September Adventures

We headed up to the Idaho Falls area for Labor Day- the boys rafted the Snake River with friends and had all kinds of adventures. Us girls had a great time exploring the city of IF, hitting the farmers market, mall, the Green Belt, and we saw the Dora movie, which is actually pretty funny.

Road trippin' and so excited.

Just in case you've even been confused about this...gotta love rest stop bathrooms.

Anders stayed with the group of friends, so we exchanged church-going pictures on Sunday morning.

We did Cupcake Wars for FHE, and the theme was "seasons". I hate to brag, but I WON. Mine is the first picture of the bears roasting marshmallows, so I won for obvious reasons. :) 

Nils and the kids dyed the dog purple, so that's been fun. Lots of double-takes when she's seen in public. In the second picture, I was cutting her hair, and she was trying to hide from me in the basket. Nothing is easy with Pip, except dying her purple, maybe.

Anders went to Homecoming and had a lot of fun. He's got a good group of friends.

After 4 weeks and 1 day of online/homeschool for Addie and Aani, the school was deemed "done enough" for the students to enter. This has been quite the fiasco for everyone involved, mostly the poor principal and administration, but they have handled it well, and it will make for a memorable school year for sure. Half of the school still isn't done, like the auditorium, gym, etc., so everyone is improvising.

Where the lockers will be one day. :) 

Nils and the kids went on a walk, and the girls all hung on to him the whole time. Patient father.

We've had this flock of sheep grazing in the field and hills behind the house all summer, but last week they managed to jump the fence and were having a heyday in our yard and the land by us. Fortunately Nils was home and managed to herd them back to the field and fix the broken fence. They would have eaten everything in our yard!

Things are good. Just the busyness of regular old life, and a few random sheep and a purple dog thrown in there to keep things interesting.

Summer 2019

'Tis been a summer indeed. After June's insanity, and a trip to Mexico, we were ready to hunker down a bit. Nils worked hard on the deck and got it finished up, and we've been loving it. July was full of lots of visits from cousins, for most of the month, and into August as well. Lucky us, to live by Nils' parents and be the beneficiaries of people coming to visit them. :) 

Anders and Addie went on Trek, and cousin Tiago joined them. Their reviews were a little mixed, but overall they had a good experience. 

Randoms: 

Why is it so hard for the tooth fairy to remember to come? Maybe because it's the 4th kid and she's really tired? Ava had to write a note.

Giant sombrero continues to come in handy.

Addie continues to read in restaurants, and GrandPar has even joined in on the action! 

It wouldn't be summer in Utah without a couple of random microburst storms. We were driving to meet Nils for dinner, and we were really wondering if we would get swept off the freeway. Crazy stuff. 

Pip pretending to be a good dog. 

She was the only one paying attention during FHE/Scriptures.

Our little pioneers, so excited to be going on Trek at 5:30 a.m.!

THE DECK/FIREPIT. We do love it so. It has made summer even more magical. Roasting marshmallows is very therapeutic and calming. We had a movie night out there, too!

Lots of family time this summer.

School started! What? Didn't we just do that? A new middle school has been being built close to us, but it's not done. We didn't find out it wouldn't be finished until a couple of weeks before school started- although everyone was wondering, since it hasn't looked like it would be finished. Anyhoo, after a lot of heartburn for the principal, school district, construction workers, etc., it was decided that the middle schoolers would do school online for the first 3 weeks, after which the classrooms will be done enough to move the teachers and kids in. The auditorium and gym won't be done until December or January. It's bananas. Hooray for the internet!!

Anders, showing his usual first day of school enthusiasm. He's a JUNIOR. What.

Ava, 4th. Genuinely excited. She said she got pretty bored this summer. Sorry, kiddo.

Ava and BFF Brinley matched on the first day. How fun to have a best friend. 

Addie, 9th grade. Look how excited she was to be going to school on the internet!

Aani, 7th grade, also soops excited to be going to school on the internet!

It really has been totally fine. The teachers have been doing a great job at teaching their lessons and having assignments for the kids online. It's all working out great, considering the circumstances. 

By way of life updates: Anders decided not to do marching band, which hurt my heart a little bit, but he doesn't seem to have any regrets, so neither do I. He's been working a lot, which is awesome. He got offered a new job at Noodles and Co., which will be opening a store in town in a little while, so he's happy about that. He's growing into a great young man, and having a job and responsibilities has been good for him.

Addie continues to read in restaurants, hang out with friends, likes baking things and drawing. Despite what she says about not having very many friends, she seems to get invited to an awful lot of parties... She's a good sister, a good student, a good daughter, and we think she's pretty swell.

Aani has been part of a gang of girls that have run around together all summer. They've been eating all of our food and using all of our cups every day, until we had a little chat about that. They're all good kids, but they do need to go home and eat their own dang food. Aani is lovable as all get out. She's also a good sister, student, daughter and friend.

Ava has been part of a similar gang of girls this summer- just the little sister version. She loves activity days, and has been doing tumbling at a new studio. She's got her back handspring now and loves practicing on the trampoline. She still loves being crafty, her room is still always a disaster, and she's still very sweet.

Nils has been working crazy hours for all of August, and anticipates that going through September. It's pretty yucky, but it's hopefully temporary. He lost his drone in the lake during one of the crazy storms. He was trying to capture some lightning, but the wind picked it up and flew it right out into the lake. It was sad. But not to worry, he bought a new one for his birthday. ;) It's newer and even nerdier!

All is well for me, too. Working part time this last year has been mostly a good thing- stressful at times, learning how to juggle it all, but I feel it's been for the best in many ways. I like being around people, and I'm pretty good at it. Sometimes I'm just plain old worn out, but it's fine. Life is good.