Lena's Birthday and the Arizona Recap

I have two weeks to catch up on, and one of them includes our Arizona vacation, so I hope you're comfy. Settle in for the long haul.

1. Last Monday was Lena's 10th birthday. It worked out that the kids had the day off of school for a teacher work day, so we were able to spend some quality time together before the big vacay. She got the traditional breakfast in bed of cinnamon rolls and one present.

She really wanted heely-s for Christmas, but I didn't find a good deal on them until the beginning of January. One perk of a January birthday I guess!

Levi made sure that Stella got in on the birthday action

Later that day, she and I got pedicures. I was astounded by how expensive it was. And the guy who did my toes totally "salon shamed" me the whole time. He kept showing me all the ingrown toenails he removed and made a big deal about how much dead skin he scrubbed off my feet. Eventually he said, "How often you get pedicures?" I told him "very rarely" and he responded, "Ah, that make sense." Dude. I'm not paying you to tell me how gross my feet are.

Finally, once Justin got home from work, she got to open the rest of her presents and we got to go to KFC for dinner.

Two whole hands!

That night, we dropped the kids off at my parents' to spend the night. I was very nervous about how Lena would do with the separation, but she did totally fine. Sometimes her anxiety doesn't make any sense to me (which I realize is the nature of anxiety). She wails and clings to me when I leave for a two hour Bible study 10 minutes from our house, but she barely bats an eyelash when I leave her for five days to fly 2,000 miles away? Regardless, I was very relieved. Of course, my anxiety kicked in as we drove away. I knew it would. I hate flying and I'm always nervous when we leave our kids.

Here comes the Arizona recap. It's going to be very long, because I'm going to include all the details. Some of them have already been on facebook, so feel free to skim or skip altogether!

2. We went home Monday night after dropping off the kids, took some melatonin, and went straight to bed. I was surprised that I actually fell asleep fairly quickly (we went to bed at 9:00, when I usually go to sleep between 11 and midnight). My alarm went off at 3:30 the next morning and my wonderful nephew Tayton picked us up at 4:00 to bring us to the airport. (He goes to work pretty early, so it wasn't too much of a stretch for him to pick us up that early, but he still gets the "nephew of the year" award!) Our airport is very small, so it was a breeze getting through security. We grabbed some expensive breakfast sandwiches, popped some xanax, and waited to board.

Once we boarded we had to wait forever for the plane to get de-iced and cleared for take-off. Our first flight was just to Chicago. I think it was technically 46 minutes, but it felt shorter. We were definitely in the air for a shorter period of time than we were sitting on the runway waiting to take off. I felt like as soon as we reached altitude and leveled off, the pilot was announcing that we were about to descend! Haha.

We had an hour layover in Chicago, so I wasn't stressed about making it to our gate even though it was on the complete opposite side of Midway. I had forgotten that Southwest starts boarding half an hour before take off, since seats are first come first served. It worked out, though. We made it to the gate just in time to board our second flight. This time we didn't have to de-ice, so we took off almost immediately. Again, the flight was fine. The worst part for me is the claustrophobia. I was squished between Justin and a stranger and just could not get comfortable during the whole 3.5 hour flight. It's torture on my back, and I've been having trouble with my knee lately too. I really need to be able to stretch it out. I dozed a little bit (thanks to waking up at 3:30 in the morning!), but mostly counted down the minutes until I could get off the darn plane.

Thanks to our early flight and the time difference, we landed in Arizona at 10:10 a.m. and had the whole day ahead of us! Temps were only in the 40s when we landed, but the sun was shining and there wasn't a cloud in the sky!

The Phoenix airport was huge, and it took us a while to find our luggage. Then we had to ride a miles-long shuttle just to make it to the rental car counter. I had reserved the lowest tier "economy" car online ahead of time, and Justin casually mentioned, "I hope we get an upgrade." There was literally one little Chevy spark in the lot when we went to pick it up. As we were standing there, a Hertz employee pulled in with a 2022 Dodge Challenger and said, "you guys can take this one. We don't have many options and I'm feeling generous today!" It had 2,000 miles on it! That day was Justin's actual birthday, and that was a pretty great birthday present. He had so much fun driving it all week.

We couldn't check into our hotel until 3:00, but we knew we wanted to check out the Desert Botanical Garden and it was close to the airport, so we headed straight there.

Amazing scenery from the get-go!

Our plan was to stop at a restaurant for lunch on the way there, but it was closer than we expected and all highway. Haha. The exit literally took us straight to the Garden. There was a restaurant on-site, but we didn't really plan on spending that kind of money on lunch right off the bat. We were so starving, though, we gave in and ate there anyway. Haha.

Fortunately, they were offering a couple lunch specials that were cheaper than the menu prices, so we got those. They were very good. And they had Dr Pepper! I broke my three week fast with relish.

Some kind of chicken caesar wrap

Pulled pork and coleslaw

Finally, we set off to explore. The Desert Botanical Garden reminded me of Frederick Meijer Gardens, only bigger, and all outside. I was amazed by how many different varieties of cactus there are!

I was a little chilly at first, but once we got walking around I warmed up. And the temperature rose over the couple of hours we were there, too. It was comfortable by the time we left.

Some of the cacti had styrofoam cups on them like this, but not all of them. Temps dipped around freezing overnight all week, so I'm guessing this was to protect the most vulnerable species?

We climbed up a big hill to get a view of the surrounding mountains.

We were already enjoying the perks of vacationing without kids: expensive meal made less expensive by only two of us eating, we were able to leisurely stroll through the gardens at our own pace, and we read every informational sign we saw about the plants, the early desert dwellers, and the garden's conservation efforts!

After a few hours of walking, my back and feet were done, so we decided to head to the hotel. It was nothing fancy - just a La Quinta on the south side of Phoenix . . . side note: did you know Phoenix is the 5th largest city in the U.S.? I had no idea! I spent a lot of time studying the map and getting familiar with the subdivisions. Our hotel was in Chandler, near Tempe, in case you care. 😂 We were surprised that the highway near our hotel had 7 lanes!

We rested at the hotel for a little while, then found a nearby Red Robin so Justin could get his free birthday burger. Finally, it was back to the hotel to make plans for Tuesday.

3. Our main reason for choosing Arizona for this trip was so Justin could see the Grand Canyon. Tuesday night at the hotel, we consulted the weather and tossed around the idea of waiting a couple days until it was forecasted to be marginally warmer (high of 37 instead of 32). But ultimately, we decided not to put off what we came for and risk there being a freak snowstorm/closure or getting sick or missing it for any random reason. We also tossed around the idea of getting there to see the sun rise, but that would've meant leaving our hotel at 3:30 a.m., and we didn't relish the idea of another pre-dawn wake up call. Instead, we decided to leave the hotel at 6:00, so we could get to the park by 10. We did get to see the sun rise over the mountains as we drove out of Phoenix. Neither of us quite realized how surrounded the city is by mountains. It truly is a valley.

There were so many cool elevation changes and different kinds of scenery on our drive between Phoenix and the Grand Canyon

Truth be told, I didn't do a ton of research ahead of time when I booked this trip. I knew the Grand Canyon was in Arizona. I knew it was open year-round. I figured it was in the desert, which meant it would always be warm-ish. I knew that the only major airports in AZ are in Phoenix, and I wanted to stay close to the airport. So I figured we'd just make a day trip of the Grand Canyon one of the days we were there. As our vacation got closer, I started to watch the weather in both Phoenix and the Grand Canyon, though, and I realized there was quite a disparity. Who knew the GC gets so much snow? Or gets so cold?! I do now. Lol. The weather forecast was very unpredictable, changing every day, so we hadn't decided ahead of time which day we would go to the GC. If I were to do it again, I would have chosen a hotel closer to the GC - even part way between Phoenix and the canyon. It's a solid 4 hour drive from the south side of Phoenix to the Grand Canyon . . . which means we spent 8 hours in the car round trip that day! I also probably would've waited til March or April if I had it to do again. As we left Phoenix and gained higher and higher elevation, we watched the temperature fall lower and lower.

I was also shocked by the amount of snow some of these mountain towns had. Apparently Flagstaff had gotten dumped on the week before we got there. They had more than we'd left behind in Michigan!

Doesn't this pic make you think of Radiator Springs from the Cars movies? 😂

It was 18 degrees in the park when we arrived at 9:30 (we couldn't sleep, so left the hotel earlier than we planned).

The sun shone brilliantly all day, and walking kept us warm, so it wasn't unbearable by any means, but the snow was a nuisance at times, and it would have been nice to forego the hats, gloves, scarves, and layers.

I had done some research ahead of time on the best way to see the Grand Canyon, but there are so many options and suggestions that it was a bit overwhelming. I knew that we wanted to park at the visitor center (a perk of going in the winter, the lots were mostly empty when we got there - apparently in the summer, the lots fill up and you're out of luck), and that we could immediately see views from Mather Point right off the parking lot. So that's what we did, and the views did not disappoint.

From there, though, we were stumped. I knew that I couldn't physically handle a lot of hiking. But we wanted to see as much as possible, and we wanted to hike some. We started off randomly hiking along the South Rim trail just to see where it took us, but then we decided to go back to the visitor center (where we'd parked) to get a better lay of the land and make a plan. Again, there were so many options: you can drive your own car along the South Rim, but the roads were icy and the Challenger was not made for snow. Plus, I didn't spring for the $35 a day insurance, so we decided not to risk it. Haha. You can also take the free shuttle buses to the various lookout points, but we did want to hike a little and see more than just the lookout points. Finally, we decided to just hop on a bus at the visitor center and see where it took us.

Again, I can't imagine how packed these things must be in the summer. They were almost empty while we were there, and I had room to rest my aching feet on a seat in front of me!

We ended up at the Grand Canyon Village. This is where the first tourist attractions were built and it was amazing to see the old hotels and lodges and lookouts that people built a hundred years ago. It boggles my mind to think of the difficulties they must have encountered building on a ledge of a canyon without today's modern technologies. I just kept thinking, "Why? Why would you ever take the risks?" Haha. I'm obviously no pioneer. The bus dropped us off at the railroad depot, and we walked to the rim to take in some more incredible views.

We walked the length of the tourist village, which ends at a trailhead. Justin decided to hike down the trailhead just a little ways, while I waited at the top for him. There were lots of signs declaring "paths are snow-packed and icy. Foot traction strongly advised!" Neither of us had foot traction. In fact, I was just wearing tennis shoes, but Justin was at least wearing hiking boots, and as a Michigander, he felt confident in his ability to walk on a snowy path. Haha.

Justin took this picture on the path.

I took this picture from above of him on the path.

This is a bad picture, but the blob of black at the bottom of the picture, just above the snow is Justin walking on the path just below me. Can you see how sharply it drops off to the side of his walkway??

That is the thing that stuck out to me the most about the Grand Canyon: how few guard rails there are. Haha. I can't believe this national park trusts people not to plunge to their deaths! I definitely couldn't have handled having the kids with me. They're always pushing and shoving and messing around. One wrong move, and they'd be hurtling over the side of a cliff faster than they could say, "Stop touching me!" It was even worse because of the snow, I think. Along the rim where we walked in Grand Canyon village, there are stone walls. But because the snow was packed so high, the walls only came to my shins!

After Justin was done with his mini-hike, we checked out the Hopi house. Apparently Native Americans were short!

By this time, it was 1:00 and my feet/back/legs were killing me, so we decided to get lunch. We didn't want to spend a lot, so we chose a "food court" in one of the lodges. The food was not very good, so we got what we paid for. Lol.

Then, it was back on the shuttle to make the rest of the available stops. There's a whole section of the South Rim that the shuttle doesn't run during the winter (Hermit Road). That's another reason we should've waited to go 'til March. I feel like we missed a lot by not being able to see that. But we enjoyed the Yavapai Point and Geology Museum. It's another one of those engineering feats of a building built into a cliff with incredible views.

On the way to the East end of the park we saw some wild elk!

We saw pretty much everything there was to see without hiking down into the canyon by 4:30, but we wanted to stay and watch the sun set, so we sat in the car for a while. Around 5, we got out to scope out a good sun-setting location, only to realize that because it was winter, the sun set almost due south of the canyon, which wouldn't give us any cool views. Haha. So once again, we got back on the road and enjoyed the sun setting on our drive back to the hotel.

It was a long drive in mostly darkness. I'm so thankful that Justin is comfortable driving long distances in unfamiliar places. I slept a lot both on the way to the Grand Canyon, and on the way home. But we also listened to some of an audio book together, listened to a lot of country music, and sang along with old school CCM and some current worship music. Again, it was nice to travel without kids. We enjoyed each other's company and didn't have to deal with cranky kids (just cranky me!) We got Chick-fil-a in Flagstaff and made it back to the hotel around 10.

4. On Thursday, we decided to drive east a little ways to Canyon Lake. There was a brochure at the hotel for a steamboat tour and Justin had read that Canyon Lake is good for bass fishing. We ate breakfast at the hotel, then took our time driving out to Apache Junction. It was kind of a dumpy little town at the foot of Superstition Mountain. That morning, when I opened the shades to another day of glorious sunshine, I wondered why my ancestors ever chose to settle in stupid sun-less Michigan. Everything we'd seen of Arizona so far had been picturesque and beautiful. But Apache Junction was a good example of desert life. Even the residential areas were desolate and depressing looking. Everything is brown - the houses, the yards, the trees. There's no grass anywhere. Most people actually had cacti in their yards - I bet their kids learn quickly not to mess with those! Haha. We stopped at Wal-Mart to get Justin a cheap fishing pole. We'd been driving for a while and both had to use the bathroom, but they were closed for cleaning. We had planned on getting lunch next anyway, so we weren't worried. We went to Arby's and were shocked to see that they didn't even have a public restroom. Justin ran next door to McDonald's only to discover the same phenomenon! I don't know if they have a homelessness problem or what, but I've never known a fast food restaurant not to have public restrooms!

Finally, we headed up the mountains to get to Canyon Lake. I was totally unprepared for the kind of drive it would be. Haha. Let's just say Justin was loving that sports car, and I was grateful I don't get carsick! There were so many switchbacks and cliffs and again, an alarming lack of guard rails! It sure was beautiful, though.

We had to go over two of these one-lane bridges, where you just hope no one else is coming!

We got to the steamboat tour an hour before it departed, and the place was totally empty. I was a little worried that I got scammed by paying for the tickets in advance online! Haha. We walked around for a little bit, then I sat in the car enjoying the sunshine while Justin found some shoreline to fish off of while we waited.

After about half an hour people started showing up, and the boat pulled in.

It was a fun little tour with lots of great scenery.

It was windy and chilly that day, though, so I took most of my pictures from inside - hence the glass glare.

We stopped off at a little park where Justin fished for a little while, but we were both a little nervous because he was doing it illegally. Haha. All the parks on Canyon Lake were clearly marked with signs mandating that your vehicle have a park pass - which ours did not. Plus, he intended just to buy his fishing license online, but we had zero service in the mountains so he was never able to. Fortunately we never got busted, and he did buy a license once we got out of the mountains, so he was retro-actively legal.

We wound back down the mountain around 5:00 and decided to go check out Scottsdale. I had read that they have a super cute little historical section with gift shops and restaurants and such, so we headed that way.

Oranges growing in someone's yard in Scottsdale!

Cute little tourist town.

I had been wanting to get some authentic Mexican food since we were relatively close to the Mexican border. We found a restaurant in Scottsdale that fit the bill (I think? I guess I don't know how to judge how authentically ethnic food is. Lol.) Justin and I split 6 tacos so we could try a bunch of different kinds. Of course the steak ones were the best. Haha. #expensivetaste

Then we walked down the street to this cute ice cream parlor inspired by the ice cream shop in the Family Circus cartoon strip.

5. Friday was our last full day and we decided to check out Phoenix itself. I had looked up scenic drives/views in the area and saw that Dobbins Lookout had gotten good reviews, so we drove out there first. Again, I did not realize what I was getting myself into. The drive up the mountain was way worse than the drive to Canyon Lake the day before. I had serious anxiety the whole way up and couldn't even enjoy the view. I didn't let Justin enjoy the view either because I was constantly telling him, "Keep your eyes on the road! Don't look over the edge!" I'm a real joy. Lol. I was so relieved to make it to the top, but immediately dreading the drive down. Fortunately, I had my xanax with me in the car, though, so I took one at the top while we took in the view.

Justin is not afraid of heights at all, and perching on cliffs like this doesn't bother him in the least. Freak of nature.

I wanted to give my xanax plenty of time to start working and Justin wanted to check out a trail that went down the side of the mountain we had just driven up, so I found a spot to lay in the sun while he took off down the trail.

The xanax did its job and the drive down the mountain was much less scary!

We wanted to have another cheap lunch, so we tried a restaurant that we don't have in Michigan: Raising Cane's. The sign said "chicken strips" on it, but we figured it would have other stuff. We were so surprised to see that's literally all they serve! You can choose 4 strips, 6 strips, 8 strips, or a sandwich - which is just strips on a bun. All the meals came with Texas Toast and coleslaw. And when I asked for ranch to dip my strips in, the cashier looked puzzled. She responded, "Um, we only have Raising Cane sauce or ketchup." I guess it's a niche market! Fortunately, the strips and the sauce were good!

We spent the afternoon driving around to different parks in Phoenix looking for places for Justin to fish. We saw some of the seedier sides of the city, including a two block section of scrapyards. I've never seen so many smashed cars! Despite the Internet's assertion that Phoenix is a "fishing forward community," Justin was not impressed with the man-made lakes artificially stocked with fish. Who would've thought desert fishing isn't that great? Haha. I enjoyed reading my book and napping in the car.

We finished the day at Papago Park because I'd read there was this formation called The Hole in the Rock that was an easy climb with a great view of the sunset.

I was a little nervous about hiking up to the hole, but on the way I saw two women with babies strapped to their chests, multiple children and old people, women wearing heels, and one pregnant woman, so I figured I could do it. Haha. It was super easy. There are steps and it's not much of a climb at all.

When the sun finally dipped behind the mountain everyone in the cave cheered like they'd never seen a sunset before! Haha.

That night we decided to get Mexican food again since the night before was so good. It was a Friday night at 6:00, so we were worried there'd be a long wait, but we found a place near our hotel called The Sandbar that seated us right away. Phoenix is a city of retirees and college students, so 6:00 ended up being perfect timing. The retirees had already eaten and left, and the college kids hadn't shown up yet! We decided to go all out for our last night. We ordered an appetizer: the best guacamole and queso I've ever had. And I ordered an alcoholic drink for the first time in my life. I got a frozen strawberry margarita, which I've never had. It nearly killed me to pay $10 for a drink - especially because it was gross! Lol. I would've preferred about 50% less alcohol and double the strawberry.

Obviously not a college student anymore. Actually, probably closer in age to those retirees . . .

Southwest burger with that amazing guacamole on it

Steak fajitas

6. On Saturday we had to return the rental car by 11:00 a.m., so we slept in, had breakfast at the hotel, then packed up and headed out.

This was only my second time ever renting a car, and apparently I'd never looked at the return paperwork before. I was so shocked by this:

We flew out of a different airport on our way home than the one we came to Phoenix through. This one was much smaller. I think it's even smaller than the GR airport. I was so surprised to arrive at our gate to see this:

That was our plane - just parked right outside the door!

We had one last lunch in the airport where I downed my last Dr Pepper.

While we were waiting to board, an announcement came over the speakers that GR was experiencing inclement weather that may cause flight delays or cancellations. At this point, we'd already returned our car and checked our luggage, so I was preparing myself to live in this tiny airport for a while until another flight became available. But fortunately there were no issues. We walked up a ramp to get on our plane in gorgeous weather:

I had taken my xanax again, but this flight was harder on me for some reason. The plane was definitely smaller, so my claustrophobia was at an all time high. And I overdid it with the Dr Pepper in the airport, so I had to pee about five minutes after take off. Of course, you're not allowed out of your seat until you reach elevation and as soon as that happened they came around with the drink cart, so I was practically bursting by the time I made it to the bathroom. I've never used an airplane bathroom before because I'm so claustrophobic, but I had to pee so bad, I didn't even care! Fortunately, the entire row next to ours was empty, so I moved over there and stretched out for the rest of the flight. We caught a good tail wind and had a straight flight, so we were only in the air for 2.5 hours.

We flew over so many of these "crop circles." Anyone know what they actually are?

Finally, we landed in this:

My wonderful mom picked us up in the blizzard, and 2/3 of our kids were happy to see us! (The third was happier than she let on.) It was a long drive home because the roads were terrible, but we arrived to this:

It was seriously such a great trip. It was so nice to get away without the kids, but to know that they were being well taken care of. I didn't worry about them at all. I can see now why people love to travel. We go to Florida every year, but we don't sightsee. I loved finding different places to go every day. I loved eating out for every meal and never got sick of it. Justin said the bed in our hotel was the most comfortable hotel bed he's ever slept on (it was too soft for me). I loved the break from our regular life. And traveling as a couple is so much cheaper than traveling as a family! Haha. (Duh!) It's amazing how much cheaper it is to fly with two people than with five, and it makes me want to do it again and again! Haha. Our 20th anniversary is in two years, so we'll probably wait until then to do a "parents-only" vacation again, but I may have been bitten by the travel bug.

7. Coming home has honestly been hard. Of course it was good to see the kids, but I really don't do well with winter weather, and I'm starting to wonder about my decision to completely wean off the Zoloft. The past week has been pretty bad. I've been very depressed, irrationally irritable and angry (aka rage monster), constantly exhausted, weepy, and despairing. I'm trying not to make any medication decisions right away because it could be the perfect storm of a variety of factors: vacation withdrawal, Zoloft withdrawal, the weather, or PMS. TMI, but this is my first cycle without the aid of Zoloft in over 10 years. I don't know if this is what PMS will always be like for me now or if it's just an adjustment period. I'm going to try and give it a couple more months before I decide whether or not to go back on it. But you might have to bear with (or steer clear of) me in the meantime.

If you read this far, thank you, and I'm sorry. Here are a few memes as a reward: