Gila Valley Temple Trip

We took a trip to Thatcher, Arizona on May 1st to go through the Gila Valley temple openhouse. It is a really beautiful temple, and I think our kids enjoyed it a lot. It was a 3 hour drive to get there, but it was an awesome experience for our family.

Afterwards, I wanted to get some pictures of the kids in front of the temple. Do you think I got the beautiful, perfect shot I was hoping for? Of course not. I think this one just might be the best one I got, because all three kids are actually visible in it. And no, I'm not really that bad of a photographer.

Here's the story--after walking through the temple, we went over to the chapel to have some cookies. I took Isaac to the bathroom, and handed him a paper towel after he washed his hands. Apparently that was a big mistake. He wanted to get his own paper towel, but I told him no because 1. He couldn't reach the paper towels and 2. I had already gotten him a perfectly acceptable paper towel. He actually flung himself down right there on the bathroom floor and refused to get up and leave the bathroom. I pretended to leave, and then he came. However, this mood continued for the next half hour.

We walked over to the temple grounds to take some pictures, and he would not look at the camera and just flung himself down on the grass and threw a fit. I even tried positioning him in front of the girls so I could take his picture in all of his fuming, temper-tantrum throwing glory, but he just crawled away before I could get a picture. Fun times. I was just glad he waited until our tour was over to act like that. Someone who saw him said, "Oh he's going to be out in 30 seconds on your drive home." Unfortunately, this was not true--he stayed awake the entire drive home. We put him in the back of the van by himself so his tantrum would be slightly less annoying to us, and also because he and Finley tend to fight when they sit next to each other. Curse our wretched DVD player that stopped working recently...Anyway, he did not sleep, but at least he stopped crying not long into the drive. Finley, bless her little heart, did wail and cry for a lot of the drive home. She finally fell asleep for her "nap" at around 6:30 when we were a mile from our freeway exit.

Anyway, on to the pictures I did get.

The girls were very cooperative.

I snapped a quick picture of Isaac when he sat up for a moment.

Which caused him to do this.

Me and Keith.

And we actually got one with the whole family!

Anyway, I can see us laughing about this years from now when we look at these pictures of a happy family and a scowling little boy. At least now we'll remember the backstory too.