My House is Quiet?

You are probably assuming from my title that this post is about school starting but that's not for two more days.  Yet, even with all three of my noisy kids, bored to death with summer, running around my house I'm sitting here thinking how quiet it is...  I guess that's what 15 people in my house has done to me!  All joking aside, I've had a fabulous two weeks with my family and find myself feeling sad today that they all live so far away.

My sister, Rebecca, arrived two weeks ago with her husband, Brian, and five kids.  We were so excited to see them but the one year old triplets were not at all excited to see us after two long days in the car!  The next day they were much happier after some sleep.  Andrew was in heaven having three babies to play with!  The good thing was that there was always at least one happy baby to play with but unfortunately there was almost always one sad baby too!  I couldn't help but think that my house resembled a day care center every time I walked in.  I am constantly amazed at how my sister can possibly keep up with triplets!  We enjoyed playing in the wading pool and the slip and slide, a day at the Dinosaur Park, and trips to Beus Pond for bike riding, picnics and pushing the babies in the stroller.

All the cousins.  I think this is the only picture I got of them all together all week.   It was nearly impossible to get all the kids in the same place looking at the camera at the same time!

Emily, Andrew, Teresa, and Aubrey

Laura and Kaitlyn

My youngest brother, Spencer, came from California (by way of Germany) a couple days later and then later in the week my parents drove from California.  The only ones in my family we were missing were my brother Ethan and his wife Cecilia who are living in Europe.  We took Spencer downtown and played some miniature golf and checked out the construction on the Ogden temple and went to an Ogden Raptors game one night.

Jared, Andrew, and Kaitlyn in front of what's left of the Ogden Temple.

Jared, Andrew, Kaitlyn, and Spencer downtown Ogden

Spencer in his typical Dodgers attire.

Lucas, Laura and Kaitlyn at the Raptors game.

Dad, Mom and Andrew

We celebrated my niece, Laura's 6th birthday.  Jason was convinced if he fed Emily enough birthday cake she would like him.  It didn't work but she enjoyed the cake!

I love this picture of Kaitlyn and Laura when they climbed in the hammock together!

Emily, Andrew, Teresa, Jared, and Aubrey at Beus Pond.

A trip to Utah wouldn't be complete for my dad without a fishing trip.  Thanks to some generous friends of ours who share their property with us my dad was thrilled to catch his biggest fish ever!

I grew up looking out my window at Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake but had never actually been there.  My parents and I took the kids out there to see what it was like.  It was a pretty fun day trip.  The kids enjoyed earning their Jr. Ranger badges.  We visited the old ranch house, saw herds of bison and antelope, and the kids played in the water at the beach.  They had a lot of fun swimming until they got a taste of the water!

Jared practicing his lassoing at Fielding Garr Ranch

Kaitlyn decided this was the easiest way to lasso the horse.

The view from Buffalo Point

Kaitlyn and Laura after church on Sunday.

We were planning on spending Saturday swimming at the water park at Cherry Hill's at the Christensen family reunion.  Andrew rode his bike while Jason went running that morning.  They went on some of the trails in the foothills.  Andrew was loving the mountain biking until his foot slipped off his pedal and the gears on his bike sliced his leg open.  So Jason spent the morning stitching Andrew's leg up.  We still made it to the family reunion but late and the swimming wasn't quite so fun for Andrew.  He did a couple slides and floated on the tube in the lazy river but what he really wanted to do was just jump in the pool and he couldn't.

Camping

Every summer Jason and his brothers go on a backpacking trip in the Uinta mountains.  This year it was hard to find a place to go without snow, even in July!  Here are a few pictures from their trip.

Sam, Jason, and Brian (Thanks for the picture, Sam!)

In August Jason took the scouts on an overnight backpacking trip.  Andrew was the youngest scout that went but didn't have any problems keeping up with the 16 year old boys!  Everyone caught a lot of fish and no scouts got lost so it was a successful trip!  I'm not sure who looks happier in these pictures about catching a big fish!

Jared was feeling jealous that Andrew and his dad were off on another camping trip without him so I took him and Kaitlyn on a hike up waterfall canyon.  I'm not sure it was as good as camping but we had a lot of fun.

Becoming a Nuisance

This is what my flower beds used to look like.

This is what they look like now.

The squirrels have dug up my flowers and dug tunnels under our sidewalk.

Any flowers they haven't dug up they have eaten all the blossoms off.  As much as I love animals these squirrels are becoming quite a nuisance!  Any suggestions?

Girls Weekend in St. George

For years Jason and his brother's have gone on an annual backpacking trip.  My sisters-in-law and I decided that we deserved a yearly trip too.  It was tricky finding a time we could go and we still didn't get everyone.  It ended up being me, Jana, Nancy and Melanie.  We decided to go to St. George and see one of the plays at Tuacahn.  We wanted to go before it would be too hot but it kept getting pushed back which is why we ended up in St. George the hottest time of the year!

We saw The Little Mermaid and it was fantastic!  It looked like a storm was blowing in when we arrived at Tuacahn at the outdoor theater and we were a little worried about it getting rained out.  All we ended up getting was some light rain and wind so the show went on and it actually helped to cool the air down a bit.  Aside from the show we ate lots of good food (including ice cream at midnight), wandered through the farmers market, and shopped at the outlets and the mall.  We had a small adventure thinking Melanie's car was falling apart but it ended up not being anything duct tape couldn't fix and we discovered a fun fabric shop in the Ace store in Fillmore.  Mostly we just enjoyed being together without the constant distraction of lots of kids running around!

Wednesday night this week I got a call from a member of our bishopric asking me to speak in sacrament on Sunday.  (I think I may have mentioned before how much I HATE public speaking!)  He didn't get me the topic until Thursday night and since we left for our trip Friday morning that meant most of my preparation didn't happen until I got home Saturday night.  (By the way, the only thing that makes public speaking worse is feeling like I don't have enough time to prepare!)  I stayed up until almost midnight until I just couldn't think anymore.  While in St. George I bought this decorative glass with vinyl that really summed up well the topic that was on my mind.

Kaitlyn loves anything princess.  I think she really believes she is a princess.  All the Disney princesses are her favorite.  In our church we believe that we are literally spirit children of God and have the potential to become like Him.  Our children sing songs about it from when they are just tiny but I hope they can learn what that really means.  My talk was about setting goals and making sure your priorities are in the right place to reach those goals.  The most important goal is to return to our Heavenly Father yet so often we are so busy in life that we let other things become a bigger priority.  That's the message I was trying to get across anyway so hopefully someone got something out of it!

Earlier this week we got a phone call from Brazil.  It was Moises who is someone Jason baptized on him mission there 16 years ago.  He wanted to arrange a time on Skype that his family could meet ours.  So last night we talked with their family on the web cam.  They are such a wonderful family!  It was fun to see their children acting just like ours!  The kids had fun talking about games they liked to play and musicians and TV shows they liked and finding out that Moises' girls like the same things!  They kept saying how grateful they were that Jason had gone to Brazil and shared the gospel with him.  It made Jason so happy to see what an amazing family Moises has and how faithful he is in the gospel!  He loved talking to him again and before we knew it an hour and a half had passed and it was time for Jason to go to a meeting.  Earlier this week Jason was also able to talk to another family on Skype in Brazil.  I am amazed by technology now.  It was almost as good as sitting in their living room talking to them.

Easy and Cute

I'm really not any good at coming up with my own cute ideas.  My sister-in-law, Melanie was nice enough to let me copy her idea and even helped me out with the sanding painting, and cutting!

This is the other fun project I picked up last week at the Wood Connection.  As I wandered through the store I realized the possibilities were endless...  I thought it turned out darling.  Thanks for the help Melanie!  (And for keeping me company on my weekend alone!)

Home Alone

My mother-in-law and her husband have a tradition of taking the grand kids to Disneyland the year before they start kindergarten.  This year was Kaitlyn's year to go.  The only problem was that Andrew and Jared never got their trips since we lived in Iowa when they started kindergarten.  So my awesome mother-in-law decided to take all three of the kids to California.  When she told me I was thrilled and started planning a weekend getaway for Jason and me.  After all, how often do you have someone ask to babysit your kids for several days?!

The problem....  I found out she scheduled the trip the same week Jason was going backpacking with his brothers.  So much for a second honeymoon... I was going to be home alone.

I'm not the type of person that enjoys being alone.  I always like having people around.  However, it has been at least 12 years since I have had a significant amount of time completely to myself.  I've spent the last month scheming what would be the best use of this time since it probably won't happen again for another 12 years or so.  There were plenty of projects to get done but the problem was that every time I started thinking about how much I needed to do I thought it wasn't fair to work the whole time everyone else was on vacation.  No matter how much I tried to look at this as an opportunity, I couldn't help dreading the week.  In fact, I cried tucking the kids in bed the night before they left thinking about how much I would miss them.

My first thought when I got back to my house was how quiet it was!  Too quiet, to be honest.  There have definitely been some nice things.  I've eaten what I want, when I want.  I've gone to bed when I want, gotten up when I want.  I've gone for some nice trail runs in no hurry to get back.  I went to dinner with a friend.  When I pick something up it actually stays put.  I had a nice phone conversation with my brother in Germany with no interruptions.  I worked in my garden which if I have to say is doing quite well this year.  Yes, that is work; but it is work I enjoy!

I did a lot of shopping.  (I thought about taking a picture of all the bags I came home with today but I think I'm going to have to slowly bring everything out so Jason doesn't realize how much I got in one trip!)  My sister-in-law told me about this neat store in Salt Lake, The Wood Connection, that was probably slightly dangerous for me to find out about because it had a lot of cool stuff.  I've been looking for a side table for months but haven't been able to find one the right color.  Their furniture is unfinished so I found the perfect table and then brought it home and painted it black.

I also picked up a more crafty project that I will post pictures of when it is done.  That's tomorrow's project.

I got a few jobs done around the house but I really didn't get around to any deep cleaning that needed to be done.  I could have a month all to myself and not get caught up on everything.  But as nice at it is to do whatever I want, I'm really ready for Jason to come home tomorrow!

Cousins

Every year when Jason and his brothers go backpacking we have a fun week of activities getting the cousins together.  We didn't get in as much this year but here are some pictures of a couple fun outings.

My sister-in-law found out about this water activity sponsored by Radio Disney at the Gallivan Center.  Here's Kaitlyn going down the water slide.

Of course like anything in Salt Lake there were lots of people and long lines for two minutes in the bounce house.

The petting zoo there was lots of fun for the kids but I couldn't help but feel a little sorry for the animals who must have been totally overwhelmed by the amount of kids!

Just when the kids thought all the fun was over we spotted the fire truck at the bottom of the stairs.  At first they were just letting kids climb inside the truck to see it but the best part of the afternoon started when they turned the hose on!

We loved having Vance's daughter Daniel visiting from Louisiana!

The next day Jana and Melissa and their kids joined us too and we went to the splash pad in South Ogden.

The pictures aren't the greatest and I didn't get half the kids there because I found it awfully hard to photograph kids moving that quickly.  There aren't any pictures of Kaitlyn because a lady at the park offered her a bag of pretzels and a jar of peanut butter and she wouldn't stop eating the whole time we were there!  I'm sure the lady must have thought I never feed her!