Casper Travel Diary (lolz)

Over Labor Day weekend my parents and brother + sis-in-law came up to visit! You guys, our masterplan worked. We made it back west after 4 years away and now we are seeing family approximately 800% more often than we used to. My brother Jordan will be coming up this weekend, so that means that literally everyone in my entire family drove up to visit in a one-month period. (Besides Timbo on his mish. If you're out there, hey Timbo!) It's been so great. Casper isn't exactly a world-class tourist destination so it means a lot that they'd come up to see lil' old us and our new home. And someday we'll have a real bed (read: real futon) in our guest bedroom so all y'all won't have to sleep on our camping mattress anymore! Now Casper just needs to up their airport game so we can see Jared's family more often too! 

My parents arrived late Friday night. Jack and I were supposed to meet them at Martin's Cove & Independence Rock on their way up, but Jack spent the night before puking some really scary pukes so we stayed home. He's always had reflux, but this was like stinky barf-up-a-gallon-and-soak-all-the-bedding pukes. So between that and the exhaustion from being up with him all night, we opted to stay home and rest/prepare the house some more for guests coming. Plus a million loads of laundry. It's true what they say about doing 10x more laundry once you have a baby. Luckily he seemed back to normal by afternoon.

When they arrived I had just finished picking up Jared from work so we snagged a Sam's Club rotisserie chicken and salad on the way home for a fast and healthy dinner. We ate, got Jack down to bed, and then watched Peter Rabbit on Netflix. It exceeded expectations. The next morning we planted a couple trees and grasses in our front yard. Yay landscaping! Jack just sat on the grass and watched. Kiddo loves being outside.

When Chris and Caitlin sent word that they were passing Rawlins, we changed into our swimming suits and headed to Alcova Lake to meet them for some beach time. Alcova's a pretty lake about 40 minutes outside of Casper. It's tucked into some cliffs and has a white, sandy beach. The water is always cold and it was a windy day (pretty standard around these parts), but we enjoyed making sandcastles and floating on our inflatable rafts! We also enjoyed Jack's beach bod in his cute swim shorts.

I'm glad everyone humored me in coming to this beach. I really wanted to do it before the end of summer and this was our best chance at making it happen. Also, ONE MILLION THANKS to Chris and Caitlin for driving our nEw CaR up to Casper for us. It's actually a 20-year-old Honda that used to be my grandma's that we bought off my younger brother. We have never had a second car in 5 years of marriage. This has been a serious game changer.

Don't let the smiley pics fool you. He was ultra grumps by about an hour into this outing and he screamed the whole way home. That child came to earth with a set of lungs (the very first thing the nurses said before handing him to me for the first time).

Strolling around our apartment in his Sunday best! This kid eats a TON but I guess he's probably just extra hungry from burning calories walking around in this thing all day. 

We stopped at the National Historic Trails Center on our way to church. It's a really cool free museum with sections on Wyoming's Native Tribes, the Oregan Trail Pioneers, the Mormon Pioneers, and the California Gold Rush Pioneers. Being from Utah I usually think of the "pioneers" as being all the Mormon pioneers crossing the plains to Utah, but there were sooooo many more pioneers going to other places too, and all of their trails intersected in Casper. I'm not much of a museum junkie, but this one was really well done.

Escaped church to feed this grumpy gus in the car and grab his binky, but then he was like, "Psych! Me so happy! Let's photoshoot?" Typical Jack. He knows when he's punking us, and it happens on a daily basis.

Monday was a bit chaotic. I knew everyone would be leaving in the afternoon so I wanted to cram in all the last quintessential Casper things, but most of my plans fell through. Jared was finishing up a 28-hour shift at the hospital (YES 28 HOURS), so we met him there when he was supposed to be done so he could give us a hospital tour and join us for the rest of our activities. But when we got there he just had time for a short break and then needed to do several more discharges. He gave us a mini tour and then went back to work. We drove to main street so I could show them the cute cowboy shops and old-fashioned soda shops, but literally EVERYTHING was closed for Labor Day. Should've seen that coming. So then we drove up to Casper Mounatin to see the waterfall. This is the #1 "outdoorsy" thing to do in Casper, but it's a bit underwhelming in my opinion. I guess I'm a waterfall snob? Hey, at least we have a good mountain here!

At this point we were all pretty tired, but Jared finished his shift and we met him at the hospital so he could use his meal card to buy us lunch. The hospital cafeteria actually has a really good grill.

Jack was all about the pickles and red onions. He didn't eat them, but he was sucking on them pretty aggressively the whole time. After this it was time to go home and say goodbye to everyone. That was a toughie. It's always hard when family leaves, but I have to say, it's a little less hard knowing they're a 6-hour drive away than it was when we lived in the middle of the Caribbean sea, or when we lived 29 hours away in Georgia. I was expecting our move to Casper to be a difficult adjustment, but we really felt at home almost instantly. Having family just one state away helps with that. Until Thanksgiving!