Yellowstone Day 3

 Dragon's breath

 Yellowstone river

 All of the grandkids

 On day 3 we hiked around Dragon’s Mouth and Dragon’s Caldron- very smelly. We saw a whole flock of white pelicans flying over Yellowstone Lake. We drove past Yellowstone Lake every day multiple times - it is truly beautiful. We walked around the Mud Volcano Area looking in every stinky hole and went to the Lower Falls lookouot before having a picnic lunch at Otter Creek. The kids ran around being crazy together. After our picnic we went to Yellowstone rapids and were completely swarmed by bugs. They didn’t bite but the kids were going crazy. Red Fish was especially excited about seeing cutthroat trout trying to swim upstream through the crazy rapids.

Yellowstone Day 2

 Yellowstone Lake

 Old Faithful Geyser

 West Thumb- My Dad, My Mom, Two Fish, Red Fish and New Fish, Lee Lee holding Pixie, J holding Nixie, M.E. with Noodle on her back, Doo (M) with Doodle on his back, me.

 marshmellows

 We went to Old Faithful on day two. We had a ninety minute wait for the geyser and we made the mistake of trying to wait for lunch- bad idea with this many small kids. The kids picked up their junior ranger packets so they did plenty of reading up and taught us all about the geysers. We hiked around the trails by the geyser and had a picnic lunch after we saw Old Faithful. We went on a hike in West Thumb and then had a dutch oven dinner.

Yellowstone Day 1

 We started our summer vacations with a trip with my side of the family, camping in Yellowstone. I love camping. The first day of the Yellowstone trip was amazing. We had all the craziness of packing ourselves into our small car, trying to make sure we had everything packed for a very long trip and all of our camping gear ready. We fell in love with audio books on this trip though and now I think we are hooked for life. Throughout the trip the kids could hardly wait to get back in the car and “start the movie” meaning turn the audio book back on. I’m weird and want my kids to stare out the window on long road trips instead of watching movies the whole time so we only did two movies in two weeks of road tripping.

Anyway- back to the amazing part. On our way to the campground we drove through the park and saw two bald eagles (nobody seemed to be quite as excited about these as I was), literally hundreds if not thousands of bison. We were freaking out about all the bison because on our last Yellowstone trip we only saw three bison the whole time we were there. I’m not sure how that was possible. We saw dozens of baby bison, which were incredibly adorable. I hope my kids remember the fields of baby bison their entire lives. We saw a moose, a lake full of trumpeter swans and a grizzly bear from far far away which did not diminish our excitement. We saw a black bear and Red Fish and New Fish are such an animal fans so this trip was a complete dream come true for them. We saw bull elk and a field of mule deer. By the time we got to the campsite we were so worked up about all of the animals, we could barely contain ourselves.

Eating Out

Someday we will get a patio and table but for now this is FUN.

Art Group- Still Going Strong

Just to give you an idea of how many kids come to art group at our house every week.

Happy Sunday

 We celebrated the May/June birthdays on my side of the family tonight.  We hosted at our house and had a barbeque with hula hoops, giant bubbles, swings, cupcakes, babies and crazy kids. I know people say that you can't choose your family, but this is who I would choose to share my life with even if we weren't family.

 It was a beautiful evening outside, just chatting and eating on the lawn. Nights like this are my favorite.

 These little cousins love each other so much. Thing 1 was just walking into the house and finding whatever he needs. He knows where everything is and what he can access and I love that he feels so at home.

We celebrated my Mom's birthday and we thought we would get her a birthday picture with the kids. 5/6 looking toward the camera is pretty good!

Snorkeling Lesson

Red Fish wanted Pop Pops to give her a snorkeling lesson.  We are going to have to upgrade to some larger equipment because the tiny kid stuff is too small.  She is prepping "to snorkel with manatees and dive with ship wrecks"- two goals for her future. When Red Fish turns eight she can officially start practicing her scuba skill sin the pool and she can be certified at age ten.  I think scuba is in her blood.

The Dancer

Little New Fish has decided she wants to be a dancer when she grows up and has been taking tap and ballet all year. She loves to dance. I on the other hand am not cut out to be a dance mom.  It stresses me out and even though she is just taking weekly classes that were fine, the recital had 50 million rules and full makeup, dress rehearsals and other things that nearly gave me a nervous breakdown.  I'm going to have to learn how to roll with it if New Fish is going to continue with dance. 

 She is so cute though and you can see how much fun she has.

 The week of the [New Fish] shows ended with her big recital in a fancy theatre downtown. Red Fish was especially excited for her sister. New Fish did awesome and was one of the few preschoolers in the show who sort of knew their dance. Most importantly, she had an absolute blast and was thrilled to "be on the stage again!"

Three generations

Preschool Graduation

This week is the week of the "[New Fish] shows!  The child was born to be on the stage and she LOVES to perform. Her preschool program and graduation was hilarious.  She made such dramatic faces and sang so loudly. She was very excited that they were performing a short play.  She kept saying: "My very first play!" All of my pictures are terrible but the lighting is not great in the theatre.

Hula Hoops

 The girls have been working to earn hula hoops.  I thought that I would absolutely be able to demonstrate how to use a hoop but alas, I have lost any and all mediocre skill I once had at the hula hoop.  I also require a bigger hoop but that may just be an excuse. It was hilarious to watch them attempt to hula and Two Fish was expecially fun to watch. We are all equally untalented.