Mystery solved.

I couldn't find Axel and Hanna the other day... so I went next door...

...this is what I found in front of Grandma's house.
Hmmmm.... do you suppose?

In the eyes of a child...

Apparently something other than cheese was on Axel's mind when he looked at my cheeze whiz cracker and yelled "Temple!"  Thank you Axel, for reminding me of what's important and giving me hope that occasionally I'm being listened to.  (What's a temple?  It's not a cracker with cheese... check it out!)

We're Home!

We made it back!  It has come to my attention that I forgot to mention an important part of our trip.  "The Traveling" (ominous music).  The kids and I drove, and we took along my friend Roselle and her kids(4).  We had 9 (nine, in case you think I made a typo) kids in our car, it was something (for lack of a better word).  We just got a fourth row seat for our Excursion and we installed it the day before we left.  My car now holds 11 people.  I love it!  It worked so good on our trip, things were tight, but everyone had a car seat if they needed it, or a seat belt, or whatever.  On the way there we started early in the morn, and drove all day.  It's normally a 14 hour drive for us, but took 18.  It was awful and good at the same time.  Good because the kids were really good, and only the two little ones broke down the last few hours.  Awful because, well, because it was an 18 hour car drive with 9 kids (duh!)  On the way back we changed our tactic and drove starting at 10 at night.  I think we shaved an hour or two off our time.  Worth it.  Especially because most of the kids were comatose for 8 of those hours.  I don't have any pictures of the drive, apparently I had other things on my mind (like resisting the urge to abandon ship, lol.)  Roselle's family is moving from Cali, so that's our last trip together (sigh.)  Anyway, we're glad to be home!  Yeah for Idaho!

Meet the Cous!

Here's Millie checking out her newest cous!

Millie is 4 months, Gabe is 4 weeks.

Cute, Cute, Cute!

Here Comes The Sun ... Da Da Da Daaa (Beetles)

Yesterday we went to the park, and I kept Millie in the shade the whole time, I promise, but...

...if you look closely you can even see the white line where her head band was.  Sorry Millie!  (no vitamin D supplements needed this month)

More Vacation!

We went to the beach on Saturday.  It wasn't too busy and was perfect weather.  We did get burned though, it was overcast and I didn't do sunscrean (even thought I know better).  But not too bad.  We spent the whole day playing in the sand, searching for sea shells, and checking out anything we could find that was alive.

Here's my dad and the girls looking at some marine life on these rocks.

Christy found a sea snail.

We found some poor crabs to harass with a stick, until one of them "came out after" Cynthia.  (I think she was just a little jumpy)

Hanna's having a good time!

Axel too.

Today we went to the Jelly Belly factory, yumm!  It was tons of fun and at the end of the tour we of course got free samples.  My fave:  I think it was the "pear", or maybe "root beer", or "buttered popcorn."  I haven't gotten up the nerve to try the "baby wipes" yet.  (no joke, that's a flavor)

family pic in front of the "jelly belly bug"

hope you're all having a great day and summer!

Sunny California

Jen and the kids have gone to visit Jen's dad Tom in sunny California.  So far we've went to the park, museum/aquarium, and more park.  Here's a few pictures of the kids:

Here we are at the aquarium, it was lots of fun!

Here are some of the kids at the park, also lots of fun!

More soon!