Schaun Rachel & Winnie Lu Too: Visiting Family in the Great State of Utah

Schaun and I didn't plan on seeing his family until Christmas this year and realized that it would have been more than a year since we last saw them. So we did a last minute flight search, found something affordable and off we went.

Our first stop was to Payson, UT to visit my sister, Melanee, niece, Marlene, and great-nephew, Nolan. Of course we enjoyed the company of their families, made dinner together and let the babies play. It was particularly wonderful to see Marlene again. I haven't seen her in a year and at that time she was in the very first stages of recovering from brain surgery. I'm sure there's a more accurate and complicated way to describe her brain trauma but, if I understand correctly, she had a stroke. She was 21 years old, newly married and pregnant.

She's got a long road ahead of her but on this part of it she has made amazing progress. First of all, she had her son, Nolan. A year ago, she struggled to prop Winnie up in her lap and now she bends down and picks up my 20-pounder with ease. That's just a small example of her progress. Thankfully, Melanee had recently moved to UT when she had her stroke so she was there to help Marlene and Stephan pick up the pieces and start moving forward. Marlene and Stephan have since been able to move in with Melanee and Randy and she works hard as a mom and grandma (she loves even harder!) We were so happy to catch up with them!

My great-nephew, Nolan. So cute!

Nolan and his mom, my niece, Marlene.

My sister & bro-in-law, Melanee and Randy

Winnie was fascinated with Nolan's head!

She couldn't get enough of Marlene's wheelchair.

Us.

Winnie lovin' Melanee's kitchen drawers

We spent the rest of our trip in and around Ogden, where Schaun's family lives. It was such a nice visit. Winnie was in her glory with all the people around and she took immediately to Grandma and her Aunties. It took her a bit to warm up to Pa-Pa Wheeler but it happened! There were lots of playdates with cousins, car-rides to get her to actually take a nap and tons of snuggling with Grandma. We were glad to be there for Schaun's Mom's birthday. The whole family got together and took her to dinner and we also had a family get-together at Schaun's brother's home. I made her favorite cake, black forrest. That'll be a separate post :) We took family pictures and Schaun got to visit the Ogden Temple with his sister, Shaylee. It was really fun to see Winnie with everyone. She LOVES being around people and Grandma has more toys than a little girl could ever want!