Bradleys do Idaho

We had a fun adventure this past week. We packed up the kids in the car and drove them to Idaho  to spend the weekend with our friends, The Frosts. The Frosts are fabulous people who Christian has known for about 15 years. They are wonderful caring people and were so happy to host us and let us spend some time in their fabulous cabin. 

We left Salt Lake Thursday afternoon and rocked out to some Broadway and  rock on our way up. James of course covered his ears, he believes the only good music comes from his toy car. We finally made it to the Frost's home where Christian and John were able to go spend some quality time watching other men blow things up and Marta and I were able to sit around and talk while Marta did some crafting. 

The next morning we loaded up the Frost's trailer and we were on our way to the cabin! 

Their cabin is in McCall, Idaho about two hours outside of Boise. It was beautiful and sat right on the golf course.   Matty was right at home and showed off his new trick, climbing on the fire place hearth. 

Once we unloaded the trailer and the men set up the new pool table we piled everyone back in the cars and went to get dinner. We went to a fabulous place called the Pancake house. With six kids at the table it was a very loud dinner and I chuckled a bit when they put us in a corner far away from the rest of the customers. Christian and I shared two different dinners, I really liked the hot pasta salad they had. It was fabulous and with honey mustard dressing was even better. John then introduced us to the biggest sweet roll I have ever seen...

We ordered three and ate two...It still looks like a giant cow pie.

My kids were just happy to be out of the car and were more than happy to pose for pictures after we fed them the giant sweet roll.

Saturday we had a lazy morning then drove up to Burdorf Hot Springs. The kids had a great time playing in the warm water and the adults thought it was pretty fun too.

So funny little side story. I had forgotten Matty's swim diaper back at the cabin and bought one from the nice man at the hot spring. When I put it on Matty I thought it looked more diaperish than anything else but I had watched him pull it out of a swim diaper pack so I just figured it was a different brand...yeah not so much. It was a plain old regular diaper that weighed about as much as Matty does by the end of our stay. The diaper had exploded and Christian and I spent a fair amount of time wiping Matty, ourselves, and the table clean of the lovely gooey crystal substance that is found in diapers.

We drove back to McCall and walked around the downtown area. It was so nice and pleasant  We tried to stop for ice cream at Ice Cream Alley (which by the way is down an alley) but they had closed for the season. We did get to enjoy ice cream from another shop though...we cleaned them out of mint chocolate chip.  But James seemed to prefer the chocolate.













Then we took a walk by the lake and snapped a few pictures of course.

During our walk we found the 1930 McCall Jail. I lovely two bedroom abode where your family had to bring you your meals.  The kids thought it was a fun place to pretend they were in jail.

We finished out our night roasting by the fire side. The kids just wanted to throw sticks on the fire and played most the night out there. They seemed to like to pick up long sticks with one end on fire...yeah I don't get the fascination there.

The men roasted our sausages to perfection...they later did the same thing with marshmallows.

Once the kids were in bed our evenings were filled with games, cookies, and sparkling cider. Yes children, your parents have lots of fun once you are in bed. It was also filled with great conversation. We are very lucky to have such great friends who we can sit and laugh with.

Sunday morning we hurried and cleaned up and helped Laine get in her service hours. She told me as we backed the car out to leave Thursday she had to turn three of them in on Monday. A few of the kids were sad to leave their new friends. Laine thought Oliver was great because, "he got my jokes." and they were on board with Oliver's plan that we buy the house next store. We did finally hit the road though.  Eight hours made for a long trip back but the kids were good. They also liked seeing the Idaho state capitol, and the Boise State stadium. They also enjoyed listening to the children's version of The Odyssey and were sad when we told them that there wasn't time to do another book so they would have to listen to Les Mis instead.  We made it home though, all limbs attached and very few tears shed.

Thanks for the awesome weekend Frost Family! Let's do it again soon!

Hop on the Bradley Reading Train

At the beginning of the summer we set a goal to read  100 books by the end of the summer. It was a lofty goal and one that was going to be a challenge to read. To help us I put a reading train up around the room. Each car had the book name that we finished, the name of the person who read it, and the day that the book was finished.

 It took us a while to get the hang of it, but soon we were reading books left and right.

 We didn't quite make our goal by we did get 88 books by August 31st and 100 books by September 10th.

 James was our number one reader, reading about half of the books on his own. Eve read the most pages though finishing the last three Harry Potter books.

After we hit 100 books the kids decided that they wanted to continue our reading train. So our new goal is to go around the whole room. We are up to 108 books.

It has been a fun adventure and the kids love watching their train grow longer and longer.

Fall Festival and Fair

There are so many things to do in the first weeks of September here in Salt Lake. The Downtown Farmer's Market is full of Fall harvest and because of it my pantry is now full of fresh peach and raspberry jam. The circus is coming to town again and the Utah/BYU game is Saturday. 

There are two things that I associate with fall kick off though and both happened this week- The Annual Greek Festival and the Utah State Fair.

The first time I attended the Greek Festival I was 23 and I went with my family and grandparents. We waited about two hours to get food....but it was well worth the wait. Now we go right when the festival opens Saturday morning. 

The girls were really excited for the festival this year. They loved the pilafi (lemon rice) last year and wanted to try a gyro this year. Laine also had a bowl of calamari to herself.  James is my timid eater, there are days I have a hard time getting him to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich let alone something that is new. He didn't want to try anything until I got him some tyropita (cheese in a phyllo pastry) then he was a happy camper. 

Matty, unlike his brother, is quite an adventurous eater. He loves Indian food, Mexican food, and anything with spices.  We had gotten him his own plate, but he decided he wanted to share Poppa's stifatho (beef stew) in fact Matty just ate it all. Poppa also gave him his first drink of coke, thus explaining why there was no afternoon nap that day. This might also explain why one of Matty's few words is Poppa.

We had a ton of fun and the kids loved the dancing, food, and touring the church after we ate. Laine even had a few questions she asked the Father.  Then of course we left with a box of desserts!

A few days later it was time to go to the fair.  The kids loved the animals and the rides, but most of all they loved the interactive physics center. I think it was the giant bubble maker that did it for them.

'

  This exhibit also had drums, a pitching machine, chess, blocks, and so much more. not sure what it had to do with physics though.

The girls then got footlong corn dogs...oh the joys of fair food.

 And of course we found the butter statue, this year it was a tribute to The Hunger Games!

Matthew spent most the time in his stroller looking at animals and asking dad for more dippin dots.

Then there were the rides. The kids loved them, Christian and I realized that we were getting old. After one ride each we were done and very lucky that the fair food we had just ingested stayed down. 

Eve decided to practice for Disneyland and be brave. I love the look of terror on her face there. She was brave though and tried several different rides.

 James was just a tad too short for most the "grown up rides" so he got to ride the trucks...

  Helicopters...

And this version of the adult drop down ride.

This was one of those moments I was very glad Christian and my brother Adam talked me into a smart phone. I had left my nice camera with Christian and the girls but was able to whip out the phone and use it's camera. If only James could have mustered up a smile for us. 

I was also proud of James for conquering the slide fun house. Two years ago when we went he decided to try this and eventually a worker had to go up and retrieve him because he wouldn't come down on his own. You remember that scene from a Christmas Story where the kids are screaming no as they go down the Santa Slide, yeah this is what happened then. He did really well this time. Got a little nervous crossing a rolling tunnel, but other than that he was a champion...and no tears. 

So welcome fall, I have missed you and the fun things that you bring to the city. Now do you think you could drop the temperature another -5-10 degrees?

First days of school

Though cooler temperatures still seem to be a week away it summer has "ended" and the kids have gone off to school. 

Laine has become a little lady in the past year. She is growing up so fast and started 4th grade this year. She is still in the gifted and talented program at Morningside and has an awesome teacher. She has already started a research project on South Korea and is aiming to get the Gold prize this first trimester. That will include her reading 1000 pages, 4 different genres of books, one book report, one book test, and six hours of service.  Wow!

Eve is our sunshine girl, she is generally happy and easy going and is quick with a smile. She is also in the gifted and talented class in 2nd grade. She is working on her drill and kill math projects and has almost accomplished completing 72 addition problems in 2 minutes, when we hit that goal we will move to subtraction, her goal is to get through division by the end of the year. 

The girls ride the bus to school and back. They are rather independent as they leave to the bus stop in the mornings and make sure that their brother gets on the right bus on the way home.

A week after the girls started school James started Kindergarten. He is our super reader and after his Kindergarten testing, where he totally blew away his teacher, his teacher pulled us aside and asked if we wanted to have him tested for the gifted program. She is great with him. She makes sure that he practices math and not counting, he has counting down. She does the same thing with reading instead of letters. He is currently reading 1-2 Magic Tree House books a day and keeps mom hopping back and forth to the library.

We have some great kids and know that they are going to have an awesome school year.

Having fun in the kitchen

We have been working a lot in the kitchen lately. The kids have been having  a riot helping make some fun dinners and delicious treats. 

We've made home made noodles and tortellinis for Sunday dinner...they were delicious. 

I have also been making the kids homemade bread. I have loved trying out new recipes and the kids have loved having "good" bread around the house. 

We have nine tomato plants that have been producing like mad. To make good use of them we decided to make marinara sauce. So far we have canned six quarts and that was after using the sauce on pizza and our homemade noodles last weekend.

Then I have been trying out a few new cookie recipes.  We have made Rocky Road Cookies....

 And golden oreo truffles.

We have kept busy but find we really do like cooking and baking together. 

Last outings of summer

The summer days have drawn to the end but we did pack them with a lot of fun.  

We went bowling with the Justesen girls

Took advantage of an early morning zoo visit.

The kids love this rhino, they insist to have their picture there every time.

They also loved the three bears.

And making monkey faces

Laine even took a picture with my camera.

We even survived a $2 Tuesday at Thanksgiving Point

Aunt Kirsten was great on explaining about different things and the kids loved listening.

Then we had a drive in movie at Grammy and Poppas. 

The kids thought that was fabulous.

The next morning we went back for breakfast and to play with cousins.

They were some great ways to wrap up the summer fun.