Lake Powell Catch Up

The Clark family Lake Powell trip was in June and I am finally posting about it.  Yikes!

Once again, another great trip with great family!!!  The best part was that 7 out of 8 of the Clark siblings made it this year.  This is a feat!  We missed the Ludlows :(

We found a pretty little bay up in Hall's Creek that was perfect for bathing in the shallow water and playing on the beach.  We had lots of little ones on the boat, as well as 2 prego ladies - Jenny and Jess.

One of our favorite parts of this trip {that I didn't get pictures of} was going to Forgotten Canyon to see the ruins of the Moki Indians.  It was a way fun and cool excursion!!!  It has been a few years since we last made the hike and for some reason it gets neater each time.  Of course Will had a million questions and comments about the whole experience :)

AWESOME TRIP!

Sambo and Landon

Audree, Sadie, Q

Of course I brought crafts....we made Sharpie tie-dye shirts and bracelets with the Rainbow Loom

Also see picture at the beginning

Grandpa Jim surfing

Grandpa Jim biffing it

Fishing fun with Brady, Sadie, Q, Spencer, and Kade

Kade and Will

 

Will, Sam, Millie,  Rylee, Karlee

Sadie, Spencer, Q, Audree

Millie wake boarding

 

Sam and Karlee

Q and Mom

 

Pure Joy

Laters

Silly Grandma

Taking a break and watching a movie

 

Fishing Deer Creek with Grandpa Jim

These boys do love to go fishing with Grandpa!

They were extra stoked this time because they caught a Walleye!

Tifie Scout Camp

The Boy Scouts in our ward invited the 11 year old Scouts to join them for a couple of days, so Sambo and BS went up and for some camping fun.  Camp Tifie is a posh camp and they had a blast!

Bought a new pocket knife at the Trading Post

This is how 11 year olds pack the car 

A Nice Day

We try to spend as many free summer days as we can at ECR, but it's never enough.

I took my bike and rode solo up to Snowbasin.  It is quite a climb, but it was so nice because it was cloudy and not so hot. It started to rain just as I reached the lodge.  I took some time to enjoy the rain and some rare time to myself.  But then it rained all the way back down to Mountain Green.

I made it!

 When I got back the kids were fishing in the pond.  I helped Will's friend Maddux catch his first fish.

 My boys think it's so funny that I know how to set up fishing lines, bait the hook, catch a fish, let it go, or gut it :)

 

And of course, the usual 4 wheeling and motorcycling.

It's so great that we can bring friends up here and they can just be kids in the outdoors. Explore and do whatever they want and just be kids.

What a nice day!

Pamperfest

In July, my friend Kelly talked me in to doing a cycling event called The Pamperfest.  It is a 4 woman relay from Snowbasin to The Homestead in Midway.  Even though I haven't been riding much, I figured I could handle 2 legs that were 20 miles each.  As unfortunate events played out, Kelly's Dad passed away and she had to miss the event.  I decided to still go for it - but instead 4 of us rode together for the last 3 legs, equaling 67 miles.  That would have been fine, except we started at noon.  Noon in July.  It was soooo stinking hot!  I struggled at one point but for the most part I really enjoyed my day with awesome people!  Even better was the 30 minute massage I got at the finish line, in the shade, at the beautiful park.

Jenny, Brenda, me, Dee

From Kamas to Heber with Jordanelle in the distance

But the best part of the day was coming home a scrumptious homemade cheesecake that Millie made

just for me!

Stolen!

In the early morning on July 3rd, BS and I went went outside to go for a nice bike ride. BS was fiddling with the bike tires when I noticed that the car {Escalade} was not in the driveway. I asked BS "Where is the car?"  He looked at the driveway, looked at me, then we both walked out and looked back and forth, as if it would be parked down the street or something.

It was gone.

And I immediately remembered that I had left my purse in it the night before.  

Ugh!

Yep, pretty much invited the robbers by leaving my purse in the car, with a spare key to the car in my purse.  Not that I usually do that, I was planning on making a quick run to the grocery store when our neighbor friends invited us to go to a late movie.  We jumped in their car, went to the movie, got home late, went inside and went to bed, totally forgetting about the purse.

Forget the car, my whole life was in that purse!

We drove a rental car around for 8 days {that luckily insurance paid for} until we got a phone call that our car had been found.  In WEST VALLEY.

Here are some pictures of where the car was found, all locked up.  The car was in good shape, not one bit of damage.  But all of our personal belongings inside were gone. 

It has been a total pain starting over without licenses, cards, checkbooks, social security card, etc.

Oh well, what can you do?!

8th, 6th, 4th, and FIRST!

People who know me best know that I am not a fan of school starting.  It just means that summer is over and my kids leave me and we have to wake up early and have a schedule and keep track of a million papers/dates, and then do homework and many various projects.  Ugh!

Usually I am somewhat prepared for this.  But this year it snuck up on me from behind and it hit me HARD!  In the weeks leading up to the big day I was very busy with the start-up of our new business (Aerie*) among other things.  Traditionally I plan a fancy "back to school" night for the kids where I cook a favorite dinner and decorate and and have a fashion show and we get all pumped up.

This year it didn't happen.

School started on a Tuesday so we settled for FHE with a steak dinner at Texas Roadhouse.  Lone Peak football had a big kick-off party as well with a scrimmage so that was fun too.  And of course, because I was so unprepared, I was taking the boys to get their hair-cut at 8:55 pm, just before they put up the CLOSED sign.  There was no way I was going to let them start school with crusty hair-dos.

Texas Roadhouse

Well, ready or not, the morning came and here they are, so cute and excited for their first day of school:

Notice Sambo is in a white polo and navy shorts. That's because he is going to a new charter school for 6th grade.  Surprisingly, he is not too bugged about wearing uniforms.  That was until he had to wear a white shirt and tie on Monday.  Every Monday.  I was nervous for him, starting a new school - but when he got home the only complaint he had about his first day was "there aren't very many cute girls there."  So I figure if that's the worst thing, then it's going to be ok :)  

First day at Mountainville Academy

Mrs. Burnside's class

Mrs. Worlton

BS and I got the kids dropped off (because we do a lot of being together these days thanks to Aerie*) and I came home and started doing the dishes.  And then it hit me and I started to cry. And then I started bawling. The reality of it all came at me so hard and so sudden...the reality that we are officially on to the next phase of life.  The phase where there are no more littles at home.  No more buddies to play/eat/run errands with. Call me weird but I like having kiddos with me at home.  I've been doing it for 13 years and now here I am.  And I missed Quincy already. I don't want her to be so grown up. Any of my kids.  Then BS came downstairs and saw me crying and then we decided that we were at a huge milestone and that we needed to celebrate!  

So we went to the movies!  Here we are, the only people in the theatre at 12:15 in the afternoon, with our feet on the chairs and a huge bucket of buttered popcorn and a soda from the fancy soda machine.

It helped me feel better.  

As I write this, school has been going now for 7 days.  I have yet to have some time to myself at home while the kids are at school (again thanks to Aerie*).  So yes, I am still bummin about them being gone.  But I'm sure once I get a taste of it, I will like this new phase more and more.

The kids and friends after their first day of school. They all had a great day!  Except for Chops.  Just when he thought things couldn't get worse than the cone of shame, he had to go all day without the kids around and he got lonely :(

Just for fun, I took some pics the next day of the 2 littles walking to school together.  

So. dang. cute.  I LOVE that they can walk and ride their bikes together.  And I can go with them too!  And Chops!  I feel really lucky that each of my kids are excited for school to start and not sad, nervous, or whiny about it :)

 

Still have tons to blog about from summer, but wanted to get school started.

*Information about Aerie coming.  Stay tuned.