JUNE

This post is long...because June was good to us.  It was fun to find our summer rhythm.  We started the month of with Phin's birthday.  It is hard to believe he is 12!

While the kids were at summer recreation classes, Lou and I went on walks and she played at playgrounds.

 

We also found a number of free little libraries and read the books while we waited for the kids.

 

The boys took a 3D printing class...where they did very little 3D printing.  I think this day they painted with frosting. 

 

Millie took a cooking class and did cook or at least heat up food everyday.  Here she is with some sausage she wanted to share with the boys.

 

While the older kids were in another class, I ran to Costco with the three littles.

 

The Sports and Fitness camp at our local rec center was a favorite for these three.

 

Free school lunch also started...and while it is not always a favorite for the kids...I love that I don't have to make or clean up one more meal during the day.

 

We had family over for pizza on Phin's birthday and Lou turned my flour into a sensory table.

 

I made Phin Cake by Courtney's Brooklyn Light Show Cake which had dark chocolate cake layers, peanut butter cookie dough, chocolate covered graham crackers and chocolate fudge frosting.

 

Phin was quite delighted with his birthday presents.  His favorite one was probably this backpacking chair...he carried it with him everywhere we went for several days.

 

We had fun playing at Firefighter park one day when we were waiting for the big kids to finish their class.

 

When we went to pick them up we caught Phin's group doing some relay races at the local park.

 

We got the Get Out Pass and our first venue was Altitute Trampoline Park.  This was by far a favorite activity for the month.

 

We also made a stop at Gardner Village.  We visited Ricochet Canyon.  The kids loved the little Wild West town.

 

We also visited the petting zoo.

 

We also walked over for the Fairy Festival and followed the scavenger hunt clues to find all the fairies.

 

Another day we went to a newish park.  The kids spent lots of time playing in the sand at the volleyball court.

 

Lou at another park one morning.  She is big enough to get herself on and off this toy.

Yet another park while the big kids were at a camp.

 

We celebrated National Doughnut Day with our favorite apple cider doughnuts from Cross E ranch.

 

We also met up with cousins at Lagoon.  

 

I made Seth take a mozzarella cheese making class with me. I haven't had a chance to make mozzarella on my own....we have been busy but I am also quite intimidated still.

 

 

We also went to Orson Gygi's pizza event.  Seth jumped right in and made his own pizza.  His instructor was great...we found out later that he lives just a couple of blocks away from us and does pizza Friday nights were you can visit his backyard and buy a pizza for $8.  We went once and will definitely be going again.

 

We also went to the Chalk Art Festival.  This Spider Gwen was a favorite for all the kids.

 

Someone brought their pet snake and Silas was so excited to go up and touch the snake.

 

We invited neighbors over for an outdoor movie night.  We watched the Minecraft movie.

 

I had the little kids stay in the car while I brought Costco groceries in one day...they found the strawberries and nearly polished off a pound.

 

 Phin acted as Dungeon Master so the kids could play a game.

 I love to watch Lou play pretend.  I will have to try to catch a video of it sometime soon.

 Lou also loves to swing when we visit parks.  She often shouts "higher, higher, higher" which quickly turns to "too high, too high, too high."

 This week Silas and Conrad did an "Adventure" class with a different theme each day. This particular day was Outer Space.

 While we waited for the older kids we went to Walmart.  These kiddos loved visiting the toy aisle.

 We went to This is the Place Heritage Park for Huntsman Day.  We always like to start our visit with a free ice cream.

 Followed immediately by a train ride.

 Their favorite spot was panning for gold.

 We had no idea you could take your "gold" to the bank to find out how much you had found.

Phin made the most money and definitely had some tips for finding gold.

 Carver and Millie took Pickleball Class.

 Phin took basketball.  

I made Cake by Courtney's Lemon Blueberry cake for one of Seth's bosses' birthdays.  The homemade lemon curd was my favorite part of this bake.

Free Frazil Friday was a favorite in June.

 Picnics in the park were also a common occurrence.

We loved the Car Show.  In this photo you can see one of our favorite neighbors as the passenger in the red car.  The kids cheered and got lots of cars to honk.

 Millie loved this purple monster truck.  

 She caught this shirt from the second Monster Truck and it has become her favorite "night" shirt.

 We also found some heroes at the car show.

 

While we were at the car show, Phin and Seth were headed on a little backpacking trip.  They hiked the Whiskey Creek Trail to Bourbon Lake.

 

 

 

Phin caught his first fish seconds after casting out.

 

 

Seth made him eat his catch...unfortunately they had forgotten to pack salt and pepper. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I took Millie, Silas and Lou to the Red Bull Soap Box race...with 40,000 other people.  We would have never made it to this spot without my brother Bart's help.  He took the front of my stroller and we pushed through the massive crowd to join up with Jeff's family.

 I decided we all needed some Snelgrove's after fighting the crowds.

I also made a Father's Day Seven Layer Bar Cake.

We put a candle in the cake to celebrate James' and Phin's birthdays with the family.

Seth opening his Father's Day cards from the kids.

 Another day...another park.

I made the kids leave the house to go to a couple of parks one afternoon.  My favorite thing at this park was watching them all play "Superheroes."

Phin was pretty good on the xylophone at this park.

 Lou insisted on climbing this "ladder" each time we passed it at this park.

This week Phin took a Super Sports class and Millie, Carver, Silas and Conrad took a Jurassic themed class.

We went to see How to Train your Dragon in the theater.  We love luxury recliners...and Mars samples from Kim.

We picked up summer reading packets at the library near Nona's.  The kids loved  the watercolor bookmarks.

These Blockaroo blocks are one of Silas' favorite toys.  Here he is with the "footchuck" that he made...rather than a Nunchaku.

One day while we were waiting for the kids Lou told me she wanted to do my hair.  Then she asked "How do you want me to do it?" I said like Elsa because that is her favorite way to have her hair done.

We went to a Street Carnival at a local Assisted Living Center.  The kids had so much fun playing on the inflatables.

 The also adored the face paint.

 

The balloon artist was also a huge hit. 

 Uncle Bart was kind enough to invite us to play with them on their boat.

Phin tried knee boarding.  Bart has the best rule that you have to try at least three times before you get back on the boat.

 We ended our boating trip with another free Frazil.

We headed up to Cache Valley to spend a night with Grandma Jo and Grandad.  We met them up Logan Canyon for a cookout.  While Grandad cooked the kids fished.

I took the kids to Classic Fun Center for some skating using the Get Out Pass.  Silas insisted on roller skates...but his enthusiasm quickly disappeared after his first fall.  I made him do a few laps with the walker and my assistance.

Millie loved the Hula Hoop contest.

We finally made it back to Banbury Cross for hot doughnut night.  All doughnuts are just $1 on Monday nights...and it is a pretty good motivator for the kids to get their "work" done.

 

Phin left for Young Men's camp the next day.  I had no idea how hard it would be for me to have him away.  We definitely missed Phin.

 

 

 

Here he is helping with breakfast prep one morning.  They hiked Ben Lomond this day.

 

He also loved the games around camp during their down time. 

His favorite day was the play day at Pine View Reservoir. 

We got our Imaginext toys out and Silas and Lou and so much fun playing.

 We went to Kangaroo Zoo one morning.

 Lou loved playing with one of her classmates.

We were able to go to my Aunt's graveside service.  While we were there we searched for Lou's namesakes grave.  We were so happy to find it.

 On the way back from the services we stopped for ice cream in Morgan.

 Lou always loves playing with the magnet mazes at the library.

 We walked down to the Splash Pad/ Farmers Market one evening.

We also went to the Reading Program's magic show.  Silas was chosen as a volunteer and really hammed it up on stage.

Then we headed to the Natural History Museum.

 

Lou is finally not terrified of this section with a glass floor over a dig site.

 

 I loved watching them all line up to get a turn at this exhibit.

We of course had to stop for our last Free Frazil of the month.  We also stopped at the Food Nanny store and shared a delicious sugar cookie, Coconut lime cookie and Chocolate Peanut Bar.

We had another picnic at the park.  Lou loved having Millie push her on the swings.

For this round of summer recreation classes Millie, Conrad and Silas took a STEAM class and Phin and Carver took a Youtube Challenge class.

We drove all the way to Saratoga Springs for a couple more Get Out Pass venues.  Our first one was Sky Zone.

Then we did a very quick game of glow golf at Fat cats.