Summer Wrap-Up

It's been a good summer. 

Tanner, Tim, Jake

  Life never slows down around here and there are a few more summer memories worth recording before they're forgotten.  

 June 26-29 - Tanner and Aaron joined with 10,500 fellow scouters for a special Boy Scouts of America Encampment.

 This massive undertaking required impressive organizational skills as the scouts participated in various activities throughout the week.  The sea of tents was a sight to behold!

Jacob, Ricky, Tanner

 Aaron and Tanner had the unique opportunity to earn and receive the prestigious Thomas S. Monson Award - given for the first time at this Encampment.

G-pa M, Aaron, Tanner - 3 generations

Aaron and Tanner

 Our friends returned from living in India for six months. The kids made this welcome home sign for them and hung it up in their kitchen as they were driving home from the airport.

Taken from our backyard.

The long summer days here - and amazing sunsets.

Jantzen (11) & Great G-pa M (91)

It's been a tough summer for Great G-pa M with Ruth having to stay in an assisted living facility.  They'll be reunited again soon!  Jantzen was thrilled to have a chance to golf with his buddy.

Many afternoons were spent playing at the "Middle Pond" as it's referred to around here.  After a long day of mowing, Tanner especially loved to jump in the cool water and swim around with his friends.

The younger children were not able to go unless there was adult supervision - which didn't happen often enough for their liking. 

So Quinn and Elsie were very happy when we decided to make this our FHE activity one evening.

Somebody had to take a few pictures, right?  I volunteered this time.

I don't know if we'll ever get pictures from Tanner's friends (our small camera broke) but want to mention the 50-mile backpacking trip he enjoyed in the Wind Rivers mountain range in Wyoming - August 13-17.  Tanner has a knack for packing light and tight for these high adventures - and loved living off the land for a few days.

 Another day we joined up with our friends, the Black's, to play at R Lake for the afternoon.

 We had serious sand toys to share with all of our friends so everybody was busy and happy with their creations on shore.

Eliza, Elsie, Aislyn, Haley, Brinley, Quinn

Austen & Jantzen

 We accomplished most of what was on our Summer 2013 Bucket List.
Except perhaps the "get bikes repaired" part.

 Well, Quinn did help Aaron get one up and running because Elsie determined she wanted to learn how to ride a bike.

 Even though the size was not quite right for her, she jumped on and started riding within minutes!

 Wow - she really took off!  Now she just needs to perfect the starting/stopping aspects and she'll be ready to race Taylor:).  Way to go Elsie!

 Another item on our "Summer Bucket List" we squeezed into our final week before returning to school was to have a picnic at the Nature Park.

 The kids brought scooters to ride around and we also fed the ducks.

The last day of summer is marked with a huge community party (the newspaper reported 12,000 participants) - "Celebration Youth".
Numerous games and activities and "sack dinners" are available from 2-6pm followed by a huge raffle drawing and an evening dance for the teenagers.

It's getting easier to navigate as my kids are getting older - but it was still total mayhem at the park.

Quinn - digging for new pencils in the straw.

 Anna spent most of the afternoon with Lillian W. but I did snap one pic of her.  Jantzen and Brinley were much too social for me to follow around with a camera and Tanner skipped out this year - he had more important things to be doing - such as taking his driving test to get his license!

Elsie - waiting her turn for one of the games.

Heather with Elsie on her favorite horse.

The best part about the whole shin-dig is the price = FREE.
This year we won something at the raffle drawing (first time ever)..

Well, Quinn won something.  We'll happily use this new picnic table but the irony is that we purchased one last summer....:)

Aaron and Home Care Pulse were recently featured in our local paper.  Besides the typos and a few mis-quotes, it's a decent article:).  He's famous now.  Good job Aaron!