A Confession

Ever since I can remember I have gotten very nervous @ this sight:

(No, not the cracked windshield silly!)

One would think that having grown up in the Pacific Northwest, where logging trucks are quite common, would make a girl immune to this kind of fear.

Wrong.

Every time we approach a truck full of logs I just hope that Doug will quickly pass it before the chains break. He assures me that this could Never happen.

According to a quick search on the Internet, there are very few cases of this sort of event...documentation error I'm sure.

Don't get me wrong, I love trees. I love everything about them, flooring, paper, toothpicks, sap, wait, I don't like sap. Anyway, they're quite lovely and very useful. I just don't like them next to me on the freeway.

So, my arborrollaphobia will continue (we came up with that one on our own. Craziness had set in after 8 hours in the car.) and I will try my best to stay off those mountain roads. They're just teeming logging trucks, ya know.

Lunch in Mountain Home

On our trip home we made it all the way to Mountain Home without stopping. You may not think that's a big deal, but if you've ever traveled with 6 children you will understand that this IS a major accomplishment. It was time to stop for lunch, gas and a potty break, not necessarily in that order. So, we spent a leisurely hour eating and getting our wiggles out.

oops! I forgot to flip this one. :)

The Hike

A trip to Idaho is not complete without a hike of some shape or form. We're not talking Olympic athlete kind of hike, but difficult enough to tell me that walking the dog for 45 minutes each day is just not cuttin' it. I tried to blame it on the elevation, which is somewhat legitimate because they are about 5000 feet higher than us in Kennewick, but let's be real, I could kick my workouts up a notch. I'm not in that good of shape and I can't even say it's because I just had a baby because my baby is almost 8 months old. Anyway, here's some lovely pics of our afternoon hike:

Gabe and Grandpa Gaven

The crew was
grateful to reach the top.

A "sundog"
I've never heard this term, but that's what Doug's dad called it.

"That 1/4 mile hike sure seemed more like 3/4 of a mile Grandpa!" Next time we will bring a string and measure it.

"I'm all worn out!"

Real Men

You know a man is secure in his manhood when he can wear a hat like this:

The Garden Shed

Doug's dad put the men to work this week on a shed for the yard supplies. I think Doug enjoyed having a project to work on while in Idaho.

This is the pathetic set-up they were calling "scaffolding." They assured me that it was VERY safe. "I can't watch this," is all I said.

Play Ball!

Yesterday we played a weird Knighton version of baseball. I think they make up the rules to games as they go along. Rules or no rules, everyone had a good time.

Gabe and I hung out on the sidelines trying to avoid getting sunburned.

Go, Go, Go-Carts

Grandpa has been busy getting go-carts ready for all the kids (big and small) to ride this week.

Carson dreams of the day when he can reach the pedals to drive all by himself.

Miranda was quite the speed demon. She didn't get that from me!

Tanner managed to loose one of the front wheel to the adjacent field. All the wild driving kept Grandpa busy in the pit.

Garrett was pretty excited that he steered AND controlled the gas pedal all at the same time.

Carson wins the crazy driver award for the week. Thank goodness he has many years before he gets his license to drive. ;)

He made it...

...through the first day of cub day camp and was still smiling.

Three more days to go. He'll be worn out by the end of the week!

Car Care 101

In preparation for our trip, we did a bit of care maintenance for our Family Home Evening tonight. Look how lucky Doug is to have so many helpers!

Car Care spurs on LOTS of questions!

The little boys like to get right in with all the action.

Miranda made sure they added enough oil.

Tanner and Max took a try under the van to drain the oil.

Carson was VERY careful as he added the new oil.
Now we just need to pack, then we're good to go!

Stake Family Field Day

This morning we headed down to the high school track for a bit of competition. It was pretty warm out. I'm glad that I do my exercise early in the morning.

Doug got suckered into running the 100yard relay. The old guys didn't do too bad!

Miranda's team won 3rd place in the relay. She gave those older kids a run for their money.

Max was good natured about faceplanting on his first try @ long jump. He redeemed himself with a 2nd jump of 9' 10".

"I'm so Big"

Just a few days after he figured out the arms part of crawling, Gabe decided that he wants to pull up to a standing position. I thought I could enjoy him tooling around for a little while before he wanted to be one of the big kids.

Now I'm nervous to let him too far out of my sight. Where's a crash helmet?!?! (I think the rest of him will be okay with all of his "built-in padding")