February: Island Park, Bowling and Bonus Day

My parents invited us to go to Island Park with them for part of their annual week! We were able to go Wednesday night and leave Saturday morning. Thursday we went out snowmobiling and had a blast! Rusty and I got to do a ride just us, and then we also went out and took the kids out for a little. Thursday night Rusty and Dad took them to the pool.

Friday we went snowmobiling again and had dinner at a cool place that you have to ride snowmobiles to get to! It was really fun, but we didn’t know that they only took cash. Between us we had enough to get like two hamburgers haha. Still fun.

Amelia fell asleep on the snowmobile

Saturday morning we left and stopped at Angie’s house to see her and the kids. It had been a while since I saw them so it was really great! We have the funniest video of Henry trying out one of the VR masks. The best.

She gave this to the girls and Della snuggled it all the way home

The girls in the primary presidency and I went to Provo to have another tea party! I don’t know when the last one was, but it had been a while. It was fun and they had lots of gluten free options for me so I didn’t feel like I was making things difficult or awkward.

I got to go snowboarding with Rusty again this month just us! This time we went during the week on a weekday and it was absolutely amazing haha! There was fresh powder and it was just the best day!

And then we got to go as a family! The kids are getting so good- we were doing blues and they were tearing it up!

We went ice skating again! The kids and Rusty all really love it, and as I’m getting older I do actually think it’s kind of fun. If I went often and actually got to where I could go around without holding on to the walls I’m sure I would like it more haha. I’m getting better and I’m liking it more so I’m sure it’s correlated.

It was finally time for the Valentine’s Day Party! I can’t even believe it, but I only have two pictures of the whole party. We had a ring toss game downstairs in the basement, they made slime with cool mix ins, they decorated cupcakes, and exchanged Valentines. The moms had yummy treats and pretty pink champagne flutes with sparkling cider. It was really cute- I can’t believe I took zero pictures! Actually I can, it was very stressful haha. We had like 20 kids there. Sheesh.

Phyllis and Kirk came to visit for Henry’s birthday and so that Kirk could go skiing with all of us. We went out to dinner at The Back 40 Grill with them.

The next day we went skiing with Kirk! Phyllis stayed home with Amelia and Kirk taught us how to ski- mainly me though. It was my first time! And it was immediately easier than snowboarding in some ways, and way harder in others. It was a long day haha.

Then it was time for Henry’s birthday!! He woke up to his room decorated, we read his birth story while we ate breakfast (crepes of course) and then he opened his presents. Later we went bowling for the first time in Heber and it was fun because both sets of grandparents got to come! We were going to eat dinner at home but we ended up eating there. Happy birthday to our Henry Boy! What a great way to start a family. He is a great firstborn and older brother! We love him fiercely!

A few weeks later Henry also got a Pokemon party with his friends! He had a ton of fun and I got to re-use a lot of things from his last Pokemon party so that's great haha! They made Pokeballs and caught Pokemon, played Bingo, ate Pokemon food and cake and had a great time!

We’re still going to nature school! This month some highlights were learning how to tie knots and going to Utah Lake to make little boats to float. Grandma Phyllis even got to go to one with us!

We sneaked away to the cabin for the first time since like November. Everything was still obviously decorated for Christmas, but I didn’t want to take it down because we didn’t even get to really enjoy the decorations. We had fun hanging out at the cabin, it was short and uneventful, but that’s kind of the beauty of the cabin. 

When we got home from the cabin we ended up getting caught up in an imaginary game of fighting dragons! It was really fun and it’s so special to see their imaginations come to life.

One day for school I thought it would be really fun to have a tea party and do some read alouds. I made sourdough lemon blueberry scones and we ate them with our tea! It was really fun!

Rusty and I got tickets to a Jazz game! I’ve never been to a pro basketball game before, so that was kind of fun. It really wasn’t as exciting as when we would go to BYU games and sit in the student section. These seats were in a nice section so the people were kind of serious and there was no loud cheering haha. It wasn’t my favorite.

Tori from nature school had set up a “field trip” of sorts with a woman who does stained glass. We got to go to her home and see her studio while she explained the whole process to us. Then she told us that she had done some stained glass work for the Provo airport so we drove out there to see it. Then we went to the Orem library and saw the stained glass there!

It was Leap Year this year, so I thought we should do something fun for Leap Day! We decided to use it as an “extra” day and do something that we would like to do but never have time to do. We went to the Fun Plex in Orem and it was so fun! We did everything we could there- bowling, rock climbing, go karts, arcade, laser tag, all of it. It was fun! I’m grateful for my family!

Extra Pictures:

Amelia's puppy dog face haha

I love Midway so much

Henry wrote a little note

We went to an axe throwing thing with some people from ERC!

Henry's Highlights:

• "It's hurting my feet through my souls!.... How is it doing that Mom?"
• "That's cool, but creeps."
• I haven't pushed a mission on him. I haven't said "When you go" or anything like that because I didn't want him to feel like he had to do that for me to love him and be proud of him. Of course I hope he goes because I think it will be such an amazing experience for him and he will be able to serve and teach people, but I didn't want to start that when he was so little. So I was really surprised when he told me that all the money he is making from his investment is being saved for his mission. I said, "That's great honey! I think you will love serving a mission, and I think it will be so good for you. I am proud of you for making that decision. You could also use some of the money to go on dates and do fun things in high school!" He said, "I'm not going to date before my mission Mom." I asked why not and he said, "Because when I go on my mission I will change and she will change. Being so far apart is hard and it just seems like its better to wait until after." I asked him if I could have that in writing haha.

Adeline's Adventures:

• Della and Henry were talking about crocodiles. She said, "I'm sure there's a softer side to them. They're not always mean."
• "Some birds change their colors to attract maidens."
• She is the absolute BEST big sister to Amelia. It's so fun and sweet to watch her.
• She's got some more sass showing up. She'll roll her eyes or make faces at me now. But she always apologizes after because she feels badly. Her heart is so soft.

Amelia's Updates:

• She was pretending to read a story aloud to me. She said, "Her mom was really mean to her, but it's okay because she had a boyfriend. He was going to kill her mom." I said, "AMELIA!" And her eyes got really big but she didn't look up from the book she just said, "And she said, 'NO! YOU CAN'T KILL MY MOM! SHE IS MY FAMILY! IF YOU KILL HER, I WILL THROW UP ON YOU AND YOU WILL BE MY PUKE BAG!'" Oh geesh.
• She asked if she could "pet" my friend's 3 month old baby
• "I do it BY MY OWN"
• I made cowboy caviar and she took a bite and the first thing she said was, "I like this food more than people!" Cutest video.