The Mystery of Stinging Nettle at Phantom Falls

Scooby Doo where are you??

Last week-end Josie went to youth conference up in the South Hills. We hatch this great plan to meet her up there Saturday afternoon and hike into a water fall that just out the side of a cliff from a underground spring. So the kids and I hopped into the Mystery Machine and headed up to meet up with Daphne AKA(Josie). The first mystery of the day was to find the trail head which was challenge in it self. We missed the sign the first time and end up almost all the way to Burly then we ran into "Clampits Family" which straighten us out and told us that the sign at the road was knocked down and you had to look back into the grass to see the sign. So we finally found the trail head strapped up and set out on the "Mystery of Stinging Nettle at Phantom Falls" The tail was a bit overgrow but after we handed out a few scooby snacks the team was good to go. As instructed by Daphne I took the lead to fend off any wild beast that might jump us. But don't you worry I had my loaded 9mm the only problem was I left it in the truck. As the adventure continued I started noticing a plant along the trail that has cause me some pain in the past so I thought being the leader and assuming that Josie knew what stinging nettle looked like (especially being the camp nurse for girls camp this year) I would yell to the rear watch out for the stinging nettle. Half way in on the hike there was a mutiny Daphne and Velma shutdown and decided that a calamine lotion bath was not going to be in their future any time soon. So after carrying a crying Velma up the hill. Being the diplomatic person I am no yelling of course. The mystery was solved. Along this same trail was another plant that kind of look like stinging nettle but was not. So both Daphne and Velma kept thinking they were surounded by stinging nettle. Once it was properly identified Velma was able to stop the goal of not to let a blade of grass touch her. Which was quite the challenge on the over grown trail in shorts as you can see from the pictures. In the end it was a wonderful hike and a fun family adventure. I have attached a picture of sting nettle so next time you to can solve the Mystery of the Stinging Nettle.

Sincerely,

Scooby Doo

Past the Scooby Snacks ( Bottle Caps)

You know an update is way over due when your husband asks if you are ever going to update your blog. So I am catching up. Expect great things to come. But for now, here is a small taste of what we have been up to the last couple of months. How 'bout that first picture as an attention getter, heh?! I work very part time at the MSTI here in Twin Falls, and they were having a fundraiser auction to go along with the "Relay for Life". So they asked people to decorate a bra with a "Breast Cancer Awareness" theme, to be auctioned off at the dinner. So the is my contrabution. The "treasure chest" or "treasure your chest" if you will. It didn't come out perfect by any means, but I was kind of proud of the final out come. Blake and I had fun coming up with runners up ideas. If anyone has a great one for next year, I am open to suggestions!

I love this next picture! It was on one of the first nice days this spring and the boys were playing super hero's in the back yard. When they got the brilliant idea to jump on the trampoline like they were flying through the air. They got some good "flying" in, I thought it was a cute idea that they came up with all on their own. I love the simple joys of youth!!!!

Here are some very belated pictures of Easter. We went down to Sara's for the MS Walk in Salt Lake, then back to here house to dye eggs and the big hunt. It was a nice weekend, and nice weather too. More to come later, I PROMISE! (if you look close at the bottom picture you get a glimpse of Jack's "Hulk Hand". He didn't feel the need to use the "dipper" apparently.)

California: Part 2

California: Part 1

Our first stop on our California vacation was at my brother Ben's house in Turlock, CA. We love getting together with them whenever we can, because our kids enjoy each other so much and have very compatible personalities. I love to just listen around the corner to Reese and Jack 's conversations. And Anna and Emily are like sisters! Sam giggled every time we talked about going to visit Maya and Bella. They play so well together. Just cute little kiddo games. Like "working out" in Ben's living room. Sam had those girls doing push ups and kick boxing, and relays. And they loved every minute of it. It was quite inventive.Then there's Jessica, the oldest, TALLEST, most mature of the bunch. She really is so grown up! It wasn't until she drove the baby stroller like a nascar driver through the parking garage that I remembered she is 12. (That's a good thing Jess, be young as long as you can!!!) I tried to discreatly tuck baby Jeffrey under my arm as we left, hoping know one would notice. But Blake made me give him back! What a cutie!!!
Anyway, we felt lucky to attend Anna's baptism while we were there. The above picture was how well behaved our group of nine cousins were....during the baptism. The below picture is a better depiction of the cousin memories made throughout the weekend.

And through it all, my sis in law Emily put together a lovely baptism program, and a delicious luncheon without breaking a sweat. Impressive. Thanks for a wonderful visit!!!!


The slide show below is of our trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We had taken a trip there 9 years ago. When Emily was a baby and Blake was working in Modesto, CA. It was a fun trip then, but even better to take all our kids back, and watch them enjoy it. I have to say that all 9 of the kids were well behaved!!! A huge accomplishment in my book!

Feeling younger instead of older!!!

So, Blake asked me what I wanted for my birthday (which I thought was pretty brave considering the fact that I made him go to a Shakespeare play the last time he asked what I wanted to do), and I told him I would like to go skiing. And being the wonderful husband that he is, he found a way to make it happen. With a little help from Aunt Becky, who watched the kids for us, we spent the night in Albion, and went skiing at Pommerelle the next day. Neither one of us had been there before, but had always wanted to go. I was nervous the first run because it had been a while. So I told Blake we had to find a green or a blue run to start with. But it didn't take long to find out that even the trails marked black diamond were pretty mellow. It also helped that we had rented our equipment. I have to say that skis have come a long way since my "Rad Dog" days at Targhee. They made me look like a much better skier than I really am. It was a gorgeous day! And I ended up feeling alittle youthful, instead of older. We also found THE BEST place for scones in Albion. With the most delicous honey butter and raspberry butter to slather them with. YUM! It's just a really good thing that you have to go all the way to Albion to get them!!!!

The one Spring skiing tip we forgot was Sunscreen. We both went to church the next day with red faces and outlines were our sunglasses and headbands had been. LOL! (by the way that is the first time I have used LOL ever! What a dork I am!)

I will start with the excuses first, and move on to the actual reason for the post. I know I have been absent from blogging for a while, and the last post wasn't even written by me. But the above picture and following explanation are an attempt at deriving understanding, if not pity (ok maybe not pity). Anyway, it was 5 weeks ago that I took my favorite pair of shoes to the repair shop to get some stitching repaired (did I mention these are my all time favorite shoes). As usual, I was in a rush and told the boys to sit tight while I dropped them off. But as I was rounding the corner I tripped over what I later found to be an uneven sidewalk, and was on the ground before I even knew what had happened. All I knew was that my fingers hurt like crazy. Then I looked at them....you guessed it....dislocated.....not a pretty site!! Now, I can handle alot of medical emergencies, and gross stuff, but orthopedics is the one thing I CANNOT HANDLE. For what ever reason I am not equiped to deal well with broken bones and dislocated joints! Especially when they are mine! Needless to say I was left with 2 options: 1. Drive myself to a hospital and let someone else fix it (knowing that I would have to look at it the whole way), or 2. Pop it back in myself. I quickly picked 2 and thankfully it was fixed in a split second. But it has been the sorest, and most swollen injury I have ever encountered. The above picture was taken 5 weeks after the "incident" and they are still sausages!! (middle and ring fingers on the right). Not a great excuse, but it's what I've got. It was 2 weeks before I had the courage to return to the "scene of the accident and retrieve my shoes (did I mention they are my favorite). The thing that really had me miffed was that I had just chopped my hair off short that same day, and I couldn't "do it up cute" until just recently. (sorry no photo, I am sick with a head cold today, and not feeling photogenic). At this point they still don't bend very well, and are pretty crooked, but I am still hopeful of a full recovery. If not I will definitely need to come up with a better story than "I tripped" to go along with my crooked fingers.

Now for the reall reason for my post. It is a rare thing that I have anything crafty to share, but I was just so darn proud of how Emily's school valentines turned out that I had to share. I got the idea from Family Fun website (so who knows, there may be a million of these passed out on Friday) and I thought they were both adorable and easy peasy to make. You just wrap a candy heart box (4 for a $1) in colored paper cut to size, and add the ipod cut out that you down load from the site. Genius!

Blake even had me take a picture in a docking station to show how "realistic" they look.