put those in another post with more information about the trails. The fair was our last big activity with the family - we left around 6:00 am the next morning to head to Montana with some of my siblings.

"After the Bath" by Paul Peel

When I was growing up, I remember that we had a print of Paul Peel's After the Bath in our home for some time. I remember seeing it last when we were living in California; I'm not sure if my mom kept the print when we moved to Ohio. I remember looking at this print often when I was a girl, being intrigued and a little dismayed that the little girl in the picture was sitting on a fancy rug with her bare bottom!

I think that the coloring of the image below is probably a little more accurate than the print we owned, which contained more orange and brown tones (similar to this AllPosters.com image). Perhaps the enhanced contrasts and darker brown tones weren't a bad thing for me in the long run, since it might have subconsciously influenced by interest in Caravaggio and tenebrism!

Paul Peel, After the Bath, 1890

Art from Grandma's House

About two weeks ago, we spent one brief - and altogether too short - night at my Grandma J's house. I wish that we could have stayed in the area longer, but we had to keep traveling south for a wedding and a family reunion. It was nice to visit with Grandma J in the morning, though. I'm glad that she is doing so well and is able to be in her own home.

When I woke up that morning at my grandma's house, I went down into the basement to blow dry my hair (so as not to wake up other people who were sleeping upstairs). Everything was just about the same from when I lived in Grandma's house as a teenager, even down to the white owl ornaments in the bathroom. I saw a few familiar posters on the walls, and I realized that there are a few distinctive works of art that I associate with my grandparents and their basement:

Norman Rockwell, Girl at Mirror, 1954

A print of this painting is in the back hallway of my grandparents' basement. It hangs on the dark wooden paneling between what used to be Uncle B's room and the study. I associate the movie star Jane Russell with this painting, perhaps partially because my sister and I watched old movies like Gentlemen Prefer Blondes in my grandparent's house while we lived there. Interestingly, I learned that Rockwell regretted included Russell's image in this painting, since he received a lot of criticism for doing so.

John Hafen, Girl with the Hollyhocks, 1902

A print of this painting used to be in my mom's old room in the basement, but it isn't there anymore. If I remember right, I think that this print might have been up at the same time as the original decor in her bedroom, including a pink beaded lamp (somewhat similar to this one) and her floral wallpaper (somewhat similar to this wallpaper, although the actual color scheme and design were a bit different).

Charles Courtney Curran, On the Heights, 1909

A print of this painting is currently in my mom's old room, in replacement for the Girl with the Hollyhocks print. I'm guessing that this print was put up around the time that the wallpaper was changed to its current blue-white-pink striped design.

As I was writing this post, it struck me that my grandma and/or grandpa must like pictures of women wearing white dresses! The upstairs bedroom has a reproduction of my uncle's painting Three White Dresses too. (My uncle combined my features and V's features for the bride, used his daughter M as the model for the girl, and my sister L as the model for the baby).

The last work of art that reminds me of my grandparent's house is a modern reproduction of Gainsborough's Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire (original of 1787). Her dress looks white in the original painting, although I think it has a bluish-gray tint in my grandparents' reproduction. I think that they might have inherited this print from my Great-Grandma L. I remember Grandpa T used to ask me if their copy was valuable - I'm not sure if it is, but it is a nice copy. It hangs in a heavy gold frame in their dining room.

This Just Happened

I just got Sam down to bed, and then entered the bathroom to prepare for bed myself. I had only been in the room for a few minutes when I heard some whispering underneath the bathroom door (so as not to wake Lucy, who was asleep nearby). This conversation followed:

Sam [whispering under the door, apparently lying down on the floor]: Moooom, want to hear a joke?

Me [whispering back through the closed door]: No, Sam, it's time to go to bed. Go back to bed.

Sam [still whispering]: Pleeease Mom? [Pause] What do vampires call their girlfriends?

Me [relenting]: I don't know. What?

Sam [stage whispering under door]: Their fianc-fangs!

Me [still whispering]: That's a funny one. Good night, Bud.

I love that Sam is at an age where he loves to tell silly jokes that revolve around word puns. And I love that these jokes are important enough to him that he'll get out of bed and lie down on the floor so that he can whisper them to me underneath the bathroom door. I know that this joke phase probably won't last forever (it didn't last forever with my little brother C, although admittedly he still likes to try and be "punny" when he can). But regardless, I want to appreciate this joke phase with Sam now, as much as I can. I love his innocent sense of humor. He is a sweet, kind-hearted boy.

Recent Summer Adventures

We've gotten to do a lot of fun things lately! Summer is off to a great start. Last month we got to ride on multiple ferries to-and-from Bainbridge Island, once for a trip to Bloedel Reserve and the other when J's brother B was in town. Here are some pictures of our trip to Bloedel Reserve:

Lucy just woke up from a nap as we got on the ferry. She was a little bewildered as to what was going on.

We had a magical time walking through the trails at Bloedel Reserve. I love that there are so many different types of environments. Prentice Blodel was interested in exploring the different emotions that one experiences when out in nature, and I felt like each place at the reserve had a different "feel."

I felt like we were approaching a small English estate (like a miniature Lyme Park) when we came around the bend and saw this lake and house. 

J and Sam also attended a Mariner's game with the cub scouts.

Most recently, we went on an impromptu camping trip to Sequim over the 4th of July holiday weekend. It has been really hot up here, and we noticed that the weather was twenty degrees cooler on the Olympic Peninsula. J found a tent site at the John Wayne Waterfront Resort (he thinks it was the last site available on the whole peninsula). It wasn't the most secluded spot, but we didn't plan far enough in advance to get something spectacular. We did love having our tent be located across the street from Sequim Bay and the marina, though. We had a fun time overall, despite a few mishaps (including forgetting the key to our car-top storage bin, but luckily we found a locksmith who made a new key).

Lucy is clapping her hands in delight about her first time camping!

Even though the resort was mostly a camping place for RVs, we did get a little tent site that was next to some lovely trees, a stream, and a cute bridge.

Sequim Bay, just across from our camping resort

We also enjoyed getting to do some hiking while we were on the peninsula. We went to Marymere Falls on Friday afternoon (before we set up our campsite). The hike is short (a little less than 2 miles there-and-back) with only a very slight elevation gain. The waterfall is quite stunning, and both J and I agreed that the payoff was really rewarding, despite the minimal effort required by the hike itself.

Lucy fell asleep on the trail, but we almost got a good family picture in this shot!

The trail to Marymere Falls goes right by Lake Crescent. The water was really beautiful: it was a bright turquoise water in the deeper area of the lake. We played around in the water for about twenty or thirty minutes before heading back to our car.

After cleaning up our tent site the following morning, we hiked out on the Dungeness Spit. We didn't make it to the lighthouse at the end (which would have been a ten mile walk there-and-back!), but we did walk out for over a mile.

The sand spit in the distance

 Happy 4th of July! We joked that it was ironic that we spent the morning of the 4th of July staring at Canada across the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

An Ancient Art Conversation

While driving in the car last week, Sam and I had quite an intelligent conversation about ancient art; it left me feeling really proud of my smart, thoughtful boy, and also a little baffled that he made such keen observations and connections. I'll try and recreate the conversation as best as I can here. It was cute to see that he was thinking about ancient art and wanting to discuss things that he knows I teach to my students:

Sam: [Looking at my Rosetta Stone lunch tote] So, what is written on the Rosetta Stone?

Me: Well, it talks about a few laws, including saying that some priests (who are leaders in the Egyptian religion) could get a tax break. That means that the priests wouldn't need to pay taxes or as many taxes as other people.

Sam: Well, then I think everyone in Egypt would want to be a priest!

Me: Ha! Maybe.

Sam: And why was the Rosetta Stone written in three languages?

Me: Well, the Egyptians were ruled by the Greeks at this time, so they needed things to be written in more than one language so that both Egyptians and Greeks could understand the message. It's kind of like how your summer reading packet from the library has instructions in both English and Spanish.

Sam: I see. [Pause.] And remind me what was Stonehenge was made for?

Me: Well, we don't know for sure. Some people think that it was a calendar. Remember the summer solstice we just had? One of the stones at Stonehenge lines up with the sun rising on the summer solstice, so it may be a way to help tell the time of the year. But we also think it was associated with things kind of like funerals, because people are buried there. [Side note: I was going to explain that there are cremated remains, but Sam interrupted me.]

Sam: There are people buried there?!? [Pause.] Well, maybe they thought about people rising up from graveyards because of the sun rising.

Me: That is such a good thought, Bud! Maybe so! Did you know that the pyramids have a similar connection to the sun? The pharaohs are buried inside, and the slanted sides of the pyramid are like the rays of the sun.

[Our conversation was interrupted while we dropped Lucy off at her day care. When we got back to the car, Sam started things up again.]

Sam: So, what about those gray statues with big faces that are really tall (and we saw one in England) - where are they from?

Me: Like "Dum Dum" from Night at the Museum? Those statues are from Easter Island.

Sam: And what are they for?

Me: Well, we think that they might be protectors or guards. They might be representations of the relatives of people who have already died, and they now help protect and guard their family members who are still alive.

Sam: Well, why did they make all of the faces look the same if it is of a relative? Why didn't they make them look like the person? [These cute questions made by art historian's heart swell!] T

Me: Well, what if the relative died a long time before and the people didn't know what the ancestor looked like? Maybe they wanted all the faces to be generic and look the same, so that it would look like a person but not make the mistake of trying to look like the relative but not getting it to look just like them.

Sam: Well, why didn't they just ask someone what the relative looked like? Or just look at a photo of the person?

Me: Well, these statues were made a long time ago, before the invention of photography.

Sam: Before the invention of photography?!? Huh. I wonder who invented the photograph.

Me: Well, some people say that it was invented by a man named Daguerre, and the early photographs were called daguerrotypes after this man.

Sam: And how did they work?

Me: I don't know all about daguerrotypes, but I imagine that they were made with light burning an image into something like film. Remember how Dad has a film camera? Photos used to be taken with film, but now they are digital.

Sam: Right.

Our conversation ended there, because we reached our destination. We actually arrived at the library; I needed to do some grading and we planned out that Sam read some books while I worked. I was so pleased with our little chat, and Sam again showed off his intelligence while I was grading: I was typing an explanation to a student about Hercules and his labor to find the golden apples of the Hesperides. As I briefly explained the mythology in a sentence or two, Sam looked over my shoulder, read what I wrote, and said, "Yep. That's true."

I looked over and said, "What do you mean?"

Sam replied, "I read about that in my book on Hercules. That was one of his missions to get the golden apples."

I told Sam that it was pretty neat that he already knew things that I was teaching to college students, and he seemed really pleased with himself. As he should be. I'm so lucky to have such a bright boy for a son.

On Sunday I found this cute selfie of Sam on my phone

Over the past few weeks I've been thinking about how Sam looks so tall and old. He's not really "my little boy" anymore (something that I loved to call him), and I need to get used to that. But I also am enjoying the more mature, grown-up way that he is able to interact with me. But I also love that he is still be a sweet, kind, innocent boy.