Eating Cactus with Max

 Max drove all the way down from Provo to meet us over Memorial Day weekend! He brought his girlfriend, Morgan, our friend Jason Richards from McLean, and another friend named Emily. I appreciated being able to plan some activities with Morgan since Max is incapable of spending more than 2 minutes making any form of plan. It is part of his spontaneous charm.

The thing that I was most excited about was trying some barrel cactus fruit. I have been wondering if the mini pineapple looking fruits were edible for years, so I finally looked it up. They are edible! They taste like cross between citrus and bell peppers. The ones we ate were a little dry, but that might be because it is late in the harvest season for them. We ended up putting a few of them into our tuna/egg salad for sandwiches the second day.

"may I offer you some fresh picked cactus fruit?"

Morgan was not a fan

Annie is always happy to munch on anything

They have tons of black seeds inside that the internet says are edible

Max feeling fly with a cactus

Annie insisted on carrying this stick back. And not being carried.

Good thing she has pals that don't mind going slow

 We also took them to the Desert Museum. This place is always a hit. The best part was definitely the Packrat Playhouse. All of us went up in the big net crawling area and had a generally good time. We eventually had to leave to get Annie down for her nap, but the guys stayed to attempt to go bouldering. Their report was that it was too hot, and the boulders were too advanced for them to climb with no equipment. 

Max hoisting up Elliot to smell the creosote

Annie and Morgan were always fighting over who got to hold Max's hand

Classic saguaro pose

Don't ask

We went to Reid Park after the Max Mandated lunch at El Guero Canelo. We explored the Rose Garden more than we have in the past. 

I always love having Max around, and not just for all the great massages he gives. It was fun having his friends around too. Annie and Elliot were in heaven with all the attention. Jason and Max subbed in Annie's nursery class with Aaron on Sunday. We'll call that devotion to the little sweet pea instead of a desire to skip Elder's Quorum. 

Look at these guys reading books to my kids