It all adds up.

Toph is a hard worker. Really hard. He has his job, and then also a side job.

Once a year his side job holds a conference, and he usually attends, documents it for the website, then returns home. BUT this year, the conference was in SLC. He had to attend, and he happened to get a hotel room, with 2 queen beds. So, there was plenty of room for all of us, and we couldn’t help but come up and join him.

It was our first vacation with the 5 of us. And I have forgotten how hard it is to travel with a baby. Elliot had more stuff then the other 4 of us. 🙂

So while Papa was hard at work, we spent 3 days at the pool. Yep, that’s what I said. We ate and swam. Literally.

The moment we got there, Toph helped us get checked into the room, and then the boys changed into their suits, and off to the pool we went.

And we were water logged after that for the next few days.

We did take a few moments not in the pool to:
Eat at Trumans favorite restaurant, Olive Garden,

And we were reminded of a serious perk of Hotel staying: Sleeping in and watching cartoons on your bed in your jammies.

But mostly all we did was hang out at the pool, Toph would sneak in between sessions, say Hi, and take a few pics, here are a few of my favorite:

Elliot was a real champ. He slept in his stroller, and then I’d swim with boys. He’d wake up, I’d feed him, then he’d go for a little dip. I am still amazed by his easy going come what may attitude.

One day for lunch, I had my first real public ‘I am the mom of three very busy children’ moment. I know, it really should have come by now…but it hadn’t.
Toph had a break for lunch, and wanted to head to a restaurant that we thought was real close, we started to walk,

but after walking a few BIG blocks, the boys were tired, and Toph realized the restaurant was not where we thought it was.

The boys had been swimming and were already tired. This walk kind of did them in. So we skipped into the first restaurant that we saw. It happened to be a upscale burger place. We got seated, and soon realized there were no other children. In fact they didn’t really have a kids menu. And it was packed with business men in suits.
The kids were tired and hungry, so we decided just to stay there, rather than risk a breakdown.

We ordered our food quickly, and then to distract the children, Toph found some youtube videos on his Blackberry, which was nice.

We didn’t realize that they make the burgers fresh (which normally we would have loved), but it was a little bit longer than expected. So as soon as the food arrived, Toph ate very quickly, then had to race back to the conference.

It was then that the I am the mom of three children moment occurred. Now granted, my children were being very well behaved for the circumstances. They were tired. They were out of their normal surroundings. I was proud of them for the good children they were being. But they still were children, and not adult men in business suits. So we stuck out like a sore thumb, especially when we accidentally knocked our drinks over 4 times. And I had Elliot asleep in my arms, and was trying to take care of the mess with my one free arm. I noticed many people watching us and looking at us, and it was then that I realized, I AM SUPER OUTNUMBERED, and even with good behaved children, we were still making commotion, and making the noise that comes when children are having a good time.

As I walked back to the hotel with a child holding each hand and Elliot strapped to the front or me, I was grateful for that experience, and grateful for my three children. Often times I am an onlooker to others, who might feel like a mother surrounded by business men. At the restaurant I never felt really uncomfortable, or ashamed, but just different. It has been awhile since I have felt like that, and it was a good reminder to me that we are all different, but yet we are children of God. And being different is okay, if we are doing the things we should be doing.

So I have realized yet again, how the little moments in life add up to be the big moments, and hope I am making the most of the little ones.