Our trip to Arizona

This past week we finally made it back down to Arizona.  It was a hot time to be there, but we knew we had to get down there now knowing we couldn't put it off any longer with our upcoming move to Germany.  We went down mainly to visit Tom's sister and her family and we get the bonus of seeing my aunt and uncle and three cousins when we head down there too.

Our trip started out a little crazy with spending THREE hours on the runway in Denver before our two hour flight to Phoenix.  It gave us a little taste of what it will be like on our LONG flight over to Germany in a couple of months...we need to find some more toys to bring with us I think :-)

While in Arizona, we got the privilege of hanging out with our three great nieces and nephew...at their favorite place...the mall!  Gregory got to go in a Lego store and a Disney store for the first time, so he was loving it too.

We went to the Arizona Natural History Museum as well and looked at dinosaur bones mostly and then enjoyed Night at the Museum 1 & 2.  It was a fun time and it was great that Tom (our brother-in-law) was able to take some time off while we were there and it was nice that Lorrie (Tom's sister) was done with work since she works in a school.   

Gregory and Tom got to watch our nephew Ian practice his karate and Gregory also enjoyed playing with Ian and his legos. 

Joshua loved the attention from Casey and Samantha!  Too bad the cats didn't love Joshua's attention :-)

We also spent some time swimming in the pool at our hotel, but most of our time was spent inside in the air conditioning since it was so hot and windy.

It had been 3 years since we had last been there so the kids had all changed so much.  It was fun to hear about what's going on in their lives and to share with them what's going on in ours.  We wish we had more time to spend with them, but we take what we can get.  Due to safety concerns I don't have any "public" pictures of us with them at my sister-in-law's request...but I do have a few pictures which I can share from our adventure at our photo website here... http://tomandroxannecook.shutterfly.com

Like I said earlier we got to see some "extra" family while we were down in Phoenix...my aunt and uncle and cousins.  These are the ones that I got to spend weekends with when growing up (when they lived in Minneapolis & Nashville) before I was married and before their kids had grown up much.  We enjoyed dinner together and hanging out.  Gregory will remember aunt Laurie reading lots of books to him and Joshua will be able to look back at the pictures to remember uncle Lyle being silly with him.  Blake, Brady and Brennan were around too, so it was nice to catch up with these guys as well. 

As always it's nice to get away, but it's also nice to get home too.