What’s life in Utah Like?

I was reticent about moving my little people away from their lives in Dville, but this week my fears proved unfounded.  The little boys couldn’t be happier.  The pictures in this post mostly feature Jude because he is the guy getting the most out of our new digs.  Also Silas and I are in a little fight today because he’s been hissing at me. 

People always said that Utah is very family friendly and has tons of kid activities, but I didn’t know that the best way to get into them is with a guide, specifically an expert Hush-type guide.

But first stop was the super rad pirate pool with Anne.  Lazy river (and mothers) included.  Only one issue with this pool is there are too many beautiful people there.  Why is there an over abundance of beautiful people in Utah?  I want to punch these skinny blonde girls in the face.  Why do they produce so much rage in me?  I have issues.  Moving on.

Last weekend was Gay Pride!  If that isn’t a good transitional activity into conservative Utah I don’t know what is.  All the freaks were out and we felt right at home.  Thankfully they had a few hours that were family friendly and not over-sexualized like Gay events frequently are.  Jude and Silas had their hair spray painted. 

Hush taught the boys to play hacky sack and now they can’t stop kicking it around.  They’re terrible but at least they’re close to the ground to pick it up. 

Apparently we’re hikers now.  We hike places.  Turns out hiking is just walking uphill in the dirt.  Why does it get a special name?  This hike was up Immigration Donner Cottonwood McParley This is the Place.  Or something like that.  Perfect length hike for the kids with a big marker statue at the top. 

There was a second incident at the top of this hike.  I tend to have incidents in Utah, the first being in church a few weeks ago where I was shushed because some dude who was late to church thought I was not giving him sufficient quiet to think about Jesus.  I told him that that was my first day at an LDS church and how surprised I was at his condescension, and do they treat all investigators that way.  This time the incident involved me teaching Jude how to do some rock climbing holds on the base of some nondescript marker.  I was then accosted by a nasty older dude who got on my case saying we were “desecrating” the landmark.  I bit my tongue, but was very hesitant to obey some big jerk guy who was obviously targeting me because I look abnormal.  Even when people don’t say exactly that I can always tell if that is what’s motivating their irritation with me.  Anyway, Hush made peace and I didn’t have to knock out an old dude.

Hats.  The boys have adopted newsies hats and it makes me love them more.  They’re the same size right now and I dress them as alike as possible.  People ask me every day if they’re twins and I tell them no, but they feel like they are and I like getting credit for having twins.  I’ve started to feed Jude a little bit less and Silas a little bit more to keep them the same size.  Just kidding.

 

 

Our friends out here have motorcycles.  This is the only time my children will ever be allowed near motorcycles.  Learning to ride is on my to-do list this year, for no other reason than to say that I know how to ride a motorcycle.  I don’t want one.  Too dykey.

 

SHAVE ICE.  So it turns out Utah might have more to offer us than originally expected.  Not only do they have shave ice, they have the REAL KIND not just lame snow-cone flavors.  AND they know what SNOWCAPS are!  Shave ice isn’t shave ice without sweetened condensed milk.  Last night Hush and I took a walk in the evening to the shave ice place down my street.  There is shave ice within walking distance to my house.  The weather was lovely and the shave ice cheap (because Utah is a foreign country with foreign exchange rates rendering everything pretty much free).  Dare I say it felt like an evening in Hawaii.  Fragrant flowers, warm breeze, shave ice, flip flops, sunset, and a hammock.  I’m trying not to love it here but secretly I do and I feel like a big fat traitor to California.

Next fabulous element of life?  Music.  Specifically, guitar.  Want to know what my life is like these days?  Think laying on your back singing ‘Wish You Were Here’ and the Grateful Dead.  Turns out we have adopted a juke-box!  I had no idea Hush could play guitar, not only play but play well and just about anything I demand.  I love unexpected talent.  Hush holds the chords and lets the boys play.  And I die of the adorableness.

 

Next activity?  Baseball! Hush scored free tickets and we went to the Salt Lake Bees game, except my children don’t understand that baseball is anything but the Giants.  Baseball = Giants, thus they called the team the Giant Bees.  It was the first time that Jude was really engaged in the game and I sat there and taught him all of the rules.  Val would be proud.  He was into it for a few innings, and then the real reason to go to baseball manifested itself:  food.  There was a lot of action being that it was minor league, but both team had problems keeping the ball on the field.  Dummies.

And now for the main event.  The feature of Utah we’ve been enjoying most is rock climbing. 

I learned to rock climb as a teenager at my hippie school.  My older brother and Ellie and I were pretty into it, but I hadn’t been in a long time and I’d forgotten how much I enjoy climbing.  Climbing is like dancing – it’s hard and graceful and I love watching talented people do it so much better than I ever could.  Hush I’d put in the professional category.  If you own your own ropes and look like this because of climbing you’re professional in my book.

 

 

(Yes, that was gratuitous and you like it.)

Anywayz, Hush and I feel sufficiently confident in our abilities to feel like the kids are safe climbing, but we didn’t know what they would think about it.

First we started at the climbing gym.

 

They were scared at the beginning, but then I watched as the climbing fever took over Judejude.  He screams and yells in frustration sometimes as he climbs, but he pushes himself and he’s actually pretty good.  He understands how to hug the wall and match his feet and use his legs to jump off.  Silas can’t figure it out yet, but he tries and enjoys hanging out.

So we took the boys outside for a real climb.  Jude got his own little harness.  And up he went.

Belaying my little kids is one of the best experiences of my life.  I’m militant about it of course and err on the side of hefting them up the rock by keeping the belay so tight.  With Silas I actually yank him up because he prefers to be lifted, lazy kid.

 

So we thought that Judejude would just climb a bit overhead and get frustrated.  But he just.kept.going.

 

You can see there’s a bit of a vertical overhang right above Cubby in this pic, but he just climbed right up it like a little spider monkey.

I went up the trail by the rock to try to talk him into giving up and coming down, but he wouldn’t.  It was scary high for me, not being on a rope. But check Jude out in this video.  He looks at me, looks at the ground, and keeps going up.

 

Climbing, baseball games, shave ice, playing music, hikes, killer pools, hacky sack and a bunch of other fun things.  Yeah, I’d say Utah is kind of growing on me.