Celebrating Oma's Birthday

Oma turned 93 this month and we had fun celebrating!  We hosted a big family dinner Sunday evening and we have more room in the back yard than we do in the house so we hoped to do most of the entertaining outside.  Therefore, we spent the bulk of our day on Saturday doing yardwork: mowing, trimming, and lots and lots of weeding.

We quickly took showers and ate dinner, then as a reward for all of the work we'd done during the hottest part of the day, we drove to a new place for some yummy treats.  Brooker's Founding Flavors is a family-run, colonial-themed, homemade ice cream shop and we enjoyed reading the names and descriptions of the offerings almost as much as we did eating.  Almost.

From there we drove straight to Salt Lake to pick up Oma and Grammy for a wonderful birthday outing: seeing the new production of Rogers & Hammerstein's "Cinderella."  We loved it!  The music was essentially the same but the script has been changed a fair amount and it was all great.

The highlight of Sunday's big birthday dinner was a game of balloon volleyball, which Oma likes to play at her assisted-living facility with her friends.  Everyone had a lot of fun with it, and I only wish we'd had more time to play.  A game of baseball also broke out in the back yard, which ended with Jack getting whacked in the forehead with a plastic (thankfully) bat because he was standing too close to Cat when she was batting.  Miraculously, Jack's goose egg was mostly gone the next day.

 

I loved getting to celebrate this wonderful woman and spend so much time with family!

Pioneer Day Fun

Two days before Pioneer Day, our ward had a celebratory cookout, complete with Pioneer-ish games and activities.  Eliza and Luke spent a long time making candles, Eliza made two cute rag dolls, Cat and Jack competed in the potato sack race, and what Pioneer Day picnic would be complete without stick pull?

E's on the left, L's on the right

The big day was fun too.  Ben was out of town but the kids and I had a good time with cousins in the afternoon.  Their front walkway is slick, so the kids used it as a slip-n-slide.  Cat had the idea to wear trash bags to give bathing suits and skin an extra layer of protection.  I think it added an extra element of fun.  The kids loved Joe-Z flinging them around on the walkway too.  (I didn't get a picture of each kid, but I got most of them!)

We drove straight from cousins' house to Oma's so we could all go see the new Lion King.  We loved it!  It was the perfect movie for all of us to enjoy together.  After the movie we had a delicious Zaxby's dinner, then headed home.  The younger kids went to bed and Cat and I watched a few of the fireworks from our balcony before we went to bed too.

Hike to Timpanogos Falls

We went on a hike in the mid-afternoon and I underestimated two things: first, how hot it would be; and second, how long it would take.  The hike to Timpanogos Falls is less than 2 miles roundtrip, but the shade is spotty, and the day was hot, and the kids were less than enthusiastic, so it took us a while.  Jack was on the verge of death almost before we lost sight of the parking lot.

You can't tell from the picture, but there's snow under the tree limbs beside Jack.
I don't know if it qualifies as a glacier, as some people call it, but this was in mid-July.
We used some of the snow to cool us off as we walked.

After what seemed like an eternity, we made it to the first waterfall, which was very cool.  We enjoyed getting to feel the cool water too.  Then the kids hung out there for a little while as Ben and I hurried up to the second waterfall.  I sure loved getting outside and seeing a little more of this beautiful area around us.

Musical Theater Camp

Back in the Spring, I was looking at our little city's website and saw that they offered a very affordable 3-hour-a-day week-long musical theater summer camp for ages 6-12.  I signed up all three younger kids.  I was excited to find something cheap that they could all do together, giving me a bit of a break in the middle of summer, and I expected they'd have a lot of fun with it.

Boy, did they.  They were singing the songs all week, learning the lyrics.  They were so excited about the choreography, the little opportunities to shine, and the friends they were making.  I loved hearing about all the fun they were having and couldn't wait to see their Saturday performance.

The performance used songs from Disney movies/plays.  Some of the numbers included the entire group, while others were just for the older or younger kids.  Eliza was the oldest child in the younger group, and was not okay with it.  She told her teacher on the first day that the choreography was too easy for her.  She and the teacher decided that Eliza would do a little bit of tumbling to make things more interesting, but then several other kids wanted to do tumbling too, so Eliza was no longer doing something special, which was a less than desirable solution for Eliza.  In the end, she was able to join the older kids for some of their choreography too, which helped her feel better about the whole thing.

The Saturday performance was so great.  It was obvious that my kids hadn't done a performance like this before, with the boys especially looking kind of stiff and concentrating a lot on what they were supposed to be doing, but it was great for them to be on stage and to have to remember their steps and all of the lyrics.  They had fun with it and were quite proud of themselves.  Grammy and Oma drove down from Salt Lake to see the performance and they loved it too.  We celebrated with brunch at a nearby cafe before Grammy and Oma headed back up north.

First day of camp.  Can you find Jack?

Head Shots at the performance

Jack was Scar during the Villain Medley

Luke & Eliza

E&L

Jack and the 2 other older boys were Herculeses during "Zero to Hero"

E&L

E&L

E&L
The kids were so excited to finish the performance with confetti canons during "One Jump Ahead."

Eliza was too busy being social to be in our picture.
Luke was too excited about eating the refreshments to take a break from chewing.

We brought the head shots home after the performance and it took about 2.3 for Luke to add
some embellishments (including a neck beard).  At least he was drawing on his own picture.

The teachers at the camp recorded the entire performance and will be posting it on YouTube.  I'll share the video when I can!