Home, almost.

We got into Salt Lake this evening. We knew we were home because the air told us so. It is cold here! My brother and his wife picked us up at the airport and even brought us dinner. How very nice of them.

I feel so blessed to have family members who are willing to sacrifice their time to help when help is needed.

Tonight I texted Ryan and told him that after being away for the past 5 days, I understand a little bit more how frustrating it must have been for him while he lived in New Jersey and he would call me and I would constantly tell him "I can't talk right now. Gotta get the kids dinner" or "Sorry honey, I can't hear you. Can we talk later?" or "Wait just a second. Sorry. Hold on one more time." or "Can we talk about this tomorrow? I'm so tired."

He said "And I can understand why you said that being a single parent sucked."

Yep.

We can both see things a little more clearly with each passing day.

And sometimes the progress is impressively fast. But most of the time it's slow. It comes in bits and pieces. Usually small bits. And small pieces.

We're learning that marriage is about learning to understand each other. About trying to see things from each others perspective. It's about giving your spouse the benefit of the doubt when they act in a way that you don't completely understand or agree with. It's about hanging in there while you learn and grow together and accepting that sometimes it takes years to figure out what works and what doesn't.

But as long as you're both trying. As long as your both willing to hang in there. ESPECIALLY when things are tough. Marriage can work. And it will work.

But it takes work. And work is hard.

Moving on.

I'm headed back to Idaho tomorrow. I'm not anxious to drive another 4 hours, but I'm excited to see Ryan and the kids. This is the longest I've been away.

Here are a few pictures of the Indian ruins we hiked to, dad and Tyson trying to clean the truck windows (note the frozen and broken window brushes) and the Monticello temple, in no particular order.