New 3rd Grader

Chandler is a full fledged third grader at Bell View Elementary, he started Monday. Even though he said he didn't want to go back and that summer was too short, he was excited to start school again. I think if there is one thing that is constant for him among the chaos of two households, it's school. He seems so grown up now when he talks about learning cursive and keeping his assignments in a planner. He seems so happy when he comes home chatting about his day. This is such an exciting year for him and we are so proud of our big kid!

Cache Valley Vacation

We had a full, uninterrupted week with Chandler last week so we decided to take a little trip. Per my mom's suggestion, we traveled a short one and half hours to our friends, the Pierce's. They live in Providence, which is just outside of Logan. We get to see Bill and Sadie and their family just a few times a year, all of us would like it to be more. We had a great time at Bear Lake. Chandler and Scott both said it was better than the beach! We timed it right so the water was just a little chilly. We also timed it right for Rasberry Days! La Beau's is a great place for burgers and shakes, we even watched the parade. According to Bill and Sadie's oldest, Bryson, we had dinner and a show.Friday we started the day with a tour at "Weeks Berries of Paradise." This was our first stop on Logan's famous food tour. (Ok, I don't know if it's famous but it was on the Cache Valley Visitors website and it sounded fun.) We got to see the rasberry bushes and taste fresh blueberries right off the plant. The fruit was fantastic so we got a little bottle of jam to go. Next we headed to "Cox Honeyland and Gifts." We tasted about 20 different flavors of honey and watched the queen bee work along with the worker bees. That was a yummy stop too. We stopped by "Crumb Brothers Artisan Bread" but missed the 9:30 am tour. Their bread is delicious and picked up a loaf of sourdough for our little picnic. Next we headed to the "Aggie Ice Cream & True Blue Cheese" tour. We got special treatment for the cheese tour and learned some new facts about one of our favorite foods. Chandler handled the camera at that stop. I guess the ice cream is pretty famous at USU so we couldn't resist tasting this as well. I have to say it was pretty fresh!

We ended our Friday with a Big Horse Adventure at the American West Heritage Center. It was fun to ride (for about 15 minutes) in a covered wagon and play horseshoes and try to throw a tomahawk and attempt to lasso. The driver of the wagon was a true country boy who had his own team of horses (Babe & Sam) and mules. He cooked up a great dinner of steak and chicken in dutch ovens and we enjoyed funny music from "Whoa Molly!" It was a fun night.

Saturday we headed back to the American West Heritage Center for the live demonstrations and exhibits. It was really great to learn about life in the 1800's and talk to people who love that era. It's amazing what people could build and create with such limited tools and technology! Aside from feeding baby goats Chandler shot a black powder musket, we threw more tomahawks, and shot arrows with Shoshone Indians. This center really was a fun place to visit, and they sell Indiana Jones' whip. That was the best $2.25 we ever spent. Chandler spent the rest of the vacation cracking his whip!

That afternoon we took a dip at the Logan Aquatic Center. This great community pool has 2 diving boards, 2 mega slides, and 2 huge pools. For our family, this was the perfect vacation: great friends, great food, great swimming. So, if you need to get away but don't have much time or moolah, we recommend Cache Valley. Thanks Pierce's for living in such a fun place!

Hot Air

Thursday night Chandler participated in his first Raingutter Regatta with his Scout den. Although we didn't have a lot of time to work on his boat, he did a great job sanding and painting it to be ready for the races. Luckily Scott made it home in time to glue the rudder and mast before the event. Chandler used a lot of hot air to get his boat to win most of the races. It was a fun time. He also earned three belt loops from activities at Cub Country.

Butterflies and Such

Chandler started his BMX riding again this week. He practiced this past Tuesday for the first time on an outdoor track. He is pretty excited about starting up the sport again. I think the biking excitement is hereditary--Scott is just like a kid about it all. Chandler's first race was this past Thursday night. He did a great job sticking with it, even though he took a little tumble during the first race. He didn't qualify for the main races but he still wants to move forward with the sport. We took a bathroom break between his two races. When we were walking back to his bike I told him he'd have one less thing to think about at the start of the next race. He responded he always feels like he needs to use the bathroom while waiting at the gate. He also said he always gets butterflies. I teased him a little that he'll get butterflies when he likes a girl. He, of course, said "Ewwww." and I told him not to worry about it for about 20 years. He said he'd be 28 and probably won't be dating by then! :) I just want him to stay a true kid for as long as possible.

Scott loves everything about BMXing. He was so excited to put together Chandler's bike and rooted for him like no other parent. It's fun to see Chandler enjoy something like this and I hope we can encourage him to just have fun and do his best.

Bloom Time!

We have been enjoying some of the produce from our garden the last few weeks. The lettuce has continued to grow after harvesting and has been really great for summer salads. We picked a few green beans for Sunday dinner. I love to see the flowers in bloom, they make me feel happy every day. We have quite a few green tomatoes and I'm looking forward to fresh salsa soon. Does anyone have a fried green tomatoe recipe?

Crack of the Bat

I guess I really shouldn't be surprised when we get back what we put out there, good or bad...

Scott and I enjoyed a little outing with The Bees last night, thanks to my broker Gaynell. It was a great night for a baseball game, even though the Bees lost. It was nice to be out with my hubby and just enjoy watching players play and be entertained by the fans. Thanks again Gaynell!

Cub Country

Chandler's first experience with Cub Country was today. It's a little day camp for the 8-9 year old cub scouts. I'm not sure of everything that occurs there. Growing up I was jealous of my brother's scouting adventures, partly because they were always such a mystery. It is still a mystery to me as my own eight year old didn't say much about today's adventure. He was very excited this morning and was all shiny and clean at the beginning of the day. I found out they did a little bit of archery, Chandler was the first to hit the bulls-eye. He had lunch and played on an obstacle course and bought some sort of knife at the trading post. All I can say is that he seemed to have a good time and he is still looking forward to another day of it tomorrow. He'll be shiny and clean again, and come back with the fun on his face and shoes!

Summer = Rodeo

I don't think anyone who knows us would peg us to be a very "western" kind of family. But every once in a while it is great fun to observe and participate in a good, home town rodeo. Challey and Spencer invited us to go to the Draper Days rodeo this past Saturday. I think the motivation behind it was so Scott and Spencer and some other unnamed fool could attempt the crazy cow milking contest. I'm happy to say they didn't enter, but Chandler tried the Cash Calf and Stratton was tough enough for Mutton Bustin'. You'll have to see Challey's blog for the video on Stratton's adventure. We had a good time and I felt all kinds of American during the special flag presentation. Chandler was very excited about the Cash Calf. His goal was to get $4, I'm not sure how he arrived at that number but we applauded his enthusiasm. There were two groups of kids for this event, Chandler was with the bigger kids. I'm not sure how many there were, about 60, I'm guessing. If you ask Chandler, the number gets bigger each time he talks about it. There was one poor calf with money attached in plastic baggys to a cover over its back. The whole thing took less than five minutes. Chandler was pretty tough but did say the calf stepped on his arm when he tried to trip its front legs. Needless to say, he didn't grab any cash but he had a good story to tell later!

It seems there is always something fun to do as a family in the summer time! However, I don't know how to fit it all in. I'd love to make it to a Bees game this year, and I know Scott and Chandler want to see how the BMX action is happening.

Life.Liberty.Happiness

I wore a t-shirt this last 4th of July with the above statement. I think that pretty much sums up the point of celebrating our country's independence. Our little family had a great time for the holiday weekend. Chandler got to come home Thursday night and we had a little fireworks show with Tori, Brooklyn, Aubrey, and Amy. What is it with boys and matches, fire, fireworks, etc? I think it was more entertaining watching Chandler quickly light "flowers" and get out of the way than the fireworks themselves. Friday started kind of early with a great breakfast at mom's house. It's tradition to gather as much family and friends possible to enjoy homemade scones, and all the breakfast fixins'. Our group shrunk a little this year. I think we need to round up new (and possibly younger) blood to keep the fun tradition going. Of course the morning ended with the obligatory water fight. Chandler was soaked. Scott and I stayed relatively dry. One of these days the kids really need to plan a new way to drench my brother. He seems to be the center of the activity and remains pretty dry throughout. It's always fun to get the cousins together, they love to spend time with each other.Scott and Chandler spent the afternoon with Uncle Mike at the golf course. Scott was able to relax a little while Chandler drove crazy on the golf cart. Later we cooled off by swimming for a bit at a neighbor's house. We love living close to the Carlisle's! They are so nice to let us enjoy the fruits of their labors. After a little BBQ we had more fireworks. I love to watch Scott do this kind of thing. It's a good balance for my "sometimes over the top safety at all times" attitude.

Of course, Chandler's best buddy, Sam, spent a lot of time with us this weekend enjoying the festivities. We capped off our adventures by going to one of Uncle Travis' races at Rocky Mountain Raceway. I've been there once before but it was a new experience for Scott, Chandler, and Sam. I'm glad we brought earplugs! It was great fun to cheer on Uncle Travis. He did really well in his races and he inspired Chandler to state he wants to race cars when he grows up. Scott said the same thing, but luckily he put in a quantifier that he won't do it until we're rich! Needless to say, we were all exhausted by the time we got home, and it was really difficult to be close to on time for 9 am church. I hope your holiday was as fun as ours! I'm grateful to have the opportunity to live in this incredible country and know it all comes from God. What a blessing!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Thank you all for wishing me a happy birthday yesterday!
My very cute husband made the perfect breakfast of french toast (with bread from Hagerman's) & Chacon (my version of bacon, which means it's very crispy.) He also set the mood with a lovely bouquet of flowers from our garden. Tori, my oldest niece, sang to me in Spanish and French. I got several phone calls and text messages throughout the day and felt very blessed. So, thank you very much. I did feel a bit spoiled because I really just got to relax and enjoy the day. Scott was sweet enough to take the afternoon off work so we could play at Lagoon and just be goofy and carefree. It was great fun to be there with a smaller crowd and scream my head off while riding "Wicked" and "Jet Star 2." We love the rollercoasters!
Many of you may not know how old I am, and that is ok, unless you think I'm older than my actual age. I asked my Grandma Bee how old she thought I was. She looked at me and seemed to be calculating something in her head and then said, "47." What?!!! Where did she get that number? No, I'm not 47, not even close...I should mention that Grandma Bee will be 91 in August, so I'll give her a break. But, I'll stick with what my mom thinks, 31. I could be 31 forever. :) Yeah birthdays!