Playing at the Park in Heriman - May 27, 2013

Monday - May 27th

We stopped to play for a little bit when we went to visit Family.  It was a fun time.

Roger's Birthday - May 25, 2013

Saturday - May 25th
We stayed up late and decorated the house for Roger's Birthday.  Then we woke up early, so we could jump out and yell "Surprise!" to Roger when he got home.  We were all pretty tired.  Roger enjoyed us surprising him.  He opened his gifts before he went upstairs to go to bed.

 While Roger slept. I made a few pies, took out the frozen Marie calendar's Pie, and made some potato salad.  Roger's mom and his friend Dan and his family came to celebrate Roger's birthday.  We had a yummy Barbecue.  Roger is really good at grilling meat.  He makes us the yummiest barbecues ever!  So we really enjoyed our food.  Roger's mom stayed and visited for a while, but she had to get home.  I think she didn't want to be driving home in the dark.  Dan and his family stayed for long time.  I feel bad, because I got tired and went to bed before they ended up leaving.  Dan had bought Roger a really fun video game and they stayed up pretty late playing it.

Adventuring in Bear Lake and Logan Canyon - May 20, 2013

The past 2 weekends we planned to go to Bear Lake.  Each time we ventured out, we got distracted along the way and ended stopping and exploring different places in Logan Canyon.  This time we finally made it all the way to Bear Lake.  We stopped and went on a hike a little bit before we got there.  The hike we went on is called Limber Pine Nature Trail.

Here is a view of Bear Lake from the hiking trail.

This was our first stop along the trail.  when we stopped here and read the number on this sign, we realized that we were hiking the trail in the wrong direction.  The sign says this is a spot to reflect and this is where we took the pictures of the view of Bear Lake.

This tree looks like a big cartoon tree.  I love it!  We all had to take turns posing in front of it.

I love taking pictures when we hike and the kids love to pose for the pictures I take.  We have so much fun.  I love to see the poses they come up with.  They are too funny!

This is the part of the hike where we came across a large amount of snow on the trail.  It was also super windy in this area.  The sign at this point was pretty much ruined, but what we were able to read of it, it said something about the strong winds in this area.

We went off the trail for a little bit at this point and found some treasure.  We ended up finding a bunch of fire wood and something to tie it with.  Luckily we found this toward the end of the trail so we didn't have too far to hike with it.

This tree made a perfect seat for us to pose on.  Brinley was really scared when she was sitting on it.  In her first pose, she is sitting really stiffly and you can tell she is nervous.  then she came up with this funny second pose.  I love it!  Alissa posed for a few pictures and she was really cute, but I didn't get the focus right, so the pictures didn't turn out.  Parker was so funny posing with his gun in almost all of the pictures I took of him.

 We stopped at a café in Garden City called Merlin's Drive Inn.  It was really yummy food.  they had really good tater tots, grilled cheese sandwiches, burgers and hot dogs.  It said that they specialize in milkshakes, but we didn't try one.  Next time we will for sure.  I also think it would be fun if we try the Merlinater.  It's a big $16.00 meal.  It is an extra large burger with drink and fries.  If you eat the whole thing, you get your picture hung up on their wall.

We finished eating then headed to the lake.  It was too cold, so we didn't plan on swimming.  We just stopped for a while and the kids practiced their rock skipping abilities.

 Here are some pictures from the ghost towns that we visited after our stop at Bear Lake.

 We had a long drive home.  We decided to break the drive up a bit by stopping to go on another hike.

After our little hike, we went adventuring in the truck.  We followed this tiny dirt road for a while.  I insisted that we turn around and head home when we reached Idaho.  Later we looked on a map and discovered that we would have eventually reached a lake, had we not turned around.

Finally out of the canyon and heading home, the scenery was beautiful.  I love the way rain looks from a distance and the kids were super excited about seeing the rainbow.

 

Happy Birthday Parker! - May 19, 2013

Sunday - May 19, 2013
Parker is 9 years old!  It is so crazy how fast my little ones are growing!  This year will be the first in about 5 years that we are not doing Birthday party with friends.  The kids don't love it, but they are okay with it.  We just live in a place that makes doing a friend Birthday party difficult.  Alissa, Brinley, and I woke up really early to decorate the house for Parker's special day.  We normally wait until he falls asleep, then stay up late decorating.  We did it different this year because I had just gotten home from a retreat and I was tired - Weird, huh?

 So, we woke up really early and decorated the house.  We made the whole day feel like a party by letting him open gifts all day long.  He opened a gift when he woke up, then again an hour or two later, then another one after church, and so on like that.  He loved it!  He was so funny when he blew out the candles on his cake.  It took him a few tries.  It was funny because he was blowing so hard, but I think he just wasn't aiming right and was missing the candle.  He is such a funny boy.  It is just so hard to believe that he is 9 years old already.  Here are some pictures of out fun.



I'm going to take a minute to vent about life in these townhouses:

Before Roger came to pick me up from the retreat, I talked to him on the phone and he told me all the happenings from while I was gone.  The landlord came and was mad because the neighbors called and told her that our kids pushed over two of the trees on the property.  They told her that they came over to use my phone to call and tell her about it, because their phone wasn't working. She said that she has been trying to call and talk to me about it, but I've been avoiding her calls.  She claimed that one time when she called, the kids answered and said that I was in the bathroom.  The time after that, she called and she could hear talking in the background and then someone hung up the phone. ---- All of that is pure craziness!  The neighbor kids pushed over the trees.  Parker admitted that he was outside and joined in when one of the trees got pushed over, but he had nothing to do with the other and the girls didn't participate at all. No neighbor ever came to use my phone.  And I have no record of the landlord calling me at all.  I have no memory of it and my phone history has no memory of it.  We don't get a good signal in our house, but when someone calls it shows up on the phone.  We almost always have to go outside and talk or we lose our signal.  It's just crazy! That's all!  I don't know if the landlord called the number that we gave her or the number that the neighbors told her was mine and the phone that they called from.  I wasn't here to defend myself, but Roger kept telling her that he knew I wouldn't avoid her calls.  She didn't believe him and kept saying, "I'm not that scary.  I don't know why she would avoid my calls."  Anyway, since they had no way to prove that our kids knocked the trees down, they can't charge us.  So, that's good.  Now that we know the type of neighbors that we are dealing with, we can't let the kids go out and play outside with out us there to supervise.  Being outside supervising so my kids can play is exhausting.  I've stopped the neighbor kids from knocking down a third tree and I've saved them all from being run over a few times.  They all seem to know nothing about safety around cars.  They have no rules and nobody watches them ever.  One day, I decided that I was too tired to go out and (against my better judgment) I let them go out with out me for a little while.  When Roger went out to check on them, Parker's friend had a lighter that he was playing with.  We took it away and decided that it really isn't safe for the kids to be out with these friends.  They all have no rules and get into so much trouble!  Then when something gets broken, they blame it on our kids.  The kids have always been able to go outside and play with friends.  This is going to be a rough year for them since they can't do that here.  I feel bad, but it's the only way.  We have been keeping busy though.  I take the kids to the park a lot and let them play with friends from school or old neighborhoods we have lived in.  On the days Roger doesn't work, we go out adventuring (Hiking, camping, exploring places we haven't been before). That stuff has been a lot of fun.

Mom's Renewel Retreat - May 17, 2013

May 17th - 18th.  I went on a retreat with other homeschooling moms.  When I first pulled the kids out of school, I found this lady in my area that plans regular activities and get togethers for other homeschoolers.  I saw this retreat and thought it would be nice, but I didn't dare to go by myself.  I thought that I would be too shy to make friends and that would make the weekend akward and uncomfortable.  I found out a few weeks before it was scheduled that my cousin Barbara was planning to homeschool her kids and she had signed up to go to the retreat.  After discovering that, I couldn't wait to get signed up to go.

It ended up being exactly what I needed.  I had so much fun!  I met so many women dealing with the same things that I deal with.  It is so comforting to not feel alone.  I learned so much, made many new friends, got to know my cousin better, and had so much fun!  I will definitely go to this again next year.  Here is a picture taken of a lot of us who were there.  We didn't pull the camera out early enough.  a lot of people had already left when we thought to take pictures.

 

A Very Long Walk to the Park - May 14, 2013

We have always lived right across the street from a playground, except for the 3 months in Penrose (But there was a slide and swing and lots of property for the kids to play on).  In our town houses we are nowhere near a park or playground.  It is so sad.  We really miss having a playground close by.  We decided to walk to Jeanne Steven's Park while Roger was at work.  We stopped at Maverick on the way there to use the restroom and drop off a Red Box movie we had rented.  It took us about 50 minutes to get there.  I wondered if the kids would have any energy to play, but, of course, they did.  They're kids.  We played for about an hour, then we headed home.  I didn't take any pictures of the kids on the playground, because I was too busy talking on the phone the whole time.  On the way home, we stopped to play at the Skate Park for a little while.  The kids love playing at the skate park. Not including the stops, I think it took us about 40 minutes to walk to the park.  But we had a lot of fun, so it was worth it.

Hyrum State Park - May 13, 2013

We decided to go experience Hyrum state Park.  We loved it!  We had so much fun playing in the water.  The water was really cold!  I knew the kids would play in it anyway, but I didn't think they would get all the way in.  When they first got in, Alissa and Brinley both ended up falling, so they accidentally got all the way in.  They got used to it pretty quickly.  The water looked like so much fun and I couldn't resist getting in with the kids.  It was soooooo...... cold!  It took me a long time to get all the way in, but I did it.  Alissa and I had a fun time playing make believe games.  We played like we were mermaids then crocodiles.  When we were mermaids we ran while we swam so it seemed like we were super fast swimmers.  As crocodiles we crept slowly toward Parker and tried to get him.  He ran away every time.  He thought it was lots of fun, until he was backing away from us, tripped on a rock, and fell in the water.  He was a little mad about that, but it was funny!

Roger was enjoying relaxing in the sun and didn't want to come in the water with us.  Brinley only played in the water for a little while before she decided that sitting in the sun was nicer.

Also, I love Mendon, Utah.  I really need to live there.  It is so beautiful!  As soon as our lease is up, that is where I plan to look for a place to live.  If I can't find a place there, we will try out Wellsville until we can get a place in Mendon.  I drove through there once in 2004 and fell in love with it.  I spent a lot of time talking with Roger and dreaming about moving there.  We were all settled in our house at the time, so there was no hope of moving anytime soon.  Eventually, I stopped thinking about it.  I had nearly forgotten when Roger mentioned that we would be going through Mendon.  He remembered how I had talked so much about it, so he was interested to finally see it.  As soon as I saw it, I had that overwhelming feeling again.  I love Mendon!  I need to live there!  I love the scenery all around it.  It is the perfect small town.  I went home and did some research on it.  They have a population of 2000.  On their town website, they have a collection of stories, from the towns past.  It is so fun to read and makes me love Mendon even more.  I can't wait to live there!

   

Adventuring - May 11, 2013

We decided that we want to go to Bear Lake and get a little more familiar with that area.  So we climbed in the truck and headed to Bear Lake.  On the way to Bear Lake, we kept passing places that we wanted to stop and explore.  We kept on driving and decided that we would explore them on another day, but eventually we got too antsy.  We had been in the car too long and couldn't resist the urge to stop and explore.  So we decided that we would go to Bear Lake another day and we turned on a road that lead to a lake.   We were headed toward Tony Grove Lake.  There was snow on the road in a few places.  Eventually we reached a place in the road where the snow was pretty deep and slushy, so we decided that we would turn around.  Before we headed back home, we got out of the car to play and enjoy the area we were in.

The really thick snow was around the corner on this stretch of road.



Sleepover and Parker's Car tracks - May 10, 2013

Friday - May 10, 2013
Alissa's friend, Sydney came for a sleepover.  They had a lot of fun doing their make-up, getting all dressed up, and playing like they were models walking the run way.

 I have been really struggling with depression since we moved.  I really don't understand it, but it's like this dark fog and everyday I have to fight to stay out of it.  Some days I'm successful, but other days, it is just too hard.  The most frustrating thing is that I really don't feel like I have anything to be sad about.  I guess when that happens, I'm not really sad, but I have a really hard time feeling happy.  I just feel blah.  Not sad.  Just blah.  It is really hard to explain and really frustrating to try and understand.  I don't really understand it.  Luckily, these major bouts of depression don't happen too often.  They are miserable!

Anyway, I started telling you this, because, I mentioned something to my friend, MaryAnn (Sydney's mom), when she dropped Sydney off.  When I'm depressed, I rarely answer my phone and I never call anybody.  If someone comes over, that really helps.  So I mentioned to her that I had been having a hard time.  Thankfully, she was intuitive enough to realize that I really could use some company.  She asked if she could come back after she put her son to bed so we could hang out and watch a movie.  That was such good therapy for me.  It really helped to have someone to talk to.  Watching a funny movie together just made it all the better.  Roger is always here for me and I talk to him a lot, but he is not a girl and is not good at girl talk, which is what I really needed.  I know that I have lots of family that are always willing to talk to me when I'm having a hard time.  The problem with that is that I don't like to call anybody or answer the phone when I'm depressed.

I'm feeling much better now.  Thank goodness.

May 12th - Parker saw a picture while I was looking at Pinterest.  The picture was of a road made out of tape, on the floor.  Parker couldn't wait to try it.  Here's what he made.  He really likes parking lots.



Hiking the wind Caves - May 6, 2013

We went to Providence to help my cousin clean her house.  The kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins at a park and I had fun visiting and getting reacquainted with my cousin.  I was excited and surprised to hear that she had done the same thing that I did.  We both pulled our kids out of school around the same time this year.  It makes me feel better knowing that I have somebody that I can talk to who is dealing with the same stuff that I am.  We didn't get a lot of cleaning done.  I feel bad about that, but I'm very happy that we got to visit.

When we finished at my cousins house, we went to eat a late lunch at the International House of Pancakes. Yummy!  Then we decided to drive up the canyon and go for a hike.  It was not smart of us to eat so much food right before a hike, but we survived anyway.  We had a lot of fun.  We hiked to the wind caves.  It took us forever!  But we loved it!