To St. George, With Love

Dear St. George,

We love you for your heat.

We love you for your Nelson's custards.

We love you for your Narrows.

We love you for having a Barnes and Noble where Coleman and Dad can go and look at books.

We love you for the time you give us to read books at the pool, on the deck, or in bed.

We love you for our friends, the Forests, who fed us curry and gyoza, for their runaway pug and happy smiles.

We love you for the mornings that we can sleep in.

We love you for the mornings we can get up early and run near Snow Canyon.

We love you for the breakfasts out on the lanai as we listen to the waterfall at the pool.

We love you for the card games my kids learned to play.

Our kids love you for endless TV and movie watching.

Steffani loves you for the almost guilt-free consumption of  M&Ms, trail mix, cookies, and Chex Mix.

We love you for your new yogurt place Krave where we can add all the toppings we want!

 We love you for your In n' Out Burger.

Even Dad ate with us.

 We love you for your sand dunes.

 Even if I did have to rip my shirt off to escape a pollinating bee.

 We love you for giving us bronze skin.

 And places to relax and think.

 And read.

 And talk.

And play ping pong.

 We love you for your interesting parks that twist and turn us

 and make us dizzy.

 We love you for your splash pad.

Even if we have to change our clothes right on main street to put on something dry.

We love you for the chance our kids have to go to church in a new ward and be so brave.

We especially love you when Coleman remembers his Sunday clothes

We love you for Sunday dinner spent with Uncle Kent teaching our boys about the right way to live.

.

We love you for your diving boards where we can learn to back dive, front dive, and have an olympic competition, even if Cy gets mad and only gives me a 2.9 for my awesome toe touch.

We love you for the fears we overcame.

We love you for the chance to go to Zions for the first time in our lives.

To see the three patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

We love you for amazing hikes that reminded us of Hawaii.

And squirrels who weren't afraid to be our best friends just for some snacks.

   

We love you for the river we were able to forge like pioneers, sans ice and snow.

We love you for the emerald green pools that weren't so emerald.

And for the fun run on the way back to the bus.
We love you for your golf.

Most of us love you for having Cars II in 3D, except for Steffani.  The glasses hurt her eyes and if Uncle Kent hadn't paid for it, she might have had a fit.

We don't love that our haystacks were sick down there or that we didn't have any paper.

But, really we love you--enough to stay 9 days with you every summer.  And we love Grandma and Grandpa Packer for sharing their condo with us so we can.

Love,

Us