Independence Day!

We had a fun time celebrating our country and the freedoms that we have this Independence Day!

We started off with a breakfast feast of strawberries and waffles. We usually do waffles to break our fast on Fast Sundays; however, our children have been wanting biscuits and gravy lately, so we often have waffles on other special occasions now.

Then we went out to the city parade. They had a new route this year so the people in the parade could go down hill the whole way instead of up. It must have been a shorter route because it was super packed and we had a hard time finding a place to sit. Eventually we did though. The only bad part was we were facing the sun, but we still got to see everything and the children all got their share of parade candy (I think we came home with 500 frooties and then just a few of other types of candies).

Several of the floats/parade cars had people squirting the crowd with water. It was really hot, so that was nice, but I think they need to offer spayer training ahead of time. We often either just got a heavy stream of water on us or nothing at all. Aiming would be another important part of the training. When the high school football team came by, ten or so of the guys jumped off and came running toward us. I guess there were a couple of their friends sitting right behind us that they wanted to soak. But their aim was way off. Rebecca and Asher got hit in the face with a full stream of water (not the squirt gun type, but those push soakers), from just 2-3 feet away. The guy who did it apologized, but they kept on coming back and getting us every time in the process.








At the end of the parade we were walking back to our car and we walked by a group that was selling donuts. By that time though most of the people had left and so they started just giving them away. I think we took home about two dozen. In my mind I was thinking that they would last us a month or more, but we actually finished them off by the next morning.

We played a bunch of fun relay games and activities as a family in the afternoon. Then we had our Independence Day dinner of hamburgers (still no outside grill yet, but Rebecca did get a grill pan), corn on the cob, baked beans, and salad.



After dinner we watched a movie until the fireworks started at 10pm. Sometimes when we have corn on the cob we act out the scene from What About Bob where Bob eats it really loudly. So the children were begging to watch that movie. We gave in and they loved it. We did fast forward a few parts, but overall it is a pretty clean movie. Julia and Ethan got most of the jokes and laughed a lot. When it was over Ethan said it was his new favorite movie.

Right before 10pm we went out to our back porch to do sparklers. Then the city firework show started. They were amazing to watch. I am sure bigger cities in other states have bigger shows, but this was perfect for us (I always enjoy watching them, but also cringe as I think about how much tax money is probably spent on them).

Meibos Family Reunion

Monday through Thursday this past week we were down in Utah for the Meibos family reunion. Tyler and HyeWon were kind enough to let us stay with them.

On Monday we had tennis and playing at the park in the morning. We then had a kick-off lunch and various social activities (family member bingo, crafts, water balloon volleyball, and talking). We also fit in a trip to BYU during the afternoon. Then dinner and some races that evening. It was super hot that day!





















On Tuesday we were up in Salt Lake. It started off with visiting the cemetery where a lot of the church leaders are buried. It was neat to see the graves of some of the early prophets and apostles as well as some of the more recent ones. We even saw the spot where President Thomas S. Monson will be buried when he passes away.



We then went to the Church History Museum which was a lot of fun. There were some pretty neat exhibits about the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum and the initial translating of the Book of Mormon. After that we walked around temple square some. While walking around on temple square we tried to mimic some of the poses of the statues.

We also watched some of the Meet the Mormon videos in the Joseph Smith building, and explored around in the interactive family history center of that building.















We met up with everyone again for dinner at a park in Salt Lake. After dinner, Rebecca's grandparents told stories about growing up in that area. One of the stories that her grandpa told was when his brother and his friends found some bear cubs in a cave and brought them home. They lived in the home for a little while before they took them to the local zoo.





On Wednesday we were back in Provo. We spent most of the day at the Provo Rec Center. The children loved this. There are four huge water slides (two indoors and two outdoors), a rock climbing wall coming out of one of the pools, a high dive that looks like a cliff, a pirate ship indoors, a water play set outdoors, and a lazy river. We finished that night with dinner at a park again, more races, and family stories. A lot of the stories that were shared were very inspirational and it is neat to be part of this great family.









Thursday was an optional temple day. Rebecca and I went to the temple on Tuesday morning so we could watch Tyler and HyeWon's children on Thursday morning. But Tyler ended up having to work so we just spent the day hanging out at their house. We played in the pool, did some drawing, and so other around the house activities. That night we ate leftovers at Rebecca's Grandparent's house. Then we had our drive home. We planned it out for a late evening drive because our AC in our car is not working.

Visiting Nathanael and Mary-Anne

Right after we got back from the Father and Son campout last weekend we drove down to Utah for the Meibos family reunion. It didn't start until Monday, so we spent the rest of Saturday and Sunday with Nathanael and Mary-Anne.

On Saturday we went up to the Tibble Fork Reservoir. The children had a ton of fun there. They played in the water some, but it was super cold so they spent most of the time playing in the sand. They all did do a complete dunk under the water to earn a popsicle from Nathanael.





On the way home it was super smoky. When we got out of the park we saw that the mountain was on fire. It sounds like they have been having some pretty bad wild fires this year in Utah.



That night we had hamburgers and hotdogs on the grill. The next day we went to church, ate lunch, and played with legos. The children loved spending time with Jacob and Hannah and are excited to get to see them again at the end of July.

Father-Son Campout

Last Friday I was able to take Ethan, Christian, and Elliott to our ward's father and son campout. One of the families' in our ward owns some property just outside of Pocatello and we had it there. After setting up our tent and eating tin foil dinners the boys just ran around and played with each other and the other boys that were there. They played in the stream and lake, played with air soft guns, did a rope swing, and played various tag games. Then when it got dark we had some of our bishop's cobbler and then a fireside with testimonies. There were tons of stars out and we ended up sleeping with the top of our tent open. In the morning we just had pancakes and sausage, packed up, and went home. It was lots of fun and I am glad that we get to do this every year.






At home, Rebecca and Julia watched all of the Anne of Green Gables movies. Well, Julia mainly watched it while Rebecca packed for our trip. Julia read all of those books this past year, so that was kind of her reward.

Father's Day

I had a great Father's Day this year.

For the meals I picked chocolate monkey bread (like regular monkey bread except each small bread piece is wrapped around chocolate chips) for breakfast, BLTs for lunch, and ribs for dinner. Then we had apple fritters for dessert.







We actually did the breakfast on Saturday instead of Sunday. We had stake conference that day and I had a 7 am priesthood leadership meeting.


The children all made me great cards. Here they are:

Christian's








Ethan's:






Elliott's




Agnes':




Julia's: