St. John Family

Sunday April 5, 2015

Dearest Cassidy:

Well - I'm writing you from our beach house at Mission Beach. I will tell you all about us getting here, but please know that gosh we miss you today! I hope us telling you about this trip is ok. I know Dad gave you his play by play of the week - so I'll just start my stuff from us getting on the road for the trip.

First off - I woke up Saturday morning and was very surprised to see emails from you! That was fun. I was worried for a split second that something else crazy had happened to you - you know like being chased by drunk guys! What the heck! Not comforting for the mom. Anyway- it was fun to read about all your country's holidays and how ironic that is that they celebrate such religious holidays for several days. And also fun to know where you're heading! I know it'll be hard to leave - but this will be good!

We decided that we'd leave Saturday morning and get to Vegas. We wanted to spend a little time with Ty & Kacee's family and didn't necessarily want to travel the whole way on Easter Sunday. So, we packed up and left Saturday morning. We brought food with us this time and Dad kept saying we'd have plenty of room because we didn't have your big suitcase! BUT - as he was packing he declared that we had just as much stuff as if you were here with us. When we loaded the car Saturday morning the wind was whipping around like crazy and it was 38 degrees. Cold!

We made it to Vegas just fine. Ate at Freddy's in St. George and Hadlie threw a fit because she "hates Freddy's." But somehow she survived. We had pretty good luck listening to conference in the car, but that is NOT the way I like to do conference. I really missed watching it at home and especially getting to go to the conference center. Anyway - we did listen to most of it, but I definitely feel like I'll go back and re-listen, maybe as I'm driving all over the place like I do in a normal week.

It was Peyton's 9th birthday Saturday so that was fun to celebrate with her. The boys went to the Priesthood meeting and all us girls went to get ice cream and play at the park. We met up with the boys afterward and went to a little Taco place that's by Komex. It's not as good as Komex but was still good. We didn't get to watch either final four game but Duke beat Michigan St. and Wisconsin beat Kentucky! So, it'll be Duke vs. Wisconsin for the championship on Monday night.

After we got back to the Allred's the all the kids but Peyton & Milani went night swimming. Their pool just opened this week. Our girls were very excited to go swim! It then took us forever to get all the kids to bed and put Easter together. We went to bed very late. We were all up by 7:30 this morning and had a fun Easter morning. Milani and Peyton were really cute with the whole Easter bunny thing. It was fun to have little kids around. After the whole Easter to-do Ty & Kacee cooked a giant breakfast and we watched the first session of conference.

We got on the road to head to San Diego at about noon and I kid you not - it was a pretty terrible drive. It took us like over an hour to get to Primm (where the big roller coaster is just outside of Vegas)! We had to stop there to get gas and food - because we didn't know how long the traffic would be so bad. The gas stations were just packed with people. Like a million people there. I honestly thought that scene would be how it'll be at the end of the world. Just mass chaos. We finally got outta there and we prayed in the car that things would be ok and get better. And they did. It still took us about 7 hours to get here, but we made it. It turned out to be Grandma, Becky & her girls, Ricky's family and us this time. We're all in one house. We're all getting settled and I think things will be good. There's always a few glitches like there was no toilet paper or soap here and the hot tub needed fixing. But we got here in time to see the sunset and Hadlie was super excited. Just like you would be. That's why I miss you.

We don't have much of a plan other than to just be here. It's only supposed to be in the mid 60's, so not too warm but I'm sure it'll still be fun to be on the beach. We're planning to do baptisms at the temple on Wednesday and guess what? The Martineau family is going to be here and asked if they could meet us to do baptisms. So hopefully that'll work out. And I'll be sure to take a picture.

So - overall this has been a weird Easter. We haven't done our Easter picture because we didn't have church today. So I'll do that next week. And Colten I hope will wear his new suit we bought for Prom! Exciting!

*Important answer this!* How do you guys watch conference since you're so far ahead of us in time? Did you watch Saturday's sessions on Sunday? Just curious how that works. Do the members watch it at the church?

The only other thing I wanted to tell you about this week was that on Thursday I got your sweet birthday present for me! I cried. That was seriously the sweetest thing ever! Thank you so much Cassidy. As a mom - you just always are wondering if you're doing a good enough job, if the things you try so hard to teach or care about even matter, etc. So I love hearing some of those things paid off. And also I really loved reading about your favorite things we did together! I love that New York trip too. I just printed a few of those pictures for your book I was putting together and those are really great memories! And I love that it was just me and you too. Anyway - thanks so much. I loved it!

Well - I will go put together some pictures to send to you of the week. I'm excited for you this week - to get to move to another area and meet a new companion. I'm sure it will be a bit of an adventure and I can't wait to hear all about it next week. I love you so much and will keep praying for you all the time!

Love you - Mom