don't faint...but it really is a post.....

I told the kids we couldn't decorate for Christmas until the living room was painted....as I didn't want to put the living room back together and then take it back apart to paint. It's been torn apart for a few months now..... So we pushed, all of us pushed, and got it painted in the last week.

All five boys....at one time........well ok, it was three paint rollers and one paint brush, so only four boys.....all painting at the same time.....yes, really. It would have been all five, but I didn't have enough pieces to have all five at one time. So they rotated.

Anyway the final result was so worth it. We LOVE how it turned out. This first picture is of the boys FINALLY getting to decorate the tree this year. (we still have plastic on the carpet in the background, I'm still painting some other stuff...)


Lee decorated this window with our stuffed snowmen...

The brown is called chewy caramel, the white (which was supposed to have a hint of tan in it), footprints.....

Lee is putting the nativity scene up on the piano. The boys are so happy to have the piano back where it belongs!

Our three living room windows.....

AND.....we have NEW living room furniture coming....well new to us and it was generously given to us by a ward member. It's a medium size sectional and it's about four years old, but looks brand new. No pets, no children......we'll fix that....... We're hoping to get it tomorrow night.

big dogs

I didn't get good pictures of the big dogs....but here is what I got. Here is the first sign that we have several LARGE dogs in the house...... a 3 gallon bucket, that had to be filled twice daily..... And the towel is in indication that two of the dogs drool..... a lot..........

And here they are........minus Nicki that is 390 lbs of dog sitting there. With Nicki we had 400 lbs of dog running through the house!!

The Reservoir

I'm at a hospital getting to indulge my new baby desire to my heart's content! Courtney had her baby yesterday evening and I've been staying at the hospital to help her out, so that her hubby can go home and be with the kids. His Mom is staying with them, too.

Anthony Joshua arrived yesterday at 6:35pm weighing in at 7 lbs 13 oz and is 21 inches long. I arrived about 45 mins after he did and it was perfect timing. She was just done getting cleaned up and so was AJ!

No waiting around wondering when that baby was going to come! It's about a 3 1/2 hour drive from my house to hers and when I left things were just getting moving for her, so I did not expect that she'd be all done by the time I got there!!

I'll be here until tomorrow and if all is going well, I'll head home when she leaves the hospital tomorrow. I'm also here to help with the breastfeeding as she's previously left the hospital with cracked and bleeding nipples and we don't want that! So far we're doing ok there.

The following pictures are from our trip to UT in July. We headed to the reservoir on Thursday, despite the cold and rainy weather. It was our only day to swim and it was the only day the TOYS were going to be there! Pam's (Pam is my sis-in-law, married to Brent's brother Merrill), sister's husband's uncle.....still with me.......let them bring their sea-doos down and let us play with them. The older boys had a lot of fun on them, but the younger boys were done very quickly. Did I mention rain and cold weather?

Brent and his sister actually left with two cars full of kids after being there a short time as the younger kids were really miserable very quickly.

Here is Pam's sister with Aubrey and Collin.


Collin really enjoyed his ride!

It's hard to see here, but his smile is a mile wide!

Than went out once or twice, but that was enough for him.....did I mention wet and cold weather?

guess who went shopping today!

We went to the Scout Shop today and the boys got their scout shirts. They were so excited! Scouts has been on hold since we moved from De Pere and I've heard about it off and on from them. There has been much rejoicing now that they are back at it.

They put on their own patches and after that they wore their shirts and stuff for a couple of hours! I had to bite my tongue, I really wanted them to just hang them up! And then of course they wanted to work on merit badge stuff, so they were outside doing, who knows what with the shirts on, of course....although I do know they were teaching Lee knots at one point. And NO I did NOT get a picture of that. But I did get these pictures.

Than

Collin

All three of them

Lee, who really was much more excited than this picture portrays!

I'm riding twice a day!!! Well ok.....I AM riding twice a day, but it's because somewhere along the way Nebby shed a brain cell or two...... We fenced an entire hay field in at the cabin, aprox. 10 acres. No moving fences this year!! Yeah!

Take the horses over, they of course are thrilled with fresh grass and we have no problems, until dark.

They are pacing the fence and the bugs are bad, so I go home, get the fly spray, come back and they are GONE, not in the pasture and the fence is down. Did I mention it was DARK. Brent found them, they hadn't gone far, not that I thought they would. They were by the back door to the cabin.

Sooooo I got to ride Nebby home, ponying Leo, who by the way has never appreciated previous attempts to pony. (ponying being the act of leading one horse while you ride on another horse.) They did fine, even with headlights and all. Thankfully there was a pretty full moon and it was out.

So, Brent rewires the fence, and gets the electric box on it, I hadn't thought they'd test the fence for a few days, all that grass you know.... We take them back yesterday.... They spend the ENTIRE day in one spot eating clover heads. What a life.

Evening we go to check on them and they are at the fence again, we settle them back down with more fly spray and some grain. Walk away to check my bees, come back and they are at it again..... So I rode them home, and rode them back this morning. If I have to do this for the next three months I was hoping to keep them on that pasture I will be in great shape. Because then I ride a bike home!!

I am feeling my riding muscles as we trot/canter most of the way. My legs are screaming at me by the time I hit the half mile mark, when I ride the bike home. I have to drag myself down the driveway. It's a wonder I can walk when I get off the bike! Did I mention I could probably use the exercise?

I've gotten lucky so far and haven't had to ride over to the cabin, that's uphill and yes it's more a rise than a hill but it's UP, I'd probably have to stop half way or something!! Good thing the doc just gave me new, good meds this week.

And Mom said I should blog about the dogs, so there I blogged about the dogs.....missed it, well I just wrote a sentence about them, didn't I??!!! Probably not what she meant.......

I have to take pictures for you to really get a visual on the situation...... But I guess I could get a little more detailed here. One 135lb St. Bernard, one 115 Newfoundland, one 90 lb Labradoodle, one aprox. 50 lb Australian Collie, and one 10 lb terrier cross, is it becoming a little clearer now? Pictures soon, really I'll try hard.....

The Newfoundland and Collie are here for the weekend. A five day weekend I just realized, so ummmm they're here for a week..... that seems a little overwhelming now.....

Temple Square

From the Timpangos, we went to Salt Lake City to see Temple Square. The boys had not been before and they really enjoyed it. We also went out to dinner at a restaurant at the top of the Joseph Smith Building, that was fun! The boys really enjoyed it.

Here we all pose in front of the Christus. We also viewed a movie about Joseph Smith, it was very moving for us all.





And this is what happens to 10 yr olds at the end of a long, physical day of hiking and walking!

Timpanogas Cave

On Wed. Merrill and Pam let us know that they were headed to Timpanogas Cave. I had no idea what it was, but it sounded good! I heard it was a stiff hike up to it, but you know I'd done that hike in AZ up to the Indian runes, so no worries right!! Riiiggghhttt.....


Here Jayden and Max pose next to the sign.



When you go to the cave you have to buy tickets and then hike up to the cave by your scheduled time. Only 20 people are allowed to go through at a time, and guess what we were 13 just by our selves, and then Pam had family coming. So we had to buy tickets for a tour a couple hours out. We spent some of our waiting time looking at the river the runs through the canyon below the cave. Here are the guys.



With this gang fishing is always on the mind around water! Here Brent points out several likely holes to Collin.

Finally we get to start up. They give you a start time, to keep foot track controlled on the pathway up. They give you an hour and a half.....piece of cake! Riiigghhhttt........ Here Brent, Than and Collin pause to read the sign that talks about the different layers of stone we'll see.

When you go into a cave you're headed into temps of around 60 degrees usually. So you might need a jacket, especially if you're going from 80 plus to 60 degrees! Here Brent carries the pack containing jackets and water bottles for all of our family.

Here's a clue that it wasn't an easy hike up! Yes it really was that steep at times. And that red line isn't there to show you which side is your side.....it's to warn you not to stop at that point, as a rock slide could happen and you'd be in the pathway!

THANK GOODNESS!! Somebody decided it was worth it to put a bathroom at the end of that 1 1/2 hr hike!! From here there is another short hike to the entrance, here Lee points to it.

I turned the camera over to Collin while I used the facilities and this was one of the pictures he took, not to shabby!

Lee, Collin, Carsten and I think Aubrey and I all arrived first. Carsten led the way, the entire way up and down. In the picture below I took a picture of Brent coming up behind us, and it gives an idea of the switchbacks we hiked!

Here's a look down the canyon from the top of the hike. Did I mention it was a tough hike..... That is a long way down and we went almost straight up, using switchbacks most of the way.

My camera isn't set up for taking pictures in the dark, so no cave pictures, sorry. But the boys and I have now been through several caves in three different states and we've enjoyed them all. This was Brent's second cave with us. We went through with only one other family, so it was a nice cozy group. Here is the exit area out of the cave. This picture drives home all much the boys have really grown, especially Than and Collin. Brent is standing downhill a little bit, Than really isn't taller than him......yet......

And then we got to hike down......so we thought, first you have to go up a bit to get around to where the entrance trail is. Did I mention there were very few barriers between the trail and the cliffs!!

Here we're still on the exit trail and that's valley down below us. Did I mention we were up a ways? In the picture is Brent, Lee in red, our nephew Carsten in green, Jayden in stripes and Max in the black shirt. And yes he fit right in. A large amount of the grand kids have blond hair and blue eyes, making them look like they could go with just about any of the family!

I stayed behind to take a picture of the next group, and so did Lee. Here is our niece Aubrey and then Collin. Merrill about had a heart attack over this picture. Aubrey kept getting closer and closer to the edge and looked like she was going to go over.....it was a little nerve wracking for a second!

Did I mention it was steep?


Here is Merrill and Lauren. Lauren and Than formed a bond very quickly and he was always on hand to help with her the rest of our visit.

Than was so great, he also packed a backpack for Merrill, as Merrill had the baby the whole hike.


And what do you get after a 3 hr hike straight up and straight down...... One very, very tired five year old!! He didn't even make it to the Wendy's at the entrance of the canyon area. He was out! We drove up to Salt Lake City after hiking the caves and he slept the entire way.

We had such a good time on this hike and are so happy Merrill and Pam invited us to go along. We rarely make time to "sight see" when we visit family and obviously we need to do that.

Oak City Canyon

On Tuesday we went "up the canyon". Brent has really fond memories of going "up the canyon" growing up and had mentioned when we were traveling that he would like to take the boys to Oak City Canyon. So it was really great and just one of those moments when we found out the plan was to go to the canyon on Tuesday. We decided that the boys should go fishing while we were there. And we had lunch there too.

Here Brent and Merrill get the poles ready. With the boys eagerly looking on.

I think Max shadowed Brent the entire time he was fishing! He loves to fish.

Oak Creek Canyon is a campground. It has individual campgrounds and large group campgrounds. When we went up we used one of the group ones, we were the only ones up there and it was great.

Sharleen brought up some board games and the kids enjoyed some great games with her and each other. They started with Mexican Train.

Sharleen told us when she was a teenager they would all drive up to the campground, turn on their radios and have a dance. Jay said he would just park on a back street in Delta and turn on the radio and dance with Sharleen. It was fun to hear the stories of their youth! In the picture below they would park towards the back right side of the parking lot.

The Trip

Ohhhhhoooohhhh...... You wanted posts about the TRIP......well.....ok...... I guess I could give ya those......

We did indeed have a very, very good trip to UT. We left June 28th an hour ahead of schedule! Mom has already posted some great pictures of that over on her WI Snapshots blog. We had a great trip there.

Brent decided to have us drive straight through. The energy it takes to unpack and pack a family of 7 takes as much energy as just driving straight through the night! The only reason we could do it was because Brent handles sleep deprivation well! I only have to spell him for a few hrs and he does the rest.

The boys did really well, no fighting, everyone was cheerful and happy to be on the road. The trip home was a complete 180 from that, but I get ahead of myself.....

So we got to UT Monday afternoon and it was SUCH a relief to be DONE driving for a bit! We got there a bit earlier than anyone expected, so that was fun!! The boys were very happy to be set free!

Further posts will have pictures....I really did take them.....I promise!

Fishing!

So the boys got fishing poles for Easter, wasn't that cool.....don't they look neat hanging on the wall......

So yeah.....we did finally take them fishing..... Here Brent walks Jayden and Max through casting.


You are very lucky to have any pictures for this post. My inclination was to stay home and avoid the whole scene of five boys and five poles all with sharp hooks on the end! I did cave in the end and go, the boys wanted me there after all. Then I even managed to not cover my eyes or hide in the car!!

Here Jayden throws out his line.

He was a happy camper to be fishing finally!

Here is a wide shot of the pond they fished in. We went to our great friend's home and fished out of their pond.

Max shows off his technique. And look I even managed to keep my eyes open again! He stops my heart when he has a fishing pole in his hands!

And of course he was one of the only two who caught a fish that night! Boy was he thrilled! Although Daddy had to take it off the hook and throw it back in, Max wasn't going to touch it!

At the end of the night, Brent got to fish in peace and quiet as the boys all got cold and went indoors.