Family Activity

So while I was being "lazy," Jeremy was working hard at a fair in Twin Falls, Idaho- for several days that first week, then also on Labor Day. He didn't start first thing in the morning, though, so that Saturday, September 3, we did something fun as a family together. We already are in the habit of having prayers and sometimes scripture study over the phone when Jeremy is traveling. So why not do a little something more? Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was on Prime Video and we actually had the DVD checked out from the library as well. So the kids and I turned on the DVD, Jeremy started the movie on Prime, and we watched it "together." Then as we were watching, we texted comments back and forth. That was fun. We didn't get to finish the movie, though. Jeremy had to go work on his balloon sculpture and a little later kids were fighting enough I told them to turn it off.

We had Chicken Caesar Salad Wraps to celebrate International Bacon Day on the 3rd.

Lucky's loose tooth finally came out as he was eating his wrap. He'd been working on that tooth for a while.

 

Here is how Jeremy's fair sculpture turned out by the end of the fair (he added to it each day, except for Sunday. He doesn't work on Sunday. Instead, he went to church with our friends and visited with them, playing board games and such). I like how this sculpture turned out:

Southern Utah

The last time I went down to Southern Utah (St. George area) was when we went as a family to Zion National Park in 2017. We made that a day trip, getting up early to drive down there. 

Jeremy had it on our Summer wishlist to take the whole family down to Southern Utah this year so we planned a trip (again planning on getting up really early to drive there). We especially wanted to look for roadrunners. We'd never seen roadrunners before but have been wanting to for years. 

The only day the trip would work originally (and that's why we scheduled it that day), things looked like they might not work out. Jeremy was told earlier in the week that he'd have to work that day, but that was canceled. Woohoo. A day or so before we were going to go, Nichole was sick but that didn't last long and she was better by the weekend.

So the Saturday of Pioneer weekend we got up really early in the morning and drove down to Southern Utah, hoping to see roadrunners... and some other birds we'd never seen before.

We went to a few birding spots and parks around Hurricane and St. George (all that had reports of roadrunners recently). Yay for helpful fellow birders who go down there enough to give us suggestions.

I did take pictures of cactus/cacti but somehow lost all the pictures that were on my phone from that trip. That means a lot of pictures of us. I am sad. 

Here's the one picture that survived.

Eating alligator meat stick (not just alligator meat, several meats put together but it was also alligator meat) that Jeremy picked up at a gas station for us all to try. Note how exhausted I look from getting up so early in the morning and the long day.

We took plenty of pictures of birds and lizards and other creatures with the birding camera, though, so it's most important that we didn't lose those pictures. Nichole also took plenty of pictures with her camera... of birds.

Speaking of birds (and other creatures), here's some we saw (we saw lots of new birds):

Black-chinned sparrow (looks a lot like a junco to me but we knew what we were looking for so didn't mistake it)

 

We went to a park/walking/hiking trail and saw several new birds, but also got some old friends.

 

Phainopepla (Jeremy was so excited to see this one just because of the cool name)

 

Great-horned owl (still a favorite even after so many years of seeing them)

 

Peregrine falcon (no longer my nemesis bird, I figure I'll be seeing it all the time in the wild now)

And there were lizards all over the place.

We stopped at a park where Jeremy had seen a vermillion flycatcher on a previous trip. We saw some this time as well as more and more and more lizards. They were on practically every tree. They blend in so well with the trees but Jr. Jr. got really good at spotting them. He knew to look for them sticking their heads up from the bark of the tree (almost like a yoga pose, stretching your neck and head out while lying on your belly). I don't have any good pictures of that (sigh, I took some with my phone. Nichole also took pictures but I don't have access to those pictures right now),

 

We enjoyed a tiny bit of rain then a caterpillar before we got back in the van.

After that, we debated about eating lunch at that park or going to another park a few minutes away. We opted to go to the other park.

When we got there, we parked and just sat for a bit. Jeremy fell asleep. The kids contented themselves in the back while I looked out the windshield at the walking trail in front of us. Jeremy told me he picked this park as one of our stops, not because of birding friends' recommendations, but because he had seen an online report of roadrunners there just the day before. So I daydreamed of what it would be like to see a roadrunner when all of a sudden one started walking along the path right there in front of me. "Jeremy, wake up! There is a roadrunner right there. Seriously. I am not joking!" Jeremy was happy to wake up and called out to the kids. "Look, kids, there's a roadrunner. There are two roadrunners. Three!" He was so excited and exhausted he started crying. They walked in front of us to a nearby tree where we were able to get some pictures, then when they continued on the trail, Jeremy took some of the kids out to get more pictures of them in a tree. I didn't know they were tree birds. I just always assumed they ran around on the ground but I guess you can get bugs and lizards up in the trees as well.

Here are some of the pictures Nichole got of the adult Greater Roadrunner with two juveniles.

 

That was the trip highlight. Lifer for all of us and nemesis bird for Jeremy. Hip Hip Hooray.

We finally got some pictures of cicadas at that park. With the hiking trail we went to earlier in the day, it was pretty quiet when we got there but by the time we left, all the cicadas were active and the sound was deafening. I wasn't able to see any there but we got to see some at this park. Also loud but cool.

As we walked back to the van to eat lunch, I told the kids how the heat reminded me of when we made the trip to Las Vegas when Jr. was a baby. It was so hot it melted the CD case of music we had in the car (we didn't have the van back then). After taking one walk around the block in that heat, I was not going to do that again. Luckily in St. George we weren't out of the van as long.

After lunch (in the van) we headed to a nature area where there were lots of trees and more lizards (this time blue tailed lizards) and more birds and a pond with frogs, turtles, ducks, neotropic cormorants, etc. etc. etc.

Neotropic cormorant (which we do see from time to time but not as often as the double-crested cormorants which we see a lot)

Summer tanager (we're used to Western tanagers around here)

 

Lucky's loose tooth came out so I took a picture (which I can't show. Writing this blog post is reminding me of all the pictures I lost. Sigh). I happened to have a bag on me that we were able to keep his tooth in until we got home that night.

At one point we drove past the St. George temple and I was able to tell the kids a little pioneer story about their great great great grandfather who was a carpenter on the St. George temple. And Jeremy was able to tell them the story about how Brigham Young didn't like the height of the tower on the temple. He thought it was too squat. Later it was struck by lightning and ruined and rebuilt higher as Brigham Young would have liked it.

 

The last bird of the day in Southern Utah was a great-tailed grackle which we get in our neck of the woods but I still love them.

Great family/birding trip.

February Catchup

It's amazing how I can miss just a few days of posting on this blog and I feel like I have to do major catchup. Oh well. So let's do some of that catchup right now.

February 19 was National Chocolate Mint Day. Jr. really wanted to make chocolate mints but couldn't find everything that was needed so he took my advice, melted some chocolate, and dipped pieces of candy cane in it- voila, chocolate mints.

February 21 was the anniversary of The Legend of Zelda. The kids played Zelda music on their stringed instruments. A couple days later, Jr. played the game Majora's Mask while Nichole painted. Yeah, that's right. If you give Nichole a medium...

February 23 was National Rationalization Day. It was somewhat low key that day. I did make banana bread because it was also National Banana Bread Day. I'll tell you something. It was so nice to sit around the table as a family, eating banana bread and talking. I love my family.

February 26 was Carnival Day. We had pink lemonade with dinner.

February 27 was National Chili Day, National Toast Day, and National Strawberry Day. Guess what we ate. Turkey chili and toast with strawberry jam. Mmmmmm.

February 28 was National Tartar Sauce Day. We had fish sticks sandwiches. That day was also National Tooth Fairy Day. Lucky celebrated a day later by having another loose tooth come out while he was eating carrots.

February 29 was Leap Day. Apparently, according to our 2020 National Day Calendar, it was also National Rare Disease Day USA. How appropriate I was sick that day. Luckily it wasn't a rare disease, though. I'll take what I had over something really scary. I looked back at my last Leap Year post in 2016 and family members were sick then, too. Sigh.
Nichole and I watched the movie, Leap Year, on Leap Day. Nichole and Joshua also took care of dinner that night. Thanks, kids. Joshua took care of dinner the next night as well while I was recovering but I'll go into more of that when I post about the beginning of March.

Wow. Busy busy. And it's still Winter so this is all still with the baby and me not going out much. Wow.

Polka Dot Day

January 22 was Polka Dot Day. I covered something with a polka dot piece of cloth. I'd been meaning to for a long time but this holiday really motivated me to finally do it.

We also celebrated my brother's birthday with the kids eating ice cream and watching "Paco videos."

And... Lucky's first loose tooth came out. He was very excited and Jr. Jr. was excited to share an older child's wisdom about rinsing the tooth and putting it under his pillow.

Lucky very carefully put it under the side of the pillow he doesn't sleep on so he wouldn't accidentally crush the tooth fairy. What a thoughtful boy.

Better Late Than Never

September 5 is Be Late for Something Day.  So why don't I finally blog about Jr. Jr.'s first loose tooth that came out in March of this year?  Sounds like a good idea, doesn't it?
When Nichole had her first loose tooth in 2012, it took months for it to finally come out.  With Jr. Jr., he found out his tooth was loose in the morning one day and that night it came out.

He was happy with a special note from the tooth fairy, too.

80 Year Anniversary

80 years ago, June 2, Babe Ruth retired from baseball.  To celebrate, we had Baby Ruth candy bars while at the Teddy Bear Picnic for the Orem Library's Summer Reading Program.

We also stopped in the library to see Jeremy's creation this year.  It was not as big as Starry Night was last year but it fit this year's theme.  "Nature Jedis: May the Forest be With You."

After visiting the library, we got to go over and play with some friends we haven't seen for a few years.  The kids had a blast and I enjoyed spending time with my friend.  This friend and I used to spend time when we were newly married and when we were both pregnant with our first children.  It's fun to have friends you can be so comfortable with when you get together even if you haven't seen them for a while.

Other things we did today-
Watched a movie while playing in balloon boxes.

Nichole's loose tooth came out.

It was a good day.

If I Were a Millionaire...

I could drink sparkling cider whenever I wanted.

May 19 is National Be a Millionaire Day.
Jeremy brought home a treat for me from one of his shows last week.  It was an "Avengers" cup.  Inside was a mini bottle of sparkling cider, a granola bar, and a bar of chocolate.  Yummm. 

Maybe I should save the bar of chocolate for tomorrow, Eliza Doolittle Day.

On a slightly related note, Jr. lost another tooth yesterday.  He found a dollar coin under his pillow this morning.  Jeremy pointed out only 999,999 more to go.

I Can't Think of a Title for this Post

April Fool's.
The kids got a surprise when they tried to drink their "Kool-aid" at dinner.  It wasn't long before I heard, "Is this Jello?" 

Yep.  The kids were with us when we got a box of gelatin at the store yesterday, but they didn't guess that when I made it I would pour it into cups with straws and let it set in the fridge.
I got the idea when I was reading the April 2014 issue of FamilyFun Magazine and somebody said they had done that to their kids for April Fool's Day. 
I found out later that a friend of ours had done the same thing to her kids today.  Ha Ha.
Our kids did have a lot of fun eating the Jello with straws.  Some of it was sucked up through the straws, some of it scooped.

The last laugh was on me, though.  I had to clean the Jello stains off the table and off Jr. Jr.'s face.  And I had to start Jr. Jr.'s clothes washing in the washing machine.

Jr. lost another tooth at school today. 

This evening he told me he was going to play a trick on the tooth fairy.  He put a note on his tooth pillow that said:

 I lost my tooth.  Can you find it?  April Fools!

The note had an arrow pointing to his treasure chest with his tooth in it, which was not in his pillow.

He got a big kick out of telling me the joke he was going to play on the tooth fairy.  I love it.  I love his creativity.  I hope the tooth fairy gets a kick out of it, too.
Happy April 1st!