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Introducing Baby Ezra

2014-02-12T16:16:00.001-07:00

Ezra Jonah Eyre

February 4, 2014

2:14 pm

8 pounds 1 ounce

21 inches long

As Po said this morning,

"It's good to have a baby!"

Scroll down for writings on:

Ezra's Presence

His Name

The Long Labor Story, by Aja

Labor and Baby, by Jonah

Ezra's Presence

So far, Ezra is about as laid-back as they come. He was that way in utero too. He reminds us of Cam, who was also incredibly laid back. He also looks almost exactly like Cam at this age. It's the first time we've had two of our kids look alike as newborns! He's got Cam's manly nose and small lips and wide-spread big eyes. He also has Cam's long, bony legs and arms. His weight was all in his head. They differ in that Ezra has darker hair and eyes than Cam and has a longer torse, where Cam was/is more barrel chested (like a 1920s boxer).

Ezra's an amazing nurser, which is a huge relief after the horrible five weeks of cracks and pain with Po. I used to think it was the mom that made good nursers, but after five babies, I declare that some babies are much better at it than others. He's a tad gassy/burpy, but not to the point that he's ever uncomfortable for more than a few moments. BUT, as Jonah points out, this is the honeymoon stage and he'll get his lungs in a few weeks. I'm not so sure though... with three older sisters, there's always someone willing to sooth a crying baby.

His Name

For the first time ever, we knew exactly what the baby's name would be. In 2012, when the cabin at New Harmony, Utah burned down with all of our heirlooms, journals, photos, and memorabilia inside, we made a trip to see what, if anything survived. There were probably 30 boxes of written material, from journals to yearbooks to baby books to college theses to our favorite novels and books. None of it was legible anymore. Any of the paper that was recognizable was devoid of its ink, which burned right off the page. We found old journals now bleached completely white, which crumbled to dust as we tried to flip the pages.

But in all of the devastation, we found three crucibles of writing. First, we found Ana's baby announcement, completely burned white except for her middle name, "Ruth". And we found two legible sections of the ancient leather-bound family Bible. One section was the few pages about Christ's visit to Bethany. The other part, which was the largest surviving section of writing in the whole house, was the entire book of Ezra from the Old Testament. Although it transformed to dust as we handled it, we were able to take the above photo of the first page before it wafted away in the wind. Jonah suggested that we would have one more child, and his name would be Ezra. And thus is happened.

Ezra's middle name is Jonah, after his dad of course. Not only was it important to us to pass on Jonah's heritage, but both Jonah and Ezra are the fifth in their family with three older sisters and one older brother. Plus, we liked the middle initial J. Ezra J.

The Long Labor Story, by Aja

(probably longer than the actual labor)

Baby Ezra arrived easily on the afternoon of Tuesday, February 4th. Although his due date wasn't until February 15th, we were anxious for his birth since all of my previous babies were born 2-3 weeks early and usually after only a few hours of labor. On January 25th (Cam's birthday), three weeks early, I had a few hours of first stage labor, so I though this baby would follow suit. Fast forward a week and a half and six more nights of 3-4 hours of first stage labor that would suddenly stop whenever it would start raining (we'd had a couple weeks of torrential downpours), and I was ready to just get it done! Plus, my mom arrived Sunday morning and she was only going to be here a week, so I definitely wanted to get the baby out while she was on island. On Monday, the 3rd, I was 80% effaced and dilated to a four, which didn't mean much since I was dilated to a three the week before. We asked the doctor to strip my membranes, which he did, but not very vigorously. I put all my labor tricks into force on Monday night and still by Tuesday morning they felt effective but not yet painful or close enough together to warrant going to the hospital. I woke Jonah up at 4:15 am and made him take me on a long walk in the dark. Still nothing. Finally I got myself into a hot bath in our outdoor bathtub and I at least got the contractions to move from 15 minutes apart to 7 minutes apart. I started getting ready to go the hospital around 11am, and then again, the contractions stopped! I said, Jonah, forget this, let's just go to the hospital (I'm usually about ready to push before we leave). This is not what I recommend to anyone... I really recommend waiting until you can barely talk until you go, but I was too tired to go through a few more days of stalling labor, so we went.

Once we got to the hospital, they put us in a purple delivery room. The doctor on call from the practice was Dr. Ausbeck, and she was one of our favorites. She is very calm and non-interventionist. She just had her first baby three months ago-- a natural posterior birth-- so I was glad to have her there, knowing she would be relaxed and sympathetic if I had another posterior baby.

When I got there, I was dilated to 6-7 cms. I was mad because I've never showed up to the hospital/birth center less than an eight, but the nurses made me feel better when they said I was more dilated than anyone else there. ALSO, weird, the nurses said something must be going on because they hadn't busy at all for the last week and a half and then BOOM! they were totally full when I got there. I think I got the last room in labor and delivery. In fact, they started turning maternity recovery rooms into delivery rooms later that day. It must have been the rain.... as soon as the sun came out after the week and half of downpours, everyone on the island went into labor!

I got all settled and received my least favorite things about hospital births-- the stupid gowns and the painful stupid saline drip (I still have a lump in my wrist from it a week later!). Oh, and I also usually hate the fetal monitors, but they weren't that bad this time. I've only had one birth with the saline drip (Ana's) and two with the gowns and monitors (Ana's and Cam's).

Again, my contractions pretty much stopped. Well, they went back to 15 minutes apart and not very painful, though I could tell they were somewhat effective. However, at this rate, I was probably four more hours out according to my previous labors. Once the painful contractions start, I have about 40 minutes, but with this minor ones, I knew it would be awhile. So, when the doctor came back in around 1:20, we had her try to rupture my amniotic sac to get things moving since I was still only at an 8 but 100% effaced. She tried, but I make some seriously tough sacs and she was only able to knick it, so she left again. About 15 minutes later (about 1:40... Jonah broke the wall clock when he tried to adjust the time to be correct, so I'm going off of what they told me later), those hard, painful, 1 minute apart contractions started and I was kicking myself for again opting out of pain relief because there was no turning back now! After about ten minutes of contractions, I started feeling a slight urge to push, so we called the nurses in to get ready. At this point, I become a deranged lunatic and start sweating profusely and can't move. Jonah was an excellent coach as usual and helped me get into a better pushing position and held my leg nice and firm (he should be a male doula... he LOVES labor and delivery and is very calm yet commanding) and got me through the worst of it until I finally started pushing around 2:00. FINALLY, I got that noggin out at 2:13-2:14 and then the doctor yanked a little too hard to get the shoulders out and I got my first tear ever (four other big babies with no tears... sheesh), but he was out! It's the best feeling in the whole entire world to finally push the whole baby out.

And it was a boy! What a relief. I've always worried that we'd get a surprise, but he was as he was expected. We made sure to text Cam a photo straight away so he wouldn't be worried about the baby surprising him as another sister.

Baby was healthy, and he didn't even have a major cone head. He looked great. The nurses and doctor got me all cleaned up and we spent some time with baby until they took him to the nursery to get scrubbed squeaky clean, which my favorite part of hospital births vs. home births because those nursery nurses are pros at cleaning babies. Eventually, they moved me into my recovery room and brought me some food (yay! I was SO hungry... another least favorite part of labor) and I drank loads of coconut water with lime (my favorite drink... Jonah got me a 12-pack) and felt so relieved.

For the first time ever, I was in a shared room (it couldn't be helped... the entire place was booked solid) with a sweet Tongan woman who unfortunately had a c-section (so she was hooked up to five monitors with alarms that went off every 15 minutes) and had a very severe snoring problem (which set off a separate alarm for low oxygen every time she fell into a deep sleep... but she was snoring so loud, she could never hear it, so I'd have to call the nurses). I was giggling all night because it was so classic that the only hospital roommate I'd ever had was so incredibly loud. The one good thing was that she didn't have her baby room in with her at night, so we didn't also have a crying baby. Oh, and at 4:30 am, she also made a long distance call to Tonga for 45 minutes.

Later, when I checked out, I suggested to the nurses that they not give her a new roommate because someone else may not find the humor in the situation. My nurse said they had thought I would be the one person who could handle rooming with her, plus they knew I wouldn't be there long. That was true.

I also want to remind myself of the little baby across the hall whose cry sounded EXACTLY like a kitten's mew. It was uncanny. I've never heard anything like it, well, except for kittens.

My mom brought the kids to visit around 7 pm and they were delighted. Well, Po and Ana were delighted, and Cam and Elsie were a little indifferent. But, they've warmed up to him since we got home.

I spent a boring 24 hours in the hospital watching TV and having some choice friends come visit. The food was actually pretty good, and I love having other people clean up after me. Plus, I love having the mechanical bed. But, it is a hospital, so I was glad to get home and have a normal night's sleep.

And now, it's been a week. We were lucky to have my mom here for the first five days, so I was able to have lots and lots of naps. It was so great to have her here to take care of all the little things and give the other kids much needed attention, especially since Jonah was finally able to get some work done on the West Side and was gone for two full days, which I had prohibited until after the baby was born since I didn't want him so far away when I could go into labor at any time.

All in all, this has probably been my easiest recovery so far. I'm actually able to get up and walk around without much pain! Plus, nursing is SO much better than it was with Po and Elsie, who were both tongue-tied. I am incredibly exhausted most of the time, but that's expected. Jonah's also been loading me up on iron so I won't get the shivers, which can cause me to get mastitis if I'm not careful. Jonah is also recovering well. He gets severe sympathy pains. I "tease" him that I never get to be the only one sick because he is so sensitive he takes all my pains upon himself. He really enjoys labor and delivery, but he also has a lot of underlying worry, which doesn't really release until afterwards. But, he's coming around now and is sleeping more calmly. Thanks everyone for your prayers and concern... I've powerfully felt them through all of this excitement.

Labor and Baby, by Jonah

(copied from an email to his mom)

Thanks so much for writing to me. His name is Ezra Jonah and he is sleeping on my chest just now. Aja's milk came in. Aja said he nurses like a champion which I hope means she won't have as much soreness as old crappy-latcher Poem. We had a bit of an uneventful labor though for which I think we have gratitude. Aja psyched herself out numerous times and felt like she was in labor for almost two weeks. She had nice consistent contractions for five hours at a time that would get closer together and more painful, then stop abruptly for one or two or three days. Some worry and frustration were involved as her mom was coming and we never really knew what the due date was. It's pretty silly how they assign due dates and stick to them like gospel. Even after he was born at 8lbs1oz pink and healthy, they were calling him premature. Luvy (Aja's mom's grandma name) arrived Sunday last so the pressure was on. We went on middle of the night walks and she jumped on the trampoline. We went on bumpy dirt roads in bumpy cars. Small contractions and falsity prevailed. The blur of days and nights until Tuesday morning was ...blurry. Our Tuesday morning walk at 4:15 stopped her regular contractions once again. We walked up Olinda Road and down around, peaceful and slow if nothing else. I got the kids to school and then Aja in the outdoor tub in her tent of a swimming suit. Po, of course, needed to join her and made herself a space. My anticipation took over and I told her "time to go to the hospital get this baby out." At 11 AM we left the house and slowly drove to the hospital with Luvy worried that the supposed "he" would be born in Rusty Rust. As we were in no rush, all of the lights were green except that last one. I nearly talked Aja into letting me stay at the light even after it was green so she could have a contraction at her despised location (its a notoriously long red light). We found a parking space at distance from the entrance and walked. Organized Aja with her folder of check-in already neatly filled out paperwork got checked in and entered the maze of the Maui Memorial Hospital. Grammy would be proud, the room they put us in was completely purple. The nurses were kind and assured Aja she was there at the right time and called Dr. Ausbeck to check her progress. As of her appointment the day before, Monday, she was dilated to a four and 80% effaced. Doc calmly proclaimed "you are absolutely in labor, there are six other women in labor and you are much farther along than any of them. You are at at a 6/7 and 90 percent effaced." Some questioning later she informed Aja that the baby was still at -1. I as the husband could tell there was more progress to be made since she had to reach to feel baby in there. Aja and I were left alone to joke. I paced and worried. Over the course of 2 hours the Doc came back twice. Two different nurses came back and forth strapping and adjusting monitors. The baby's heart rate stayed consistent at 133bpm and the waiting continued. On the Doctor's third visit to the room I had talked Aja into allowing the breaking of her water. This turned out to be an undertaking like none the Doc had experienced as Aja makes some strong stuff. No water emerged so it was assumed that he was engaged enough and his head was acting as a cork. Aja started walking around the room and tearing down the levelor shades as she got more uncomfortable. Calmness prevailed. Thirty-three minutes passed and she calmly told me "I feel like i am going to have to push soon". I slowly walked to the nurses station looking at the great photographs of happy babies in the hallway and relayed the message. Once the nurses entered the room and saw Aja started saying "I don't know if I can do this" they knew that the time was at hand. When Dr. Ausbeck checked Aja again she was surprised to find that there was more breaking that needed to be done on that rhino skin. At this point we had Aja on the bed and were trying to get her positioned. She was hard to move around and not hearing anything we were saying since she was in the other world...the world of pain. With one nurse on each side and the other attending and with the Dr. in receiving position we coached her for 20 minutes and the room became decidedly un-calm. Aja can yell. She didn't say anything mean to me which i think is admirable. She let me hold her leg up and push a bit on her belly. Once his smashed head came out I told Aja to "not push" at the same time as the Dr. told her to "push hard". Aja listened to the Dr. and got the baby out. He...Yes it was a he, looked as purple as the guy from Earth Ernie. Aja gave cord blood in honor of Millie and Cami.

He Is a great baby. I am afraid that we are in the easy stage right now as he is eating and peeing in the toilet and being content and getting enough food and enough sleep. I am trying not to get my hopes up about the future of a quiet house but have really been basking in the newness of him and his alienness.

Christmas morning

2014-01-23T09:00:00.000-07:00

We had a lovely, simple Christmas. We feel like Santa was generous without being ostentatious....

Yes, that is Cracklin' Oat Bran. Santa knows that Elsie's favorite presents/days/experiences always have something to do with her favorite foods. (Can you see those awesome Christmas stockings from my mom!?)

Po is at that great age for Christmas... she really, really got into it.

She loved her wonderful gifts from her grandparents.

And the kids gave many thoughtful gifts to each other, thanks to some diligent garage sale and thrift store shopping with their own hard-earned money.

Po rounded out her wooden toy collection.

Each of the kids got a new suitcase from grandparents or Jonah and I. They are very very excited about going on a trip now... but, they'll have to wait until this summer I think.

We had a great Christmas morning, followed by a fantastic evening when our friends, the Niemeyers from Sequim came over for Christmas dinner. They come to Maui every December, so we are trying to keep this tradition going... this is the third year in a row already! We love having them around (again, lost all of my iPhone photos from December, so no pictures this year).

Great stuff! We had a fun, somewhat simple Christmas Eve and Christmas. We, as usual, felt overwhelmed by the generosity of our parents who sent us so many nice and thoughtful gifts. And we were also grateful for Amazon.com, which paid for shipping 98% of the non-thrift store gifts this year.

We were most grateful for the month leading up to Christmas, which although was filled with many activities, most of those activities really reminded us of how grateful we are for our Savior's birth, the celebration of which gives us good reason to share love and joy with others and to increase in joy ourselves, which is his Ultimate purpose, isn't it? We are grateful grateful grateful.

Merry Christmas 2013!

Grammy and Grandfather Come to Island

2014-01-23T00:56:00.000-07:00

We were so over-the-moon when Jonah's parents arrived mid-December for a week long visit! Thankfully, Jonah's mom Linda took lots of photos because I lost all my December iPhone photos when I switched to a different phone. (oops!). The kids were beside themselves with happiness.

We had lots of adventures, as well as lots of beach-time and loads of help getting ready for Christmas.

Above is a photo of Jonah and Po at Black Rock.

Jonah's mom was impressed with Jonah's recent cattle culling experience.. the cows had to be flown down the mountain by helicopter. It was a crazy experience I must say. We have a lot of beef now.

Jonah's parents were instrumentally important in helping us set up for my Christmas Piano Recital. I had 12 of my students perform, and I think it went pretty well. My garage isn't quite big enough to hold everyone, but I am glad to make good use of our lanai/stage a couple times a year.

The belly! I think I'm 30 weeks here? Maybe 32.

This time we had candles and a fire pit to try to make the garage a little more magical.

I loved having Linda there to play a Christmas duet with me. We laughed so hard we both got tears. It was great fun!

And again, we did the infamous Bamboo Hike (that was five times in three months for me). Sydney was a huge help with tired little Po.

Unfortunately, the week before, I sat on my Contigo waterbottle when I was getting into the car and injured the midsection of my pelvic bone (my doctor thinks it's remi osteitis, but I think it might be a fracture, but in any case, it's not treatable until after pregnancy), and this hike was NOT the ticket. I was waddling like a duck for a week after.

But it is SO fun to do this hike, especially when we can relax and swim in the waterfall pools with all these great kids who came with.

Jonah's parents are great about loving lots beach time, even if it just means relaxing on the beach for a few hours. Here we are on our Lahaina day, enjoying the beach at Kapalua. I'd never been, and it was an amazing beach! Can't wait to go back.

Plus, there was a lovely walk from the beach overlooking crystal clear laval tide pools.

Sadly, the week went by too quickly and all of a sudden it was Christmas Eve. Since Grammy and Grandfather were leaving that afternoon, the kids got to open their presents from them on Christmas Eve morning.

The most popular gift of the day/year was Elsie's Dipping Bird! It uses evaporation to keep the little "bird" dipping its head into water every few minutes. My girls have literally spent hours watching the bird and cheer every time he takes a drink. (Sadly, "Dippy Bird" "died" a few weeks later when the girls got in a tiff about something and he dropped onto the floor, but Elsie got another one for her birthday... his name is Tippy Bird since Dippy Bird is buried in the yard under a tombstone).

On their way to the airport, Grammy and Grandfather came to Kite Beach with us to watch Jonah do some kiting. He's getting pretty good! Fun to watch.

Loved having my fantastic, wonderful in-laws visit! Hope they come again soon and hope the pre-Christmas visit becomes a yearly tradition...

December is the month for the Crazies!

2014-01-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not insinuating that my friend Ai (above) is crazy, just that I have included myself in the throng of people (usually women) who put way too much on their plate in December. Even though it is often daunting, I have to admit that I kind of get a rush from the craziness of it all. Here are some of the crazy things we did in the first two weeks of December:

Ai (above) is getting ready for our annual Swim Club Membership Meeting and Christmas Party. I was elected president again this year (I ran unopposed again, so I'm not tooting my own horn here), to my kids' chagrin (it means I keep up on their attendance records). We have a team event once a month, but this party is the most important. I think it went well, especially due to the fabulous catering. And of course, the photo above is the only decent photo I took all night.

We washed all three cars in one day.

For one of her Personal Progress projects, Ana took on the task of directing and producing the Ward's Natvity Scene this year. It was a LOT of work (especially getting all the costumes and set together) with a lot of helpers, but the kids all did a great job and it went off without a major hitch.

She loves directing!!! I've always seen a future for her in directing (anything).

And we got a tree! Our neighbors let us cut down one of their Norfolk/Star pines. Much better than the Christmas Stick from last year. The kids were delighted... even though the tree kept falling over at random times (Jonah is a bit of a Scrooge when it comes to Christmas trees and didn't want to be involved, so I take full responsibility for the poor set-up of the tree).

Po and one of my greatest friends, Mary, share the same birthday (and Jamie too, but she couldn't make the trip. :) ... and lucky us, Mary and her family were here on Maui for the big day (and 9 mores days too). They rented my friend Amy's guest house and had some awesome adventures, and we had some great times hanging out, having dinner, and showing them a bit of the island, doing the crazy Bamboo Hike, and lots of beach time. Ana even got Mary up on a surfboard.

I won't divulge her age, but she's much older than she looks!

My kids loved getting to know Mary and Kade's two boys again (Cam and Elsie are the same age as their two boys and Cam and Kellan were friends back before they can remember in Saint George)(the photo above is of Po and Mary's Ethan, btw), but Amy's daughter Sophie and Mary's Ethan ESPECIALLY hit it off. It was pretty cute. I had to document it here in writing in case there's a future between them...

And, finally, in those first two crazy weeks of December,
Ana and I tried to tame Po's hair. That was the craziest of all.

Po is 3!

2014-01-21T21:00:00.000-07:00

Po turned three not too far into December. She was quite excited about it for some time, so we were thrilled to finally celebrate!

First, we had her three best friends come over for a little lunch, trampoline jumping and cupcake eating... all three girls are within two months of each other in age. Two of the girls live next door (one on each side) and one girl is a friend from church. It is just the cutest to have them play together.

Here is part of their fancy lunch, which is not much to brag about...

But man, oh man! These cupcakes were delicious... and this is coming from a person whom does not like cake or cupcakes. Mmmmmm. I was trying to find a good way to use up some of the cream cheese I had leftover from Thanksgiving, and I think this was a worthy use...

These girls are all so easy and fun, so they actually really enjoyed such a simple, formless birthday party.

All Po cares about anyway is blowing out candles...

Helper for the present opening...

Hammock time!

And then, that night, we had a family birthday party, including the Andersons (like family) and the Mathews (like family too... especially because they were visiting from the mainland!)

Love our Po!

Some of our favorite things about Poem right now:

She has an amazing memory! She can even remember back when she was 18 months old. She remembers songs, poems, people... she even remembers directions and can tell me where we are going by landmarks she sees from the car.

She is very cuddly in the early morning when she crawls in our bed and goes back to sleep. She doesn't even wiggle. She just cuddles right up next to us and lays still and goes back to bed.

She is getting good at cleaning up and getting her friends to clean up.

She is fearless when it comes to physical activity (except for anything that might get her face wet). She's been begging to learn to ride a bike. She wears slippery rollerblades around the house. She hangs upside down on everything. She runs full speed down our street. And she's good at it all too!

Jonah says, "She's receptive to reasoning." Um, receptive to dad's discussions and reasoning. I'm not so good at that myself. I usually just go lock myself in the bathroom.

She has a great sense of humor. For example, she'll say, "Hi. I'm hungry. Nice to meet you. (shakes my hand) Now give me some food." She just comes up with funny things to say and then laughs at herself. She also has an imaginary "baby brother" who lives in her belly. If she does a stinky or burps or something else impolite, she says, "Ohhhh, baby brother!" and rubs her belly.

She's always trying to spell her name... it goes like this, Po-E-M. Poem.

When she lets us do her hair, she's pretty darn cute.

Love you Poem!

Thanksgiving and Nobe and Krusti Come to Visit

2014-01-21T09:00:00.000-07:00

I think it should count as a tradition now after two years, right? We were lucky once again to have Noah and Kristi and their four kids come from San Diego to visit for the last week of November. This is especially special because they were in the midst of buying a house and subsequently moving to Orange County AND Kristi is pregnant and pretty sick for those first 26 weeks or so, so she was surely miserable, but didn't let us know. We are so tickled that we still took precedence over all those other minor complications...

Almost immediately after they arrived, Noah helped Jonah work on the traditional Thanksgiving imu (hangi for you NZ folk), or pit cooker/earth oven. We put in two turkeys this year and oops, they didn't get done in time. BUT, they still tasted delicious once they finally cooked.

The kids got extra muddy and sandy during their visit, so we got some good use out of the outdoor tub. Po is sandwiched in age between Cubby and Bennett, so she loves the party of having these two cousins around!

Elsie is about 18 months older than Lyla, but Noah and Kristi have some tall kids and I have short ones, so these girls are pretty much twins--twin little princesses.

Here's Noah working on the imu. It's quite the process!

Somehow, once again, no photos of the Thanksgiving dinner! What is my problem?! But, since Bennett's second birthday was the same day as Thanksgiving this year, we also did a b-day celebration with some of the Thanksgiving pineapple pie.

We had lots of beach adventures, including this glorious Thanksgiving morning surf and stroll...

And a couple days later we visited Boat Ramp beach, and though it was a bit overcast, we all had a good time...

We did a day-long Lahaina side visit and got to explore the Banyan Tree forest at the mouth of Honolua Bay....

(Guess who didn't like being up in a tree this high...)

We caught some sweet boogie boarding waves at DT Fleming Beach... (I was SO sad to not be able to boogie board thanks to this belly... I should've taken my friend's advice and cut a big belly hole in a boogie board and gone in anyway...)

And we of course finished our Lahaina-side day with a trip to Black Rock and the Sheraton Hotel.

Noah's going for it!

My kids CANNOT pass this Sheraton mural without posing for photos.

All the surfing, beaching, early mornings with Cubby and Bennett, playing with My Little Ponies, and cooking wore these two stellar dads out.

We also had many Upcountry adventures, including a Sunday evening visit to Pulehu Chapel, the first LDS Church in the Hawaiian islands...

But I don't know how those early Hawaiian pioneers enjoyed church services with little kids... talk about an echo! Every noise any kid makes reverberates immensely. BUT, it does make for some nice acoustics for singing...

We also went for some hikes and of course hit more beaches, but mostly we enjoyed having the Noah and Kristi family here. Love it so much! Hope they keep the tradition alive for years to come!

And finally, here is our Thankful Tree before it was retired to make room for Christmas decorations. We are so thankful!!

The Broken Arm

2014-01-20T20:16:00.001-07:00

The Sunday before Thanksgiving (during which Jonah's brother Noah and his family was coming to visit... more on that later), we tromped up to a nearby forest to go on a family walk and gather some wild raspberries for one of the Thanksgiving recipes.

Happily walking along... until Elsie ran down a hill and tripped or a root and landed on her elbow. She cried a bit and whined a lot and Jonah thought she was being overly dramatic. But, Elsie actually has an incredibly high pain tolerance, so I suspected something serious, even though her arm wasn't swollen or disjointed. (Ana actually severely broke her left humerus in New Zealand when she was seven doing something similarly unexciting, but Ana's arm was three inches longer than it should've been, so we had a pretty good idea that it was the real deal.)

We gave it a night, and she was still incredibly sore the next day.

I should've taken her to Urgent Care, because the doctor's office couldn't get me in until 2 pm, and then it took 3.5 hours!!! to have the doctor say that it wasn't broken enough for a cast, but not inoclulous enough to just leave it alone. So, after 3.5 hours of us sitting and waiting, they put on a soft cast/splint and told us to come back in a week for another x-ray. So efficient.

Elsie was pretty bummed about the soft cast while her cousin was here, but we did cheat a couple times and let her take off the soft cast to shower and maybe we even let her get in the hot tub....

In any case, here we are a week later for the follow up visit. After TWO hours with the pediatrician again, we were sent down the street to the orthopedic surgeon. At this point, we NEEDED ice cream sandwiches because I was fairly irate.

The orthopedic surgeon said she had the slightest of slight fractures along the bottom right side of her humerus and that she'd probably be fine with a soft cast/splint for another 3-4 weeks, but why not just do a hard cast for two weeks to be sure the healing was a done deal? It seemed like good medical "practice" to me, so here she is with her new blue cast (to match her school uniform).

Actually, the main reason I thought it would be okay to get a hard cast is because she doesn't seem like the type that will ever have a bad enough injury for another cast... so I thought it would be a novel experience in the least. Plus, she only had to have it for two weeks, so I figured that was just enough time for her to enjoy the extra attention without the cast getting stinky and itchy.

Elsie didn't complain once about her cast, and she only hit Camden once on purpose with it. She was pretty cute with the cast, I have to say.

On the final day before she got it off, I did a hack paint job. It's supposed to be a candy cane. She didn't mind the sloppiness... she loved it and so did all the kids at school!

But, I was glad to finally have it off and to not have anymore unnecessarily long doctor's appointments to look forward to. Whew. That's enough injuries for now, thank you (oh wait, I spoke too soon... more on that later...)

November Down Time

2014-01-19T22:00:00.000-07:00

We tried to get alot of little projects done at the first of November before the onslaught of holiday visitors, but we also took some downtime for the family too. Here's Po at the mall's playground.

Here is when Po is somewhat angelic.

Here is Ana opening the AWESOME AMAZING ASTOUNDING box of maternity clothes from my sister!! During the same week, my mom also sent a whole big box of size 2-4 nearly new designer clothes (she moonlights as a de-junker/anti-hoarding consultant in Orange County... I sometimes get the castoffs! Wahoo!). Of course, none of the clothes fit my largeness, but Ana ate them up. Fashionista!

Cam brought the class baby turtles home for a weekend and his little sisters were in total heaven. These wee babies were pretty cute. Reminds me of the TMNTs before the ooze.

Ana practiced her photography skills..

Po did her best to make it through each day WITHOUT having her hair pulled back. She loathes having it brushed, but will at least let us do it. However, putting it in a ponytail requires a special dispensation.

Ana had a garage sale, though there wasn't quite enough stuff to make it extremely profitable. She has a goal to earn at least $50 a month on her own, so sometimes she has to branch out beyond the usual lemonade stands if the weather isn't hot enough.

We also got some skating rink time in...

And we started our Thankful Tree.

And Elsie completed some life-size mermaid commissions.

And I think Po played with a friend nearly every day. (It helps that one of your besties lives next door and loves blocks as much as you do...)

I complain about this cat a lot, but at the very least, he LOVES kids and toddlers. He puts up with a lot from these two... but I think he can tell that they really adore him.

And here are some dog piles on dad...

And Ana showing off some of the designer hand-me-down PJs. And her muscles.

And Po's version of helping. My other kids were great helpers because they really listened and wanted to receive instruction on how to do it right. Po just jumps in and thinks she knows how to do it without any instruction at all. I have to pick the least destructible chores for her to help with... BUT, at least she wants to help. I'll go with that...

Mom and Ana Date

2014-01-19T14:58:00.001-07:00

Here we are! Back to blogging again. Will try and get the 16 posts I have planned out in the next week... Two a day! Wahoo!

Anyway, here's Ana and I enjoying a little date to Lahaina, compliments of the money sent to me from my mother and mother-in-law. Thanks ladies! We had a great night... we went and got some Teddy's Bigger Burgers (our favorite Lahaina food), watched the amazing 'Ulalena show, and then tromped around Front Street in Lahaian, enjoying the leisure we could take without out all the other kids in tow. We ended the night with some gelato. Yum!

Ana is a great date!

She even overcame her fear of taking photos with cast members...

Happy Christmas! Novella

2013-12-25T03:11:00.002-07:00

Just in case I don't have your current email, here is a non-brief Christmas Card.

We hope for love and peace for all of you during this festive time of year

and throughout 2014.

Great Gifts and Toys for Kids

2013-11-25T12:42:00.001-07:00

This is a blog post you would have never expected from me, I know. I'm totally anti-consumerism and hate shopping. When I do buy something, most of the time its pre-owned. Seriously, I think 80% of all of the gifts we give our kids are from thrift shops or garage sales. I can't help it. I love thrift stores!

But, it's nice to give a brand new, timeless gift once and awhile, isn't it? (I have to keep telling myself that...) Plus, this time of year, the second-hand pickins are slim.

With four kids aged 2 to 12 years (and one on the way), we've gone through a lot of toys, toy fads, and kid junk. These are toys that we have loved and that have helped us to actually own less toys, be more organized, and help our kids understand that it's better to invest in something of quality that will last indefinitely.

We've figured out that our kids enjoy their toys more if there are less of them, if they are toys that encourage creativity, learning and teamwork, and if they are visually and tactually pleasing for children AND adults. These usually don't coincide to be the most exciting presents to unwrap, though.... I think that's where the temptation to buy less meaningful or more popular toys lies. Resist!! It's only a momentary excitement!

And I used to think that those "only wood toys for my child" people were nuts, but now I get it! Wood toys are better. They really are. Ditch the plastic if you can.

Okay, here they are:

BABIES

Sassy Jitter Bugs Toy

This isn't the exact toy, but all my babies have loved the pull-and-vibrate-plush toys. Each baby has also had personal favorites (especially specific to what they loved to chew on) but every single baby has loved these toys. It's not usually something they can do themselves at first, but I'll pull the toy and then let it vibrate on their neck or hand, and they loved it. Eventually, they learn to work it themselves and it's endlessly delightful.

Skip Hop Duck

This toy works for kids up to age five or six. We've had them for two years, and we love them. YES, it's plastic. But, its a bath toy, so too bad. I prefer these to stacking bath cups because they are easier to keep clean (lots of mold here in Hawaii), and I don't have to spend time figuring out which cup stacks in which. Plus, my kids like these better than stacking bath toys. They work as boats, cups, and a gentle way to pour water on baby's head.

TODDLERS AND PRESCHOOLERS

(since the dawn of time, every toddler has wanted a doll, a truck (well, since the invention of the wheel on that one) and/or a ball. I don't have favorites in those categories though, so no product endorsements from me. I have found that simple 12-14" dolls that have soft bodies and realistic faces are the usual favorites. Koosh balls are fun for toddlers. And simple trucks are better... we loved Hot Wheels...) Preschoolers also love dress-up, but I don't recommend buying dress up clothes brand new. Aren't dress-up clothes the whole reason thrift stores were invented in the first place?!?

Embossed Alphabet Blocks

A classic toy for good reason. Kids one year to twelve will actively play with good quality wood blocks for extended periods of time. Plus, think of all the good skills they are learning! When kids come over to play, they instinctively pull the blocks out again and again.

I strongly believe that these alphabet blocks are far superior to the many-sized blocks found in many preschools. We've owned all sorts of wood blocks and these are the only ones we have kept (with the exception of Citi Blocks, which I'll get to later), because these are the favorite again and again with all different kids who come over. I wish they came in a wooden storage box, but we just laminated (with packing tape) the cardboard box they came in and it's worked now for two years.

Junior Racer

As a disclaimer, I don't actually own this toy. My sister-in-law Saren owned it when she lived next store to us, and we begged to borrow it all the time. I actually bought some other ball-based toys with the same concept, but this one is still the favorite. Kids of all ages will watch these cars go down the tracks over and over and over again and experiment with different variables. Great for boys and girls.

Geometric Stacker

(Disclaimer: this toy will fade in the sun). Of all the stackers we've owned, this has been the best. Can't you just see how awesome this is? Plus, why spend nine dollars on a plastic or plush stacker when you can get this one with three for $13?! It may take awhile for your kids to learn how to stack in perfectly on their own, but they will love playing with it regardless of their adeptness.

Wooden See Saw Sorter

This is my personal favorite. I actually enjoy putting it together when it's left in a mess on the floor. (It's so much better than those old plastic sorting balls that you have to put the shapes in and then try and open the darn thing to get them out.) It teaches sorting AND balance. They learned balance and how it works on their own, then we taught them the terms (balance, fulcrum,weight, shapes). Heck yeah!

Cone Stacker

This is another great stacker toy. It's also so visually pleasing.

Really, with a doll/truck/ball and these four wooden toys, you have more than enough toys for even an active toddler/preschooler. Maybe you want some books and puzzles around too, of course. And crayons. Oh, and one more thing:

Doll Stroller

Toddlers love something to push. I didn't include a push toy on the "babies" section because I've now had two of five babies who didn't get into pushing something around (but there are some great wooden push toys out there for babies). BUT, all four have loved pushing stuff around as toddlers and preschoolers. For boys, you could do a grocery cart or a small wagon or something if they are worried about pushing a stroller... but actually, it's a good life lesson for boys to learn to push a stroller. Plus, they can use their push toy to walk around and pick stuff up for you. You can even talk them into walking through public spaces without being worried about being coddled by convincing them that they need to take care of and push their baby or stuffed animal (works for husbands too).

ELEMENTARY AGE KIDS

Legos

I will not include photos or links of LEGOS on here because you probably already know that they are incredibly awesome, although a huge mess and painful to step on in the middle of the night (a good trick-- only allow Lego play on an old sheet or table cloth. Afterwards, just gather it up and dump it back into the bin). We have lots of Legos and they are played with nearly every single day by every single kid. If we were escaping a natural disaster, I would probably take Legos with us just so the kids would be entertained as we huddled in the storm shelter. I even have a small box of them in the car for errand down time. My advice for buying Legos is to try and find a bunch of them second hand rather than trying to build up from scratch because man, those things are expensive. Also, try and get as many minifigures as possible in what you buy-- they are the meat and potatoes of the magical Lego world. Also, don't get tricked into buying non-Lego sets. They don't work well with real Legos and are not as high quality.

Amaze n Marbles

Okay. This is another toy that I don't actually own right now, but we've played with something like it for hours and hours. We had a dumb plastic version that the kids love but parts kept breaking, so it went back the thrift store this past friday. This wood version is on the Amazon Wish List...

Insect or Fishing Net

Any net with a strong handle will do. Kids will find all sorts of uses indoor and outdoor for a good net. My preschooler uses it to carry things around and my 1st grader tries to catch insects. I won't scare you with the things my older kids have done, but just know that nothing has died.

Sleeping Queens

This is a great card game for kids from about 5-10. It's simple enough that kids can play with each without an adult supervising, but it's engaging enough that they will want to continue to play. There are many great board games out there, and I know everyone has their favorites, but this is one you may not have heard of... Plus, it doesn't take up much room or have lots of little parts.

Guess Who

Okay. Another plastic toy. Sorry. But I happened to buy this at a Thrift Shop to replace our old Guess Who game with lots of missing cards and this version has solved ALL of my Guess Who? grievances, except that the faces are a little TOO cartoonish. The whole game is self contained (great for travel... no loose parts) and there are a number of different themes to choose from. My plan is to make a sheet of relatives and/or historical people for them to guess about. (Check out Pinterest for ideas).

A great game that can be played between kids of different ages. My 12-year-old is playing with my 6-year-old as I type.

CitiBlocks

This is another toy I just happened upon second hand. They are fantastic and hold loads of interest for kids aged 3-12. Many things to build, very simple, easy to clean up. They are good quality as well. Again, I much prefer these all-one-size wooden blocks to the wooden blocks of varying shape and size.

MIDDLE SCHOOLERS

This is where my expertise will end, but really, anyone older than 12/13 probably just wants money or something very specific.

Anyway, my middle school has very specific tastes because she collects model horses, so I won't get into that. She used to collect American Girl Dolls and she made loads of money reselling them when she "grew out of them" (she had bought them herself, so she got to keep the profit), so I'm just letting her roll with this next phase of toy collecting. It seems that middle schoolers do have individual tastes and interests, but here are some toys and games I would feel comfortable getting any middle schoolers AS LONG AS I was willing to spend a little time participating/using/playing with it with them to engage them in it (yes, they still need that... and really you will be giving the more important gift of time).

Games:

Boggle

Sports Equipment:

Toys:

Nerf Guns (simple is better... they are plastic and will break)

Legos (still!)

Building kits (doll houses, barns, model airplanes or cars)

A high quality ukulele

Well, there you have it. Beyond that, I'm a horrible gift giver. Really horrible.

Oh, except a great gift for a college student is a popcorn maker.

I'd love to hear of other suggestions!

Elsie's Mermaids

2013-11-03T19:12:00.000-07:00

Here are Elsie's friends:

Sophie, Elsie and Kamalei

She's been practicing drawing mermen.

The Very Best Month

2013-11-02T20:00:00.000-06:00

But seriously, it is. Not just because it's my birthday month. I love October!

It's starts with the LDS General Conference... which, thanks to our Apple TV, was watching without a single technical difficulty for the first time ever.

Elsie drew the lovely little illustration above while watching...

The kids had a week off of school so we spent a day Lahaina side with some surfing for a few hours and then a trip to Black Rock beach for cliff jumping and pool hopping...

The girls can't go by the Sheraton face photo thing without making me take a photo.

We had fun afternoon with friends at the pumpkin patch.

And finished that off with sledding, Maui-style (on cardboard, down grass).

The chickens have finished molting and are back into egg laying mode full time.

I finished this great book... it is a historical fiction murder mystery written by a guy who graduated from Harvard the year before I got there. It's all set at Harvard and in Cambridge, so I think I especially liked it. I also learned a lot about the old buildings and historical sights in Cambridge as well as about Lowell and Longfellow, who were brilliantly brought to life in the novel. I hope the library doesn't mind that it was returned "well loved".

We sell a lot of the chicken eggs to pay for their expensive chicken feed, but we still sometimes have enough to make German pancakes, the world's easiest breakfast and the most-loved breakfast of my kids. (AKA Jackson souffle in Jonah's family)

I took the three youngest on a hike all by myself!

Jonah's sweet Grandma Ruthie died this month, so he left for about a week to go to the funeral in Logan, Utah. Check out the photos and write up by his mom Linda (and here) or sisters Saren, Shawni, Saydi, and Charity. Grandma had been suffering through severe demetia for a few years, but her health had been excellent. And then, after a blessing and final visit from her five kids, she just peacefully passed. She was surely glad to be with her sweetheart husband who died more than 50 years ago. Grandma was an awesome and elect lady. Jonah was really close with her, especially after living with her and by her during much of college. We lived across the road from her for a few months after we got married too. She was a delight and a supreme example of light, love, intelligence, steadfastness, and selflessness. She accomplished amazing things in life, but more importantly, she became a woman we should all want to be. Love you Grandma Ruthie!

Jonah isn't one for funerals, but I think he had a really nice time with his siblings, parents and extended family. I think it was fun for all the siblings to get together without all of us in-laws crashing the party too. This is the first funeral he's been to on his side of the family since before we were married. (My side has had like nine in the last 15 years.) I think he was really glad that he went. But, he did say it was freezing, so I think he was also glad to come home.

(Ana loves those sunsets that happen right after swim team practice every day).

After Jonah got back, the kids had a random-teacher-inservice-day-off-of-school, so we took the back road to Lahaina since we had never gone that way. We still have loads to explore back there some day, but we did find a favorite spot... a crystal clear deep tide pool down in the lava rock shore:

It is a scary drive over there, but I think we'll have to do it again soon. Anyone want to come with?

Po loves her blocks lately. They are her favorite toy.

She also loves spelling her name.. I think because it's so easy.

Of course, Ana had to get in on the action. Lucky for her I didn't inlcude the photo where she had accidentally held up A-N-X. Oops. She was mad when I wouldn't take the photo and couldn't figure out why I was laughing so hard.

And its a great month because, of course, its my birthday month!!!

My awesome friends Amy and Malia took me to brunch (that lasted so long it became lunch too) and I had the most scrumptious baked french toast with fresh raspberries. Mmmmm. We had a good time laughing and laughing. They are such great friends.

I came home to Ana baking up a storm. I couldn't figure out why she was making 50 pieces of naan bread. She also made me brownies from scratch (we have the best recipe... easy and delicious) and cleaned up the house. I also cleaned the house a bit and laid low.

After taking the kids to swim team, we drove home and I was looking forward to the butter chicken Jonah had promised to make (to go with the naan bread). It smelled so amazing when I walked in the door. mmmmmm.... and then SURPRISE!!! Ana had organized a surprise party with the Anderson and Akinaka families. So fun.

I probably would have done my hair and makeup had I known we would have visitors. :)

Oh my heck! Look at that face.

Thanks Ana and Jonah and everyone for the great birthday. I got some amazing spoil-me presents from my mom, dad and in-laws and some great presents from the family. Looking forward to another great year!

September 2013-- Hiiiii YA!

2013-11-01T20:00:00.000-06:00

Oh ya. I'm knocking these blog posts right out of the water. I'll caught up before you know it.. and then maybe I'll be a regular blogger again... who knows?

One of the treasures that we brought back from summer vacation is a face painting kit. Ana has been honing her skills in hopes of one day being one of the high-paid face painters at the village street fairs... Above: Po the Kung-Fu Panda.

Elsie quit ballet this year and started hula because, "I live in Hawaii, duh!" (I think she just wanted to try something new). On her way to h ula one Saturday morning, I asked her if I could buy her a favorite treat. It took awhile for her to explain to me what that favorite treat was, but I finally figured out that it was Nilla Wafers. Luckily I bought the right thing. She hasn't forgotten the name since. The weirdest thing is that Nilla Wafers are a favorite of my mom's side of the family... now how did that get passed on genetically?!

Some more Elsie photos. We've been practicing her posing...

We live within walking distance of a fantastic, fun and super cheap thrift store. Ana and I have been racing up there on certain mornings when they put new stuff up to buy things we know we can resell on Craigslist. We have been known to fight over certain items.. with each other. She also tries to charge me an exorbitant amount if she has to handle any of my Craigslist transaction (answering the door... making change...). Sheesh Ana-- didn't you read the web address of this blod?! Anyway, baby items sell very well. Plus, Po likes to play with them before they go to the new owners.

The kids were actually somewhat excited to get back to swim team practice every day. They were ultra excited to do swim meets again. Elsie even did her first swim meet. She did well in her 25m freestyle (well, her dive looked good. she did get last place, but that's because she takes after me in the speed department). For her relay, she may or may not have jumped into the pool right after the second swimmer jumped in even though she was supposed to go fourth.. and she maybe ran headfirst into the third swimmer who was halfway across the pool.. .and she may have not heard the 20 people on the sideline yelling to her to turn back/watch out/ swim to the side. It was great. I love that girl. It was so fun to watch her swim. I love watching all the kids swim in the meets. It's truly fun.

Our great friends the Andersons let us celebrate many birthdays with them this month (Sydney and Sophie have September birthdays and Ethan is in October). Here we are at the first LDS Chapel in the Hawaiian Islands celebrating Sydney's bday.

And now, for the big announcement!! (You may have suspected it when I was so sick this summer, but the strep/low blood count/ altitude sickness was actually surprisingly totally unrelated)... we are surprised and delighted to announce that we are expecting a baby due February 15th, 2014. Crazy you say?! You're telling us! But no, really, after a few months into it, we are coming to terms with it and getting excited.

But because it was unexpected, we (Jonah and I) didn't want to tell the kids until we found out if it was a boy or a girl. We felt like if it was another girl, we might need tell the kids differently than if it was a boy (like, we might need to preemptively get poor Cam into surviving-sisters-therapy). We are excited to announce that, according to the ultrasound, it is a boy!

We made plans to tell them at Family Home Evening on the the Monday after the ultrasound.

We started our with homemade blue mac-n-cheese (it's just food coloring, not mold).

Then Jonah and I wore blue...

(Jonah gave an FHE lesson on using less toilet paper.)

And then we served them blueberry brownies.

Welp. None of them caught on. They just said, "thanks for all the blue stuff." Finally we had to drop more hints about how we wanted to tell them something, and about how Cam would no longer be the only blueberry in the family, etc. FINALLY Ana caught on (I think she's had an idea for awhile) and she whispered in the ears of the other kids. But still, they were confused. Elsie listened to Ana whisper and then yelled, "FIREMAN?!?!!!" Cam kept saying, "I'm so confused! I'm so confused!" then he wouldn't stop giggling. Eventually they all caught on. It was extremely funny and we were all cry-laughing by the end.

Po has by far been the most excited. She talks about her "new baby brother coming after Christmas" all the time every day. We've nicknamed the little guy, "Harry Pop" after Po's mixup with calling lollipops Harry Pops. (They do get hairy if you licked them and then drop them on the furniture).

If we haven't had the chance to tell you in person, please forgive us. To be honest, it took us 20 weeks to tell our own kids... we're still grasping the fact that just when we thought we were moving into the kids-and-teenagers stage of life, we are being thrust back into the baby jail. It's hard to explain. We (both Jonah and I) haven't felt like this before, but I think its just the shock when we weren't expecting it. Babies and children are a blessing though, and we are grateful for the blessing and will do our best with the little guy to raise him well. We truly are getting excited and we are especially glad to bring Cam a brother. Here's the video we showed to some of our extended family:

Okay. Well. In other news, Ana finished the mermaid tail she promised Elsie back in January and did one for herself too. It was some tough sewing, but she pulled through and did it all by herself!! They wrap around the monofins they already had, so they are functioning swimming tails! So fun!

And I finally came through on a promise to Po and had her friend Betti come over to play a few different times. Po and Betti are about the cutest and dearest two-year-olds I've seen. I was worried about Po because she's got some rough older siblings and she likes to play rough and rowdy, but she and Betti are as sweet and gentle with each other as they can be. Po is so concerned that Betti gets what she needs and that she's having a good time and she's happy. It's heartmelting.

Here we are on a walk. We stopped to feed the goat naemd Trough some hibiscus flowers.

It took us about an hour to make it four blocks, but they had a fun time. The next time Betti came over, we did a much shorter walk. Po has since been to Betti's house too. But unfortunately, she had so much fun that when I came to pick her up, she clenched onto the door frame and screamed, "Don't take me! I don't want to go! I want to stay here! Don't take me!!!" It was a little embarrassing.

For an early birthday present, Jonah spent the better part of the month stripping and repairing and repainting my car!! It looks fabulous!!! Po is not going to be able to crawl on the roof anymore... I don't want any scratches up there.

Here's Po after she snuck herself a fudgesicle. Oops Po--You forgot to lick up the evidence.

And I found this cool old galvanized tub to use as bath in our shower. It's perfect for Po. Our old rubbermaid bin was getting a little small.

And lastly... isn't Elsie's art great?!... yep, even when she draws and traces it backwards

Fun and Fantastic August 2013, or Getting Back into the Swing of Things

2013-10-31T20:00:00.000-06:00

Well, I'm glad we came back a day early from Oahu, because otherwise we would have come home only 12 hours before the first day of school Whew. We had one little day to recover and dig the kids' school shirts out of storage. They were a little peeved that I didn't have all their school supplies ready yet, but they survived in the end.

Both Elsie and Cam have great teachers this year. We feel very blessed. They also have some great friends. Cam especially is a friend magnet. Elsie seems well-liked, but she's so distracted sometimes, I think she simply forgets everyone's name. Anyway, they were excited to get back to school... well, actually, Elsie was afraid that first grade was going to be "super hard", but she's doing fine. She's just afraid of hard work, but we're surviving that too.

We were glad to go on some of our old favorite hikes with some friends who came to visit from LAs Vegas-- remember Anthony and Melissa and their kids (think Old Ghost Town Nelson in Vegas...)? Well, Anthony and Melissa can for five days on the tail end of their 15 year anniversary they had spent on the Big Island. We loved showing them around and spending some good quality time with them, since usually we can't even sit and talk since there are eight kids between the two families. Anyway, we took them on the Bamboo Hike...

Which tempted Po to disrobe, even though we said we would NOT be swimming this time.

and Cam cannot be kept out of the trees either...

Cute sisters.

August was a great month to just hang around at home and enjoy not needing to be anywhere or do anything (well, besides clean up the yard and garden that had died and overgrown over the summer, get the chickens back from their summer "babysitters" and get them happy and laying again, unpacking all of our stuff we put in storage, cleaning the house, restocking the food, helping the kids adjust to school and homeschool/online school (Ana), do doctors and dentists visits). In our downtime, Po practiced drawing and writing. LOOK! She was so proud of herself when she actually wrote "Po"!!

At open house, Elsie once again wowed us with not only her excellent artistry, but also her ultra-blondness in every self portrait. But, I have to say, she really does stick out here in Hawaii.

Po was glad to be back in her outdoor bath

and back to "Beachtime!"

Down at Ho'okipa, where there are a dozen turtles sleeping in the sand behind them, we found three little mermaids (thanks for the sand construction, Amy!).

And then, just like that, the month ended and my baby girl Ana turned 12!!!!

We had a small family party on her actual birthday,

And she got some great presents from her parents, siblings and grandparents...

Including her favorite--collectible Breyer horses and accessories. (No, she's not obsessed. Did I say she was obsessed?!)

And then we had a much anticipated friend birthday party, which started with a mall scavenger hunt and shopping excursion (this was all meticulously planned and executed by Ana... even the cute invitations),

Followed by a burrito and taco salad bar at home.

Ana has made and solidified some really great freindships here. We were so glad to have such a nice and fun group of girls to help celebrate. Turning twelve is a big deal! Ana is a delight to have as a daughter and a friend. I can't believe she's already twelve, except that I sort of feel like she's been twelve since she was born. :)

Happy Birthday Ana!!!

NOW! Attention readers. Rigth after Ana's birthday, my sister Sonna came to visit. She took all of my photos and her photos and combined them into a more excellent blog post here. You must read it. It's fabulous, as was her visit. It was a dream to have her here. Miss her and Sloan and her kids so much. I also like her little advice/tidbits on the left side of her blog... especially the one about laundry.

Happy Halloween 2013

2013-10-31T00:00:00.000-06:00

Happy Halloween!

This year we are traditional scary Halloween creatures:

Ana is the Bride of Frakenstein,

Po is a spider,

Elsie is a witch,

Cam is a plain clothes vampire,

Jonah is a ghost,

and I'm a pregnant skeleton.

(She wrote it herself!)

Scared yet? You should be.

Making the Journey Home, August 2013

2013-10-30T20:00:00.000-06:00

Oh so sad that the summer is over, but we can't complain too much, because we did miss home, despite all of our fun. Sammi and our friend Torrin help boat us over to the mainland from the island, despite the pea soup thick fog. Thank goodness for iPhone GPS!!!

The kids and I had some time to killi n Bellingham while Jonah sold our car (we were so lucky... sold it only a few hours before our plane was supposed to leave... AND they met us at the airport. We did maybe forget to get sleeping Po out of the car before we sold it, but luckily the new owners noticed that there was a sleeping baby in the back before they drove all the way back to their home in Seattle).

Anyway... with that time to kill in Bellingham, we got some Rocket Donuts and visited our very favorite museum ever, Mindsport. It is a Children's/Science/Art museum. Most of the exhibits are hand carved wooden works of art that the kids can play with and manipulate. There's also a working stream that the kids can build dams on and float little wooden stick boats down. It's the greatest place. And the admission is only $2 or something!

We were glad to get to the airport on time and get our bags checked (we had to be tricky because we were on Allegiant, and they have weird baggage rules. We may or may not have duct taped two bags together so they would only count as one...). BUT, then we found out that our flight was delayed by at least FIVE hours!! That meant we wouldn't be leaving BEllingham until 11 pm and not getting into Honolulu until 3 am!! Wow. And when we called the rental car guy that we had reserved a camper van with on Oahu, he just up and cancelled our reservation. It was awesome.

But, we tried to make the most of it. We had brought a whole lot of food, including some crab that hadn't been eaten at Blakely, so we were all well fed. Allegiant gave us food vouchers and free drinks, so we were especially well fed. Plus, Bellingham is a small but newly remodeled airport, so we had nice accommodations.

When we got to the Honolulu airport, we found a relatively quiet spot to camp out and we all slept on the concrete floor until morning. Well, Po got to sleep in her carseat. It was actually fine.

In the morning, we found a rental van (the lady cut me a deal, but it was still outrageously priced) and took off for our 36 hour whirlwind tour of Oahu (the kids and I had never really been, except for stopovers).

We drove around nearly the whole island...

Of course visited the beautiful Laie temple and BYU Hawaii campus...

And the kids had really missed the warm Hawaiian water, so we spent a good long afternoon at the gorgeous North Shore beaches as we made our way up the coast.

We spent our one night at a friend's house (actually a roommate of mine from BYU Jerusalem 1999) on the north end of the North Shore. She and her family were so great to put us up. Ana and Cam were glad to reconnect with my friend's kids who they had made friends with when they visited us on Maui. I've actually been trying to convince them to move over to Maui, but now I'm realizing maybe its good to have some friends on Oahu...

We made our way back over to Honolulu side so the kids could go to an event in Waikiki where they met some actor from a Disney Channel sitcom they love. We made sure to see some sights along the way...

And had some amazingly delicious dim sum in Chinatown in Honolulu...

And visited the Royal Palace (I just finished a huge history of Hawaii, so I was especially interested in this...Jonah and the kids, not so much)...

And then, right before our plane was due to leave, we made a quick dash so we could see Pearl Harbor...from the fence (it was closed when we finally got there)...

*Not pictured: The loads of time we spent in Waikiki, which we liked a lot more than we thought we would. The kids especially enjoyed the Natatorium (the large ocean fed swimming pool) and the Las Vegas-like Waikiki strip. Cam also liked that his shoes were still there along the boardwalk, even though he left them under a bench the day before. *

Oahu was gorgeous and better than we expected. But, it is amazingly crowded, even by Maui standards. The North Shore beaches are pretty off-the-hook-- stunning, uncrowded, great sand, and supposedly some of the best surf on earth. I also slightly envy the amount of cultural activities on Oahu... they have everything a big city would have. It would be cool to have a little easier access to that...

But, we were pretty anxious to get home to Maui. Maui is still the best. Hawaiian Airlines helped us out and let us come home a day early. The friends who had rented our house this summer left our car at the airport, so we got in our good old car and drove it home. After two months, it sure felt good to be back in our own beds. Ahhh....

Blakely 2013

2013-10-29T20:00:00.000-06:00

This was one of the best years at Blakely. Why? Because my sister and her kids AND my brother and his girlfriend AND his daughter came too! Everybody didn't exactly come at the same time... but we'll shoot for that next year, right Dad? In any case, all of the Fegert cousins were on the island at the same time for almost a week. It was rockin' awesome.

We had so much fun. AND it was relaxing too. It was just great. And the weather couldn't have been better.

Cam and I above with some of our crab catch. LOVE all the fresh seafood we can catch and eat while we're up there. Jonah does a great job of making the most of the fishing opportunities while we are there. He even did some mean clamming. Mmmmm. I love me some shellfish.

The three toddlers were the star of the show. All three of them wanted to be with Papa (my dad) every minute of every day, and would make sure they were on or in whatever vehicle he happened to be operating.

They all got along so well, and they are so incredibly super cute. Po still talks about Reggie and Riley all the time and about "Papa's house at Blakely" and the four-wheeler, of course.

We also had loads of lake time...

And plane rides in Papa's four seater...

And fun dance parties at Noni's (my grandma's) house with my fantastic cousin Samantha. (And also many card games and Settlers of Catan tournaments)...

Jonah did his best to do maintenance on all the vehicles. He even got some of the old bikes running again...

Po was SO excited for her turn on an airplane ride... and then promptly fell asleep about three minutes after takeoff.

Reggie (whose real name is Gabriel, remember) was always ready for a ride. ALWAYS.

The three littles also begged for food constantly. Here is Papa divvying out some root beer float...

But don't worry--everybody eventually got their own.

Cam and Jonah caught some awesome trout. (Cam also had a little fall on the razor scooter... on his face, of course).

Po became a master of the catch-and-release frog program at the lake beach.

Reggie and Papa are special pals.

Riley is sometimes not so sure...

Luke LOVED exploring all around and everywhere.

Luke gets a ride...

Sonna's cute kids.

My cousin Breanne and her husband Brandon and their three boys were luckily up on the island for part of the time we were there! I hadn't seen them in about three years, so it was quite a treat. Cam really hit it off with the boys, and he loved having so Fegert-side boys his own age for a change (but he still loves hanging out with you Ruthie!). Here are all the kids (minus Ana) that we had up there for about four days. Noni was definitely getting her great-grandchild fix. She was only missing Trista's kids!

Beautiful, fun, delightful, sweet Riley! I love this girl!

Tyler and his gorgeous, wonderful girlfriend Jerica finally made it up towards the end of our trip. Tyler hadn't been on island for about four years, so it was a blast to have him come AND have him show Jerica around. I think she's hooked...

We also were so fortunate that the Stewarts invited us to Anacortes for Meme's surprise birthday party. She turned 98! I can't believe we did a surprise party for a 98 year old, but I guess she can take it! She's a firecracker. She still picks up and holds my kids! And she dances and parties all night long. The only assistance she needs is a hearing aid. What a gal!

Here she is with her oldest grandson, my dad.

And here is my dad's uncle Larry (who organized the party and took us there on his yacht), my grandma Noni (in the blue), my dad, Samantha (my cousin), my dad's aunt Pam and Meme in the middle. I wish Luke had been there-- he's Meme's youngest great-great-grandchild. She has a few great-grandchildren who are younger, but Luke is the youngest great-great.

Tyler and Jerica. Isn't she cute?!

We left the kids back on the island painting piggy banks.

Cam occasionally needs some down-time-- he plays pretty seriously on Blakely.

And Ana too...

We also took some fun family rides in the forest.

And of course did some sunset catching trips to The Peak.

Ana built her traditional moss teepee at The Peak.

And even let Elsie have a go! (What the heck!? First time ever anyone else has been allowed to go inside!!)

So so so sad to leave. So blessed to go from one magical island home to another. But man, or man, I miss that place when we're gone. Don't miss the winter weather, but miss the island. Thanks again Dad and Roxanne for hosting us for another memorable year!

The Quick Drive North, July 2013

2013-10-28T20:00:00.000-06:00

(I think my big camera was packed away after we loaded the car and left Bear Lake, so these are all iPhone photos.) We had to hurry up to Sequim to turn over our old house since the last people we were owner financing had moved out in June. Usually we like to take three or four days to do the 20 hour drive from Bear Lake to Northwestern Washington, but we did it in one and a half-- we left at 4pm on Wednesday and got to Sequim on Thursday. We stayed at our friends' house about an hour past Boise and only stopped at rest stops besides to let the kids get out and run. We usually have a fun time hiking and camping and exploring history along the drive, but since we didn't bring any camping gear this year, maybe it's good we were forced to travel fast.

We did take one detour this year, however, to see my cousin and her baby. They'd been living in Moses Lake for about six months, which is near Othello where my parents grew up and where I was born.

There's the infamous Othello water tower. Sadly, we didn't have time to stop by in attraction filled Othello...

And again, I managed to leave someone's house without taking any photos. I missed taking photos of cousin Brynda's cute house and amazing view over Moses Lake, complete with her own boat access! Her daughter Brooklyn is about the cutest baby I've ever seen in my whole life. Seriously.

The kids had a fun time playing with little Brooklyn and making some Lego people.

We finally pulled into Sequim at about 10 pm. Our sweet friend Amy had gone over to our house and cleaned up a bit and set up beds for us on the floor. We owe her big time.

We got up the next morning to quite the mess, but it could have been worse. We did have to mow an acre of three month's worth of grass (up to our chest), catch some wild cats that had moved into the basement, and scrub until our hands were raw. My old garden and hundreds of strawberry plants and most of the orchard and blueberries had been taken over and literally destroyed by weeds. They also had strangely cut down an old beautiful tree that was the centerpiece of the yard and my kids' favorite climbing spot. But the worst part was the paint jobs they had done:

What the heck!?

Anyway, we worked like CRAZY for two straight and full days. The kids took care of priming and repainting the walls and removing rubbish. Elsie entertained Po. Jonah mowed and mowed and mowed. We all put in our fair share of hard labor...as in, 18 hours each day all of us. Oh, and six hours on Saturday. We had some sweet friends feed us and some other friends take the little girls for play dates. We were so grateful.

We did take two hours to run errands and go see two friends who couldn't come by the house to see us (we really wanted to see our friends, but we had to say, "If you want to see us, come to our house because we can't stop working"). The photo above is from a visit to our friends' new house... and we also got to see their new snake!! Elsie's not afraid of any creepy crawlies.

On Saturday morning, Jonah took the last of the loads to the dump and we signed papers and got a deposit from the new owners! We hope they are going to be the long term owners of the place, but if not, we'll go back and do it again, I guess. We should probably just sell it outright to someone, but it is so nice to be making the income through the interest we can charge by carrying the loan ourselves. Hmmmm....

Anyway, we were glad to pack up again and head up north for one final stop... In any case, our backs needed a break.

Bear Lake 2013

2013-10-27T22:06:00.004-06:00

Each year we have the grand opportunity to visit Jonah's family's property on the shores of the enormous Bear Lake, which sits on the border of Utah and Idaho (and nearly on the border of Wyoming too... its right there in the corner where the three states meet). This year we got up there almost a week before the big influx of people, so we were able to welcome everyone as they arrived. We spent the 4th up there too... although I am having a hard time finding photos. BUT, it wasn't anything too spectacular because we usually rely on the neighbors setting off some awesome fireworks that we can just watch. It is great to be on a big wide sandy beach to watch the fireworks.

My kids are in heaven at Bear Lake, especially once all of the cousins arrive. They each have quite a few cousins their same age, so they are never alone. Cam is the oldest of a group of five boys, not including the girl cousin two days older than him, another girl cousin eight months younger, and another girl cousin 11 months older. His sociality really shines through when he gets to the lake.

Ana mainly hangs with her two cousins-- Grace who is two months older than her and Isaac who is six weeks. They are quite the trio.

Elsie has a whole gaggle of girls her age, including Lucy who is a few months older, and Emmeline and Lyla, who are about 18 months younger.

Po really lucked out to have two boy cousins her same age. She loves it.

Jonah loves having such great brothers and brothers-in-law to waterski and fix the multitude of engine malfunctions with.

And of course I love all the great conversations and festive reunion activities. I especially appreciated having my kids fed and entertained while I spent a lot of the nearly three weeks fairly sick. Well, the first two weeks were bad, but I got much better once we visited a doctor friend who figured the strep throat must have knocked down my blood volume and made me extremely low on iron (a common problem with me) to the point where I was having symptoms like altitude sickness or panic attacks. Once Jonah gave me a giant spinach and strawberry smoothie once a day and I ate a lot of frozen chimichangas (surprisingly high in iron and protein with very little sugar), I started to feel much much better. The heart racing and shortness of breath at random times of the day of day was starting to get real old... so glad it wasn't what the doctor initially feared it was, which was either rheumatic fever or a damaged heart valve. This is the second time I've been sick at the family reunion, and as much as it is a bummer to miss out on a lot of the fun, it is SUCH a huge relief to be able to recover without having to worry too much about cooking and cleaning and entertaining the kids. I feel bad to not be able to contribute, but I'm also so thankful to have everyone's help. At least this year I wasn't contagious so I could hang out in the midst of the crowd and at least get in on the conversations. I could also sit on the beach and go in the boat-- I just couldn't get my heart rate up or it wouldn't stop. Whew. Glad that's over.

Anyway, my sisters-in-law do a much better job of recording the happenings of the reunions, so I'll link here to their sights and then put on a few of my own photos. Our memory card was broken for a few weeks, so that's part of my excuse for not taking as many photos as they did...

71toes Shawni's 2013 Reunion Description

71toes Shawni's Settling in at Bear Lake

71toes Shawni's Reunion Description Part 2

71toes Shawni's Reunion Description Part 3

71toes Shawni's Lighting of the Floating Lanterns

Saren's Reunion Description

Saren's REUNION MUSIC VIDEO 2013.... You should watch this!!!

Saren's Bear Lake Reunion in Photos

Saydi's Bear Lake 2013

Saydi's Bear Lake Connections 2013

Charity's Bear Lake Reunion Description

And my mother-in-law probably did the most complete synopses of all:

Linda's Pre-Reunion Festivities (Including our Fourth of July)

Linda's Reunion Day 1

Linda's Reunion Day 2

Linda's Fear Factor

Linda's Lake Baptism

Linda's Minute to Win It

Linda's Reunion Food Review

Linda's Reunion Talent Show and Tennis

Linda's Reunion Fun

Linda's Reunion Finale

Linda's Post Reunion

Linda's Grammie Camp for 12 year olds and RV Trip

Linda's Grammie Camp for Princesses

Linda's Grammie Camp fro Group 4 Guys

Jonah's youngest brother Eli cuttin' it up. Sadly, I did not capture any epic crashes on film this year, but the rooster tail on these ones are sweet...

Jonah with the deepest cut ever. Not deep... like deep. Like his knees are nearly submerged.

Paddleboarding

Po just played in the shallows for hours and hours every day.

She also made friends with Uncle Jeff and made sure she always got in on the canoe rides.

Cam got up on skis again and even got up on a wakeboard for his first time.

Po and Peter were killer cute. They are only a couple months different in age and both have names that start with P and are both the fourth kid in the family!

They didn't get very far on this bike though.

Ana is taking after her aunts-- she's a sunset lover!

Ana dressed up a bit for the Bandito show this year. We go to the Pickleville Playhouse every year to get our melodrama fix in for the year. It was hilarious, as usual.

Ana and Grace and their yearly traditional tandem rides.

Even though the Kolob Fire is still a heartache, it makes treasures refound like this one all the better. Can't wait to get this onto DVD... and SO glad we paid for an extra copy to give to the in-laws!

We had a fun ragnar-style race this year. I can't remember how our team did... I think 2nd? I had to be the designated driver.

Cam fulfilled his dream of winning Fear Factor this year! Good thing he loves weird food anyway!

We also had an enchanting time letting off some floating lanterns.

Hooray for Bear Lake!

Swim Camp and Park City

2013-09-21T12:00:00.000-06:00

And finally! The moment Ana had been anxiously, excitedly, stressfully, happily been waiting for since she signed up in January--BYU swim camp!

Ana only had maybe three or four major freak-outs the morning of swim camp, worried about everything from not having the right shoes to anything we did that might delay our arrival or make her in any way late for registration.

But, I could understand her franticness. Ana worked so hard to get to swim camp, raising half the cost of the camp, working hard on her swim team and to improve her strokes, and going over the packing lists, rules, and schedules about 600 times. She wanted to be as ready as possible.

She was also so relieved and thankful that she arrived at Swim Camp in good health. Up until we left Maui, her health was fairly iffy and her doctor wanted her to prepare to not be able to go. I'm so happy that her prayers were answered and she was all better in time to go (well, besides being a little weak, but she said she regained her strength through the cafeteria).

She has always been "going on 17", so I can see why she was thrilled about the mini-college experience. I myself was thrilled that she ended up with the sweetest roommate and friends. I'm also glad that during that whole week I could trust her to take full advantage of the excellent coaching, swim instruction and of course unlimited food in the cafeteria. We also knew we could trust her to keep the rules, be a good friend and example, and to learn as much as she good. I love having such a responsible daughter. Thanks Ana!

After we dropped Ana off at Swim Camp (whew!), we got to pick up one of Cam's BFFs--Heath! Heath lives in Saint George, so when we decide to fly-by Saint George this year, I called Heath's mom (another old friend--she was actually one of the leaders in my YW when I was growing up in Henderson!) to see if we would by chance cross paths at another point, and wouldn't you know it, she was in Northern Utah that same week that we were. We stole Heath away from his mom and older sisters (Yay! he said, No more shopping!) so he could come join us up in Park City at Jonah's parents' house for a few days.

Of course, even though they only see each other for a few days or a week every year, these guys are forever best buddies, as if no time has passed at all since they were three and making paper ships. I hope someday they get to live by each other again.

I drove back down the mountain from Park City to meet Heath's mom when it was time for them to head back home, so I thought, why not just make a quick visit to Ikea?! You know, walk around... get the kids some lunch.... Again, it's another missed attraction when you live in Hawaii. But oh my heck!? What was I thinking!? It was "Free Kids' Meals" Tuesday and nothing is more crowded than a place offering free kids' meals in the middle of Mormon Utah!!! At least I saw some people I knew (welcome to Mormon-ville... we all 16 million of us seem to know each other one way or another) and the kids were especially hungry and thankful when we finally got our (free) food.

We also came down the mountain one evening for an off-the-hook ice cream party with all of my Beer (my mom's side) cousins who are currently living in Northern Utah. Oh heck yes!!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE my cousins. It was awesome. Ana was gone, so I was sad she didn't get to hang with one of her BCFs (Best cousins forever) Livy, but it actuallyl worked out okay because Cam shone through and became Mr. Personality for all the girl cousins, even directing them in a little gymnastics/circus performance. What in the world? What planets aligned that night?!

Anyway, my cute cousin Lyndsi came and brought her boyfriend Ofa (we got to again Lyndsi again later the next week and get the full scoop, so it was great to have met Ofa before that), Jennifer came, my cousin Jerilyn's son Andrew came (we missed him when we were in Vegas), and of course cousin Eric and his wife Amy hosted us at their new immaculate and darling house. Their three girls are just the bomb-- so much pizazz and personality and fun-- and I loved seeing them all at their own home. So fun. Can't wait to see everyone again next year, but I hope its sooner!

(hint hint, come to Maui you crazy people!)

And finally, we spent that week while Ana was at Swim Camp recovering. Remember how I mentioned that Elsie came down with strep throat after her trip to San Diego. Well, come to find out, my poor little nephew Gabe had strep (plus majorly and chronically enlarged tonsils, which have since been removed) and my dad and a few other relatives at the same time. So, that sore throat I had had since we left Vegas of course also turned into strep throat. I had been fighting it back because we were traveling and I didn't want to be sick and miss out on the fun, but once we arrived at Jonah's parents' home (and they were gone for most of the time we were there) and I relaxed for a day, it hit full bore. Luckily, I happened upon a miracle cure online (cayenne pepper tea) and was able to swallow without pain after two days. But, both Jonah and I definitely had the infection for almost a week. Jonah healed up fairly well though. On the other hand, I never got my body to start working right again and for the following three weeks, I had what seemed like altitude sickness. A great doctor finally saw me and said my immune system had done too well against the strep and had nearly knowcked me out. And though I luckily didn't have rhematoid fever, my blood volume was low enough that it was causing the constant heart palpitations, shortness of breath, headaches, and major fatigue I had been suffuring from since the sore throat stopped. Sheesh. Thankfully, this stupid "recovery from strep" that last three weeks took place while we were places where there were plenty of other adults to help take care of the kids and plenty of other cousins to entertain them (see future posts about Bear Lake Reunion).

The doctor prescribed an intensely iron rich diet (not the first time in my life that's been prescribed to me, but that's another story) and Jonah took the bull by the horns and made me ginormous spinach-strawberry (to help absorb the iron) smoothies every day, fed me meat at every meal, and let me eat unlimited microwave chimichangas in bed (surprisingly high in iron and low in sugar). I eventually healed up and it was such a relief!

It was a crazy six months of weird health problems, I tell you what. It happens that way though... one bad knock down to your immune system and it seems like it takes months or years to get back to normal. It all started when I got bad anxiety on a scary flight to San Diego back in February, which then probably caused me to finally contract the walking pneumonia that had been going around (maybe that's what Ana had in April-May?), which then kept me weak enough to catch strep (I've never had it in my life.. why now?), which then meant my finally overzealous immune system knocked out my circulatory system. Dumb. But, nothing like it to make you grateful for when you do feel great and healthy!

Well, back to the story-- the week went by too fast for us and for Ana. But, she was glad to see us and especially excited to show us around the cafeteria.

The final Swim Camp event was a swim meet. But oops, I forgot to take photos. (Ana has a ton and maybe I'll have her do her own blog post.) But, I do have a photo of the crazy divers that also had their final event in covered pool area. I had flashbacks to when my sister Sonna used to dive competitively. It was horribly scary. I think my kids will stick to swimming.

Detour! or Scenic Route!

2013-09-20T12:00:00.000-06:00

Our friends let us stay one more night after they left so we could get an early start in the morning. It was a lazy Sunday, so we decided to take a detour on our trek up to Northern Utah. At the last minute, I picked a dirt road that was supposed to eventually get us to Bryce Canyon, but we weren't too sure...

Oh well! Here we go!

There were some awesome stops along the dirt road, like this canyon out in the middle of tousands of acres of sagebrush. We were also glad to see other humans after three hours of driving alone on dirt roads, hoping that the Ox kept to its guns.

We were greeted around every corner with a breathtaking view. How does one small area of the world contain so much grandeur?!

And then thankfully, we found pavement again and the scarlet orange hoopdedoos of Bryce Canyon. We were running a little late so we didn't actually go in the National Park, but the kids were still in awe at the road side pinnacles.

Annabella, Utah

After about three more hours, we reached our destination for the night--our friends' sheep ranch in Annabella, Utah, which is about an hour south of Provo.

We've been meaning to visit the Lawyers' sheep ranch for years. Literally. Like since 2001. Oops. We should have come sooner. We could immediately tell that it was a place we could have spent weeks. Not only are the Lawyers the very best hosts, but they run a full working sheep ranch, with sheep camps, working horses, sheep dogs, and all the big farm equipment. Plus Annabella is just lovely (at least, it is in the summer... I could guess that it maybe wasn't so in the winter).

They even have Adam's family's original cabin still there on the land. Stay tuned for future visits here, and hopefully there will be photos of us on horses up in the hills herding the sheep.

Lake Powell

2013-09-20T10:00:00.000-06:00

These are going to be some of your run-of-the-mill Lake Powell photos... except, darn! I didn't take my camera went we went exploring the canyons. Just go to someone else's blog about Lake Powell and pretend its us, K?

The house boat stayed in the marina and we just took the ski boat out for rides and canyon exploring. It was a crowded weekend out on the lake, so we were actually relieved to be able to just base out of the calm and quiet of the marina, with its full sized showers and regular bathrooms and calm nights. Plus, the kids really just wanted to ride the tubes and jetskis and didn't care about exploring as much as I did, so it was a great way to do it.

We even got Jonah out on something other than a water ski! What the what?!

I had never experienced the strange and marvelous houseboat culture of Lake Powell. It was great. They are like strange, slow moving yachts, but in a way, much more functional ,yet not as luxurious or seaworthy. I love the little add ons, like the slides and diving boards and BBQ areas and playgrounds. I also love how people try to make them like floating houses, but not like Sausalito Floating Houses, more like track houses. It's just so strange and interesting and surprisingly fun.

Jonah and I were seriously amazed at how lucky we were to get to go hang on this massive boat with these guys. It was a great introduction for me to Lake Powell, but maybe I'll be too spoiled now when we go and won't feel satisfied on an only one-story house boat. :)

Wahoo! Thanks Spencer and Katrina! Great fun!

You Guessed It-- "Leaving Las Vegas"

2013-09-19T12:00:00.000-06:00

But, one more Vegas attraction before we go. Some time ago, Sonna and Sloan happened upon a great little spot called the Nelson Ghost Town. I've lived in the Vegas-area for about 20 years total, and I somehow never knew about this little gem. We got some great photos that I wish I could share here, but my memory card got corrupted and we're lucky to have these few (for real... and the memory card failure happened a year to the day after the New Harmony fire! We need to avoid June 27th next year).

Our old friends from when we lived in Vegas right after Ana's birth met up with us out in Nelson, and Ana and Taylor tried to recreate some of the photos we have of when they were toddlers.

They also have three boys younger than Taylor, so Cam enjoys when we all get together, and I'm sure Taylor enjoys the change of mostly girls in our family.

They were just the cutest little buddies back in the day. I can't find my copy of this photo that they are trying to recreate, but here's another one from a playdate back when they were 18 months.

(The little boy in the back did not visit Nelson Ghost Town with us.)

The views of the Colorado River canyon below Hoover Dam were stunning.

Desert colors are sublime.

Leaving Las Vegas

Once again, however, our visit had to come to an end and we started another adventure.

This adventure was our one surprise adventure for the summer... at the last minute, Jonah's old friend Spencer happened to invite us to his in-laws house boat on Lake Powell for the weekend. He just happened to be heading up with his family on the weekend we were supposed to be in Saint George anyway and invited us to come along! Wahoo! We made the hard decision of skipping a trip to Saint George this year in lieu of this rare chance to hang on a houseboat. Jonah's family had spent many a vacations down on houseboats, and even my own mom did a Girls' Camp houseboat trip one year while I was up on Blakely working (grrrr... should have flown back for that one...), but I had never gone. I'd driven by Lake Powell many times and always wanted to go, and was so excited to finally do it!

So we left at 4 am to beat the heat and the traffic and set out towards the sunrise on our well-known I-15 road to Southern Utah. We stopped in Saint George long enough to fill up with veggie oil at In-n-Out and we were on our way to the lake.

Get your rest now, little beauties!

Cousin Fest, Close Up

2013-09-18T12:00:00.000-06:00

Sonna and I must have some weak genes because our kids mostly look like our husbands. Don't get me wrong, our husbands are awesome and our kids are lucky to look like them. But still, I know every parent hopes to pass at least some physical characteristics onto their kids, if not for any reason but to physically see the continuation of their ancestors into the future generations.

But thankfully, when I look at photos like this one of Gabe and Po, I can see at little a smidgen of a family resemblance. There's a photo of Sonna and I on a lawn chair in Pullman that is similar to this photo, but it might have been lost in the fire. Maybe my sister has a copy, and I'll add it in later. For now, below is a close up of the photo of Sonna and I when Sonna is about 18 months and I'm probably three.

Well, even if Sonna and I never get some little tan kids (which would truly be a shame because Sonna has the most beautiful skin and hair in the world), we sure do love these little toddlers, even with all the trouble they bring...

Sonna took us out to one of the must-see attractions in Vegas, the new Desert Springs Preserve. It's fantastic. It's finally the museum I always wanted in Vegas when I lived there. The kids will now forever equate visiting Vegas with going to the Springs Preserve, especially since we even went back for another visit after this marathon one pictured below. They wanted to take Jonah and show him all the cool exhibits.

We also took the opportunity to photograph ALL the Fegert cousins to make prints for our parents of all of their eight grandchildren at once. Yes, everyone was hot and uncooperative, but we finally and thankfully got a few good shots...

(Po is NOT that short. I promise. It's just an optical illusion caused by Riley's gargantuaness and Po's slouching.)

And here's the winner. Personalities and all.

Can you tell how much I love my kids and nieces and nephews?!? The joys of my life.