Thanksgiving Weekend

This year for Thanksgiving we were given a special treat from Ryan's parents.

For many years it was a tradition for their family to spend Thanksgiving down town at the Little America Hotel. His Grandparents would come up from Cedar City and stay at the hotel. Some years Ryan's family would just go to the dinner, and others they would stay a night or two at the hotel too.

Then we lost Grandpa McArthur and the tradition did not seem the same without him, so the passed couple of years we have celebrated a nice Thanksgiving at Ryan's parents home.

This year his mom was ready to go back to the Little America, and she wanted to make it special so she treated us all to two nights at the hotel.

so Thanksgiving day we headed to The Grand America for our feast.

Ryan's sister and her husband were not able to join us this year and asked for lots of pictures and I tried to get enough for her. We missed having them with us.





Joe had been really close to Ryan's Grandpa and spent a lot of time with him, but Joe was pretty young when he did and I did not think he would really remember being there with him.

When we walked into the building Joe looked around and got really quiet and sad looking. Someone asked him if he was okay and he just said.

"I miss him."

The first time we went to the Gand America with Great Grandpa I took a picture of the kids with him in this sitting area. So Joe and Grandma sat together for a picture this year.



Dinner was even better than I remembered it, and it was nice to get to visit with Ryan's family.



The kids loved the food too. They have a little kids buffet set up in the corners of the room so the kids went there first. I knew it was going to be a good meal when all three of the older kids started their Thanksgiving dinner with a Carmel apple.


I think they only went to the kids buffet once. Then they discovered the shrimp and crab legs at the main buffet.

Last thanksgiving Valerie was too young to eat real food so this was her first time experiencing Thanksgiving dinner, and she loved it!

I started her out with a few things from the kids buffet, but she was more interested in the stuff on my plate. Her three favorite things were the Crab legs, the berries and of course the chocolate fountain. Luckily she did not discover it until she had eaten a good amount of regular food.

It was my nephew's first Thanksgiving, and he was enjoying it so much he didn't have time to look up for a picture.

The kids always finish before the adults at a meal like this, but they were given coloring books and were happy to sit and color while we finished eating. When Valerie was done she went over to check out her cousin to see what he was up to.

She noticed that he had her favorite blanket in his stroller and I think she was worried that he would not let her have it, because she tested the waters a little before she went for it. Then she carefully took it out watching what his reaction would be.



After dinner was over we went across the street to check into the Little America. It turned out that it was our lucky day because they had messed up on the reservation and did not have three rooms with two queen beds on the same floor. So they gave us 1 room with two queens and 4 rooms with king beds. Now looking back I see the only family this really benefited was ours, because we were the only group big enough to split up, but it made it a really nice weekend for me.

At first I thought we would just take one of the extra rooms for our family. the boys would stay with Ryan and the girls with me.

So Ryan and the boys took the room with the 2 queens. the boys thought it was great to have a boy only room.



Emily however was not too excited about having to share with Valerie and me. The original plan when we only had three rooms was that she was going to stay with her Grandma and Grandpa, and she was looking forward to that.

It turned out that there was an extra room, unless Ryan's parents wanted to have their own room, it was available. So the first night Grandma and Emily stayed in it and the second night Emily had it all to herself. I think she really liked that.


As for me I shared a room with Valerie. they brought up a port a crib for her, but she was not about to stay in it, and I figured sharing a king bed with her would be okay.

I didn't realize that someone who is only three feet tall can take up the whole bed if they want to. I did sleep pretty well. We only had to swap places a few time in the night.








The best part was after visiting the boys in their "boy room." going back to my nice quiet clean room with Valerie.




The little America is my favorite hotel. One of the things that makes it my favorite is the cafe.




The food is good, it is open late, and it is right in the hotel so when you are ready to eat you don't have to go searching for a restaurant at odd hours.





When I have stayed at other hotels I am always disappointed. Even if they have a restaurant it does not compare to the Little America Cafe.


And there is nothing wrong with grabbing a cup of hot chocolate and a couple of hot rolls before bed.

I was a little worried about how Valerie would do staying at a hotel, but I worried for nothing. She loved almost everything about it. Especially having Grandma and Grandpa around to spoil her.

The only thing she did not like were the elevators. The first time she got in them I let her stand, and the elevator made two quick stops right off the bat. She did not like the motion under her feet and started to cry. after that every time we got in the elevators she started to cry. It was not until the very end of our stay she decided they were okay, but still wanted to be held while she rode in them.

The first night I took the kids down to the pool to swim. The pool is half indoor and half outdoor. It was very cold outside so the boys thought it was cool to go out and see the steam rise off the pool. they never wanted to stay out too long though, because it was really cold, but the water was warm.



The next day to celebrate black Friday we took TRAX over to the Gateway Mall. Ryan's mom divided us into small groups and assigned us someone to shop for. We were given $15 for our person and we were supposed to find them a gift that would help them get into the Christmas season.


We had about an hour to shop and then we all met at Barns and Noble where we picked out books to donate to some school children.



Then it was off to the movie theatre to see Tangled. It was a cute show and the kids loved it. I loved it too.



We had put our packages in Grandpa's office while we were in the movie. So after the show we went over to his office building. Grandpa and dad went up to get the stuff while the rest of us waited on the lobby. While we were waiting Valerie and Josh started playing in the lobby and the next thing we knew Valerie had tripped on a rug and bashed her head into the corner of a table.



It didn't look pretty, and the way she was acting worried us. Not being familiar with down town we were not quite sure the best place to take her. So I asked the security guard if there were any medical facilities close by. They asked what had happened and called for an ambulance.



After the paramedics checked her out they told us that she looked okay but that we needed to take her to Primary Children's just to make sure. Because we had taken TRAX to get there the only real option they were giving us was a ride in the ambulance.


At primaries the Dr came in and looked her over and I knew everything was fine when the Dr turned to us and asked. "WHY did you come in an ambulance?"



The bump on her head was pretty big so they kept her for observation for a couple more hours. she slept most of the time. They released us at 6:30pm, and we were relieved it was nothing more serious than a bump on her head.



When we arrived back at the hotel we all got together to give our gifts to each other. The kids were really into it. Especially Josh. somehow he figured out that his Grandpa had him. So while we were shopping Josh's group ran into Grandpa's group and Josh told Grandpa exactly what he wanted. Then when we were opening gifts Josh turned to Grandpa and said. "Now can I open my wand."


The second half to this activity is, on Christmas Eve we have to tell how our gift helped us get into the Christmas spirit. It will be interesting to see what Josh says.

I loved this activity, because even though Josh was worried about what he was getting, the kids all had fun shopping for someone else. Joe told me later that one of his favorite things about the weekend was buying the gifts for someone else, and giving the books to the kids who need them, because it made him feel happy.



The part I loved most about this weekend was just spending time together as a family. We had such a great weekend together and I know my kids will always remember it.

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!