Family Photo Time

My good friend Rochelle did our family photos again this year. I don't think they really need any captions, they're pretty self-explanatory. Here's the good, the bad, and the crazy.

Victor Idaho

Zander was going to Las Vegas for a bachelor party, and my dad was going to be out of the country, so my mom and decided rather than staying home by ourselves we'd go up to Idaho to visit my brother Dan and his family. His boys and my boys always have a BLAST playing together, and this trip was no exception. We got there on Friday afternoon, hung out at their house for a while, then headed over to 'our place'. My mom had found this amazing vacation rental condo that was just a few minutes from their house. It worked out PERFECTLY.


Next morning as we were heading back to their house, we noticed a little car show being set up in the park downtown and though it might be fun to go to. So after some breakfast we headed on over. Realistically there were only maybe 20 cars, but they were all really nice, and well presented. We were there pretty early, and I think they probably brought more cars in throughout the morning. It looked like they were going to set up some music as well. There were a bunch of people there with Husky's, and the boys thought they were awesome!


After we were done perusing through the car show we headed over to the Warbirds Cafe. This place is seriously awesome. It's right on the runway of the Victor airport so you can see the planes taking off down the runway. Let me tell you, 4 little boys watching airplanes taking off was pretty awesome to watch. The food was fantastically good as well. Easily the best sweet potato fries I've ever had. Attached to the cafe is a museum-ish airplane hanger that they all had loads of fun in as well.

The next morning we decided to drive over to Rexburg and see my grandpa for a while. On our way over we took a slight detour to find my Great Grandpa's house that is in Driggs. I remember as a kid whenever we'd go to Rexburg my parents would always show us all these 'old' places where they used to hang out, and where old relations had lived, and I was always really bored and just didn't care. Amazing how things change as we get older. I thought it was really cool to see the house that my Grandma grew up in, and learn about their farm, and the stream that they used to go fishing in etc. We even got a nice view of the Tetons, which we weren't expecting considering how many clouds there were in the area.



We got to Grandpa Weatherston's (my mom's dad) house right in time for lunch, and they didn't disappoint. I haven't been to my grandpa's house in literally 10 years, and he's moved twice since then, but I remember very clearly that meals at their house were always really really good. We had pot roast, a tomato cucumber salad (I liked it, and even ate the cucumbers!), fresh rolls, and peach pie. My Aunt Sherry lives just down the street and she came and joined us for the pie. It was really nice to finally re-connect with my Idaho roots. For whatever reason I kind of boycotted that part of my life. I guess I was forced on too many trips there when I was in my angsty teen years. Who knows. (there's my bit of a rant)

After we finished up eating and chatting in Rexburg we headed back 'home' to Victor, and had Dan and his family over to our place for dinner that night. The kitchen there was fully stocked with all the equipment we'd ever need, but we still just kept it simple with a taco soup in a crock pot. There weren't any toys for the boys to play with, but there was a movie, and some chairs, and that was more than enough to keep them entertained for the evening.



And not to leave out the dear little baby Kayana. She's so adorable and cute and slept a lot while we were there, as she should. She's such a good little baby. And she LOVES snuggling with her daddy.

Island Park and Yellowstone

Last weekend ago we went on a trip to Island Park with Z's family. I'm not sure if I can express how excited I was to go up there again. My family had a cabin up there when I was growing up, and we went up there a LOT. I haven't been in over 15 years, so I was excited to see it all again, and test my memory on where things where. We stayed in a cute cabin built by Susan's Great Uncle in the Mack's Inn area. After arriving Friday afternoon, we hung out, went for a walk, Noah went fishing for the first time, we had dinner, and crashed.

Saturday morning we headed out to Big Springs. The water is still amazingly clear, the scenery is beautiful, and it's just amazing to see how much water is pumping out of the ground all on it's own. Sadly there weren't any fish or otters, and there were about 5 million mosquitoes.





Later that day we found that we had some time on our hands, so we figured we'd drive up to West Yellowstone (about 20 min) and wander the town and see the touristy shops. Noah fell asleep on the way, so we decided we might as well keep driving and go into the park and let him see Old Faithful. As we pulled into the parking lot we could see the geyser spurting up over the treetops. How's that for really bad timing? So we went into the gift shop, got some drinks and new sunglasses for Noah, then hung around on the boardwalk for the next 90 minutes waiting for Old Faithful to go again.

Typically touristy cheesy photo that I absolutely love.

Noah took this picture

I've seen Old Faithful a dozen or so times, and I still think it's amazing, and even more so to watch through the eyes of my three year old.

When we got back to the cabin we had hotdogs and s'mores over the fire. Sadly the mosquitoes were out in force again, so we mostly just cooked the food outside and ate everything inside.

Have I ever told you how much Noah loves Auntie Lisha? They're best friends. Seriously.

After dinner we got loaded up and headed over to Dan and Krystal's house in Victor. When we got there we got the boys to bed, then stayed up until about 2am talking with D and K. In the morning we had breakfast, played, watched the boys run and run and run, had some lunch, then headed home. The drive out of Victor and into and through Swan Valley is absolutely beautiful. Last time we drove it, there was a ton of snow covering the landscape, it was still pretty, but nothing compared to the greener version. It was so pretty we took pictures from the car while we were driving.

Easter

It's several months late, but here's our post about Easter! Fairly simple and typical Easter Sunday for us. We dyed eggs in the morning. Noah thought it was pretty darn cool. I was really excited to use the little shrink wrap things on them. I've never done them before. Deprived childhood I know.

Noah loved watching the eggs change colors

Here's our 'haul'. I was really proud of myself for getting 4 colors on the same egg!

An Easter egg hunt at Grandma Susan and Papa Frisco's house. Eggs were EVERYWHERE.

K walked around holding these eggs in his hand, then took a big bite out of them. Shell and all...

Cousins comparing their baskets.

Zoorasic Park

Hogle Zoo is doing this really cool Zoorasic Park thing right now. Throughout the zoo are various dinosaurs. They're animated, and they make noise and everything. Most of them are scaled down a little bit, but the T-Rex is full sized, and honestly, a little bit terrifying. It was a fun little addition to zoo!