While Mom's Away the Family Plays

Last Week Mr. Giovannoni was kind enough to buy me a plane ticket out to Albuquerque to visit my sister Heidi. I took Isaac with me so the Mr. took a few days off and played Mister-Mom to Dylan and Alivia. These three look like they had a blast together! Way to make me look lame Mr. Giovannoni :)

Hill Aerospace Museum

George Eccles Dinosaur Park

My favorite photo of the bunch!
The Ogden LDS Temple
Dylan and Alivia got to experience life without mom as the cook as well.
They visited more restaurants in three days then what we normally go to in three months!
Mr. Giovannoni also managed to get them up and ready for their primary program on Sunday!
My kids now have a new favorite parent!
Thanks Honey for showing our kids a good time and letting me have a vacation.

Swiss Days 10 K

I wanted to get a 10K race under my belt before winter hit, so the Swiss Days 10K in Midway Utah, was a perfect fit.

Me and Livie Hanging out before the race.

Mr. Giovannoni had the pleasure of hanging out with all three of our children while I tried to accomplish another one of my running goals.
Dylan even got in on the fun this time and ran his own half mile race.
Way to go Dilly!
And after a long, long time of waiting, my kids finally got to see me finish the race...

6.2 miles in 1 hr 25 min and 32 seconds.

Now I can check that off my list!

Marathon Trip

Mr. Giovannoni has a goal of running 4 marathons in a year. This weekend he completed Marathon number three in Ashton Idaho.

We decided since we were already out and about that we were going to try to make this road trip a fun little vacation for our family.
Early Friday morning we loaded up the car and headed up through Idaho and on into West Yellowstone!

Friday August 27, 2010
We only had a few hours to spend in a place that needs at least a weeks worth of time, but we made the most out of what we could. We arrived at the lower basin geysers first so we stopped to check out Fountain Paint Pots.
The picture at the top really did look like a boiling pool of paint! It smelled like rotten eggs too, but I was awed at the vast amounts of color and scenery, what an amazing world we live in!
Next we headed to good Old Faithful.

After Old Faithful erupted we hiked around the area,
taking in all of the other mud pots and geysers in the area.
The colors and sheer variety of nature were awesome, no two places looked felt or smelled alike.
With only a few minutes to spare before we had to head back to Idaho for the pre-race dinner (which we had already paid for) I made Mr. Giovannoni take me to Sapphire Pool and I'm really glad he did, it was absolutely beautiful!
Doesn't it make you think of paradise?
It's so deceptive, who would think it was a boiling pool of water, it looks so inviting!

There were a million other places in Yellowstone we wanted to go and see, but we ran out of time. So we reluctantly headed back to Idaho.
On our way out of Yellowstone we ran into a small traffic jam and here is why,
I never realized just how BIG bison are!
Other than a fox, and a few geese here and there, this bison was all the wildlife we saw on our short trip.
Yellowstone really is a fantastic place! We can't wait to go back and spend a few days there taking our time, instead of rushing around!

Saturday August 28, 2010
Marathon Day
Dylan got to race down the finishing stretch with his Dad!

Way to go Babe, you got number three in the bag!
I think it's really fun to watch marathoners cross the finish line, I'm always surprised to see the variety of people who actually finish a marathon, it's inspiring.

Alivia snuck in on Dad and Dylan's after marathon picture.
After the marathon Mr. Giovannoni drove us up to
lower Mesa Falls, so we could see where he ran.
Right after we got back in our car from the Falls it started to rain something fierce!
Luckily the terrible terrible hail storm didn't hit us until after we were out of the canyon. I don't think I've ever been out in a storm like that. The hail just pounded and pounded our car, I thought for sure we where going to have to send our car to a repair shop after that storm!
After the storm settled down we headed back down to our Hotel in Rexburg, where the kids and I were looking forward to a nice relaxing swim in our hotel pool.
Our plans were cut short though, when we put our toes in the pool and realized the thing wasn't heated! It was FRIGID!
So we did our best to get our swimming fix by hanging out in the hot tub for a few minutes.
We had also planned to visit Bear World later that afternoon, but the weather never cooperated.
I guess we will just have to put that on our agenda too, for the next time we head out that way.

After a little down time at the hotel, we all headed out to Firth Idaho to do dinner with our friends Anna and Jake.
Their place was so cute, I could totally see myself happy as a hen living out in farm country like that. They were so nice to have us over and Anna's ham and wild rice soup was really delicious.
Thanks Anna and Jake for having us, it was fun!

Sunday August 29, 2010
It's amazing how time flies when you're having fun.
We decided to drive our kids past a few of Idaho's temples on our way home.
First up was the Rexburg Temple.
After which we headed to the Idaho Falls Temple.
They were both Beautiful.
I especially loved looking out on the river from behind the Idaho Falls temple.
I also loved that under each tree at the temple grounds they labeled what kind of tree it is.
I'm nerdy like that!

Mr. Giovannoni drove the entire trip without complaint, even thought the reason I came along was so I could drive and he could rest. The kids were pretty good too.
I feel really lucky and quite blessed that we got to go on this marathon trip and that we all stayed safe and happy.