This girl has been anticipating March 17, 2023 for as long as she can remember. Sweet sixteen for Katelee Lyn McArthur-driving and dating and all the fun! She really has been dating already...but we are going to say now she is free to a little more openly. Haha!
She is stylish and smart and amazing. She took a few friends to dinner and a movie and we celebrated hard with some lemon bars and dinner as well. The jokes never get old that she is our only non red-head born on St Patty's day. One of the students at the high school discovered that I was Katelee's mom and said "holy cow, she looks just like you." I was flattered, obviously but I told that student Katelee wouldn't be thrilled to hear that. She wasn't, but diplomatically responded with, "I just don't see it." Cheers to the non ginger who resembles me most!
While my birthday was in January, there are a group of ladies in the neighborhood who all have birthdays between January-March,
so we decided to celebrate ourselves and go to dinner in Midway. I had to document the cute little globes we sat in- they were so fun!
There were some fun school events happening in March as well...Brenna had her career day. The seventh graders were allowed to miss school to job shadow somewhere. The little dear told us about it pretty much the day before so her hopes of going with Shannon on a flight was challenging but Shannon made it work. She just accompanied Brenna as she worked with another flight attendant.
The pilot and other employees were accommodating and really made her a part of the crew. She collected trash like a pro.
Harrison had his wax museum and he always has his interests divided between history and sports but thankfully he settled on the historical hero of George Washington. He was regal and knowledgeable in all things Revolutionary War and it surrounding times. Solid work, George. Harrison has been very much in tune with all things preidential, even when we watch movies. He just asked "why does every movie seem to start on President's Day?' It took me a minute to realize he read Present Day as President's Day. Just keeping his head in the zone.
The picture below was from 'Wacky Wednesday' where the elementary students were encouraged to put together a wild outfit as part of spirit week. I really feel like Harrison nailed it. The stuffed donuts on each arm really added that final touch. haha!
Grant's final swim season wrapped up and the team celebrated with a banquet. It is super remarkable the swimmers are up for those early morning practices and rigorous drills. We are proud of Grant sticking with it!
And, the SNOW continues. We have had record snowfall this season, and really we are not hating it. Grant has cashed in on his season pass to Brighton and Katelee has been wishing she had one! But, we know how much we need the water.
On yet ANOTHER snow day, the kids built a snowman. Katelee was a great supervisor to the neighbor kiddos
and help them assemble Chad the BYU snow fan. Of course, Harry was voting for the snow person's name to be Cosmo, but Chad was accepted in the end. So many cups of hot chocolate have been consumed. I do draw the line late at night so Harrison was especially disappointed when he started laying the mugs out at 9:30pm and I told him not that night since there was school in the morning. He responded with, "What? come on! It soothes you down and calms your soul."
Shoveling the snow has been a great workout and while we have been happy with the powder, it was so nice to leave the cold and hit the beach for spring break!!
We had gifted the family a trip to Cabo for Christmas and it was fabulous!
We stayed at the Hyatt Ziva all inclusive resort and it was fancy pants! The girls and I bunked together and Dave took the fellas to a room below ours. We arrived on a Saturday, explored the resort and began our quest to consume all the tropical drinks available.
We were getting out of the pool the first evening to get ready to try our first restaurant and an odd gentleman approached the girls and me, wanting to take her picture, asking how old she was, saying "arrest me now" when I told him she was only 16. So, we spent the rest of the days on high alert avoiding creepy 'Grandpa Cabo' as we dubbed him and watching for other people to try and pick up on our teenagers. Sheesh.
Grant tried bone marrow and thought it was "not too bad" but the best part was watching Katelee observing his culinary experience. hahahaha!
We loved having our meals altogether and trying the different restaurants. The buffet is always where Harrison's heart is.
I was definitely nervous to leave the resort but we decided the church was close enough to take a shuttle to, so we spent part of our Holy Sabbath with the local saints.
I tried to sing the hymns, but I did it in English, and it mortified a couple of the children...so naturally, I just did it a little louder! We love going to church with saints we haven't met yet, but are so welcoming. It is cool everytime.
The next day, we took a couple Ubers to downtown Cabo. We haggled a boat ride to the famous arch.
and loved how pretty it was. The water on the other side of the arch was a bit treacherous so we got a good bouncy ride.
While our resort was so great, you couldn't swim in the water right off of the hotel's beach. It was too dangerous with the rip tide and the drop off. So, we just packed up our beach gear and our boat guides dropped us off on a good beach to play on.
Grant was already bright pink and burned by Monday morning and it was hilarious looking at his roasted back and then glancing over to his father who was doing everything in his power to not soak up a single UV ray.
You didn't see anyone else walking in long pants, with long sleeves and a collar flipped up covering every inch of skin.
Dude didn't get burned, though. So, mission accomplished.
The next day we spent doing a little razor excursion.
Dave thought he'd be quite the racer, but he held up the pack a little. Brenna, Harrison and I had to tell him to go faster and faster. He did accomodate that request when we were going through all the water!
It was a fun ride through desert and hills and water and it brought us back to the beach to have dinner.
It was our last night and the sunset was the best one yet!
We had hoped to make it back to the resort to try a Hibachi restaurant but being on the beach together watching the sun go down was so worth it.
We spent so much time taking pictures (especially of the younger 3)...everywhere we went we would hear 'take a picture of me,' 'take a picture of this,' etc. So, by the end we told the kids we needed to take pictures of ourselves now so we could catch beautiful gems like this....
It really was the perfect last night with breathtaking color. We spent the morning of Wednesday getting our last favorite foods-smoothies, chips and salsa, and the delightful ice cream from the front bakery store. The kids had met some other teenagers and played a last volleyball game with them.
We wanted to have a last big spring break trip before Grant graduates and we did! It's not like we won't ever have him on any other vacations, but we won't know which ones and this was a great one to have as his (possibly last) one with the family. The games of pool, dance shows, employees, whales jumping in the water and all the food will be some core memories for sure.
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