Back to School

We survived the first two days of school. The first drop off was a little rough emotionally but by the end of the day, the kids had fun.

Ivan and Brady came home the first day and raided their brother's piggy banks and played with all of Weston and Koper's toys in the big boy's room. Then they made a beach indoors. This is Ivan standing next to the sun.

Our Sunday morning battle.

Ivan and Brady currently fight over this baby. She came to church with us and it was a little startling to see her in my bag. She is very life like.

We are enjoying our new ward and neighborhood. We have started to recognize people when we are at Costco and WalMart. We seem to have adopted a neighbor and have become family to another neighbor woman who loves to talk. Life is always an adventure.

Our first egg

The tiny brown egg was waiting for us in the egg box when we got home from church today. We are excited to get our first egg!

A few more camping ones...

 We really enjoyed Laird Park and I found a few more treasures that defined the trip.

Kevin and Matt were trying to prove that the May Pole really did rotate at the top.  I thought it was supposed to just wrap the chains around the pole but nope, it really does move.  I'm sure it would be much more fun to play on if it would more consistently!

Kanyon modeling his duct tape hat.  The boys enjoyed the duct tape.  They even made boats and tried to see how much weight they could hold.

Walking to go look for animal tracks.

The matriarch and patriarch watching the plaster of paris be applied to "made up" tracks.  

New Construction

 I thought you might be interested in some of the school construction going on this summer.  There was a $10M levee passed that included work on all the school buildings.  Most are receiving restroom renovations, some get new roofs, others get labs, some get new windows, etc..  At this point the contractor is way behind ($1000 per day liquid damages) and school has been delayed two weeks.  The main problem is that most buildings don't have any working restrooms.  This mornings paper quoted the superintendent as saying they should be ready to start by September 8th although they may be somewhat limited in some services.  This first picture shows that the press box has been removed.  They will have to "wing it" for the next few games and probably all season until the new one is built. 

 This picture shows the new athletic offices and locker rooms along the north side of Bear Den.  The main entrance will also be relocated to the west side of Bear Den instead of that alley-way along the south side.

 The City of Moscow and the Moscow School District each put up $1.5M for a total of $3M for improvements to the property just north of the church (see map on last picture).  They should be mostly completed by this winter but will not be available for use until 2016 (got to let the grass get established).  Notice the "berm" is gone and there is a new asphalt sidewalk along the west side of the property next to the Paradise Creek overflow and Mountainview Road.

 Most of the dugouts are in place.  There are also restrooms in the center area.

 This is looking east from near the Nazzi Dome.  To the left of the pavement is that new "natural" area they planted along Paradise Creek a few years ago.

This is what it is supposed to look like when it is finished.  Mountainview Road on the left and Joseph Street at the bottom.  Very handy for youth activities at the church.

We went camping too!

Our ward had a campout this weekend at Ensign Ranch. We went up Friday night and came home Saturday afternoon. Sorry if the pictures are blurry. They're nice and crisp on my phone.

Our camp ground.

We honored Seth's ancestors and slept in a teepee. It was very roomy.

The view during breakfast. Very beautiful, made us wonder if we were missing some important event up in the trees.

The ward provided breakfast. It was wonderful after a very chilly night.

After breakfast, our family went for a hike to find the stream. Everyone found a walking stick.

Seth's walking stick started out a little branchy but was great at defending him from all the bears.

The stick became a little more manageable along the way.

Trying to show that I was there too. Brady loved it!

We've decided we need to camp more. Washington is a little like Florida in the sense that there are so many random lakes and rivers. There are less gators though.

School starts on Thursday! The class lists were posted this weekend, so we went and checked those out. The boys have no clue who anyone is in their classes but we are going to an ice cream social on Tuesday to check everything out. Ivan will be in preschool at the same school. He only has nine kids in his class! Which means I'm down to one kid in the afternoons. Yahooooo!

 I finally got my demo derby fix at the Wayne County Fair in Palmyra. Here they're cleaning up after the 4-6 cylinder division. Best hits of the night were definitely in the mini van division.

 Before leaving Palmyra, Kelly stopped by her great uncle's house to play his piano a bit and keep him company. His wife died in Dec. and he's been a bit lonely. As a thank you, he gave her this lovely accordion. Now she just has to learn how to play it and we'll be polka dancing every night. 

 Packed and ready for our trip back to DC

 View from a rest stop near the border of NY and PA

We're back! Sunrise at the Capitol

 Marlo's daughter Eve modeling the bandanna Kelly made for her 

 Any takers?

TL;DR - we moved back to DC. enjoy the pics.

Camping Trip

 Mom and I drove up on Thursday morning and were able to get our favorite camp site (#26).  Lisa and kids got there just after lunch.  Kevin arrived Friday evening, and Matt, Kimbre, and family came down Saturday morning.  We broke camp and went home late Saturday evening.  A great time was had by all.  About 3am Friday morning I woke up to the distant sound of thunder, then there were ever increasing flashes of lightening and growing crashes of thunder.  I was timing then and knew they were growing closer.  Then it started to rain and the thunder was really booming, one flash of lightening was within one second of the thunder.  Now, I really love a good thunder storm but not when I'm in a tent nestled between two 100' pine trees.  Finally it moved on and we all relaxed.  We had a couple of small rain storms pass over but for the most part we had good weather.  We had lots of food, cool weather, walks, swimming, crafts, reading, relaxing, biking, and sleeping.

Raya and Cole.  I assume he enjoyed the trip, he didn't say much.

 Braxton jumped off he dam numerous times and Kanyon finally did it the last day.  The water was freezing cold.

 Kanyon posing by the shore.

 And why do I like Laird Park so much?  Even after the scorching weather we've had all summer the grass was still green.

 Raya coming up out of the freezing water.

 Reading by the swimming hole....

 More reading back at camp.  

 Lots of crafts.  Mom and Lisa each brought a huge tote of paints, games, beads, duct tape, lacing (boondoggles), etc. etc.

 Riley modeling her hand made necklace.

                                                

 The kids posing on the infamous Laird Park rock.

 Kevin and Raya making plaster-of-Paris molds of footprints.

 Grandpa "creating" a very realistic bear track.

Adria testing the water at the swimming hole.

We all had a great time but it was nice to get home and take a hot shower and wash my hair.  Thanks to those who drove down from Post Falls.  Thanks to Lisa and Grandma for lots of good food.  Lets do it again next year.

Weston's Birthday

 I'll bet you can't guess Weston's favorite football team?  Everything is Seahawk color.

Just thought I'd show you what a Lego man looks like from across the room.

Mom and I left Wednesday "noonish" and drove to Seth and Lacey's place.  We celebrated Weston's birthday Thursday morning and then drove around the area with Lacey and kids.  We visited Washington State's only veterans cemetery.  It was very interesting and very well maintained.  We then drove to their shopping center and had lunch at Costco.  We visited more, stayed over night and came home on Friday.  Here's a question - Do you know what it's like to take your diuretic medicine, get in the pickup, get on the freeway doing 70 mph, three lanes in each direction, then start to feel the affects, scan the road signs for a Rest Area, not find one, every bump in the road starts to take it's toll on your bladder.  Finally I took the next exit which turned out to be a forest road.  It went about 300 feet and turned into the nicest thick grove of trees you'd every want to see.  Whew, that was close.

Roy Lathen had open heart surgery on Friday.  His valve was not repairable so they inserted a mechanical valve.  He seems to be doing fine.  Mom and I plan to go visit him on Tuesday.  He is in the same hospital I was in Coeur d'Alene.

Cole pics over the last 2mo

Adjusting to having 2 kids has taken some time so now I am finally sitting down to post some pictures of Cole taken over the past 2 months.  These are some that Mom took while she stayed and helped.

Look at that hair!  It's what most people comment on and coming in a close second is his chubbiness.

Riley loves being a big sister and asks to hold him all the time.

World class chins.  I spend a lot of time kissing these cheeks.  He's growing so fast and is such a sweet baby!