A Western Christmas

Not the best picture quality, but just a sampling of Ian's Christmas program this year. Interesting song choices and medleys! He did great. He is on the first row by the piano. 

Thanks kid.

Last night at dinner to her parents, Eliza said, "When you guys die I am not going to use a napkin anymore. I'm just going to wipe my hands on my clothes."

Hooray for snow!!

Help Please.

I have seriously tried everything to get off this baked on grease from my new stove. I have tried oven cleaner, specialized stove top cleaner. I even made a trip down to Don Aslett's cleaning supply store. The first thing I bought was a dud so I took it back and today they gave me a super orange degreaser that can take oil out of concrete. The final result? No change. This grease is never coming off. Makes you think twice about eating fried foods right? If anybody has any other suggestions of how to get this clean, PLEASE let me know!!!

In other news I found a u-pick raspberry farm in Tyhee area which is awesome! $1.50 a pound. I picked 12# on Monday and made a ton of jam. I am headed out there again Thursday, hopefully it doesn't freeze before then! 

I am tired.

We recently purchased our first house and moved in. Whew. Here is the picture of the outside, I am going to wait on inside pictures until I finish canning the peaches, hanging the pictures, and all the other million other things I have to do! We are excited. Now the only downstairs neighbors we have are Ian & Eliza. They love having their own rooms and having a yard to play in. Ian is adjusting to a new school. Settling in Pocatello was never in the plans but we are here and we love our new house.

Backpacking

Mike took me on a 30 mile backpacking trip in the White Cloud mountains this week. The kids went and stayed with Aunt Julie and had a wonderful time. I have gotten reports from them on how good her oatmeal tastes and how much fun their cousins are to play with!

We only took a couple pictures of our trip, most the time I was too exhausted when we were anywhere beautiful to do anything besides look with my eyes. To get out the camera would require too much effort!
This is Monday morning, after a sleepless night of deer running through our campground all night!

 Yes, we had to hike OVER this mountain. I did it and have the scars to prove it.

 The views from the mountain tops were amazing! We crossed multiple mountain passes but didn't get pictures of all of them.

 The mountain in the background it Castle Peak, it was a beast to climb to that pass.

We crossed steep snow fields, hiked up loose rock mountains, battled bugs, survived a thunder storm. We both have mountains of mosquito bites and Mike had to put up with my whining. But it was great. I would do a 30 mile backpacking trip again, just maybe not that route! I saw some beautiful parts of Idaho that I would not have been able to see without hiking into. We have one more trip planned this summer and then it is back to business for this family.

Ian is 7!

Where in the world has the time gone???? I can't believe my baby boy is 7. We had a fun day of playing with neighbors, swimming at Ross park, opening presents and eating a delicious Ice Cream cake. Yum.

 Ian was not happy on the waterslide because they didn't let him wear his goggles and he hates water in his eyes!

 I think the lazy river is a favorite with everyone.

 Here Mike is helping Eliza across the lily pads.

 So excited to open presents!!

Ian wanted an ice cream cake this year, so I got one at Fred Meyers. It was really good. We had some friends over to share it. Happy Birthday Ian! Now stop growing up.

Is it just me...

Is it just me or are people not reading blogs this summer? Well I still am.  Me and the kids took a trip to Cache Valley this week. We went to the zoo, the aquatic park, Newton, the farmer's market, Old Navy... all the exciting places! We also spent a lot quality time with my sister's goats. 

 I love the mountain view from my sister's backyard. Really beautiful.

 There is no better place to spend the 24th of July (or 23rd of July...) than Newton! The kids anxiously awaited the parade's start.

 It was kind of a slow parade which allowed for picture taking of our favorite locals.

 It was so fun to see the kids run in the foot races! Sammy loved it so much she ran in a lot of the races.

She even ran in a race by herself since there were no other girls her age! After the races we went to the library book sale and bought about 15 books for a quarter a piece. What a deal. We might just invite ourselves back next year.

Question of the Day....

Sorry it's a little fuzzy... Eliza woke up this morning with her eye looking like this!! Last night we had a ward water slide activity where she spent countless hours riding on inner tubes down water slides. There were plenty of gnats and mosquitoes out last night as well.

So what is your vote? Was this caused by a bug bite or some kid's foot?

The Great Outdoors

I have been meaning to post our camping pictures for a while now but time keeps getting away from us! We have been playing hard this summer. So far we have spent a week with family, a most of a week at Redfish Lake, and 2 days in Boise visiting our newest nephew and playing at the water park. We have a few more fun things planned throughout the summer including lots of camping trips, it's nice to have Mike on Summer break! 

 We spent 4 days last week at Redfish lake. It was delightful. There was some snow in the high country! We had a little snowball fight at the top of Galena Summit. 

 Our tent site was so cool. We loved being in walking distance from the lake and close to flush potties. And the best part was it was a walk-in campsite so we didn't have to deal with those pesky 4 wheeling or trailer pulling campers.

 We did a great hike the second day, the kids were so strong. We went about 3 miles. We didn't make it to the end of the trail but we will get there next time! 

 Ian couldn't get enough of the beach. It didn't matter if there was thunder or rain pouring down, he wanted to be IN the frigid mountain water the whole time! The beach by the campground was so nice, only the campers used it. 

 We love taking little boat rides. We paddled hard into the lake and let the waves wash us back to shore!

While we were up there we did some sight-seeing at Custer, an old mining town. We went through the different houses, saloons, school, houses of ill repute. It was great showing the kids how people lived back then. Stay tuned for more summer fun....

Mud sisters

A few members of my family did a 5K mud run in Soldier Hollow. If you don't know what a mud run is, you have to checkout thedirtydash.com and they have videos of one. It is a race/obstacle course/costume party/nut house. My nephew, who is not a runner, loved it because of all the mud and water and the huge slide at the end. 

 Here we are before we have entered the course, you can see it in the back ground. The hay bales and walls in the road nearly killed me, I am too short to climb all those! The mud was so deep in some areas that my sister in the dark pink abandoned her shoes and went in just her socks.

I am cleaner that my sister at the end because I didn't swim through the last moat of mud, which was pretty deep! It was fun and I would probably do it again, except now I know I would wear Teva sandals, and not my running shoes! It was the longest 5K I have ever run.

Is hoarding a bad thing?

This morning I bought 20 packages of pasta, as shown here in the above photo, for a grand total of $2.39. You heard me right. For about 11 cents a package. I am dabbling a bit in couponing and am quickly learning that it can be time consuming but very beneficial if you play the game right. I am still not ready to dive completely in, most real couponers get 5 Sunday papers every week and drive around to 12 different stores to get the great values. I just print off good internet coupons and review Smith's and Fred Meyer's ad's online. I am picky about what I buy, because even if it's a screaming good deal, we don't need 10 boxes of pop-tarts.

Remember that problem I had in November of buying a lot of Tillamook? They are having that same sale at Fred Meyer's where I can get the cheese for 3.99. I am stocking up. I guess we can have homemade mac and cheese for years to come! I will head back over to Freddie's tomorrow so I can get more cheese (I only have 4 blocks!) and use some coupons to get me some 25 cent cereal.

Anybody else out there starting to coupon? What websites do you use?

My New Ride...

I picked up this sweet little number at DI last week. I am really loving it. Isn't she a beaut? (That sounded too much like Junie B Jones, arg.)

Don't mind the weird post-it picture on the wall. Focus on the shiny redness, the chrome, the simplicity of the design. My neighbor who saw us haul it up the stairs and into our apartment commented on the oddness of it only having one wheel. Really? Should that be odd? I just like to brag that there is hardly any wear on the tire at all. It's got a lot of good years ahead! Giddy-up.

And not to be overlooked is Mike and his new ride...

It's not red. And it has 2 wheels. But it will do.

I can't believe she's 4!

I love this little girl! She is happy to be four but still impatient to turn 5 so she can go to school with her brother. She had a fun day playing with her new toys. Do you like the cake? This is the first non-rectangular shaped cake I have made. I think it is time for me to branch out, this was really easy and fun to do. 

I also wanted to add a picture of Ian diving next to the NO DIVING sign. He is doing great at swim lessons. 

Spring Break 2011

We took a little drive up to Oregon and Washington for our Spring Break. We haven't been back there in 7 years. I was excited to show my kids where I grew up.

A Gladstone Landmark

Oregon City Elevator. I can't believe that they
still employ somebody to push the up and down buttons
in the elevator!

Climbing the steps after riding the elevator down

The Geese at the Willamete River were
 huge and demanding

Clackamas River in Gladstone

I had my senior pictures taken around here

OMSI

On the way to Beacon Rock, a beautiful hike

At the top of Beacon Rock! The kids hiked the whole mile
 up and back. It was steep!

The kids loved the trip mostly because
they got to play with some awesome cousins

Round Lake Park

On the hike around Round Lake in Vancouver

We stopped at Multnomah Falls on the way home.
The kids are either cold or sad to leave Oregon.

Other things we saw and did that are not posted include Powell's bookstore, the Arboretum, the Portland Art Museum (incredibly psycho security guards that followed us room to room and yelled at our children), Fort Vancouver, My favorite brother's house, and probably more that I can't remember right now. 

Ian also lost his first tooth in Washington! Followed promptly by his second tooth on our arrival back home. Somebody make him stop growing up.

Best of all we were able to escape the stink of this town for a solid week!