S'winter and Tea Time

When I talked with my kids about S'winter, Maggie had a truly awesome idea.  She suggested we go ice blocking.  So on Saturday we went ice blocking with my sister's family.  We went to our favorite sledding hill.  It was a fun afternoon.  And luckily, it didn't rain on us, though the wind blew and it threatened several times.

Maggie goes down the hill.

Katrina looks a little scared.

Caleb tries to run over Jake.

Now Katrina goes with Hannah.

Watch out for Sophie.

For our next week's activity, we had dinner together with family.  First, we celebrated Pioneer Day with the Smalleys, Beckners, and my parents.  We had bacon wrapped hot dogs and other cook out food.  I have been wanting to try bacon wrapped hot dogs ever since I saw them on Man vs. Food.  I was hoping they would be crispier.  But they were delicious anyway.  To cap off the evening we saw a fireworks show thanks to the Beckners and made s'mores.  

Then we celebrated the Olympics with a tea party.  Having food from the host country is becoming a family tradition.  For the last summer games in Beijing, we had Chinese food.  My dad suggested we have Fejuada (I'm sure I spelled that wrong.  Sorry.), a Brazilian dish of beans and pork, for the next Summer Olympics in Rio where he served his mission.  Anyway, Hannah came up with a great menu for a high tea.  We had sandwiches with meat and cheese, cucumbers, or strawberries.  Then I made scones and clotted cream.  (I'm sure the clotted cream was no where near the real thing, but it was delicious.)  Emily researched and then made crumpets.  They were amazing.  And for dessert we had raspberry bars, brown butter sea salt shortbread cookies, truffles, and birthday cake.  (It was my nephew's birthday the next day.)  Of course we had herbal teas.  I got out my tea cups and saucers, my tiny tea spoons from my Oma and borrowed some tea pots.  It was a fun meal.  And we really enjoyed watching the opening ceremonies outside on the patio thanks to my Dad and Aaron.  

The tea table all ready to go.  

 

My nephew's awesome Avengers birthday cake.
 My sister made the faces of all the Avengers  to go around the cake.

This next weeks Badge of Fun is Go Green.  They suggest 1. Play with green power--make a lemon powered clock, 2. Make gardening more fun--make a frame to frame a flower in the garden, or 3. Learn to upcycle--turn old magazines in to glossy flowers.  We are going camping this week and I think we will just be enjoying nature.  We have plans for some hikes and I'm sure if we encounter a creek, we will get very wet and muddy.  Hope you have a green week!

Until then

Okay, so this last week was crazy.  I helped my parents fix my back patio, that took up 3 days.  I got all the school books for this coming year, so I had to organize my school room.  I had to send one of my computers back to the school (not enough kids enrolled).  And, it was our town's Pioneer Day celebration.  So, with everything, I haven't had time to download pictures for this blog.  I will work on it and hopefully have it up this week.

But, for those of you playing along, this week's Badge of Fun is Eat Dinner Together.  Here are their suggestions:  1. Play with your food--They suggest squid dogs or other funny food items, like meat loaf cupcakes.  2. Break up the rut--They suggest playing the "Clear-out-the-fridge-game" or an indoor picnic.  3.  After dinner games--They suggest "Might I bite?" It's a game where you tape the name of an animal on someone else's forehead with out showing them.  Then you ask questions to determine what kind of animal you are.

We are going to have high tea for dinner on Friday in honor of the Olympics and watch the opening ceremony.  Hannah has already made an extensive menu for this occasion.  It should be delicious!

New Traditions

I'm not sure how much fun the kids had with this weeks theme, but I got the "Christmas" letter done, so I was happy.  The envelopes are addressed, the letter written, all we're waiting for now is pictures to be printed.  Hopefully, I'll be able to send them out this week.  I think the kids did have fun coming up with ideas for our letter.  Our library's reading program this summer is entitled "Dream Big."  It seemed like a good theme, so I had the kids tell what their big dreams were.  Some of them were serious, some were silly.  Hannah and Maggie were eating cookies while they were doing theirs.  But we did do some other fun things.  We went to the Smalleys to play in their pool.  The kids were in the pool from the time we drove up to the house, until dark.  I had a hard time getting them to come out for dinner.  We ate a delicious pizza dinner with a yummy cake with strawberries for dessert.  Then the two older girls, Tim, Aaron and I went to a production of Fiddler on the Roof that some of the Smalleys are in this summer.  (Thanks to Emily for watching the younger kids!)  It's a fun musical.  Lots of good songs, which I have been singing all week.  That was on Monday, by Friday the kids were pretty sure that we had never done anything fun ever.  This next week promises to be more fun.

This week's Badge of Fun is Winter Fun.  I've been singing the "S'Winter" song from Phineas and Ferb all week knowing this was coming up. (When I'm not singing Fiddler on the Roof, that is.)

Fall-less snow on the ground,
There are sleigh bells all around,
But the sun's beating down, because it's S'winter.
It's ski and snowball fight time,
And also fly a kite time,
Cold and sunny,
Yes, that's right,
I'm talkin' 'bout S'winter.
It's a S'winter S'wonderland,
Unusual and grand,
You can freeze while you get tan,
Because it's S'winter.
Talkin' 'bout S'winter.
It's S'winter.

Besides watching the "S'Winter" episode of Phineas and Ferb, here are the suggestions:  1.  Make an ice sun catcher with multi-colored ice cubes or a homemade igloo themed game.  2.  Play outside.  I'm pretty sure they wanted you to play in the snow, but as that's thin on the ground right now, you might try ice cubes in the swimming pool, or a contest to see who can put on a frozen t-shirt.  3.  Make a wintry treat.  Theirs is snowmen made out of bananas and apples.  I thought you could also make them out of marshmallows and then roast them.  I also thought of making ice cream.  And keeping with the theme of doing things that make you cold, I thought of going to the movies--a place I'm always cold.  I would love to hear what you decide to do.  Have a wonderfully cool week!!!

S

Preserve Family Memories

Cute baby Katrina

For each of my kids I kept a first year calendar and made a scrapbook/photo album of pictures from their first year.  I usually try to complete the photo album before the next baby is born.  Poor Katrina, there was no baby coming along to push me into actually doing it.  So, now that she's four, when the other kids pull out their albums, and she doesn't have one, she complains about it and the other kids complain about it too.  So, for the Badge of Fun this week, I took a day a put together her album.  I don't know how much fun that was for the kids, except for the fact that I let them do whatever they wanted all day and didn't make them do their summer school work.  It was the day after the 4th, and it rained all day, so the kids played outside in the rain, collecting snails and getting wet and playing with umbrellas.  It was a good day.  Putting together the album probably would have taken me a lot less time if my computer hadn't died on me every half hour or so and it would take another half an hour before it would come back up again.  You really can't blame it, it's 6 years old.  What is that, like 110, in computer years?  But, despite the annoying computer, I got the album put together and Katrina has looked at it every day since.

This week's Badge of Fun is Start a New Tradition.  You remember that these came from a whole year of Family Fun.  This one is from the Dec/Jan issue.  Here are their suggestions: do something kind for others, write a time capsule letter, or make edible holiday decorations.  You know thinking of the holidays puts me in the mood for fudge.  Maybe an un-holiday fudge making is in order.  I have planned to mail out our Christmas cards this week.  I know, they're 6 months over due, but I think I'm going to start a new tradition of sending them out in the summer, when I'm not so crazy busy with school and holiday fun.

Family Night Fun

We actually did several "Family Night" things this week.  First off, we had FHE.  Always a good place to start.  I helped Katrina give the lesson.  It was a rehash of her primary lesson the day before.  Good thing I'm her teacher.  Then on Tuesday we decided to go see a dollar movie.  We went to The Lorax.  I hadn't wanted to see it much because I never liked the book, but the Smalleys highly recommended it, so we went. It was actually better than the book.  The songs were fun, and the kids liked it.  On Friday we played night games.  The kids had been wanting to ever since our backyard camp out.  We started at twilight with "Sleeping Pirate" and progressed through "Firefly" and flashlight limbo.  Caleb was disappointed that we didn't play "Ghost in the Graveyard."  I told him we could do it on the 4th when we would be staying up super late again.  It was really a lot of fun to play together.

This next week's Badge of Fun is Preserve Family Memories.  They suggest organizing mementos into a display, collecting family stories, or making a display of treasured photos.  (Check the display of treasured photos online.  It's a super cool tree display.)  For each of my kids I kept a calendar of what they did their first year and made a scrapbook/photo book of their first year.  I bought a book a few years ago for Katrina, but have never printed off any pictures to fill it up. (Darn those digital photos.  It's just too easy to let them sit on my computer.)  The kids have been after me to get it finished.  I think that will be our project this week.  Have a happy 4th!  

Learning New Things

 For this week's activity, we went to the library, checked out some books and learned some fun new things.  After last week, it was about all I was up to.

Hannah got a book called How to be the Best at Everything.  It had instructions for doing all sorts of things like: how to do the splits, how to keep your shoes from being stinky, and how to make an egg head.  Hannah made hers into a shrunken head.

Hannah's shrunken head.

Maggie got craft book with knitting in it.  She is working on making a doll/stuffed animal thing called "Fred."  It's bright orange.  When she finishes that one, she's going to make another called "George."  She also made an egg head with Hannah.

Maggie making a golden egg.  

Sophie got an interesting book about moths.  She learned that moths can look like butterflies.  They have at least a little bit of fuzz.  

Sophie liked this picture of a moth.  The moth is the black and white thing that looks like a leaf.
Sophie says it looks like a dress.  

Caleb got a book about swords.  It had lots of pictures, so it was more of a picture book of swords, but there were so many super cool ones.   

Caleb does a cool sword move with his ninja sword.  

Katrina had a very special book request.  She wanted a book about cute bunnies, not ugly bunnies.

Katrina hugs her bunny "Bedtime."  She has very interesting names for her stuffed animals.  

Aaron also got into the learning action, though I don't think he did it just for this week.  His boss at work suggested that he get an iPad so he could be familiar with the technology that all the people in courtrooms are using.  

Aaron and his new iPad.  

And finally me, I didn't take a picture because a picture of me reading is rather boring.  I read an interesting book called Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family--How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook.  My favorite part of the author's philosophy is that food and eating should be joyful and pleasurable.  I also liked that she says that no food should be off limits.  Her main point, though, is that food should be enjoyed as part of a dinner experience with your family.  Dinner isn't just about the food, but about the time spent with family, enjoying each other's company.

Next week's Badge of Fun is Family Night.  They suggest two games; first, a tabletop soccer game with cotton balls and straws, then a game where you have to work together stacking cans with a rubber band and string.  They also suggest making a crazy family craft with a photo of yourselves and craft supplies.  I think we may get out some games and play.  Maybe we can work on the Farming game that we started and kept out on the table for almost a week.  We would sit down and play for every meal, and we ate a lot of meals outside as they were not "game friendly."  We finally broke it up because we were going camping.  Maybe you want to read a good book together.  We just finished Mr. and Mrs. Bunny--Detectives Extraordinaire.  It's a funny story about a girl whose parents get kidnapped by foxes.  She teams up with Mr. and Mrs. Bunny to find them.  Hold on to your garlic bread, there may be marmots about.   Hopefully, in addition to FHE, you will be inspired to do something fun together.  Let us know what you thought of!

 

Road Trip

I hardly know where to begin to tell you about our road trip.  I guess I'll start at the beginning and when I come to the end, hopefully, I'll stop.  Aaron has a convention that he goes to every year called Infocomm.  It alternates between Las Vegas and Orlando.  The kids were asking me when we were going to go to Las Vegas again.  Apparently, the last time we went, they had a fabulous time swimming in the hotel pool.  We invited my Mom and Dad to come with us to baby sit the kids because some of the companies hold parties in the evening that are a lot of fun, but not family friendly.  Aaron flew down on Tuesday and I caravaned down with my parents on Wednesday.  We got in pretty late, but I was pretty proud of myself for driving the whole way, thanks to diet Coke and an audiobook. 

Thursday morning dawned clear and hot.  The kids had plans to spend the whole day in the swimming pool, so we proceeded there after Caleb threw up on the hotel bed, locked his sister's favorite pillow in the safe and forgot the number he put in, and breakfast.  The throwing up was not unexpected, my sister had a stomach bug a few days before, and we watched her little girl for her.  Actually, Caleb did most of the watching.  He played with her so nicely and when we praised him for it, he told us the reason why--he was earning money for Lego sets.  That boy seriously needs a part-time job so he can buy all the Lego sets he wants.  But, Caleb seemed fine after he threw up, he even ate breakfast and was happy, so I figured we had got off easy.  After spending three hours in the pool, we had lunch and went shopping at the outlet malls.  On the way back to the hotel, the air conditioning went out in our car.  Then, as my mom was dropping of me and the kids at the front of the hotel, the car stopped working altogether.  The hotel had its own rescue car, so they gave me a jump and I was able to park the car next to my Dad's, so he could give me a jump in the morning when we would have time to sort this out.  

That night my Mom took the kids to Madagascar 3.  Caleb was so excited!  He kept asking us all day if it was dinner time, because we told him we would go to the movie after dinner.  The kids thought it was a fun movie.  Aaron and I went to Crestron's company party.  There was a yummy poolside buffet, featuring cheesecake pops.  Then they had a performance by a group called Quixotic--sort of a modern dance-acrobatic type show.  Afterwards the comedian Sinbad performed.  He was really funny.  Apparently, he had done the show last year, and everyone liked him so much that they invited him back.   

We ate our dinner sitting on these fun seats that were in the water.
I took off my sandals and kept cool with my feet in the water.  

The party always features dancing girls and this time there were girls performing in large balls on the water.  

Friday we woke up early so we could get to fixing my car.  I suspected that it was a bad battery.  My Dad was going to drive it to an auto parts store and have them fix it.  The kids wanted to go swimming again, so we took them out to the pool again.

Caleb and Katrina posing pool side.  I hardly saw the big girls.
They played in the big pool the whole time.

You can never have too many floaties.

I love this picture of Caleb.  What a silly pose!

I hadn't been there very long when I got a phone call from my Dad that my car had made it two blocks and completely died.  We called for a tow truck and my Dad had a 45+ minute wait in the hot Las Vegas sun.  I cannot thank him enough for this.  If he hadn't been there, I would have been out there stranded with the kids and that would brought new meaning to the word hell.  Much anxiety and worry later, he had the car at a repair shop where they were doing an emergency replacement of the alternator, battery, and belt.  We decided to meet him at a local McDonald's for lunch.  Just as we arrived, they had a fire in the restaurant and Caleb threw up again.  We ended up at In-N-Out.  Caleb laid down on my lap and fell asleep.  He was not feeling well.  

Alien eyes require two pairs of sun glasses. 

We drove to St. George to buy groceries for the second half of our trip.  We were going camping for my Dad's family reunion.  But, by this time, Katrina had a raging fever, Caleb had diarrhea, and I was just done with this whole trip.  We were trying to decide what to do and when we asked Caleb, he said he wanted to go home.  The big girls, though, wanted to go camping--some of them were in tears.  My Mom and Dad offered to take them on to the camping while we went home.  We got in at 1:30 am and spent a peaceful night in our beds.  Everyone dragged through Saturday, but by Sunday, we were all feeling much better.  

The big girls had a lot of fun with Grandma and Grandpa.  They slept in a tent, went exploring, played with cousins, and won prizes in the raffle.  Maggie had her camera and took pictures for us.  

They found a Sego Lilly.  It's a very pretty flower.
 I wonder how the bulb tastes. 

Here's Maggie's horse, Brownie, looking fancy. 

Now it's Maggie's turn.

Hannah made a hat out of the tinfoil they used to wrap toys to play with on the trip.

They also found a horny-toad lizard.  I remember catching those as a kid.
They named him Squirmin because he squirmed when you held him upside down.

They got home this afternoon, hot, tired, and dirty.  But, they really had fun thanks to Grandma and Grandpa.  

This next week the Badge of Fun is Learn Something New.  Here are the suggested activities--Explore your world-find out more about static electricity, Solve science puzzles-experiment with angular momentum, and Play with the alphabet-find letters in unexpected places, ie pavement cracks or telephone lines.  Last summer, I had my kids pick out a non-fiction book from the library every time we went.  We learned how to make clay figures and how to knit, not to mention Caleb's ever expanding knowledge of animals.  I would love to hear what you decided to learn about.