A True Teenager

Emily is now officially a teenager.  The night before her 13th birthday she invited a couple of friends over to hang out.  Her friend Lindsey from the old neighborhood and her new friend Kelsey 

They had a fun time playing games and watching movies.  

The day of her birthday Grandma Bolander wanted to throw a party for her and Grandpa.  When we arrived Grandma told Emily she had to wait  for a minute before she could go out to the party.  At one point Grandma had talked to Emily about maybe inviting a few friends over including a boy.  So Grandma told Emily that she had gone ahead and invited a boy to the party and he was waiting on the deck.  

Emily was very relieved when she found out who the boy was.  Dad was too.  

Emily loves sharing her birthday with Grandpa.  It always makes it that much more special.  These two have a lot in common.  Someday I will have to do a post on all of their collections.   They both have some interesting ones.   

Emily loved her gifts.  Most of them had something to do with superheros.  

 Emily is such a great kid.....even as a teenager.....She is so helpful and hardly ever complains about anything.  Yes we do get the occasional eye rolls that seem to be a little more frequent now that she is really a teenager, but she is such a great kid we really can't complain.  At Thirteen She loves to ride her bike all over the place including the dirt trail by our new house,  and she also loves super heroes and comic books.  She was very disappointed when we went to the library in our new city and found that their comic book collection was very lacking.  So she was thrilled to get a few of her own.

Emily loves to read other books too.  She likes fantasy books.  If it has a dragon in it she usually likes it.  She  is very easy going,  and has had an easy time with the move.  She has already made some new friends.  I am so grateful for Emily and all that she does for our family.  I hope she knows how much we love and appreciate her.

We love you Emily.  Happy Birthday!!!

Fathers and Sons.......and Daughters

     I have mentioned in the pasted that much to the disappointment of our children camping is just not something our family does for entertainment.  In the 14 years we have been married I have slept in a tent 1 night for a ward camp out, and the only reason we did that is because I told Ryan I was going with or without him........He is a wise man and came with us.

     I really would not mind going on a camping trip every now and then,  if someone who knew what they were doing was willing to go with us.  Ryan does not think camping is fun at all, and I have mixed feelings.   I am happy going on hikes during the day and maybe lighting a campfire in a campground to roast hot dogs and marshmallows.  Then returning home to my clean warm bed for the night.  That is about as close to camping as we get at our house.
   
     The kids on the other hand have friends who camp and think that camping sounds so much fun.  They have asked us a few times if we can go camping,  but they have all come to realize that dad is just not going to do it.......unless there is a planed event.  So when the ward announced the fathers and sons campout the boys were all over it, and they actually had convinced Ryan to take them.  He was not quite sure why he had agreed either.

     They had not given many details about the event yet,   just the date so we waited to hear more about it.   As the date got closer things became busier at work for Ryan and it was clear that they could still go,  but with his court schedule leaving early from work would be tricky.  So they would arrive at the campsite later than planned.  Then the Sunday before the camp out they finally released the details of the event....... The campsite was reserved...a hike was planned for 7:00pm and the fires would be up and burning,  but you had to bring everything else including your own food.

      Now I know for most people this would not be a big deal, but remember...WE DO NOT CAMP...and they would be arriving late, without mom who usually makes all of the food anyway.  So we began talking to the boys about other options.

I was surprised how easy it was to change the boys plans with them.  Once we started explaining to them the situation of dad having to work his regular hours and the food being better (cleaner) at home.  the boys were more than happy to move the campout to the back yard.

So Friday night came.  Ryan ended up having to work later than normal so the kids and I set up the tent in the back yard.  They were happy to let Valerie join in on the fun too.  Valerie was the most excited.  As soon as the tent went up she went and got her pillow and blanket and announced she was no longer living in the house.....This was her new room.

(Emily was not interested...more later on that)

 Then we fired up the grill and started cooking our dinner.  We let the kids roast hot dogs and marshmallows on the sticks like they were camping.

The kids loved sleeping in the tent especially when it got dark and they could use their flashlights.  Ryan was happy to sleep in his own bed.  It was a win win for everyone.   Except for Valerie who would not go to sleep outside (she was having too much fun)  so we eventually had to drag her back in the house to go to bed after the boys fell asleep.  She was not happy about that.

As for our kids getting to camp.......
     Don't feel too bad.
This is a picture of the bus that took Emily for a week long camping trip to Oakcrest last week.

She returned Friday afternoon and had such a great camping experience she did not feel the need to sleep in the tent with the other kids.  She also spent a week at girls camp in June.  (Sadly she did not take a camera with her on either camping adventure so I have nothing to share.  Except that she had a great time.)  The kids will have plenty of chances to camp as youth,  and with any luck Ryan and I can let them have those experiences while we sleep in our nice clean bed.  I have a feeling though that Ryan's days are numbered.  Scout camp is closer than he thinks.      

Great Grandma's

As things had started to settle down around here and the piles of boxes have started to disappear I was beginning to realize that summer is more than halfway over and we had yet to visit my grandma.  She must have been reading my mind,  because it seemed like as soon as I though about calling her, she called me.

It is always funny to me how excited my kids are to go work at my grandmas.  

She was looking for people to take some of her apricots off her hands, and we were more than happy to help.

I don't know if it is getting to climb the ladder,  or digging in the dirt.  or maybe it is the fact that Great Grandma always has a yummy treat and lots of love for them when they are done,  but whatever it is they always happily do the job.  (unless it starts taking too long)

Whenever I announce that we are going to Tooele to visit Great Grandma, it is always received with happy cheers.  I keep wondering if there will be a day when they will grumble and complain,  but I don't think there will be,  because they always arrive happy and leave happy.  

Great Grandma's is one of my kids favorite places to go.  I am glad,  because I love going to visit her too.  We are already planning to go back in a couple of weeks before the kids go back.  I can't wait for our next visit.  

3 Years Old

Valerie is 3

and no one is more excited than her.  

She has been waiting for her party for weeks.  

One of Valerie's favorite things to do is shop,  and one of her other favorite things is shoes.  So to start off her birthday I took her on a shopping trip to pick out a pair of birthday shoes.  She was looking for very specific shoes.  They had to be Pink & Sparkly.  We checked out a few stores and found the perfect pair.  We then celebrated with lunch at Chick-fil-a.  

After our shopping trip we headed home to get ready for the party.  

For moms sanity we kept it small this year,  but Valerie didn't seem to mind.  We invited Grandma and Grandpa Bolander for Spaghetti and cake.  

We played a few games.  

and of course there were presents.  Valerie was the most pleased when she opened the shirt she had picked out on our shopping trip.  

Valerie may have just turned Three,  but sometimes I wonder if she thinks she is Thirteen.  She is the youngest and smallest in our family but she sure does run the place.  She wants to be in the middle of everything and loves playing with her brothers.  The thing that I loved the most about our shopping trip was every time we got in the car and started driving Valerie would holler up from the back seat.  "Mom!  Turn up the radio!"  I expect that from Emily.    The other day we were in the mall looking at clothes for the boys for school.  After a few minutes Valerie said "OK now lets go to the girl clothes."

Valerie loves to paint and color and draw.  It keeps her very busy,  and she is getting better at keeping it on the right canvas,  although I think I have cleaned up more marker and crayons from her than all of my other kids combined.   Valerie loves learning, and asks a lot of questions about things.  Her favorite question lately is how much things cost.  She will be doing something and suddenly turn to me and ask me how much something costs.  For example the other day I was mopping the floor and she was coloring.  She suddenly started asking me how much her coloring book cost and then the crayons.  Then she asked me how much my mop cost.  Maybe we will have a banker on our hands.  Or maybe it is because when her brothers start asking me for things at the store,  (like they do every time we go to the store) I tell them they can buy it with their own money, and tell them how much it costs.   

Valerie has always been the most Independent of all of my kids.  I love her independence, It can make life a little easier most of the time,  but what it can also mean is, if I am not sure where she is or what she is doing.....I might want to find out.  She could be making herself a sandwich,  or helping us paint a wall,  or coloring a beautiful picture on something other than paper.  Or if we are taking too long getting ready, she could be taking herself to the park.  Yes independence keeps life very exciting.  

I love Valerie's spunk and love for life.  She does not want to miss out on anything,  and is always trying to be as big as everyone alse.  I love having her for a daughter.  She is such a blessing in my life.

 

Happy Birthday Valerie!!!

4th of July Block Party

This year we celebrated the 4th with our new neighbors.  For the last 6 years this street has had a block party on the 4th and we had been told for a few weeks how great it is and that we should plan on coming.   So we decided to stay home this year and get to know the people we live by.  We started off with a BBQ and then once the food was consumed the games began.  

Ryan joined in the first game of Coke Russian Roulette.   

He lost....but it turned out there was only one winner.  5 of the 6 bottles were rigged with a mento.  

 The kids had lots of games to play.  There was water balloon pinata.  This one was a big hit,  I am still impressed they were able to get the prizes in the water balloons.

This game was see who can stand in the ice water the longest....Joe won.  

Valerie did not like this game,  but she didn't know she could get out so she just stood in it and cried.  So I quickly snapped a picture and then told her she could get out if she didn't like it.  

There were two watermelon eating contests.  The first one I did not get pictures of,  because it was the adult round and I was in it,  but the second one was the kids.  

 Joe did a great job.  He didn't win,  but he came close.  Valerie was just cute with her big piece of melon.

 Then to finish off the games we had a water balloon toss that ended in a water balloon fight,  because don't they all.

This was just funny to me.  

 The adults and the kids were all involved and Emily got her dad right in the back.  

After the games everyone played and visited until the sun went down and then it was time for the fire works. Because of the fires recently and the really dry weather everyone was a little more cautious this year, but we still had a good show. This was a great way to get to know our neighbors a little better. I am grateful to the people who worked so hard to put it together.

 I read on facebook the other day something about the children of the 80's being the last generation to play in the street. I had to laugh a little, because as I was reading it my kids were out riding their bikes and playing basketball in the street. While there are things we are adjusting to in our new area like everyone does when they move,  there are things that I love already about living here, and all the kids running around outside is one of them.

I am grateful to live in a country where we are so blessed.   Happy Independence Day!

P.S.  Valerie was having so much fun at the party she kept referring to it as her July birthday party.  I kind of wished I had baked a cake and wrapped her presents.  I hoped that she was not going to be disappointed at the end of the night when there was no cake and presents.  And I really hope she is not disappointed on her real birthday when her small party with just us is not quite so exciting.  Maybe I better plan a couple of games.  :)

Family Fun - Lagoon

The last week of June we were ready for some fun,  so we headed to Lagoon TWICE!

(Brevin, Joe, Josh, Ian, Emily, Me and Davis)

The first day (Monday) we had planned because my bother Brent was in town.  We met both of my brother's familys there.  

this picture is of Jon and Jenny with their kids Jaxson and Violet.  

My sister-in-law Amy's entire family was also there which made it really fun,  especially when we went on Colossus and our group took up an entire car.  I was not sure how joe and Emily felt about having to ride in the front seat the first time they went on it,  but they went on it a lot more throughout the day,  so they must have loved it.

Last year Valerie loved Lagoon,and her favorite ride was Bulgy the whale. This year she still loved it, and her favorite ride is sill Bulgy the whale. If you ask her she will tell you it is Bombora, but while we were there her face lit up every time she rode Bulgy. She did not ask to ride Bombora much. She hated the dino drop. I talked her into it, and she did not cry, but she did NOT like it. The people in line were very entertained watching her ride it though.

 

We ran into her friend Addie the first day at the park,  and the girls had lots of fun riding rides together.  

Emily Joe and Josh were not into kiddie land at all this year.  For them the crazier the ride the better.  They really liked the new ride Air race.  I had a hard time even watching that ride without wanting to throw up.  The first day I spent a little time with them in the morning riding roller coasters,  but then I stayed in kiddie land with Valerie while they headed off with their cousins.  

Ryan had an unexpected court appearance come up for work on the first day we went to Lagoon, so he was not able to come.   We prebought our tickets to get a group deal,  (if you have 25 or more people who buy tickets together....you don't have to go on the same day, you just have to buy the tickets at the same time......you get 25% off plus if you do go on the same day you get a pavilion and they will also sell your group food tickets so you can eat on the park for half the price......This is better than Costco)    

Anyway because we had already bought him a ticket we decided to take a chance and bounce back the following Saturday.  I was worried it was going to be crazy busy,  but to my surprise it was not too bad.  We really did not have to wait for anything for more that a couple of rounds.  

The kids knew we were going to be bouncing back,  so every morning Valerie would ask if we were bouncing back that day.  She was very excited when the day finally came,  and the kids were all very glad to have dad there.

Dad likes all of the spiny rides that make mom want to throw up,  and mom likes all of the roller coasters that dad is not a fan of like Wicked.  We did get dad to try Spider once.

Both days were pretty hot,  so the favorite ride for everyone seemed to be Rattle Snake Rapids.  That is a ride that you can't help but get a little wet on.  

The first time we went with Ryan we all got really wet.  

Especially Valerie and I .  We went right under the big waterfall at the end. There are no pictures of me,  because I had the camera, (it was in a ziplock during the ride) but I was at least as wet as Valerie.   

Ryan had the lucky seat and hardly got wet at all.  He started bragging about how he never gets too wet on those rides.  So we decided to go again.  

This time I positioned the kids weight a little differently and.....We got him.  Ryan went right under the falls.  Joe went with him,  but he liked it.  

Even though by the end of the day Lagoon reminds Ryan and I just how old we are getting, we love going and had a great day together as a family.  Once or twice a year is good for me though.  Valerie keeps asking me when we are going to bounce back again.   I tell her next year.  Luckily she is good with that answer.

The Dump Fire

On June 21st I wrote this on facebook.......

Proof we live in the sticks....... My boys come home dirty every day. I have weeds in my yard that are completely foreign to me. When a Vole got in my window well, the neighbor boy came and took care of it with his air soft gun, and told me I could call him any time. And.......... we have lived here two weeks and have now seen two wild fires. The second one was a little closer than I like them................ 

Here is the full story

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It was about noon on Thursday June 21st.  The boys were out with a friend riding their bikes. I looked out the window to check on them.   I saw smoke and a line of orange headed our way.  It was still pretty far out there so I grabbed my camera.  (because the picture lover in me wanted a picture)   by the time I got it the fire fighters had thankfully gotten the big line of orange stopped and the only orange left was the little bit you can see in the center.  A few minutes later it actually looked like they had gotten the fire out.  I was relieved.  There were quite a few houses between ours and the fire,  but it has been very dry this summer,  and there is a lot of kindle around us.  

I started going about the day again,  and then I saw more smoke.  The fire was not out.  It was raging again, but this time it was headed up the hill and away from us.   We spent the rest of the day getting things done,  but at the same time watching the fire climb the hill as the planes and helicopters flew over it to fight it.  That night the mountain glowed orange, and we were not sure what the winds would do with the fire.  

Friday Joe had cub camp with his old troop so we had to leave early to get him there.  We had planned to spend the day in Sandy with our friends while he was at camp and then return when he got home.  I checked the news websites before I left to see how the fire was doing.  Everything seemed OK.  The fire was still burning,  but away from us.  So we left for the day.  Around 10:00am  I started getting phone calls from friends and family.  Evacuations had started.  Were we evacuated?  Was our house OK?  I really didn't know.  I got online and looked and as far as I could tell we were OK, but  the evacuation line was just a couple blocks from our street.   The next choice was to go back and get things.....most of which was already in boxes...photos important documents..... or just stay out because we were already out.  

The fire still seemed to be burning away from our home,  so I decided just to stay away,  Ryan headed back to the house around 2:00 to check things out, and found everything was fine.  As long as the wind didn't change we would be OK.   Emily was away at Girls camp, and Joe was going to stay over night with a friend so we didn't have to get up quite so early to get him to cub camp the next day.  That night Josh, Valerie and I returned home.  We followed the advice of the local authorities and packed our bags and were ready to go.     

This was one of those situations in life where you can't do much but pray for your safety and wait and see.  As I was trying to decide what we needed to pack in our bags,  there was a point were I found myself laughing a little.  How ironic would it be if we did loose our house in this fire, before we even made our first payment on it. We waited so long to buy a house.  We knew this was the house to buy.  That would be a little mean wouldn't it?  But when it came right down to it the only thing I really cared about was that my family was safe.  Our bags were packed with a few clothes, photo disks and important documents.   Everything else would stay and I didn't care if it did.  It was just stuff.  

Packing our bags got Josh worked up a little.  His bag contained clothes, cowboy night night (his blanket), and his DS.  We watched the orange mountain a little before we went to bed to try to show Josh that the fire was way over there and he didn't need to worry. But he woke up a couple of times in the night to make sure we didn't need to evacuate.  Part of me wondered if he wanted to.   

We woke the next morning to find that while the fire was still burning, most of the evacuated homes were now out of danger.  Over the next few days the fire was put out.   Our community was very blessed.  The fire came within 200 feet of some homes,  but no homes were lost.  It is still very dry here and there have been other fires burning all over, many much worse than the one we had here.  I am very grateful to all of the people who are working so hard to put out the fires and keep everyone safe.   May they be blessed and protected.