Place your bets, the race is starting . . .

We are currently taking bets as to what will happen first--Joy walking, or getting teeth.

She still has no teeth. Pretty ridiculous.

Prizes for the person who gets closest to the dates of said events.
Winner gets . . . um . . . a picture?  Bragging rights?

Apparently I need suggestions for prizes, too.

Family Reunion - Yellowstone

So for our biannual family reunion for Johnny's side of the family, we went to Yellowstone.  Surprisingly enough, Johnny had never been before.  Neither had the children, though that is not very surprising.  We only spent one day of the three there, and even though it was a hot day and almost all of us got sunburned, we still think we need to go back, hopefully soon.  There was just so much to see that we didn't have time for with this trip.

But back to the show, our first stop was Old Faithful, of course.  And we had a bit of a wait before it erupted.  So we walked around it. Then we sat and tried to keep busy.

For some this meant phones

Some slept

Grandma passed around snacks

The Captain showed to his cousin how geysers work.  At least he retold my preschool level explanation.

 

Finally it went off.  We were all excited cause that meant we could eat lunch.

When everyone was feed and therefore much happier, we decided to back track a little and see some of the things we had driven past on our way to Old Faithful.  We only stopped at one spot, but it had a little bit of everything, so we felt pretty good about that.  

There were pools.  And thanks to the Young Scientist section of the Yellowstone Discovery Center we found out that the amazing blue color of the water is caused by bacteria and that different bacteria live in different temperatures.  So you can tell the temperature of the water from it's color.  Blue is the hottest.  

Didn't know you'd be learning something today, did you?

As a side note, while we were in the Discovery Center, Miss Joy randomly started squeezing her fists, shaking, and making a growling face.  She did this on command for about 5 minutes and a few times since then.  I still have no idea where it came from, but it was hilarious.

There were steam vents.  These were producers of the stinky, rotten egg smell I associated with Yellowstone in my youth.  Luckily for us the wind was blowing, so it wasn't very bad.

There were mud pots.  Full disclosure, I did not take this picture, I yonked it from the internet.  I was way too fascinated by the real thing to take pictures.  They were definitely my favorite.

And there was another geyser.  Not as big as Old Faithful, but we did get there in perfect time to see it erupt.  It even sprayed us because of the wind. 

Speaking of wind, this was my lame attempt to demonstrate how ridiculous the wind was.  It was one step above a gale and two steps below tornado.  The Captain is holding hands with Johnny because he was liable to blow away.  I might have been in danger of blowing away.  But as you can see, we were all still happy.

On our ride back both kids conked out.  So we took a little detour to Fire Hole Falls.

We went out and took some pictures while the grandparents stayed in the car with the kiddos.  Sadly, that is not a fashionable belt I am sporting, but rather the back support to the child carrier which saves me a little pain.  Also, I am terribly afraid of heights and the wind was very strong, as I mentioned, which means it is somewhat crazy that I am this close to the cliff edge.  What is crazier is that I got even closer to take some pictures of my own.  I guess having a lens to look through counteracts the inborn panic.

We spent lots of time at our amazing cabin.  The cousins were playing games.  Sorry for the fuzzy picture, there was rarely a moment were everyone was sitting still.

We spent the 4th of July in West Yellowstone at the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center.  There was a bald eagle.  Very patriotic.

Actually, this particular bald eagle has brain damage and spent most of the time with his head upside down.  Not sure if that's a symptom of a brain damaged bird, but it was interesting.

Here I am mere moments before discovering a major blow out from Joy.  Why do I look so grumpy when I haven't yet held my child's poop in my hand?  Well, I was already having a bad day, and I had a bad day until my meds kicked in about mid-day. 

My bad day aside, the bears were really cool.  They let 2 or 3 in the exhibit at a time for about 45 mins at a time, so they are really active. 

My favorite picture.  Check out those claws.  Definitely do not want to run into a bear in the wild.

That night after dinner, we had the family talent show.  There was much dancing and singing and a little joke telling.  I didn't get a good picture of The Captain's talent, but it was ballet related.  At my friend's house a week earlier he said, "look what I can do" and stood on his toes.  Not just the balls of his feet like the picture, but up and over onto his knuckles.

This is him rolling up onto them.

Joy's talent was her clinched fists.  But we did choose a good time to be with our family.  In the time we were there she became a confident crawler, pulled herself up on things,

And moved her feet and generally enjoyed moving around.

After Joy went to bed, those of us who wanted to parked by the side of the road mere yards away from the fireworks spread and waited for the show to start.  We had an amazing sunset to play with while we waited.

This will forever be known as the Yoga picture.

The boys (and K) showing off their ninja skills.  Notice how The Captain is not in this picture.  He fell asleep in the car in the 2 minutes it took to drive down the road.  He stayed asleep in the car until right before the fireworks started.  He was really really sad and scared, so he spent the fireworks display in the car, with his blanket.  And in true toddler fashion, he can't stop talking about it.

Utah Trip

So our biannual family reunion was at Yellowstone this year (post to follow), so at the end of June I headed out to Utah to spend some time with my fam before heading up to Idaho.  Johnny didn't get to join me for a whole week.  Did I think traveling alone with 2 children was a good idea?  Not exactly, but I thought "Hey, I'm going at the beginning of the trip before everyone is sleep deprived and jet lagged.  They'll be well rested, excited, and willing to listen.  Our flights are pretty ideal times.  I've taken airport-running-away precautions. So I should be okay.  Plus, it's just one day.  I can handle anything for one day after the year I've had."

False.  The above may sound logical, but I forgot to take into account that airplane travel is the most horrible of all necessary evils.  Our 8:30 pm arrival time (10:30 our time) turned into midnight.  And you can imagine how much trouble one baby can be who doesn't get to sleep until (what feels to her like) 2 am.  Not a good idea.  

Needless to say, it took a few days for all of us to be not grouchy.  But I will say, once they adjusted, the children were awesome on the trip.  They slept great, they were happy, and we all had fun.  Here's the evidence:

The Captain helping Grandpa mow the lawn.  And wearing proper ear protection.  Thanks, Dad.

Kicking up a lot of dirt.

Lil Miss Blue Eyes enjoying the shade on the porch.

Did she like Grandma's house?

Water gun wars!

The Captain is very serious about his water guns, apparently.

And this is what happens when you get all serious with your water guns with Grandpa around.  He was pretty sad his shirt got soaking wet, but he asked for it cause he was really sneaky and attacked Grandpa point blank.

After we got back from our family reunion, we took the Trax train (the Captain loved it) to downtown SLC and went to Temple Square.

Checked out the fountains at the new City Creek Center.

These were definitely Johnny's favorites.  They looked like jellyfish and moved in the wind.  Totally cool.

Went to the Church History Museum.  The Captain DID NOT want to leave that.  

Went to the Clark Planetarium at the Gateway Mall.  The Captain DID NOT want to leave that either.

And played in the fountains at the Gateway, of course.  Joy DID NOT want to leave those.

It might have been the greatest day ever.  The boys feel asleep on the train ride home.  I totally would have too because it was a really hot day and I spent it carrying 17 lbs of dead weight around in a non-ergonomical fashion, but Joy would not sleep, so I didn't get to either.  Silly baby.

July Wreath

When I saw this picture, I thought it would make a great Patriotic wreath, just change it to red, white, and blue.

Supplies:

• 3-6" grapevine wreaths $.79 each (This is definitely the cheapest and lightest option.)
• 200-1/2" pom poms of each color $15 online before shipping
• ribbon $2.50 at Michaels
• lots and lots of glue

Total:

$20 approx.

1) I didn't do this step, but I'd recommend it.  Spray paint the wreaths the colors of the pom poms.

2) Hot glue the pom poms to the wreath.  I did one layer for coverage and one layer for poofiness.  200 was pretty perfect.

3) Glue the ribbon to the back of the wreath.  The length depends on the final look you want, of course, but 3" is a pretty good place to start.

4) Add bows if you're super cute like my friend.  I must say, fat yarn goes perfectly with pom poms. And I'm totally in love with polka dots.

5) Hang and enjoy.  As you can see, my ribbon between is about 6" instead of 3, but I have a lot of door I can cover.  Also, I didn't add any bows, but I still love it.