Summer is for taking it easy

Last week Elizabeth woke up really early in the morning (like 5 am), which is completely unacceptable for the summer. She was ready to play, but I was not. When she came to me. I told her to take her blanket and pillow and find a place to fall back asleep thinking that she would probably crawl back into bed with Abigail. When I woke up she was not in the girls room and I got a bit nervous. I went to go look for her in the back yard and I found her sleeping on the kitchen floor by our sliding glass door. That was an interesting choice of places to sleep, but at least she followed directions.

We live very close to the elementary school and so we like to take the girls to ride bikes in the parking lot so they can have free reign and I don't have to be nervous about them watching out for cars. We also let them choose what ever they want to wear most of the time in the summer hence the clothing choices. I still get to choose the girls outfits on Sundays though.

The twins love going to the bank to get suckers especially when they can come home and enjoy them while they watch a movie.

Swan Valley Camping

We planned a last minute weekend trip to Swan Valley, Victor, Driggs & Jackson Hole. We decided to camp and wanted to attend the Celebrating America Event in Driggs on Saturday, July 2nd. We rolled in in the late-afternoon on Friday, July 2nd. The twins helped daddy set up the tent.

This campsite was pretty remote. No electricity, No plumbing or showers. We did have a water spickett and an out-house and TONS of mosquitos. I immediately lathered up the kids with sun-screen and bug spray.

Grand Nan would be proud, the girls made sure to brush their teeth after every meal and snack.
Idaho summers are hot during the day (not humid though) and cold at night. The first day it was 90 degrees for a high, but it got down to 38 at night. I did not sleep a wink the first night cause I was really cold and gave most of the blanketts and sleeping bags to the kids.

Darin's favorite thing about camping is cooking breakfast in the morning. My favorite thing about camping is that Darin does most of the cooking.

The girls decided to strike different poses on the mat infront of the tent.

Trying to warm up by the camp-fire.

The girls first trip to the out-house. They were afraid they were going to fall in the scary hole. Notice their faces in this picture.

Falls Campground

Our campsite was really pretty. Very remote and tucked away in the Caribou National Forest. The stars were beautiful at night. The sky was so clear. We planned on staying three nights, but only ended up staying two. We left on Sunday after a brief trip to Jackson Hole, Wyoming. We were done with the mosquitoes (I have 18 bites on one arm, and then stopped counting). There were also no bathrooms and we were pretty smelly by the third day. I was pretty sure I couldn't sleep with out a shower with the smells of hot dogs, sweat, camp-fire, bug spray, sun screen, and hand sanitizer coming from every one's body. We had fun, but probably won't be camping there again cause of the mosquitoes. We also told Darin that we can't camp in a place with no showers for more than one night. That is the girls rule and the girls win the majority vote in our house.

Victor / Driggs

From Swan Valley, we drove into Victor & Driggs (about 45 minutes). These were such adorable little towns (population about 1000 for each town). There are alot of little towns in Idaho, but most of them are not well kept and run down. Victor and Driggs were so cute with cute little downtown areas with little shops, drug stores, places to eat, and a country market. I loved it. We first stopped at this little park and let the kids play. It was such a fun park with the kind of toys that I remember playing on as a kid. They had a huge swing set with long chains, a merry-go-round, a sea-saw, monkey bars, and of course your usual playground. Darin and I even had fun on some of the toys.

Swinging was always my favorite thing as a kid. I didn't realize then, that it was such a work-out on your abs. I was on the swings for about 20 minutes and my abs were sore the next day from balancing and pumping my legs.

After the park, we went to the drive-in movie. I had never been to a drive-in before and was so excited! It was such a family friendly place, I loved it! Why aren't there more of these around? We paid, got our snacks, and parked the car. It was not very expensive either (candy was a dollar and the tickets were $7 for adults $3 for Abigail and the twins were free). While we waited for the movie to start the kids got out and played in the big field in front of the movie screen. They had a blast playing Frisbee and hanging out with the other kids. This is my kind of movie outing with my kids. When it got dark, the kids climbed in the car and we enjoyed the movie. The twins fell asleep, but that was okay cause we just laid them down in the back seat of the car.

Abigail started out on top of the car with her sleeping bag.

Getting all the wiggles out before the movie.

We saw Cars 2. I liked it, but loved the experience more. I prefer the 1st Cars movie, but this one is worth seeing.

Celebrating America

The whole reason why we decided to plan a weekend trip to the Swan Valley, Victor, & Driggs area was because of this event. The Huntsman cancer foundation put on this event. There was pig racing, jump dogs, a hypnotist show, juggling act, comedian, sumo wrestling, BMX show, air show, street carnival, bounce houses, classic car show, face painting, a patriotic symphony, and GLENN BECK came to speak before the most spectacular fireworks show I have ever seen. The entire event was FREE except for the food. The cancer foundation was just accepting donations.

We arrived at Noon and Glenn Beck spoke at 8:00 until dark. This is the closest we could get to the stage, we could see him. It was very inspirational, and motivational. We are planning on making this a family tradition from now on. Glenn is supposed to return next year too.

Wind

So we just got this trampoline about 10 days ago. See a couple of posts below. We had a really bad wind storm on Thursday, June 30th and I get a knock on the door from my neighbor that my trampoline was on the fence. I couldn't quite comprehend what she was saying to me, so I went to look and this is what I found. The wind had picked my trampoline up, carried it across the yard and set it back down on the fence, braking a few fence boards and hanging on my Internet antenna. I was not quite sure what to do. I called Shane (Heather's husband) and he came to my rescue. We will be securing our tramp to the ground from now on with sand bags. Hopefully, that will help.

The crazy thing about this story is that my kids were jumping on this trampoline 5 minutes before this happened. I am pretty sure their weight at 30, 32, 51 lbs would not have held that trampoline down cause it took Shane and I with all of the strength we had to remove the trampoline from the fence and keep it from carrying us across the lawn. It was like tying a sail to a sail boat on a windy day. We don't really have tornadoes here, but the wind can be quite ferocious even on a beautiful sunny day.