Sunday, August 1, 2010

The Family History Tour

So, Ben had an audition in Salt Lake, and rather than him go down on his own we decided to make a family trip out of it. Ben's parents live in Orem and since we had only seen them for a night when we stopped through during our move, we decided they needed some grandkid lovin' time. Now I love, love, love Orem. I couldn't have picked a more perfect place to grow up, so I love taking the kids back and spending time doing what I did as a kid.


First stop, BYU. My dad went back to school when I was 3 or 4 and so I remember taking family trips to the Wilk and the bookstore, Sunday walks on campus and walking through the buildings he had class in (which was some science/computer building that I have never been back to). I have lots more memories as a grown-up, but those little kid ones with my parents are awfully sweet. So we took the kids back and did the tour and explained to them how we would still love them, but perhaps just a little bit less, if they chose to attend college anywhere but here. We focused our time on the HFAC (Fine Arts Center) as that's where most of their dad's time was focused (and a good portion of their mom's because of that).

My "slab rat" kids. (Give me a holler if you get that reference.)



We toured the theaters he performed in and visited for a while with his favorite professor, Barta, the heart and soul of BYU's theatre department. Ben's dad also teaches (voice) at BYU and his office also happens to be in the HFAC, so we stopped by and visited with him in his office for a bit. There were also a couple of great art exhibits going on and we spent some time going through those.

While Ben and I continued with our visit with Barta, Ben's dad popped in and took the (bored) kids over to the bookstore. We caught up with them a little while later in the Wilk eating Creamery ice cream cones that they were supposed to have finished before we got there as our plans were to visit the Creamery off campus later. They proudly showed off the books Grandpa had also bought them and then we headed back to the bookstore to buy fudge and Grandpa headed back to his office to finish up some work. After a bit more sight seeing we finished off the day by heading to the Creamery (hey, Mama needs her ice cream too and it's summer and no one ever died from two ice cream cones in one day!). So yummy.

The next day we headed to Scera pool. I spent a good portion of my youth doing Scera related things. My childhood best friend's dad did something at Scera, I forget what, but we spent our days going to (free!)movies at the theater and our summers at the pool. I took swimming lessons there as a little kid (it's old enough that my dad actually learned to swim there, too) and the Scera pool snack bar was my first job. Later, as a teenager, I spent my whole summers doing shows at the Shell (outdoor theater). So, again, fun to go back. Now, the Scera pool today looks NOTHING like the pool did when I was growing up, they did a major overhaul several years ago, but it still takes me back to my childhood. Perhaps that is why I neglected to put on sunblock. Are we detecting a theme ? The boys had a blast going on the waterslides and off the diving boards, while Ev and I splashed around in the wade pool. Now I don't go swimming super often, so my skin doesn't see a ton of sun. I did remember the air show tragedy from the week prior and slathered my face and chest with sunblock (good thinking, Aimee, you are on the ball). But here I am, sitting in 2 feet of water, back and shoulders totally exposed, for 2 hours! It did not even occur to me that I might just be frying my lily white skin. Apparently, it is a summer of lessons, my friends. Needless to say, I burned. Badly. So you add the leprosy type peeling on my face, the giant cold sore that prevents me from opening my mouth all the way that I also got from that same sunburn, to the fact that I can no longer move my arms because that moves the skin on my back and shoulders...well you can imagine. I think the neighbors were outside my door with burning torches and pitchforks. We did end that excursion with a visit to the Sno Shak where I got my favorite, raspberries and cream. I love me some Sno Shak. Totally worth the burn.

So, anyway, that was our last day there and it really was tons of fun. It will be nice being able to get down to see Ben's parents more often; we've missed them. Perhaps we'll forgo sun-related activities for a while though.