Banff

This past week, Josh and I went to Canada with my brother, sister and their spouses. We dropped the kids off at my parent's house and all 6 of us hopped in our car and headed north. My brother in-law is Canadian, and since seeing pictures of their trips to Banff, Josh has been dying to go.

It was probably the most beautiful place I have been to. The mountains are spectacular! The forests are nothing like I've ever seen before! Idaho's small potatoes (he he he) compared to the Canadian Rockies. It rained most of the time we were there. Which we didn't mind at all, in fact it made the mountains even more amazing and everything GREEN! It was kinda fun hiking in the pouring rain :) And the days we needed it to be sunny for photos, it was!

We checked all the boxes of wildlife we wanted to see, Elk, big horned sheep, deer and yes even a few bears!! We witnessed a couple of massive avalanches, beautiful blue lakes and water falls and lots of glaciers.

We had fun exploring the towns and even went Canadian bowling (They only have five pins and use very small bowling balls)

It was so much fun, and I would LOVE to live there! Eh? ;)

Lake Moraine
I love the mountains!

Soaking wet on one of our hikes!

Lake Louise Fairmont hotel
(no we didn't stay at this hotel)


Lake Louise view from the hotel

Luckily our one sunny day! We hiked way up behind the hills above the tree line where we saw a couple of MASSIVE avalanches, to the Tea House.

Tea House hike.

You can kinda see the tail end of an avalanche.

Peyto Lake
The water looks fake, and I kid you not it is bluer than this! And it was pouring rain. It is that blue because of the glacial silt.

Canmore, the town we stayed in, means big head.

Johnston Canyon
A beautiful canyon with 2 huge waterfalls that you can stand right next to.

The first bear we saw was HUGE!! We saw 2 more much smaller bears. All were right off the side of the road! I'm just glad we didn't run into this guy while hiking.
*looking at other pictures of this bear....he may have been a grizzly!! He had a very distinctive hump on his back! (...I specifically remember saying "It's a grizzly! It's a grizzly!" so I will go on record as calling that one. hehehe)

This is the smaller one, and this one had a cute little baby.

Is summer comming?

School is almost out and our weather hasn't been the greatest. We had one or two good days and then it snowed, breaking branches on our tree, and killing my garden that I had just planted. (I know, silly me, I should have covered it) I sure hope that we start getting better weather, I don't know if I can handle a summer where the kids don't want to go outside..... :)

On our one good day, the kids played outside all day! In our neighbors back yard, riding bikes and in the sandbox.

oh and I'm really getting lazy, I don't even take pictures of my kids anymore, I let Ethan do it! ;)

After they played in the sandbox, they came in and all climbed in my bed to watch a movie (the family room was still in the garage from the flood) so I'm sure you can guess why we would be upset when we went to bed that night..........
Yep! SAND!!! Nothing is worse than climbing into bed and finding sand or crumbs (yes they've done that too) in your bed.

Tragedy & Comedy

Tragedy:

Well.....Sunday afternoon, after thinking we could enjoy a relaxing sabbath, Ethan came running upstairs telling us that our family room floor was soaking wet. We ran downstairs splashing on the carpet and opened the washroom/utility room door, to find about 2 inches of water covering the floor and water draining out of the water heater's overflow.

Comedy:

There really isn't a comedic side. I think it is one of those things that you just have to laugh at. And there are a couple of "polite chuckles" that go along with something like this.

As we were cleaning up; dumping dirty, soggy laundry on our back lawn (trying hard not to look too much like white trash), slicing up furniture so it will fit out the door (a couch we have been wanting an excuse to get rid of).....etc. Josh picks up a brand new full box of laundry soap that had been sitting on the floor, and the bottom falls out, dumping powder everywhere...in water.....Just standing there looking at the mess and still holding the empty box by the handle, he says...."Well at least the room will smell nice" I really don't know why this was so funny to me. I guess it's just one of those moments.

The other thing is, it is forcing us to do some much needed spring cleaning! We've apparently lived here WAY too long and have collected WAY too many things (that are now piled in the garage).

And sitting here, in my stench, having not showered in two days because we have no hot water, (yes I am beginning to mold) I really don't care that my house is a disaster, we have piles of dirty laundry trying to dry so it won't stink, sitting on my deck, and that we may or may not have to buy a new water heater. I'm just so happy that Josh is home for this tragedy.

But we are quietly waiting for another to follow, such as a trip to the er, a car breaking down, or something in that realm of things. (Ours always come in 3's!)

SURPRISE!!

We had told Emery she wasn't going to have a birthday party this year, since she had one last year. I think it may have broken her heart. So about a month ago I decided to give in and give her another party, but I hadn't told her about it yet (maybe hoping that my guilt would go away and I could avoid another party) :(

I always do BIG parties, with a theme...you know, the works. So as I was thinking of a theme and kind of what she's been into lately. She always runs around with her little notebook searching for clues to a real mystery. So I thought about doing a detective/spy party. Then I thought...I haven't told her she can have a party yet.....why not make it a SECRET spy surprise party!

So then I came up with these adorable invites. It was tons of fun. The girls were so cute about keeping it a secret, even some of the parents had fun with the TOP SECRET surprise, and left really cute r.s.v.p.s.I didn't tell my younger boys, for fear they would let it slip (Will mostly) but Ethan had to be in on it. He was able to sneakily get the invites to a couple of the girls at school that I didn't know.

It was a lot of fun! The girls had a blast, and I really don't think Em had a clue!!

I made the cutest cake that looked way cuter in person (or so I will have you believe) Played some super fun games. (the girls wanted more)
The girls were adorable and so much fun to have at a party. (9 is a great age) What a good group of girls!! I loved them all!

Finally something to blog about! Since my kitchen was finished, I haven't done a single thing. It's been kinda nice.

Kitchen

Well, we did it! We're done! And we love it!

In case you don't remember or haven't seen our kitchen before......


This is when we first moved in....I had already painted the lovely green cabinets, white.
baby steps..
demolition...
Josh, laying on the floor... after laying the floor!!
TA DA!....Of course as always with us, we still need a few things done, a microwave, baseboards, more lights, curtains, decorations, towels.... etc.

And thankfully it only took 3 years.

Happy Easter Folks!

What a fun spring break eh? We are enjoying our Easter with no kitchen (should be done by Tuesday or Wednesday) and this lovely spring weather.

But instead of sulking at the crummy weather, we decided to go out and make a snow rabbit..
......and a sea serpent.....

and if you are wondering what happened to the Easter bunny.....

Times they are a-changin'

Ethan, who now, likes girls, wants to participate in school programs, likes getting 100% on spelling tests, doesn't mind so much getting his picture taken, and gets excited about valentine's day, asked me why I haven't blogged about his school program. (I think aliens have taken my child and replaced him with someone else)

He did his 5th grade United States program at school, where he sang the 50 states song and did 2 dances, a square dance and a country line dance. The program was really cute and he did a good job.
He also has been studying so hard and trying to get better grades. He has been getting 100% on his spelling tests. He was able to get an award at school for kids that are improving in someway at school. It's a great little program, and we are proud of his hard work.