Camp Wild 2016 Day 2

Today we left baby Sloane with a wonderfully sweet friend who offered to watch her, and the rest of us trekked on over to the Mark Twain National Forest near Roaring River Park in Cassville, Missouri. 

Why?

The Redneck Waterslide! 

What you see here is a giant hill with a cement coated trench dug out of it. $8/hour for totally unsupervised and irresponsible redneck fun. We had a blast. I popped Soren on my lap and off we went...much faster than I anticipated! He held on for dear life and I'm not sure if it was the ride or my screaming that left him terrified but he refused to get near the slide after one run. 

Luckily, Soren is Soren and he was quite content to just kick back halfway up the hill and watch everyone in our group go down a fazillion times. Everyone high fived him on their way back up and he politely declined their offers to take him for a ride. I went down a couple of times with Quincy and Corbin, and then Spren and I took it easy by the top of the slide, watching people take off. Then we went up the bottom for awhile and watched them land. That was hilarious. 

When it was almost time to go, Julie offered Soren a shiny new quarter to give the slide one more chance. Soren countered with a request for two quarters. Sold! We went again, Soren got his prize, then parked himself back on the sidelines again. Happy to just watch! 

We hit up the short stop grill in Garfiekd on the way home for giant ice cream cones. My kids ordered the peewee cones (two sizes smaller than size small and this is what we got. Ice cream the size of their face. I put Soren's into a cup to avoid a mess (hahaha) and he fell asleep holding it on the way home. Adorable...until I hit the brakes and his giant cup went flying through the air and landed all over the floor of the van after raining melted chocolate on everyone. Oh well! The carpet stain will always remind us of good times at camp wild :) 

Camp Wild 2016 Day 1

Camp Wild is this week! 

We made freezer paper stenciled tshirts to add to shirts saved from last year and met up for a morning of games, crafts, play dough galore, and I was in charge of the "make your own" calzone station. Huge hit! After lunch we went home for a couple hours, then regrouped along with several other families at High Rise.

"Fun dad" took us out for ice cream on the way home.the kids were asleep as soon as heads hit pillows tonight! 

"Camp Wild here we come! Camp Wild is so much fun!" 

Utah Visit

We learned early in our marriage that limited vacation days meant we would alternate visits to see extended family. We prefer to spend Christmas at home, so we switch off ever other summer taking our family to Utah or California. This was a "California year" but we couldn't pass up a rare opportunity to get together with 85+of the world's finest Willardsons for a reunion in Utah. Aaron's Aunt Laurie is a Van Slooten cousin and had the opportunity to use her extended family's cabin in Charleston, Utah (Midway) for a few days.  This place was the ideal setting for a large family reunion! Whoever designed the cabin really had accommodations for a large crowd in mind, because we actually all fit in r

Plus the views were breathtaking. Utah does summer right. It was gorgeous, dry, cool in the evenings, and did I mention dry? No humidity! Being outside and not immediately drenched in sweat was a nice perk!

Pictured below (in no order): 

-Jeff and Laurie Willardson Family 

--Jeff, Wendy, Ryan, Audrey, Drue, and Holland

--Tyler

--Kristin, Adam and baby Jeffrey Youngberg

--Jenny and Taylor Rose

--Matt (undoubtedly my all time favorite of all the Willardsons and I have no shame in saying so. We bonded over Mario 10 years ago and he's been the favorite ever since)

Missing Brooke, Dave and kids as they welcomed new baby Max

-Rob and Lynda Willardson Family

--Jared, Ashley, Mattisse, Audran, and Ethan

--John, Julia, Hanna, Abby, Ella, and Claire

--Aaron, Meg, Reese, Quincy, Corbin, Soren, and Sloane

--Janae, Steve, Madeline, Preston, Sophia, and Henry Low

--Jana, Scott, Jackson and Avery Schauss

Tom and Valle Willardson Family:

--Drue 

--Roy, Kelly, Max, Mia, and Van

--Kate, (missing Rob), Tommy and Drue (my second favorite of all Willardsons, and Aaron's definite favorite. We may have tried to bring him home in our suitcase. 

--Colin, Dre, Sofia, and Curtis

-Karen and Steve Reeder Family

--Mike, Christy, Tate, Grant, and Spencer

--James and Erin and their 3 girls 

--Laura, husband, and girls 

--(Missing David and family)

-Bruce and Stacy Willardson Family

--Jack, (Missing Chase and Shannon and baby.) 

--Taylor, Katie and Stella

--Cole

 

There was a lot of quality time spent with daddy fishing and playing games

Cousin time (Reese and Abby) Abby is such a sweet girl and good example for my girls. Love her! 

Naps (Rob, Jeff, Bruce)

Corbin slept right through our trip to Pizzeria Limone. Only a person who has not been sucker punched/jumped on by a kid can sleep like this. Look how safe he feels. I used to sleep like this. Now I curl up into a self preserving cocoon...

Nappers beware! When Roy woke up, he refused to believe it was me, and blamed Colin for the mustache. 

Sloane vs the plate of spaghetti. 

Colin brought beanboozled for each family to play. Tommy's near puke gag face was awesome! "Someone (gag) someone get me (gag) a cup!" Hahaha

 There was an indoor bball court/gym and assorted games in the basement, like pool, air hockey, foosball, and shuffleboard table. The kids loved it all! There were a playhouse under the stairs and 2 stories of tube slides to play on. Loads of cousin playtime. 

And a movie theater room! 

The kitchen actually seated most of us! This house was so well designed and had big families in mind. 

Bruce and Stacy were so cute with little Jack. I only took about 15 pics at the cabin all weekend, and this was one of them. Too sweet!

I call this pic Drue vs Drue. We tried to get big Drue to get in on the pillow fight donut would be Drue vs Drue vs Drue, but he wasn't into it. 

One morning, the guys went golfing and I got to take some of the girls (plus Soren) out to breakfast at kneaders. We sure love these girls! 

Other adventures: free slurpees on 7-11

Driving past the Lehi Roller Mills:

Me: look kids! This is where they made a classic 80's movie called, "Footloose" 

Reese: was is filmed in black and white? 

We took the kids to walk around the BYU campus.  

I was lucky to have a quick visit with one of favorite people. I still get choked up when I think about how much I miss her. It's completely irrational, I know. But I just hate that she lives far away and still fight the urge to randomly stop by her house for spontaneous fun when I'm driving through woods creek. At least she's in Utah so we can see each other occasionally and I refuse to stop willing her to move back to Ar. Some friendships are just meant to last forever! 

Sloane displayed her typical anti-anyone-but-Mama antics, but randomly took to a few people (from a comfortable distance): cousin Tyler, and grandpa Rob. Just about everyone else got the stink eye. 

And of course we already miss Grandma Lynda like crazy. It's never enough time but they had so much fun together. 

The trip home was long, had bad turbulence, and a 3+ hour layover in Vegas. Thankfully, my sweet kids were awesome travelers and handled it all really well! There aren't many dull moments in my life lately, But I really love adventures with this little crew.  We are a good team and I enjoy being with them. Go go Willy Summertime! 

In Progress and Resolution

Yesterday I realized that the carpet installation at my moms house was a week earlier than I thought it was. After dinner, I grabbed a ladder, brushes, and set to work. I made my way through my entire Beatles collection, some TSwift, Kelly Clarkson, U2, Neil Diamond, Enya, and 7 conference talks. I haven't spent so much time completely alone in a long time and doing a service project in solitude was really good for me.  I had a lot of uninterrupted time to really think about the "current events" of my family and came to a few resolutions. Extended time to ponder is a welcome commodity and doing something creative and purposeful while I pondered aided my thought process and the conference talks invited the Spirit. 

I worked into the night and well into the early morning hours. The living room, halls, baths and kitchen can wait, but even though I'm really tired today, I'm so glad I finished the bedrooms.

Just in time for the new carpet! It was installed this morning.

 It's like a new house :) and smells so fresh now. No more overbearing combo of febreeze and multiple air freshener/pet odor/stale smoke. Just fresh paint and carpet. Once the paint and countertops are done, I'll get in there and deep clean. All of the window sills are black from doggy feet. Gross. I had my plumber at my house fixing a leaky tub drain and to thank me for all the business referrals I have sent his way, he stopped at my mom's house with me on his way out and fixed the broken sink drain for free. So nice! 

Other excitement, let there be light! 

I had 3 lights added to the kitchen and the existing light fixtures converted to LED's. 3 new lights still use less energy than one regular can light.  

Unfortunately, the installation required a drywall patch. So this is my kitchen right now. And I still don't have countertops on the island because we are waiting on the cabinet guy to cut the hole out for the sink. Once that's done we should get rolling and have new counters in. Hopefully before school starts and my kitchen goes back to being my "office". 

Lots of things in progress around here.

She's on top of the world

So this happens every time I turn around. And I mean every time. She thinks she is hilarious. 

I'm sure I am the hilarious one, diving after her every time she decides she's done being up there and throws herself backwards over the edge. She seems to know exactly what she's doing...she's just unaware of how dangerous it is for such a tiny pixie such as herself. 

Pioneery

I felt so pioneery today. I used eggs from our backyard. I roasted purple potatoes from the farmers market in fresh thyme from the garden. I spent most of the day folding laundry in the parlor and doling out errands and small chores to children every time one of them came indoors from playing. "Here, take these upstairs", "run these out to the garage", "bring me the empty white laundry basket." I helped Reese prepare a cornbread muffin mix, chili, and watermelon for lunch, and rang my cast iron bell to call them in when it was ready. And I did it all with a baby (and her baby doll as well) on my lap or my hip or at my feet. When baby napped, I snapped, blanched, and froze mountains and mountains of green beans. I shared with all my neighbors and still had 2 gallon size buckets full to preserve. I made 2 dozen of Ree Drummond's buttermilk biscuits from scratch and wow! Biscuit perfection, people. This is the real deal, here. I see biscuits and gravy in our very near future. And heart disease in our distant future. These are worth it! Anyway as I bustled around the house doing chores all day I felt like such a happy homesteader. A pioneer mama. 

And then before I tucked in the 3 big kids tonight, I read a few chapters of Little House on the Prairie to them. And as I read I thought about my day and how I'm kind of like Ma, keeping things running around here. And then I walked downstairs and cranked up the air conditioning I realized I am SO not like Ma, and totally not a pioneer! Hahahah! 

So maybe I'm not an legit pioneer.  

But I did do some pioneer-type things. 

So I'm kind of a pioneer. 

I'm "pioneery". With air conditioning.