Last Days in Arizona

We're home from our trip to Arizona. Nathan did great on the plane rides, again. He kept fellow passengers giggling with his adorable laugh. And he greatly enjoyed watching his mommy and daddy sprint through the Atlanta airport because we only had 20 minutes to make our connection - which we did, with 5 minutes to spare! Miraculously, our luggage made it, too!

My parents flew out Sunday, so us siblings hung out Sunday night for dinner and met up with an old friend from seminary - who is the worship leader at their church (small world), then it was off to the Pheonix Zoo for their Christmas lights display. Monday we hung out with David before we flew home to SC. Here are the rest of our pictures from Sunday & Monday.

On the drive back to Pheonix we stopped to take a picture at a giant cactus.

Sunday night Mary, David, Jacob, Nathan & I went to the Pheonix Zoo for Zoolights. It was ok, we didn't see any animals for Nathan, so it was a bit disappointing. But it was a good night for the walking.

At Zoolights there was a giant talking giraffe. Too bad Nathan was too young to enjoy it. He was just excited to watch all the human animals at the zoo.

Nathan & I. He was all wrapped up with socks on his hands to keep warm.


We got to watch Jacob climb a wall in awesome time. It was cold, though, so his fingers weren't up for the palm tree climb. Nathan had fun watching his Daddy climb so high so quickly. Jacob did awesome - you would never have known how sick he had been that morning!


Sunday night we stayed in a hotel and Nathan thoroughly enjoyed being propped up with pillows, having full control of the remote to watch Mickey Mouse.


Monday morning we caught up with David - it was his day off. Mary had to work. He took us up to South Mountain; which is.... believe it or not... on the side end of Pheonix.

From the top of South Mountain, you could see the city is all it's hazy glory.

Nathan, sporting his sunglasses while he and his Daddy enjoyed the view.

All the way up South Mountain was nothing but gravel, a few trees and lots of saguara cacti. In fact thats what most of Pheonix seemed to be... lots of gravel, little grass, and lots of cacti and palm trees. It's definitely different than the east coast!

David took another picture of us with a saguaro. They are huge! I knew they were big... but had no idea they'd tower so high above us! With the help of google, I found out that it takes 10 years for one of these cacti to grow just 12 inches. And then another 30 years before they reach 10 feet and start to bloom. Arms don't even start to grow on the saguaro cactus until its at least 65-75 years old! And most cacti can live to be 100-200 years old! No wonder its a crime to damage or cut one down in Arizona. Only the woodpeckers can get away with it - they make homes in them that often other animals, birds and owls steal. If you look at the top of this cactus, you'll see a woodpecker hole, too. This cactus was only about 20 feet tall, but the average cactus is 30 feet tall and can soak up 200 gallons of water during a storm! How wild is that!

Our trip to Pheonix was a great vacation. It was wonderful to see family and we hope we get to see Aunt Mary & Uncle Dave before another year is up. They're doing great out in Arizona. It is a pretty area with such nice people. And from the looks of it, an area in need of solid Biblical churches - which is why Mary went out in the first place. To help plant a church. For our little family, though, Pheonix is a great place to visit and pray for. Check out Elevation Church's website and pray for their plant.