No Pictures

I took the kids to the zoo today.  We.  Had.  A.  Blast.

We have a couple of days off school and Trent took the big boys camping.  The small fry were feeling left out as they watched Chris load up the four wheelers and David pack the tents and Eddie haul out sleeping bags.  They watched forlornly as the campers headed to the mountains.

Me, not so much.  I'm happy that they get to go four-wheeling and camp out in the mountains.  I'm happy they get to spend some good guy-time together.  And I'm glad I get to sleep in my own warm bed because it's gonna be cold up in them thar mountains tonight!

It's only fair, though, that we do something fun while the big boys are gone.  So we went to the zoo.  We grabbed a neighbor girl and headed out, playing "I spy" and the alphabet game all the way there.  They played at the splash pad and drenched themselves, then ran from one exhibit to another, laughing and giggling constantly.  It was so fun to see them have uninhibited fun.  If their older siblings had been around, there would have been plenty of shushing and telling them to grow up.  But not this time.  We were delightedly little kids.  We barked at the seals and growled at the bears and chirped at the birds.  And we ran and skipped and hopped and acted like a bunch of little kids, which we were... or most of us were.

At the beginning of the trip, I wished I had brought my camera to capture the look of terror on Freddie's face when he thought the water was going to splash on his dry tummy.  I wished I could catch the excitement of three little human eaglets perched in a nest.  I wished I could forever keep the long shadows following four children skipping along the path.  But then I remembered that when I spend my time taking pictures to save memories, I often forget to make them.  I don't have the time left over to do the doing when I'm doing the shooting.  I'm glad I left the camera at home so we could just play and enjoy... and be in the middle of the living.

On the way home, they kept busy in rush hour traffic by mimicking different animal sounds.  After they ran out of animals, Margaret piped up with, "Let's hear your very best singing voice!"  She began to serenade us with an impressively clear vibrato, and Angel joined in with her favorite operatic warble.  Freddy nearly broke down, crying that he couldn't think of anything to sing.  From the back-est backseat, Georgie joined in with an enthusiastic... pterodactyl.  It was anything but melodic, but so unexpectedly funny.  After a moment, when they changed to new sounds, he protested, "I haven't had my singing turn!"  As soon as he had our full attention, he began... beat boxing.

Never a dull moment with these children.  I'm so glad I have them and the smiles they constantly give me.  All's right in the world when you are in the middle of a child's hug - or two or three or four.  It makes me fell like I'm in the middle of the Lord's embrace.

We didn't get a single picture, and that's just fine by me.

Road Trip

We went on a road trip over Labor Day.  It was fun, and we all enjoyed it.  Or mostly all of us enjoyed it, or or we all enjoyed most of it.  Probably most of us enjoyed most of it - isn't that how road trips go?  We spent the weekend with our Swain cousins in a lodge with plenty of room for running and an industrial kitchen for cooking up enough grub to feed us all.

On the way home, we looked like this - happy and tired and ready for our own home and our own beds. Except David.  He seems to be the only one awake, so maybe he should have been the driver.  Shh.  Not yet.  We'll have plenty of time for growing up and not sitting in the back seat anymore.  For now, enjoy the childhood.  I know I am.

Love this family!

Sent from Samsung tablet

Family Reunions at the Temple

The whole reason we were able to pull in 6 families from more than 3,000 miles is this.

 

The first grandchild was getting married, and he and his wife-to-be decided to get married here, in the temple.  We believe that there is a scared sealing power in the temple that can tie a family together for eternity.  It just doesn't make sense that something you worked so hard on for your whole life would just be gone when you die.  We believe that families are forever.

One of the things we did at the reunion (or rather, as we were traveling to it) was to take pictures of your family in front of any temple you passed. 

 

All together, I think we got pictures of  14 different temples.

 It was fun to see the different families as they sent in their pictures.  We went out of our way to be at the temples, but it wasn't a trouble.

 Because really, this is all worth it.

 

For more information about forever families, click here.

Happy Grandma Day

We get to have Grandma Jeanne here this week.  Lucky us!  Every year, she comes down from Alaska and spends a week with us.  It's a big sacrifice on her part to come all this way, but she is as reliable as could be and never skips.  I love her for the love she shows to our family.  I love how she brings a bit of Jay back to us.  I especially love that she has accepted Trent and the little people as her own.  She truly has a heart of gold.

We love having her with us, and it's never quite long enough.

Mountain Getaway

I found this picture and remembered that I hadn't yet posted it, so I'll remedy that situation.  Looking at all this gorgeousness makes me wish that we were back up in the mountains instead of in the July heat.  Wouldn't you love to live here?

A few weeks ago, we had the unexpected opportunity to stay at a mountain resort.  My dad likes to sleep in his own bed, so Trent took the kids up for an overnighter.  My dad and I joined them the next day.  In all the hustle of getting my dad prepped and ready for the day, I forgot to take my swimming suit.  Bummer.

So instead of going swimming, I had to just watch from the balcony and keep my dad company.  Fortunately, the balcony of our room was directly over the swimming pool, so I could watch the kids play while I fed peanuts to the daring bluejay that kept flying past.

It was fun to watch them all play together.  In this hustle-bustle world, they don't do that very often.  

Love these kids.

And love this beautiful world!

It's Suuuuuuummmmer Tiiiiiiimmmme!

Yeah, it's officially summer.  Graduation is over, field day is done, grades are posted, the parking lot is empty, and the office is shuttered.  As if it knew about this, the sun has come out and heated the earth.  We've had such a nice spring, with cool temperatures and cloudy skies and lots more rain than normal, but suddenly we've been thrust into summer with its baking-oven temperatures and unrelenting sunshine.  I'm not complaining too much, because this is where we usually are.  It's just the quick change from one to the other that makes me lose my balance a bit.  So now it's hot, and the tomatoes will grow and the watermelon seeds will sprout.  Summer is good, too.

We started off the summer on an exciting foot by an impromptu stay at a ski resort.  The mountain air was cool and refreshing, the beautiful trails beckoned, and it was good to have an itty bitty change of scenery.  Even though we spent all the time watching the kids get sunburned in the pool or cleaning up.  All good.

Today, Eddie got right up and did his chores, even without the help of my handy dandy chore charts - because I hadn't gotten around to printing them off yet.  Or maybe I did but I put them in the safe place where I lose important papers.  David was running a fever (from the sunburn), Chris was spending the night with his cousins, and Angel and the twins were a touch grumpy (from the sunburns).  Remind me to throw out the expired sunscreen and buy a fresh bottle.

And so we got the house mostly tidied up, two gardens watered, another garden weeded (they each have their own garden to tend this summer), and helped my dad on a project he's been wanting to do.  We had lunch, and now... now... now we're bored.  Now we're tired.  Now we have no more energy to do anything more.  (Maybe from the sunburns).  The kids are watching odd youtube videos and I'm reading the news.

Maybe we'll start being really productive tomorrow.  For now, I think I'll go switch the youtube channel to Studio C and we'll laugh together.  And then we'll make a blanket fort on the couch so we don't get sucked into the hot lava floor.  Summer is good.

A Camping We Will Go

A little bit ago we decided to up and go camping.  We had Opa with us, so actual tent camping was out.  We hadn't really planned ahead, so most everything else was out.  Trent came up with a cabin that some of he relations used as a hunting lodge, made a few calls, and off we went.  

Trent and the boys went down on Wednesday evening, and the little ones went with me and Opa the next afternoon.  Trent figured that since one hunting season ended on Thursday, while the next hunt didn't begin until Saturday, that we would have the place to ourseles.  It didn't turn out exactly that way, but the boys had a good time.

The bigger three boys spent some time target-shooting with BB guns.  There were a few targets hung in the trees, and the plink or ding of a target hit was a common sound.  When they put the guns away, there were always 4-wheelers to zoom about on.  It was a far cry from the quiet forest I had been envisioning.  The riding up and down trails was curtailed somewhat when David wrecked one of the machines, and Trent realized that only licensed drivers should be driving.  David smashed up his hand pretty good, and bruised some ribs, but fortunately nothing was serious.  Chris, the only boy with a license, may or may not have smirked a little as he rode for the rest of the day.

Trent kept the little twins entertained in the mornings and evenings by starting the fire for them.  Yes, that is a flame thrower.  He had a great time with that noisy beast, and they were properly awed.

After the stove got nice and hot, Eddie and I popped popcorn on it.  Or we tried to.  The wood stove was hot, but not quite hot enough, so we gave up and used the gas cookstove instead.  David shook the popper for me, and we all enjoyed hot popcorn.  Yum!

We all spent most of the time outdoors, looking through telescopes, sighting up rifles, shooting BB guns, riding 4-wheelers, swinging on a plank suspended between two giant trees, or just sitting on the porch and breathing the clean, crisp air (when it wasn't full of the dust the quads kicked up, that is).  Oh yeah, and we spent a little bit of time out back in the outhouse.  I'll let this picture speak for itself. 

It's nice to make memories as a family, even if it doesn't go exactly the way you planned it.

Ho'oponopono

Just typing that word is fun!  It reminds me of a song I used to teach my elementary students called Humu Humu Nuku Nuku A Pua'a, which is NOT the same version as the High School Musical one.  Anyways... but Ho'oponopono is much more awesome.

Ho'oponopono is an traditional Hawaiian practice of healing relationships through love and forgiveness.  My very wise sister-in-law introduced this to us at our adult family reunion, and we were all intrigued.

There are four steps, and you do them all in one interaction.  You express:

I love you (should be a no-brainer, but in difficult relationships we sometimes forget to say this one.)
I'm sorry (for this specific harm I have caused)
Please forgive me (be sincere)
Thank you (for bringing this to my attention, for being a positive influence in my life, whatever...)

It seems like it would go a long way to help smooth over some of the rough spots we all go through and heal the damaged parts of our relationships.  I'm sure it's not a one-time magic pill, but I can only imagine that it would help if it was kept up.

Have to try it tonight...

Family Reunion Food

We ate really well during the our adult reunion.  Maybe because we could eat big people food.  Maybe because we could just focus on cooking and not on "Mom!  I need.." and "Ew! Do I hafta eat that?" and seventeen other distractions during meal prep times.  Maybe it just tasted better because I got to eat with all these wonderful people (plus another great couple who arrived the second morning).

One of our highlights was gourmet s'mores.   We decided to dispense with the hassle of building a fire in the fire pit and just roasted our s'mores over the gas stove burners, trailer-park style.  But look what decadence we had in the chocolate department.  These were by far the tastiest s'mores (and least burnt) I have ever eaten!  Plus no smoky clothes. Bonus.  (Thanks a million!)

Or maybe the food tasted so much better because it was prepared with love.  Trite?  Maybe, but it was such fun to stand around the kitchen and visit and help each other prepare food.  Just the being together - that was the best part!

Stink Bugs!

Jenny, avert your eyes. I don't want you to have bad dreams.

We rented a vacation house and went on an adults-only family reunion last weekend. It was wonderful and fun and recharging and frustrating and silly and not nearly long enough. I so love my four brothers and their lovely wives!

The adventures started out early, with the basement of the house filling up with ugly black stink bugs. The little beasties weren't too bad alone, but all of them together were pretty scary.

Fortunately, my awesome brothers did their manly duty and got rid of the bugs. With the manly vacuum cleaner. It was actually fun to hear their little bug bodies rattle through the vacuum tube as they got sucked up. Take that, bug invasion! There may have been some squealing, but I'll never tell.  The manly folks even emptied out the central vacuum canister from the garage so there would be no chance of a middle of the night attack back into the house through the whole-house vacuum ports. Whew.

They counted the bugs as they met your demise. Nearly a hundred. Glad they were gone, and glad I have such manly brothers. *fist bump times four*

Scout Camp

It's that time of year again.  Scout camp season.  Eddie has his first overnighter - what fun!  David spent a week at a scout camp and earned a bunch of merit badges, and was inducted into the Order of the Arrow.  He's pretty thrilled about it.  And these two were so excited to go...

Actually, there were excited.  How often do you get to hike and swim in the Grand Canyon?  They were just less than happy about Mom taking a picture of them so early in the morning before they left.

Their camping adventure was a unique one.  They attended a lecture by a camping expert and decided to make their own hammocks to sleep in.  They did most of the work, and I just helped hem the hammocks and the mosquito netting a little bit.

They tell me the hammocks worked great, as long as they were hung correctly.  How manly is it to make your own bed?  Really.

They had a memorable time, and it was fun to look over their pictures when they came home.  This is the last time Ben and Chris get to camp together before Ben leaves, and I'm glad they got to.  Love that my boys have this chance to be together, with the amazing leaders they have, in the beautiful earth the Lord made for us.

Ben and his buddy (4th and 5th from left) making "M" for Madagascar.  Chris is 5th from the right.  Love all the farmer tans.  What a great group of kids and leaders!

nope.  don't have any affiliation with theultimatehang.com.  just think they are awesome.

Perspective

We had some time to kill recently.  Angel, the curious little thing that she is, was quick to find a waterfall and rocks to play in.

It was a little bit windy, but she loved playing in the water.  It was a beautiful day, and I loved watching her excitement.

She found a sparkly rock and wanted me to take a picture of it.  Too bad the sparkles don't show up very well.  I don't know which sparkled more: her rocks or her dancing eyes.

I'm glad she had this time to play while the twins were sleeping in their car seats after a long drive.  Isn't it wonderful how we can find beauty and wonderment anywhere we look for it?  The Lord made an awesome place for us to enjoy, and we ought to.  It was a magical time for her to be in the glory of nature...

... in the middle of a parking lot.  I wish I could be so quick to find the magic and the wonder, and a little less quick to complain about the asphalt or the long wait.  I need an attitude adjustment.

The House That Bert Built

Grandma took us to see her childhood home.  If I have the story straight, her parents purchased 6 lots in town - not quite half an acre.  At first they lived on a little house on the back corner, by the alleyway.  I'm not sure if that house was there when they bought the property, or if they built it.  But they lived there while Wilbert (he went by Bert)  built the new house.

It was during World War II, and building materials were scarce.  To save on lumber, the ceilings are only seven feet tall.  The shorter height was not a problem, because neither Bert nor Ruby were tall people.  The little house was nearly 800 square feet, and had two bedrooms and a bath, a living room and a kitchen.  Down a narrow flight of stairs was a wash room, space to store the food Ruby bottled, and a wood shop where Bert worked, stored his tools, and turned wooden bowls.  The house was finished in 1939.

Bert and Ruby had four girls and a boy, and they all lived cozily in the home they called the Cleveland House.  The four girls shared the upstairs bedroom, and the son slept in a little corner of the basement.

In the ample lot, the family grew an abundant garden, fruit trees, roses, and lilac bushes.  It was a lovely place to raise children.  They learned how to work hard and be thrifty.

We stayed at cousin Lynn's house, and she showed us some pictures of her and her mother (Grandma's oldest sister) in front of the house.  This was in the early 50's, maybe?

Bert was a photographer, and took many pictures and portraits of his little family.  I'm sure there are some pictures of the Cleveland House with Ruby and the children.  I'd like to find some.  For now, I have this picture of two of the nicest ladies in the state - Grandma and Cousin Lynn - in front of the cutest little house I'd love to buy if I had a whole bunch fewer children!

Love You, Grandma!

My first mother-in-law came to visit us.  We are so lucky that, even though she lives a few thousand miles away from us, she comes to visit every summer.  She spends a week with each of her children's families, travelling more than seven thousand miles to see all five homes and twenty-three grandchildren.  She is an amazing woman, and the week we have her flies by too fast.

Maybe one day, we will convince her to move closer.  We would love it!

I am so lucky to have such a loving woman for my mother-in-law.  She is incredibly loving and giving.  She raised an amazing man, the mother of my first five boys.  And even after his passing, she still loves us!  I am impressed how quickly she adopted Trent as an honorary son-in-law when I married him.  She sends birthday cards and Christmas gifts for her grandkids - all 8 of them, no matter whether they are her biological grandchildren or not.  If you asked her, they are all hers.  And I agree.  My children are so lucky to have three sets of doting grandparents.

We love you, Grandma.  You are such a gift to our family!

Glamping

We went camping recently.  No, it wasn't really camping.  Camping, to me, involves tents and sleeping bags and dirt.  And less-than-what-I-have-in-my-house restroom facilities.  So this wasn't really camping.  We, with the encouragement of my vivacious sister-in-law, rented a cute little cabin for the weekend.  No, of course it wasn't big enough for all of us, so the oldest boys pitched a tent and did the camping thing.  They did.  I didn't.  I slept in a bed, under sheets.  This is glamping.

The man and I had a queen bed, and then there was a bunkbed with a full on bottom and a twin on top.  We fit six of us in there, plus one more on the floor.  It was nice and cozy.  And we had a bathroom!  With a shower!

My brother's hamburgers are never better than when eaten outdoors on a wooden picnic table.  We ate lunch at an historic park.  We went on (itty bitty) hikes and saw amazing vistas.  We got s'mores in our hair.  We saw the Milky Way.  It was great.

Dad trying to corral Freddie, Mom gracefully falling off the step, David trying to stop Ben from pouring water on us, Angel and her funny faces, David's monkey ears, and "Oh Heavens do I really belong to these people??"  Georgie was sleeping in the van.  I think.

Living all that close and bunched up together gives you a new perspective on things.  Like how our ancestors could have lived with a family in the double digits in a log cabin of this size.  Amazing.  Like how well we really can get along without any outside things going on.  Like how much my teens would die, just die without electricity to recharge their PDDs (personal distraction devices).  Like how many people in this family snore!  And I'm the light sleeper of the bunch!   I'm lucky I made it out of there with my sanity intact.

 And I realized, like I do every day or so, how much I love this family.

Cooking on Vacation

Yeah, almost done with the vacation stuff.  I just go out so rarely that it's a big deal.  My dad said, after watching me have a panic attack just before the plane took off and took me away from my kids, that I either need to stay home or go out more often.  I'll stay home.

Really.  Besides my family being my huge-est-er ever joy of life, I have all my tools there.  Like my bed and my kitchen.

Eating on vacation is a challenge.  I want to chose foods that are good for us, but I'm hampered by not being able to cook or do decent food prep.  So we improvise.  Here is our kitchenette in the hotel:

I loved having this.  Full fridge, microwave, and medium sink.  Full dishwasher even though we only had a set of 4 dishes.  Ha.  Countertop stove with two burners.  No oven.  How am I supposed to make cookies to drive out the old-coffee-grounds-and-burnt-popcorn smell?

In a covered skillet on really, really low heat.  They were yummy.  Snickerdoodles were Jay's favorite.  How did they get such a funny name?

I laughed about having to buy such cute little containers when I usually buy the giant packages!

We ate sandwiches and soup and prepackaged hamburger helper and rice dishes.  Mixed with frozen or canned veggies and a loaf of French bread, it was pretty good.  Dad wanted to eat out for one meal a day, but we made the others.  Apples and bananas.  Cold cereal or fried eggs for breakfast.  And muffins in a microwave!

It's much easier than I thought it would be.  Grease coffee cups (one cup for each 1 1/2 to 2 regular muffins), scoop in the mix, and nuke.  I did four cups in 3 minutes.  The batter doesn't brown, so I sprinkled on some cinnamon sugar before I put it in the microwave.  And yum.  Now I have a new quick breakfast for the early-morning boys.

More Pictures

And you thought I was done, huh?  Settle back in your seat.  I've got more pictures, then I'll be done.  Promise.

sucker for the flag - highway overpass, Petersburg

lovely wood detail -  farmer's market in old town Petersburg

wouldn't stop so I could shoot him

Civil War cannon - siege of Petersburg

long layovers at the airport

out the little window of the plane

happy to be nearly home