Summer Travels 2019: The Fourth of July

Early on the Fourth of July, Me and U went kayaking around Columbine Lake. Matthew came down a bit later and so the three of us then went in the double kayak.

U paddling away.

Me drifting in the breeze.

Later in the morning, a bull moose was down by the water.  He was having a little rest behind the boat rack.

Waiting for the parade!  The HOA puts one on every year.

Here comes the flag.

The kids bike ride.  Anyone who wanted to be in the parade could be.

Our friend the moose was hanging out in the woods behind the clubhouse. He was really big! 

Matthew, Megan and Bean enjoyed playing in a pool filled with silicon gel.

Sarah came to join the fun.

The gel got everywhere.

Elise (Bean) and Megan had a blast hanging out together.

Jen brought supplies for us all to tie dye shirts.  Sarah's rainbow gradient turned out nice.  Notice her eyes: she did special patriotic make up.

All of us in our tie dye. 

U and his siblings.

Including spouses (Greg wasn't feeling well)

Cousins!

Me took Matthew out in the kayak.

Beautiful clouds over the lake.

Everyone had labeled glasses.  Matthew came up with his title all on his own.

Someone has healthy self confidence.....
(It says "U the Magnificent".)

Provo: 4th of July

I was excited about spending the 4th of July in Provo because I'd heard from a number of people how great it is. After having been there, I am now convinced that it's crazy!!!! At least the parade is crazy. People camp out on cement all night long in order to have good viewing spots for the parade. Sunday the 3rd, we drove along University around 9 pm and both sides of the street were completely filled with people waiting for the parade. Which started in 12 hours. And they'd been there for awhile before that staking out their spots. Things around U's parents' home were still pretty crazy. Although you can't legally be on the easement between the sidewalk and road until 5 am on the 4th, there were still lots of people waiting right behind it until 5 am rolled around. U and I took a walk around the neighborhood around 11 pm and there were people everywhere! And many of these people were shooting off fireworks all night long! Needless to say, it made for a very loud night with not a lot of sleeping (although mine was compounded with waiting for news of my dad's surgery). Anyhow, it is certainly nice that U's parents live right on the parade route so that we could have nice spots to see the parade while at least attempting to sleep in beds. And the parade was nice. As was the pre parade. And they were quite long. So we did enjoy ourselves. Just with a little less craziness than many of the people around us.

Sarah, Matthew, Wren, Accalia and Rowan waiting for the parade to start.

U's Aunt Pam and Megan.

Sarah and Christian.

Matthew waving at all the firetrucks that went by.

Megan with Sarah. Christian is shouting something at the parade people. He and Allison loved shouting different things at those in the parade. For example, they'd try to get people holding banners and balloons to spin by yelling, "Spin!" A favorite was when they said, "Spin thy noble steed" to some people on horses.

Sarah all decorated up. Apparently she has the flag of Netherlands on her face.

Megan loved the star crown she got.

Matthew holding out his hand in the hopes that the policemen on bikes would come over and give him 5.

Giving 5 to the missionaries.

Some of the senior missionaries in the parade. There were a bunch of other ones walked, too. It's a small world story: After the parade, we saw a couple of senior missionaries walking down the street and we yelled something about loving missionaries. They came over to talk to us and I mentioned that my parents are serving in India right now. Turns out that the Elder's cousin is also serving in New Delhi, India with his wife. At the time, there were two senior couples in India (my parents and this brother's cousin). What are the chances that we would meet up?

There were some baby goats in the parade.

Matthew finally got to give a police officer five. He was so happy, as you can probably tell.

U and Me in our matching shirts.

With Matthew.

That night, we went over to U's cousin's home to see fireworks. That pile is a portion of the fireworks that were lit off. There were some pretty cool ones!

U helped set off a few and Matthew liked to be right up there with him as he prepared (but not when he actually lit them, of course).

Mother's Day

We had a nice Mother's Day on Sunday. U and I were both able to talk to our moms. We had a yummy breakfast! It's almost too pretty to eat!

The kids got me really colorful flowers!

At church, we were surprised to see Megan's birth family. (Megan's great uncle is in the ward and was speaking which is why they came.) Here's a four generation picture with Megan, her birth mom, her grandma and her great grandma. We ended up going to her grandparents' home for dinner. On the way home, we were talking with Megan about how neat it was that she got to see her birth mom and her grandparents together. She asked, "Do they know each other?" We got a good laugh out of that. And yes, we explained to Megan how they knew each other.

By the time we got home from dinner, I was exhausted. It had been a busy, non-stop day with lots going on at church, more church stuff to do after church and then the visit with Megan's birth family. I took a much needed rest. (I wasn't the only one tired, either. Sarah put herself to bed when we got home between 5:30-6 pm and slept until 7 the next morning!)

Leap Day!

Monday was leap day and, since it happens just once every four years, we decided to celebrate. Dad made a Leap Day obstacle course. We also played leap frog, which works much better when everyone is close to the same size (the younger two, in particular, crawled over the bigger people--we were a bit too big for them to leap over).

The kids "leaping" on the exercise ball.

Christmas lights

A neighbor told us about an awesome light display so we drove to Gilbert to see the lights. A whole street had decorated their homes and synchronized the lights to music. It was pretty amazing! We first drove through and then we parked the car and walked around. It was really, really neat. They were collecting money for Make-a-Wish Foundation, which is cool. In addition, they won an award from ABC on "The Great Christmas Light Fight." If you come visit, we'll take you to see it!

Two pictures taken at same location.

There's more info here and here if you're interested.

Happy Mother's Day!

For Mother's Day, I got a super yummy HUGE breakfast. I'm so spoiled!

Easter!

We celebrated Easter weekend by watching General Conference. The Easter bunny also found its way to our home on Easter Eve. The kids enjoyed finding their eggs full of jelly beans. There was even one for mom and dad!

Megan's Easter basket. (The little paper bunny has her name on it.)

Matthew's basket.

Sarah's basket.

Matthew loved finding eggs and even found a few of his sisters' eggs.

Megan was an enthusiastic egg finder. She even found mom and dad's egg.

Sarah enjoyed her search as well and would let Megan and Matthew know when she saw one of their eggs.