Preschool

This boy started preschool a couple of weeks ago.  I debated on sending him but thought he needed more interaction than from me.  He only attends 2 hours each Tuesday and Thursday.   He loves it.

He ended up getting new shoes a few days before school started.  Little did I know he really needed new shoe more than I thought.  I think he was wearing ones that were 2 sizes too small.  

room swap

Good bye purple!  (there were butterflies drawn on the walls)

Hello red and gray!

Josiah has been begging to have his own room.  He wants to prove he can keep his room clean if there aren't other siblings in it.  The boys room was crowded and messy all of the time.  We have had an extra bedroom upstairs since we remodeled downstairs (when we moved in).  The extra bedroom has been used some for storage but mainly for anyone who happens to come stay with us.  We have realized there is no point in having it since we have visitors maybe once a year if that.  Josiah got his wish and was able to move into Sadie's room.  Sadie moved upstairs to the extra room.  I think the extra room is happy to have someone in there and Sadie has brought lots of color with her to brighten it up.  Eventually we will get her new bedding that fits the bed and she will get some of her pictures up.  We didn't let her repaint since the room was barely repainted and has nice lines etc.  I know I am mean.  The trade off was to paint her dresser her favorite color.  She has liked being upstairs.   Josiah is thrilled with his room.  Luckily we had several containers that had minimal amount of gray paint so I mixed them all together to get what is on his walls.  I had to convince him to use that instead of having black walls.  All in all a cheap switch with only teal and red paint that we had to buy.  AND....Josiah has kept his room clean so far.  

One plus for Elijah and Jarom was that Sadie gave away a bunch of her stuffed animals with the move.  I love this photo shoot of them.  They took pictures of each other with their "new" animals.  

Josiah painting his dresser black. 

Yard and garden

Our garden didn't do as well as I thought it would.  I wonder if its because I didn't get to spend much time in it. I think I was able to weed 2 times the whole summer.   Our corn was puny with not much growing which really surprised me with how hot the summer had been.  We did enjoy eating what did grow.

We have one lonely pumpkin with the possibility of three more tiny ones. In past years we have had 6 or more grow to a good size.

What continues to grow well no mater what is my beans.  I didn't need to can any beans this year because of the plethora of them I canned last year.  There has been lots of beans given away.

We did get some carrots, zucchini, lettuce, and peas.  What didn't grow was beets, cucumbers, and broccoli.  

This is what our yard looks like after it being bone dry during the summer.  We had lots of rain last week but it isn't coming back very well this year.  Our yard looks depressing to me.  

School starts 2015

It was bitter sweet sending these kids off to school yesterday.  I am never ready for summer to end.  (the only reason it is sweet is because I might be able to clean the house and keep it clean, Ha!)  I love having my kids home and spending time with them.  They all had a great first day.  

Jarom 3rd, Josiah 5th, and Sadie 7th

One last Hurrah

On our way back from Grandparents we stopped off at the Ape caves as promised to the kids.  It was a long drive back home doing it this way but we did it.  It was fun to see some new country with the exception of this bridge.  It was too narrow for my liking.

The ape caves are lava tubes discovered by a group of scouts. 

Ape Cave was named by the Scout Troop in honor of their sponsor, the St. Helens Apes. This local group was made up primarily of foresters. The sponsor’s name, St. Helens Apes, may have come from an old term used for foresters in the area, "brush apes," or from the legend of Bigfoot.

Going in

Meat ball because that is what it looked like.

Railroad tracks since that is what it looked like

Oregon trip

Warning complete picture overload. 

We went to Oregon for 10 days straight and got back Monday evening.  It was so much fun.  Our kids didn't want to return home but school started yesterday.  We stayed at my dad's the first three days of the trip.  The kids played the Wii and jumped on the trampoline a lot.  The air was quite smokey from wildfires all around so it wasn't so much fun to stay outside for very long the first two days.  

Saturday afternoon we ran over to Aaron and Tia's for a quick visit.  They happened to have community days and all of us went to their little parade and scored lots of candy to share.  It was fun to spend a few hours and talk with my SIL Tia.

Monday before leaving for Haines I took the kids to the water park.  The air was much better that day

Just as we entered North Powder area we noticed the sun was really red with the smokey skies.  It looked cool but under the circumstances we would have preferred the normal color.  The north western states have been burning up.  Not so cool.  

The next day we headed to Boise with all of Nathan's family so we could greet Eli home from his mission in Chile.  It was quite the crowd of 60 family members.  Just a side note:  I just realized I have been to the Boise airport 4 times this year.  

The escalators are always the highlight of the airport.  It is tough to keep multiple children off and away from them so others can go up and down.  

Here comes Eli.

He is mobbed by all of his nieces and nephews as he enters.

His parents finally get a hug.

He is such a good uncle.

Maddie, Gracie, Sadie

Half of the crew headed down

View of the other half headed down

We moved our social gathering to a restaurant.   I think our kids enjoyed this the most since they were basically unattended in an all you can eat place.  The adults were busy talking and the (my)kids were busy eating cotton candy as fast as they could.   Jarom and Josiah consumed 5 each. 

Ezra, Kiley, Kilynn, Elijah, Lydia

These boys were hardly seen all week.  They were either busy building another fort in the tree at the yellow shed or riding on the 4 wheeler somewhere.   Josiah and Jarom had so much fun with Wes and Caleb who they saw the most of.  Gideon, David, David, Jonathon also worked on the fort.

playing in willow creek

Elijah, Kilynn, Kiley.  They built ferry houses.

This was on the way up to Van Patten lake trail head.   I  had 9 boys that were singing this is the song that never ends over and over till we got there.  Good times!

Gravel pile

Elijah and his canoe

front row: David, Jarom, Caleb, Jonathon, Josiah, David, Kiley, Kilynn, Elijah, and Gideon

Back row: Micah, Isaiah, Eli, Emmy, Ila, Abby, Gracie, Leslie, Sadie, Wes, Hyrum.

Not pictured --Ammon (not sure how he escaped) Ivy and Kelly

These three were a kick to walk back down the trail with.  They were worried about following the correct trail the whole way down.  I don't think they had any confidence in my ability to get them back safe.  There was a group  a ways ahead of us and a group behind us a ways.  

Totally photo bombed by the hatchet that Jarom was carrying.

My van tells how many miles to the gallon you are getting.  They boys really got into this.  I couldn't believe how much they enjoyed watching the number rise.  The MPG were creeping up as we basically coasted down Anthony Lake hwy.   Each time the number would go up the boys yelled.  They would ask if it would get to 100.  I doubted it.  Once it got past 100 they wondered if it would go to 200.   This went on till it hit 132.  For any of you that had your boys with me I am sorry if they think I was going 100 mph.  We will see if they understood what the number was reading when they start to drive.  I promise I wasn't driving 132 mph down that hwy.  

Here is the proof of my MPG.  If only I could get that all of the time.

Sadie pushing the yellow shed over.  HA!

This is the tepee that Elijah and I built.

Ivy and I played hide and seek with some kids.  Jarom ended up being the hardest to find.  Ivy and Elijah were the finders.  They went under the Spruce tree and heard some rustling then some growling.  It still took some time to figure out if he was up there.   Jarom climbed 3/4 of thy way up the tree. You can see him in both pictures.  He is wearing a yellow shirt.  This was after he had climbed down some.

Ezra

Dirt piles from renovations of a cement slab and phone line were the best to play in

Thomas

This is what happened shortly after leaving Haines Sunday evening.  Our kids were exhausted.   We had a great time visiting with everyone and the kids didn't want to leave.  This vacation is one that I needed.  It was relaxing and enjoyable and stress free.  

The perfect way to end the summer!