Summer at last

I always envision summer as completely relaxing, with nothing pressing to do and always look forward to that "summer feeling".  I have realized that summer isn't necessarily relaxing, but you have more choice about when you do all the things that need to be done or that you want to do and THAT is relaxing.  This has been an event-filled week, with beautiful, warm weather, and I have loved every minute of it!

Kami headed up to her second year of girls camp.  I watched a little boy the first day that she was there for his mom, who also needed to be at girls camp.  The next night was the night the bishopric was supposed to be up there, and the wives got to go along.  That was a great experience, and we got to see Kami, who it already seemed like had been gone forever!  She was having a great time.

The next day we got to have our Anderson cousins over for the morning because they are moving up here! Yay!!  I got to see what it was like to have ten children - it looks like a lot, doesn't it?  Sam is even missing from the picture.:)

That afternoon my brother Eli and my niece Abby arrived for a visit.  It really works out well that Shawn goes back and forth so much, because he can pick them up, they can stay for awhile, and then he can bring them back the next time he goes over that way.

The first day they were here, we went and exercised at the gym, and then around lunch time we took a picnic lunch and ate at the college gardens.  Then we went on a tour of the college - Eli will be a Junior this year, and Abby will be a senior- I do all I can to get as much family to come this way as possible!:)

I think it's amazing that we have a mini-conference center here at the college.  It seats 15,000 people. The real conference center seats 22,000.

Friday morning Shawn and Caden left on a scout camp-out.  They went somewhere in Salmon where there are indian writings on some cliffs and there are ladders up to some holes in the cliffs where the indians used to bury their dead.  They had a great time, and I only wish that they had taken some pictures!  Shawn said that he asked Caden's scout master to teach Caden how to fish, because that has never been one of Shawn's fortes, (he can't be good at everything, you know!) and Caden ended up catching six!  I asked Shawn if Caden seemed really excited about that, and Shawn said, "You know Caden. I was watching him and when he would catch a fish his expression wouldn't even change.  I finally asked him if he felt like, "Oh.  I caught another fish.  Or if he was feeling adrenaline and thinking "I caught a fish!!!"  And Caden said he felt the adrenaline and was excited.  So he had a great time.

Friday mid-morning Kami got home from girls camp.That afternoon we took the little kids to the splash park and to ride the carousel.

By Saturday afternoon we were all exhausted.  We had been staying up late and sleeping in, but still not getting enough sleep.  We were all sitting in the family room talking and I suddenly felt really drowsy and could tell that everyone else was, too. I suggested that we all take a nap and within minutes we were all sound asleep (except Shawn who went outside to work in the yard.)  I was the first one to wake up, and once again,  I wish I had taken a picture.  There were eight bodies draped across chairs, couches, the ottoman and the floor, all sound asleep.

When everyone woke up we went to the Civil Defense Caves.  This is a huge cave formed by volcanic lava.  Back in the 50's during the cold war scare, people were out looking for places to go in case of bombings and such.  This was one of the ideas of a place that could hold thousands of people.  Well, after walking through it, I think we all decided that we'd rather be bombed than spend a great amount of time there in the cold, dripping, darkness.  It absolutely terrified some of the kids.  Abram cried almost the whole time and wanted to be put down, but when we would put him down he would try to head in the opposite direction to get out!  Shawn had him at the time, and Abram started saying he wanted me, but even I was no comfort to him.  We asked him if he was scared and he nodded his head vigorously.  He was pretty excited when we said that it was time to head back to the car.  So, it sounds horrible, but it was actually something that we really enjoyed and are glad that we did.  I told the kids that we could read books like Tom Sawyer and Deeper again and they'd have more of an understanding for what the characters in the books were experiencing.

They did it!

On the way home we stopped at the sand dunes.  That's always so much fun.