The end of June

Ken put the sprinkler on a little dead part of the lawn and Isaac found it.  Yea for water.  He didn’t even care that it was spraying him right in the face.  He was in heaven.  Neil joined him not too long later….but he didn’t like the spray in the face at all.This year we celebrated the first day of summer with an ice cream party.  Rachel helped us and it was a lot of fun  to put together.  We made fancy invitation to pass out and had 15 or so toppings to put on your ice cream including homemade salted caramel and hot fudge.  Mark set up a table for the kids to make paper airplanes so they would have something fun to do while the adults talked, we had Hobbes Ball and Bocce Ball and homemade chalk to draw with too.  I didn’t get any pictures with friends, but Ken took a couple of the backyard all set up.  Definitely a tradition I hope we keep up….so plan on it next year :-)!Jessie’s so creative.  She drew up the sign and took Spencer’s picture on a fun camera setting, color select.

We joined the Albertson’s for a picnic and hike for FHE up at Bridal Veil.  The evening turned chilly for a bit and then warmed back up much to the excitement of everyone in shorts.  It was a fun evening.Rachel and Neil picked up all the fish food they could find in the cracks on the bridge while Quinn and the kids climbed around over by the waterfall.  We came back home and had Strawberry Angel Food Cake dessert.  Yummy!

The next week Quinn and Sister Albertson joined us on going up to Cascade Springs, another bucket list checkmark.  On the drive up there we had to stop and wait for the forestry service who was cutting down a tree that had fallen partly over the road.  The kids thought it was great watching it fall.

Of course all the little kids wanted to do was touch the water….

It’s so pretty up there and shady enough that even though it was a 100 degree day it was pleasant.

This time we hauled the strollers up to the top loop and walked it.  There was even a drinking fountain to refill the water bottles up there and it was fun to see where the water just started coming up out of the ground.

Before we came home we ate our picnic lunch under the pavilions there.  It was a great day (and no one got carsick this time!!).

We enjoyed Springville’s new splash pad a couple of times this summer.  Abbie brought a friend this time and Neil and Isaac just can’t get enough of the water.

After being out in the sun Neil and I crashed on the couch.  Jessie was kind enough to document it for me. :-)This was the other picture on the camera that Jessie took.  Looks like fun huh?Rachel inspired and joined us for several adventures this summer.  In addition to the ice cream party she inspired a trip to see the Manti Pageant.  We just squeezed everyone in the van together.  It was a nice night that ended very late.  We met some nice people where we parked the van and almost everyone fell asleep on the drive home – Rachel’s not sleeping, but closing her eyes so she’s not blinded by the flash. (And not to be rude, but when you have an hour trip back home at midnight and the cars in front of you aren’t even going the speed limit it was really starting to drive me nuts.)  Another bucket list check mark.

When we redid the sprinklers last fall we didn’t put any in the parking strip.  And only a month earlier the bishop helped us dig part of it out with his big machine.  So yea for us, after a month of gross rocks, weeds and dirt we finished it up.  All the kids came out to help dig and measure how far down we need to go.  Part way through I ran to the store to get a pick axe and that made the work go double time – heaven sent!  A friend helped Ken pour the cement and Yea one project on the house was done.  And we actually remembered to get some pictures.

And blessings….this was all of the leftover cement….

Isaac was showing a little independence and after I gave him some banana he took a bite, threw the rest on the floor and then smashed it with his foot.  Grrrr….. I took a picture so I wouldn’t be frustrated at him.  Which of course he smiled for.

For our anniversary Rachel came down and stayed with the kids and Ken and I got Bombay takeout and had a picnic up at BYU.  Afterwards we walked on the trail at the south end of campus, which they have redone and it’s beautiful, including a couple of waterfalls and cool rock work and some picnic tables.  So I decided that we are doing birthday pictures there this year.

And that’s a wrap up of June.  On to July….

Summer for the teens

Mark got to go one his first week long scout trip, and boy did I miss him!  He was so excited!  He was a really good worker and finished up 6 merit badges while he was there.  He also got to build his own shelter on an island he canoed out to and sleep in it one night.  And don’t tell anyone but he forgot to take any changes of undies and socks…..hope he doesn’t make that mistake again. :-)Abbie showed Spencer how to make “name explosions.”  A fun thing she had done at school.  They made several including ones for Ken and I – that are hanging on our bedroom door and two more Grandma and Grandpa.Isaac got his first major bonk on the side of the bathtub – learning to walk well sure seems to take a while sometimes.

Playing outside with the kids one day Jessie and I tried weaving together the cover buds in our front yard.  I braided mine and put them around Jessie’s bun.  Pretty cute.  The flowers even stuck around long enough for her to wear them to YW that evening.  A butterfly landed on Jessie’s finger.

Ken drove down with the bishop to check out where the girls would be having camp this summer.  They did some of there activities inside this old abandoned house that had been flooded out and there were a ton of thistle plants…go figure (it was in the town of Thistle).

Ken and Jessie got to go to Youth Conference together.  They did some stuff up on Temple Square and got to hear Elder Clayton speak.  And also a picture of some falcons nesting on the Joseph Smith Memorial building. 

Neil found Larry the cucumber, from Veggie Tales, in a toy box upstairs thought he was a great toy.  He came to tell me about his new find and said… “This is the green bean.”  It made me laugh.For some unknown reason Isaac was obsessed with this pot one morning after breakfast.  He kept pulling it out of the pantry and taking it into the front room and standing in it…..silly boy.

While Mark was at camp and Ken and Jessie were at Youth Conference the other kids and I made pudding pops!  Oh yeah!And went to the park to play with Quinn.And went bowling with Rachel and then to Red Robin for dinner. (Dinner was a mad house; they put us at a table that was too small for 6 people, right in the traffic area of the waiters and we kept having to ask for more fries.) One cool thing at dinner was an electric train that entertained Neil for most of the time and the french fry that was as long as his forearm.

David and Lisa and Rachel came down on Sunday so David could tell us about his army trip to Lithuania. He gave each of the kids a coin.   It was really interesting and fun to hear his stories.  Then we played a little Hit or Miss.We saved the treats he shared with us to try for FHE.

One thing on our bucket list this summer was making a balancing plank.  We ended up making two and the kids aren’t to bad on them….I tired and nearly killed myself.Ken has a new mowing buddy.  (Side note:  Ken’s van died this summer and we test drove a number of little cars to replace it and nothing had worked out so Ken’s family kindly let us borrow some vehicles while we tried to figure out what to do.)For a priest activity this summer they bucked hay!  That gave the phrase “Idaho farmboy” a whole new meaning and appreciation.Ken playing baseball with the boys in the backyard.  Why is Neil in a dress….I can’t remember, but he was insistent on using the stick he found for his bat….then of course Isaac copied him and wanted to use it too.Jessie left for girls camp the week after Mark’s scout camp.  Jessie’s “nice” prank at camp.  Jessie loves to think up silly pranks, but she is not good at being mean, thank goodness!  So she and some of her friends pranked the YCL’s and toilet papered their tent, but to make it a nice prank they wrote kind notes and thoughts all over the toilet paper.  She said writing all that stuff took forever. :-)

Marking off another bucket list thing – making sidewalk chalk.  Neil was so excited to stir the color in his.  Fun fun!

A little scraping

Just a little “Yeah for me” post.  I just finished up 9 more pages for my 2008 book.  Mostly pictures from Nauvoo and visiting my family in Missouri.  I added them to the 2008 scrapbook slideshow in the side bar below the kids’ pictures.  So if you have a minute click on the slideshow and check them out. 

Now it’s off to bed!   :-)

Birthday’s in Summer

We saw this sign in a store and I just love it (but not the colors).  So I took a picture thinking that someday I’d get around to making one. :-)

Jessie is amazing at quilling (or twirled paper)!  She has the patience to really intricate stuff.  She made these violets to take to Grandma Jennie for her birthday since Grandma used to raise violets.  They were a huge hit!We tried out some new cupcake liners I got on clearance – silicone flower pots.  My violets didn’t turn out as cool as Jessie’s but still fun.  Of course you guessed Mark was the one to light the candles, right?Grandma was having a hard time blowing out the candle….so Neil came to her aid.

Oh my goodness, Isaac’s taller than the desk.  When did he get that big?  Isaac loves to help! I try to talk him into the swiffer when I’m done sweeping because he loves to scatter my dirt pile if he gets ahold of the broom.  Also this year for our summer ‘write notes to each other,’  I got some old reader digest book collections and everyone got to decorate a page about themselves and put it in the front cover.  Then I printed up a bunch of pages to write on to be taped into the books.  We did really well at writing to each other the first half of the summer….but then just forgot.  I also printed up some pages later to write about the things we did off our bucket list.  We are still working on these during FHE so the kids will remember that we did fun things.

Cute Neil picture that dad took.

Neil decided that he wanted trains on his cake this year.  So I put them around the side. 

Love this excited smile!

For his birthday lunch we did Hawaiian Haystacks. Yummy.  Then did presents and cake.  Rachel brought Neil a huge collection of balloons.  I just we are low on helium right now, so she had to go to two different stores to get balloons because there was a limit on how many you could buy.  He also got some fun books from the Albertsons; a new Geotracks train from my parents, a scooter from us, a couple of books from Ken’s parents – including The Napping House, which he loves to read when we are at their house and King Bidgood’s in the Bathtub – and a mechanical ladybug from Rachel that changes directions when it bumps into things, can you tell Neil is her buddy :-)!

That night after we got the kids in bed we heard fireworks, and of course that brought them all out of their beds, and then we remembered that a couple of nights after we moved into this house a year ago we there were fireworks too.  I can’t believe that we’ve been here a whole year!