A few months ago, I made hotel arrangements for our family to spend the week in St. George for Kenna's soccer tournament. The plan was to leave Thursday for St. George and spend the weekend through Monday watching McKenna's games. We planned to spend two nights at the Hilton and then two nights at the Marriott, to mix things up and because we had a Marriott card to cover those nights and Hilton points to cover the Hilton stay...so 4 free nights! Well, apparently, I messed up the reservation and instead of reserving the 17 & 18 of Feb in St George, I reserved the 17 & 18 of December...and because everyone was in St George that same weekend for soccer or baseball or the home show, there were no rooms available when G figured out my mix up and so we were in trouble. But, then come to find out that that same weekend was Kenna's jr high musical opening weekend, Fiddler on the Roof, that she was performing in...we had never put the two activities together and when we did, we realized we were in more trouble. The Saturday I figured both these things out was a pretty miserable day...and Garrett just smiled all day long!! (I've since bought a day planner and I'm keeping it with me everywhere I go and writing down everything, even if it's three months out.) No way could she perform Thurs, Fri and Saturday and be the keeper for her team in St George Fri and Saturday too. With help from her awesome play director we were able to make it all work and she was able to be in the play on Thrusday night, and make her games in St. George. We woke early Friday morning and drove to St. George for their first game at noon. They won 5-1 and then another game in the evening, under the lights at Snow Canyon high school, where they tied at 0. Friday was sunny and warm and beautiful. 
After her last game we ate dinner at IHOP and then drove four extremely tired kids to one of the only hotels we could find...the Quality Inn in Zion Park. Yep, we drove 30 minutes to the park for the night. It will definitely be a trip to remember with our cooler and homemade sandwiches! Garrett was such a trooper, pulling into our Zions Park hotel room late at night, hauling in all the kids, all our bags and our food and then crashing into bed for a quick night's sleep. Saturday morning we woke to pouring rain and freezing temperatures. Stopped at a local rock shop in Zions so the kids could pick out some rocks and I could buy a beautiful blue geode, then we headed to the game. 
The girls played Rampage's premier team and tied 1-1, then went into double overtime with no more goals so then into a shootout. McKenna played tough that whole game. She was knocked over three times by the same girl from the other team...Haylie, who is a friend of hers from school. Haylie received two yellow cards for the way she was playing. One yellow card for running into Kenna and blowing her over and another for knocking another girl down. We didn't find out until later that Haylie had broken a girls wrist in a game she had played the day before. Our parents on the sidelines were not happy with the coach and refs for not pulling her out...it got pretty ugly. Garrett and I just watched in awe. At one point, Kenna was knocked to the ground and had a hard time getting up...that was hard to watch, but G held me from running onto the field. She had to sit out a few minutes, but kept telling her coach, TJ, "I've got to get back in there and help my team!" TJ later texted me and told me she was the leader of the team the whole tournament, especially that game, and that he is so impressed with her determination to help her team win and build them up when they headed into the shootout. 
In the end they lost and it was devastating. Some of these pictures are so hard to see, yet I love them because they are filled with such raw emotion. I love that Garrett took the time while she was on the bench to counsel her and later at the end of the game he was so quick to get to her and let her know what an amazing job she had done...being a keeper is so tough and yet rewarding, too! She told me after one of her games that she loves making a tough save and then hearing the cheers that are just for her from the sideline...funny girl!Losing in the semi-finals meant Kenna's team didn't play on Monday, so we decided to leave Sunday night instead of Monday. The Talbots were in St. George to play for the weekend and invited us to go to church with them and then over to Ty's parent's vacation home for a yummy lunch. The kids were so excited to go to church with Kobe, Trey and Owen...even though we go to church with them every sunday something about being on vacation away from home makes everything better! Owen and Wyatt loved sitting on G's lap during sacrament meeting and Ty didn't feel one bit guilty about letting G take care of Owen because every Sunday he gets to sit up on the stand all by himself...so true!! We love Ty and Di! We loved visiting with Ty's brother, Cam and his sister, Jami, and her family, too.
