Farewell to Summer

My memories of summer......

Nightly swims at Riverdale with the family, helping boys pass off swimming requirements for scouts and pushing cute little Jacob around the pool....love it!

Relaxing at Bear Lake with family and friends.....gorgeous and fun

Watering and caring for our garden and flowers.....everything is better after you've spent a little time with the flowers...who can't help but smile at a bed of brightly colored zinnia's and sunflowers---so cheerful!

Watching Joseph try to develop soccer skills in his brothers....some more willing then others!

Hanging out with four of my boys at Suzuki camp.....watching them enjoying (sometimes tolerating) concerts, new teachers, new groups....and of course, checking the lunch menu (the most important item of the day!)

Waking up tired boys to move pipe....watching Joseph and Samuel become better working partners

Walks up in the forest....it's amazing that a beautiful forest is 10 minutes from my doorstep

Watching Jonathan and David catch grasshoppers to feed to the fish in our creek...it's actually quite entertaining to watch them gobble up those annoying insects!

Floating the Bear River with family on the 4th of July...so fun, even if I only got to take pictures---next year, I'm in!

The fourth of July celebration at our community park----yummy food, family, water slides and 'live' fish ponds----loved watching cousins enjoy each other

Entering our 'crops', rooster and bunny in the County Fair...if only David would have been satisfied with his second place ribbons and not known about Jonathan's first place ribbons (although they both entered exactly the same things)

Get togethers at Papa Joe's Farm.....dinners, egg hunts, watering Dad's garden, lawn, and flowers, and discovering very unusual varieties of acorn/zucchini squash

Jumbo cherries from our tree (no lie---the size of very large marbles), sun-warmed strawberries eaten on site, picking raspberries, yummy food out of the garden----corn on the cob, green beans, fresh lettuce, zucchini smothered in butter and cheese, fresh tomatoes...sooo yummy!

Rodeo days----chasing candy at the parades, watching delighted smiles at the Carnival (and a few sick ones as well!), eating snocones, cotton candy, hamburgers and soda, walking to the car through the dark streets together

Mowing days....getting those boys to get all this grass cut with one small lawnmower---not sure if I'll miss that or not---but I love the look of freshly cut grass

Movie night at the Worm Creek Opera house---a free movie, popcorn and drink for a little volunteer work---we look forward to these nights all week long

Laying on the trampoline and watching all the beautiful stars in the sky....it's quite overwhelming, I feel like I'm being swallowed up in an amazing aura of light...hearing Samuel say, "Holy Cow....I just saw a shooting star!"

Feeling the cool breeze of the canyon sweep through our windows at night---chasing away the hot stuffy air of the summer day...love to sleep with the windows open

Late 'brunches'---if I made them wait long enough for breakfast, I could get away with one large meal for breakfast and lunch!

Motorcycle rides, Sunday afternoon walks to Grandma's, Jacob and Jonathan's delighted smiles on the 4 wheeler with their Dad

Visiting with family---weanie roasts in our orchard, birthday treasure hunts, family reunions----families are the best!

Goodbye summer....we'll miss those lazy days and ways.......

Back to school!

Benjamin, Joseph, Samuel and David doing their "Bee Gees" interpretation! (They look a little strange!)

Four boys back to school! Yey!

We had quite an unforgettable morning. Everyone was dressed and eating breakfast and David got up and said his stomach felt kind of funny----he made it to the hallway and then unloaded everything all over walls, carpet, doors, kids and himself! What a mess and only 5 minutes before the bus was due! He was so worried that he wasn't going to get the "Attendance" prize this year that he hurried and washed his mouth out, cleaned his clothes up, brushed his teeth and headed out the door. He looked very pale and subdued, but he wasn't going to miss the first day!

Hmmm....I wonder if this shows dedication to education on David's part, or if the lesser of two evils was going to school, rather then staying home with mom and missing the excitement of the first day. I hope we're not all that sick of each other from summer! It's good to get back to a routine, but I'll miss the summer days....they flew by way too fast this year!

Joseph becomes an Eagle Scout!

Sunday, August 23 at 7:00 p.m. we are celebrating Joseph's becoming an Eagle Scout at his Court of Honor. The Court of Honor will be at the Mink Creek Church house. We hope you can attend this event!

Congratulations to our new Eagle! We love you Joseph!



Joseph just walked in and noticed that I have not posted that he has made the Preston High Varsity Soccer team! How could we have missed that?! He is thrilled to have made the team and will be starting defense at the game this Saturday, Aug. 22 at 1:00 in Preston. Congrats, Joseph!

Bear Lake Summer Party with Jeff's family

We had a wonderful 'reunion' at the Lake at the end of July. Highlights were the fun ski-doo that Brenda and Keith rented and let ALL the kids have a turn riding in 2 hours (quite an amazing feat in itself---they had a good system--thanks for sharing!), the wonderful feast that Grandma and Randy and Janele and Catharine provided, the amazing soccer games, sand castles, sand burials, shell collecting and of course swimming in the water (it was cold!) but fun!

I love the lake. It seems like every time we go, life slows down a bit, everyone is happily occupied and we get to simply enjoy each other---a little bit of heaven!

Posting Bloobers and such!

Apologies to anyone who saw the last title of my 'post-in-progress'! I was in the middle of writing something and for some reason it posted the title, which didn't make any sense! My bad!

Anyway, the REASON for the silly title on my blog blooper was that I was in somewhat of a slump on Sunday after I'd changed the time of our little Mink Creek 'Mountain Air' singing group 4 or 5 times to try and accommodate everyone's schedule and the conflicting Yoga class that is the hot new Relief Society activity--meeting 4 times a week for 90 minutes each---(I sure can't figure out how to schedule around it.) After having 4 of the ladies tell me point blank that they 'just didn't want to do it anymore (the singing group),' I thought, "Well, let's just be honest, shall we!"

I think I was having wallflower complex on Sunday----you know that feeling when you'd go to a dance and stand there talking with your friends until all of them had been asked to dance except you and you tried to act like it really didn't bother you, you were having a marvelous time anyway? So, after hanging up from the last lady that just gushed, "I just don't want to come to your group, no matter what time you change it to,..." and looking at my completely wrecked kitchen (after Sunday dinner blues!)....I was beginning to question my purpose on this planet! But, oh well, you get what you get and don't throw a fit... right Rebecca?

Anyway, onward! Yesterday, I was wondering if perhaps there was a hex on our house, or what is going on! It all started 3 weeks ago when the sewer backed up into the basement. I think my husband was actually glad because he finally had a reason to dig up the yard again----okay, that's going a bit too far, but he did look like he was having a good time out there digging with his Dad and brother on the backhoe. So today, with that supposedly fixed,
*the dryer finally bit the dust and the washer quit agitating,
*the 3 vacuums that we've kept running through the miracles of duct tape and a lot of luck finally gave up the ghost,
*the fancy new sprinkler I bought that cost WAY too much money (because it wasn't free) lost it's timer button and wouldn't run anymore,
*the lawnmower caught something around it and my darling son, in attempting to fix it, turned it upside down and all the oil ran into the carburetor which rendered it useless,
*the soaker hoses in the garden quit 'soaking' 3 of the rows,
*I misread my recipe while making a double batch of raspberry jam and put the sugar in FIRST, instead of the pectin---so now I have raspberry syrup,
*Jacob learned the fine art of messing your pants and rubbing it all over the carpet before Mom clues into why he's having so much fun in his room with his brother and then pops the bath 'duck' in trying to get him into the tub,
*Jeff's cousin's wife, Necia shows up with her son for a 'visit' (she looks quite glamorous, I just got out of the shower), so I reluctantly let her, dusted the cheerios off the chair and onto the floor so she could sit and watch me try to save my burned dinner, feed the kids in 10 minutes and get swimming suits on to go to the pool---and why can I find everyone's suit except my coverup---I do NOT swim without a coverup!

I think I forgot to mention that all of the above events (except for the sewer) happened YESTERDAY! Is this possible? At first I cried when the washing machine wouldn't agitate, but by the time I was trying to get rid of all the smoke in the kitchen from the burned taco meat, I don't think I dared even breathe, for fear of what other fun event was waiting around the corner. I SHOULD have stayed up last night after we got home at 11:00 and tried to start in on the mess, but the invitation to enter a comatose state by hiding under the covers of my bed was too persuasive! And believe it or not, it didn't look quite as bad when I woke up this morning to look at it!

Okay, I've whined long enough, but I thought maybe I'd better start THIS day off a little differently.....so here are some things I was grateful for this morning when I woke up:
*the darkness hiding the dirty dishes and crushed cheerios on the floor
*Jeff' ability to read the instructions on the sprinkler better then I and being able to at least get it started !
*My swamp cooler is still working----wahoo! AT least I can be cool as I'm stressing!
*I discovered if I only put 2 or 3 items in the washing machine, it will agitate, a little----this could be a very long washing day---but at least I don't have to resort to a scrubbing board, yet! And I do have a line to hang clothes on, and it is hot enough to get them dry quickly!
*We also discovered that the sewer is NOT backing up in the basement, as I feared, because my dear little Jonathan has compacted so much laundry detergent down the drain, that it couldn't possibly backwash (I wondered why my laundry soap was going so fast!)---the washing machine has simply developed a leak---(probably because it doesn't want to agitate!), and so the water is collecting ABOVE the drain---we can simply scoop it out!
*Jeff at least 'discovered' what the problem was with the lawn mower---now he just has to 'spend some time with it'. I'm so glad someone has mecanical skills in this family! (I think mechanical skills must be math related!)
*I discovered a little sweeper vacuum in the computer room that Jonathan claimed as his at Christmastime and promptly broke with his enthusaistic vacuuming!If I can figure out how to change the belt, it will probably work for a little while!
*And if all else fails, we can go swimming and I can
**watch my biggest kid (Jeff) squirt everyone with Ben's birthday present while the lifeguard tries to kick him out of the pool (unfortunately, for the lifeguard, he's one of the young men in our ward, so Jeff just ignores him),
**be thankful that my kids can splash and play in the pool until their exhausted and then put their jammies on and go to sleep
**laugh at my cute little Jacob's crooked smile as I place him on the side of the pool and say 'ready?' and he sticks out his chin, squeezes his eyes tightly shut and holds out his arms as I let him 'jump' to me in the pool----soooo,cute, I really need a picture of it!

So if noone wants to sing with me, c'est la vie! I guess I'll have to take up yoga!