Rock Climbing

Uncle Justin came to town for a few days and bought a child sized harness for the boys. They headed out to try out Jay's new rope and the new harness. They had a great time and I'm sure they can't wait to get out again.

City of Trees Marathon

Jay ran the City of Trees Marathon for the 2nd time last week. He trained for about 18 weeks and found that he can run some pretty fast miles. These are pictures right before he crossed the finish line. It was a pretty warm day, which is why he tossed his shirt at about mile 18. He had a fantastic time of 3 hours and 9 minutes. This was two minutes faster than two years ago, but not as fast as he was hoping for. However, I was pretty proud.

Jay's Birthday Camping Adventure

For Jay's birthday, he and I headed up to McCall to camp and enjoy some beautiful weather. Camping in October is usually out of the question, but we enjoyed something closer to early September weather.

We got into McCall late and set up camp at Last Chance. Then we headed into town for dinner. Then next morning we did a quick trail run about two and half miles to a waterfall. Sorry, no pictures of that, camera's are hard to handle while running.

The rest of the day was spent biking around Payette Lake. We were in for a real treat with a sunny sky, fall colors, and a clear lake. We had lunch on the beach and had an ice cream cone at the end. That is one thing I remember about going to McCall when I was younger, Grandpa always got us an ice cream cone.

On our way home, we headed through Donnelly and up into the mountains in search of a hot spring. We found it, although it was an interesting one. There are two shacks with water piped in and a cement "tub" to soak in. The temperature was fantastic and we enjoyed a nice soak. We drove around Cascade lake to get home and hit Los Betos in Boise for a late night dinner.

It was a great way to say happy birthday to Jay and goodbye to the camping season.

First Day of School

Well, I guess this is better late than never. Here are a few pictures of the boys on their first day of school. Yes, I know it is already mid-October, but I can't imagine you expect any more from me. I had a colleague cover my 1st period class, so that I could head over and see them on their first day. As you can see, they were quite excited to get back to school. Lucky for us, they still have that enthusiasm. Oh, and that is not our fancy car in the background of the the third picture...just in case you thought we'd upgraded.

Bicycles

We decided to ride our bikes down to Julia Davis park a few weeks ago for the annual Art in the Park. We love to wander the booths drooling over merchandise we could never afford, laughing at all of the strangely dressed Boiseans, and examining photographs, taken by actual photographers, of beautiful places we've been to. (I'm teaching parallel structure to my 9th graders)

However, this is not a post about Art in the Park...it is a post about getting to and from Art in the Park.

We now live about three miles from the park, and since Nikolai has done so well on his two-wheeler, we are phasing out the trailer. So Nikolai rode his own bike with Jay's close supervision, and I took Aleksi on the tag along bike. If you've never ridden one of these great inventions, you'll just have to take my word on this...it's HARD. It looks easy when everyone else is doing it...but I found it hard to keep my balance and keep my bike going where it needed to.

Added to this, is Aleksi.

Several times while riding, the bike would suddenly sway to one side and I would have to keep us both upright and not run into others sharing the greenbelt path. Aleksi had several excuses as to why we were swaying:

1) "I was tired of sitting, so I thought I'd stand up for a while."
2) "My head was itching, so I had to move my helmet back and forth to scratch it."
3) "I don't even have to use the handlebars on this bike!"

Needless to say, we made it there and back in one piece and had a good time doing so...even if the ride was a little wobbly.

Chicken Love

We've been enjoying having our chickens around since the spring. Looking back at their "baby" pictures, they have grown quite large. We've enjoyed showing them off to neighbors and friends...they can be a great distraction when needed. We've enjoyed about five fresh brown eggs and...

WARNING! Do NOT continue reading if you don't enjoy BLOOD and GORE...

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we butchered our roosters over Labor Day weekend. We butchered them for several reasons,

1. we aren't "allowed" to have roosters within city limits and
2. have you seen two roosters together? or heard two roosters crowing in the wee hours of the morning? If you answered yes, I don't need to go on.

I was concerned about the butchering and our tender-hearted boys, but apparently I'm the only tender-hearted one. I almost cried and couldn't watch, while the boys enjoyed the whole bloody (literally) show.

Jay did the honors, dipped them in boiling water, plucked the feathers, took out the guts, cleaned them, and froze them for later enjoyment.

I stayed out of the way, pulled a few (very few) feathers, rinsed the blood bucket, and stayed out of the way. (I know I said that twice, but that's mostly what I did.)

We ate one of the roosters that night and enjoyed a good meal with homemade stuffing and corn grown in our corn field. It was a good end to a not so fun day.

Now that the roosters are gone we finally let the boys name the three girls. Prior to this we didn't want to name them in case we had to eat them, which turned out to be a good idea. I may have pictures one day, but our three girls are Golden Girl, Reddy, and StormCloud. This is what happens when you allow a 6 and 8 year old to name your chickens.

Nikolai's Birthday

Here is a backwards post about Nikolai's Birthday...again late, but still fun!



For his birthday we gave him The Fantastic Mr. Fox and The BFG. He also got a teepee...which did not turn out as well as my first attempt (I think, surprisingly, that a better made sheet makes a better teepeee) so we didn't take pictures of it. :(

Nikolai wanted a Jungle theme for his birthday...this is his tiger cake (minus the stripes). I put both of them in a tuperwear to stay moist and the frosting stuck to the lid...so, this one is missing his nose. :)

This is a big family picture taken at our house after Nikolai's baptism. He was lucky enough to be baptised on his birthday!

Andy baptised Nikolai...he did a great job and we're so proud of both of them!

This is a rhubarb coffee cake that Nikolai's loves. As you can see he is super-excited.

This is Nikolai's monkey pinata...it turned out great and everyone had a good time! He had several friends over for his party after school before school got out.

Thanks for making it to the bottom!

Andy's Graduated! Hooray!

I know this is old news...but I'm always behind...of course. But, here are some fabulous pictures of our baby brother's high school graduation. Go Mustangs!

Welcome Chicks!

We've welcomed five chicks to our house recently. Aleksi's kindergarten class watched several chicks hatch and we got to bring three of them home. We then got two more from D & B about a week later. They are hanging out in our sunroom keeping us entertained. Jay is building a chicken coop and we hope to have our own eggs in the future.

Happy Birthday Aleksi!

This is the teepee I made Aleksi for his birthday...he was really excited!

Aleksi and all of his presents.

Aleksi and the pinata.

I know it looks like it is "hanging," but it was the best we could do. :)

I made Aleksi a peach coffee cake in the shape of a chick for breakfast. He wasn't super excited, but the rest of us enjoyed it.

Aleksi wanted to have a "chick" birthday,...as in chickens, not babes. So, we made yellow rice crispie treats that I cut out in the shape of chicks to send to school, stayed up all hours of the night creating a chick pinata, and planned fun games for his friends to play (like pin the egg in the chicken's nest).

Aleksi had a great time at the party, and now I'm gearing up for Nikolai's here soon. Birthday's are exhausting, but it is so fun to see them happy and excited.

As always, my pictures are totally out of order and I am too lazy to fix them...enjoy this post backwards. :)