Rexburg, Sledding and DateBox

Last week the boys and I made a little day trip up to Rexburg to visit Brad and Emma. Believe it or not, this was my first time ever being in Rexburg. I was pleasantly surprised that the Rexburg I had created in my mind's eye was not what it actually looks like. From what Brad and Lexi had described, I had envisioned this little Podunk, one street town with a giant Wal-Mart at the end of the street and the school up on top of a giant hill, that the students would have to hike up in the freezing snow everyday. It is true that the school is on a hill, but the whole town is on a hill with it.

Anyway, the boys and I left Thursday morning and added a little crazy to Brad and Emma's life. Mostly Emma. She was a great tour guide and hostess. She started by taking us to the school to show us all the little on campus exhibits they have in different colleges. I was a fan because it made Luke walk up and down huge staircases, which, as we all know, any kind of energy exertion for that kid is a good thing. We started in the geology building (where we also got to spy on Brad taking a test), where they had a fun little room filled with fossils, rocks, gems and, Luke's favorite, a fish tank that even had "Dory and Nemo AND his dad!" It was quite exciting. Caleb would yell at the fish (which Brad informed us he could hear in his classroom), and we even did the little scavenger hunt the school put together.

The next stop was the "Stuffed animal" room. The college of wildlife has a room filled with mounted animals of all kinds. We saw a zebra, hippo, lions, porcupine, bears, birds of all kind, elk, moose and so much more. We spent a good amount of time in there just in awe of how big some animals are!

After the animals, we made our way to horticulture where we explored the plant shop, the tomato room and the jungle. We almost missed the jungle, but, luckily, when we came out of the tomato room a student stopped us to tell me I looked familiar (which I get a lot), followed by he has a cousin with Down Syndrome followed by, "Wait. Is your last name Green?" Ummmm, "Yes?" Turns out he served in Dallin's mission and recognized Caleb from being friends with Dallin on Facebook. Crazy!! Anyway, he pointed us to the jungle room, which was a little oasis of tropics in the dead of winter.

We wrapped up our school tour when Brad finished his test and met us outside the horticulture building. When Luke saw him up the hill, he ran with glee to greet his Uncle Bubs. That sweet reunion will forever be branded on my heart.

We then went to Crazee's where the boys got to play, fly a helicopter, climb and be wild. It was grand. Brad had to go back to school, so we decided to relax and  watch Finding Dory. They are living a little basement apartment that was fun to be in as it reminded me of Dallin and I's newlywed days in our little basement. Luke kept asking, "Why do they live in the basement?" You did, too, kid. It is good for the soul, marriage and pocketbook. That's why!

The fun-filled day was wrapped up with pizza from Papa John's, run ins with Napa folk and instant snoozing once in the car for the journey back to McCammon. When we got back, Luke informed me that he "Didn't actually want to leave Rexburg." He sure does love his Bremma.

For our family funday, we attempted to go sledding in the pasture. The snow wasn't quite packed enough and the slope wasn't quite steep enough, but we had fun, nonetheless. Luke was much more willing to try this year and even went down the snow bank hill made by the tractor with me, which was a little more crazy than the pasture hill. Caleb is not a fan of being cold, so he was not super into the whole being in the snow ordeal. Can you blame him?

Dallin and I learned about Date-boxes from the Taylors and decided to try them out! They are basically fun filled boxes that you get each month with little activities in them for an at home date. We went with a more simple one (there are some pretty extravagant ones out there), just to see if we liked it. We got to do our February box last week and we loved it! The activities were simple, but gave us the chance to talk, play and have fun. I highly recommend them.

The next few weeks will be filled with adventures down to Utah, Arizona and hopefully some good news about getting to be together as a family full time again! Keep us in your prayers. This part time daddy thing is rough! Especially when my children take on the grandpa Green mentality that 6am is already an hour too late to start your day.