Diana does Utah

Through a series of fortunate events, Diana has gone to Utah to visit her cousins. She left Thursday. Jared and I will be joining her next week. A friend of mine was driving up, and I asked if she could hitch a ride. That way she can have fun playing and I can have fun being lonely.

I do have to say that for someone so small, she can generate a lot of stuff every where she goes. Weather it is changing her clothes severl times daily, creating mountains of art projects, or cooking in the kitchen, well let's just say that the remaining children at my house are not quite as productive when it comes to creating chaos.

To her credit, she does do way more cleaning up than either of the boys. I think it is a girl thing. And all on her own, I don't even have to ask her. I love the way she likes to surprise me with unloading the dishwasher or mopping the kitchen floor. So nice she will be able to take good care of me in my old age. Maybe it was a good plan to have boys first, after all.

Jared and I can't go until next week because he needs to take some tests to pass off some independant study classes. Right now he is working on health. The independant study summer program allows you to do as many classes as you want to. At first I was overly optimistic that he could completely catch up from missing his whole freshman year. Gee, I wonder what would make me think that he could make up a year's worth of school work in 6 weeks? After smacking my head against the brick wall of realistic expectations, I am hoping he will complete health and personal wellness. He will get Health done this week. Anything after that will be a bonus.

Diana has been enjoying herself so far. Last night my brother took her to see Up with his kids. She told my sister that she loves Utah because the movie theaters don't even have casinos in them. For any of you who are lucky enough to have never been to Vegas or seen a movie here, all of the theaters are in the casinos. Most annoying to have to walk past all the slots and smokers just to go to a movie. One of my many pet peeves about Vegas. And how funny that it would seem great to her to not have to deal with casinos. And to term it that the movie theater has a casino, not that the casino has a movie theater in it. Besides that happiness, she saw someone at the movie wearing a BYU t-shirt. She also thought that was novel and exciting. I have trained her well.

So I am enjoying getting to pick what to watch on TV and sleeping in with out her poking me in the ribs. At the same time, it is eerily quiet. Quiet is not often heard when she is around. Sometimes it is a good thing to have absence make the heart grow fonder.