A Pretty Good Week

This picture captures my sentiments exactly (you can find it HERE).

It has been a pretty great week, actually.

But I failed to take pictures of it, so here are some illustrations:

We drove down to my own private Idaho (my dad's house in Poky) on Friday night. We got there late, so we just put the kids to bed and visited adn introduced Niles to Papa Jim and Gramma Becky. It was fun.




Dad and Becky have a raspberry patch of industrial proportions, so early Saturday morning, the kids and Rich helped pick a bunch, then Becky sent some home with us. They were DIVINE...



Rich made freezer jam with most of them on Sunday evening, and it is so delicious! Garden to jar in 36 hours? Not too shabby. (THANKS, DAD & BECKY!!!)



Anyhooooooo, the reason we made the turn-around trip was to fetch my Gram from my mom. Grammy flew from AZ to SLC on July 18th and has been visiting my mother and helping my brother Sam & his family get settled in Tooele and his snazzy new job at Dugway. She was ready to come do some time at Casa Melin, so we went to get her. She'll stay with us until we head back down to Utah for our little family vacation on August 11th. We had a decent drive home from Idaho and got everything ready and had a restful Sabbath day, too.

On Monday, we made enchilada casserole and had the Petry Family (new to our ward from Washington State-via-Farmington UT) over for dinner and FHE (I wish I had taken pix of that cuz it was so fun, especially when James and Ava Petry got SOAKED). It was a rainy day and it was a good "down" day to just be home and get situated (although things are still kinda upside down from organizing all our "dumping grounds"--the office, the laundry room, and the craft cabinet). After FHE, before bed, we made s'mores over our tiny hibachi in the kitchen. They were so yummy with nutella and coconut marshmallows!

Heidi with her 'shmallow

roasting with great-gram

blowing out the fire on Heidi's 'shmallow

Gram tasting her first indoor coconut s'more--YUM!

***

Gram has been doing a lot of baby-snuggling, but I haven't taken pix of her and Niles yet (it's on my to-do list--my mom got some, though). It has been super-fun having her here. We've watched the Masterpiece Theatere Jane Eyre twice (because Addie wanted to watch it with us, so we happily obliged) and we both expressed gratitude for getting to live out most of our lives with our true loves (the Jane in this version is so great--actually, the whole thing is wonderful, I highly recommend it). We are having a relaxing, good time.

***

I found this picture on my camera, too:

That's Addie having a "tea party" (with Crystal Light, chicken nuggets, poppyseed muffins, and cheese) with her friend Sarah last Friday. She's such a doting mini-Martha!

SO, there ya go. I'll take more pix and keep you updated, but mostly I'm gonna enjoy some time with my Gram.

Midsummer Night

My darling hubs went to college at BYUH in Laie, Hawaii on Oahu's north shore. He had a great time not just in school or at the beach, but working as a photographer at the Polynesian Cultural Center and working on the yearbook, too. His best college friends are from the yearbook staff, so you can imagine our excitement when his friend and former editor, Amber Bodily Greenwood and her family came to visit us from Northern California this weekend. Amber is becoming a Foot Zonology Master at the Zonology Institute in Paradise Valley, just a stone's throw from the ranch. So we had them stay with us the night before her latest training session began. We had SUCH a good time with them! After a delicious dinner of camping leftovers, we played out back with some sparklers.
Lighting sparklers at the grill.


Little Calvin with a sparkler

Addie

Heidi

Later that night, all the kids slept downstiars and gave our guests the upstairs (which, considering the heat, wasn't a sacrifice--sorry it was so hot, Greenwoods!). Here are Niles and Addie.

We put Niles in his crib and the girls ended up snuggling--cute sisters!

Rich & Amber relivin' the glory days over some yearbooks they made.

Ah, memories!

We had a great time with JT, Amber, Calvin, and Forrest & we hope to get together again soon--NOT in another 10 years! ;)

***
This morning after we cleaned the kitchen together, I let the kids make something out of Addie's new "Kids in the Kitchen" healthy cookbook.

I wish I had made a video because they were pretending to be on a cooking show. Addie was a startlingly good narrator, and Hedi and James kept throwing in funny details like, "After the commercial break, we'll be back to show you how to do the chocolate!" (Heidi) or "For the recipe go to kids in the kitchen dot com!" (James). It was adorable.

Ta-Daaah! Honeybees!

They're no-bake peanut butter and chocolate treats made with peanutbutter, honey, dry milk, wheat germ, chocolate (or carob), and little almond-slice wings. So fun. Now we're off to the pool on this amazingly beautiful 77-degree day. Hope all is well in your neck of the woods!
***

UPDATE: Well, crap. (literally?) The pool is closed due to a "biohazard," so we are back home doing yard work in our swimsuits. If you're in a surfing mood, may I direct your attention to some new-ish links? Over there on the right I'd like you to meet Elly, my neighbor who is a designer/seamstress/knitter/ mama/ and generally lovely person. She is part of Lincoln School Artists, Livingston's latest art collective. And if you're looking for a chuckle, Passive-Agressive Notes should make you laugh (or, if you're in my family, kick yourself for not starting an anonymous blog of family correspondence YEARS ago...;))

Camping and Stuff

Heidi is still all over Niles. I have to watch her pretty close, but she loves to take him in her room and read him stories and snuggle him. The other day She took these pictures of him on her bed.sweet little baby!
chillin' on Heidi's bed

James took these pictures of his room (he actually took about 20, but these are the only ones where you can see something).

dinosaurs!

***

On Thursday night we went up to Pine Creek and had a family campout before the Ward Campout on Friday. Here's James enjoying a cream soda at the campfire.

Niles enjoying some milk

Heidi in the sunset

her shirt says, "cute as a cupcake"--I say she's way cuter.

Addie

Daddy getting us all set up & fed with brats and veggies

Me & Niles snuggling by the fire

***

The next morning (Friday) Michaela Claar joined us for a yummy griddle breakfast adn a noon hike to Pine Creek Falls. The missionaries came, too.

Here we are at the top of the hike, relaxing next tot he waterfall.

Addie, Elder Haymore, Michaela, Elder Moya, Heidi, James, and Me feeding Niles

Addie

Elder Moya & Heidi

A random doll near the bridge over the falls.

Addie showing off her horsefly bite.

I took this picture from across the creek--Rich & the kids crossed the bridge adn went exploring while I fed and changed the baby.

(Heidi is sharing trail mix)

I took this pic of the creek while holding Niles and resting on a rock. this was our view.

Rich & Niles by the falls

Here we are heading back down the trail--Heidi holding on to Niles as usual. Addie, Michaela and the missionaries were just ahead of us.

Me & my boy on the trail

Family Hike!

Later, Rich took Niles and I walked with Heidi. She wanted to sing songs to make the walk go faster, so we sang all her favorite Primary songs, starting with "Pioneer Children sang as they walked, and walked, and walked..."

The end of the trail...tired baby!
***

We didn't take any more pictures after that, darn it. But we had a wonderful time Friday night and Saturday morning with our ward family. Brother McCann served delicious pulled pork and ribs that had been smoked all day, and Brother Jones brought tons of Wilcoxson's ice cream for dessert. We played games & chatted around the fire and had a great time. We got home at noon on Saturday, just in time to get ready for a nice quiet Sunday.

Summer Fun with the Kids

First of all, here are some other rooms of the ranch house we haven't posted yet... Dining Room

The deck with a view!
***
On Friday, we had a summer fun day. We went to the Museum of the Rockies and then went swimming.
We saw the frogs again...this one looked like a gummy frog, but it's a...

Chinese Gliding Frog!

Addie, Heidi, & James with a frog skeleton

We watched an educational film about frogs deformed by pollution

bring on the movie! We also saw a planetarium show right after this so we can do some good star gazing on our camping trip next weekend.

Then we played in the Yellowstone Discovery Room... here's Addie with an eagle

The kids going on a Yellowstone adventure...

Addie sees you!

***

On Saturday Niles had his first swim.

Sadly, the water was colder than usual, so it wasn't so fun for him. This is about as happy as he ever got, poor baby!

Here are all the kids swimming with Daddy--a fun weekend!