Happy Pioneer day 2013

 Today is Pioneer Day. It is a big deal in these parts. It hasn't always been a big deal in our family because the Dad has to work, his is not a local company so he doesn't get this local holiday off.  So we watch the parade and usually stop there. Bu this year we needed to go to Salt Lake anyway so I figured we should enjoy a little pioneer history. Lucky for us not only was the Pioneer Museum open they had some fun activities going on.

 Every one was thrilled with my museum idea. They did warm up eventually.

 I had told the kids about this item I remembered from my youth. The two-headed lamb.  Yes, part of the beauty of the Pioneer Museum is it has some weird stuff in it.  William insists this is a taxidermy trick but it sure looked real to me. Smaller than I remembered though.

 They also have a plethora of hair wreaths. You know, the wreaths Victorians used to make from the hair of their deceased loved ones. They had dozens of the these elaborate, slightly gross creations. To my amazement, as part of the Pioneer Day activities they had demonstrations of a lot of Pioneer skills. Including a lady making Hair wreaths! I couldn't believe it! I have seen a lot of lost arts in action, I do a lot of handwork my mother-in-law does tatting. But I had never seen someone make a hair wreath. Fascinating.

 There was some really neat items too, like this program from the dedication of the Salt Lake temple.

 Very cool, shiny fire engine.

So many beautiful linens and handiwork. Brittany loved the crazy quilts. In fact, she is currently working on one of her own. So I am going to count that as a success, she was inspired to recreate  some pioneer heritage of her own!

Bear Lake 2013

Sandcastles, shakes from Le Beaus, yummy food, laughter, cousins, and fantastic grandparents. What is not to love at Bear Lake! I am so grateful this has become a Butler family tradition. This year was just as great at the years previous. I'm glad my dad remembered to have us take this picture just before we left. I don't like how grown p my kids look though!

This is the fabulous creation Josh made with Grandma's help. It is hard to see but there are army guys and windmills all over it!

Abby had a new raft she graciously shared.

Brittany and Libby decided they were going to make a lighthouse. I can't believe they managed to get sand this high.

Every year Uncle Nate and Matthew dream up some crazy creation to tackle. The car this year was my favorite.

Abby and Josh made a castle with a surrounding wall.

There is a pool that we love.  Uncle Nate has set a crazy precedent for water activities at the pool. This year he would dive under the kids, they would stand on his back and then he would slowly raise them out of the water while still swimming along.  They looked like they were riding dolphins at Sea World! Crazy!

It was such a fun vacation! It is good that there are some things in life you can count on. Having a blast with my family at Bear Lake is definitely one of them!

Cherry Hill

 The summer is coming to an end. It has been another fun summer at our favorite water hole Cherry Hill. Big progress for Josh this year, he can carry his own tube up Cardiac Canyon.

 He does a pretty good job of hanging on too.

Josh and his buddy Gage. I can't believe how big these two are. Sun, water and friends. What a great summer!

Bringing Back the Fun Mom

A week or so ago I realized that I used to do a lot more crafts with Matthew and Brittany when they were Josh's age and next year he will be in school all day. I figured I should try and do more crafts with him while I still can. So I looked at my pinterest boards and found this one. Marbleizing paper with shaving cream. Spray the shaving cream into cookie sheet. Then drop food coloring and stir it around with a popsicle stick. Then I let him take it over by the sink and "shave" it with a small spatula.

Look how cool they turned out! As he was shaving it I had him put the colored shaving cream in a bowl and then he took it into the bathtub.

And painted the walls. What a blast! I do admit I had a moment of panic when I thought "what if that doesn't come off the marble?" But it did. It was so much fun we had to do the whole thing over again the next day with Brittany an Matthew!

Bubble Boys!

We had a go with the bubble makers again this week. We firs tried this a few Summers back. That post is here with the link to the instructions. It was just as much fun as it was then. Brittany helped Josh and his friend Gage get the hang of it.

Gage got pretty good!

So did Josh. Then it turned into a whole game of restaurant, using all the dishes they could think of to make from bubbles! Kept them busy for almost an hour which is pretty good for five year olds!

The Zoo 2011

The kids and I had a great day at the zoo this week.

This is the second year we have met up with our friends the Franks. We became friends when we all lived in Syracuse, several children ago. It is so fun to get together for a good visit with my friend Jen, and to let the kids remember each other.

Josh made friends with Luke, watching rhinos.

Apparently our kids are even bigger than I thought, the same size as Apes!

I love this picture, Jen's boys Chase and Luke checking out the elephants but Josh couldn't get past the smell!

Brittany and Emme. They have been best buddies since they were two. They are getting so tall and lovely. It breaks my heart they can't see each other every day like they used to but I am grateful that they seem to be able to pick up their friendship when they do get to see each other.

Boys and trains. It doesn't get better. I loved that no one wanted to sit with the moms. This was at the end of the day and by then they all had a buddy they wanted to sit with.

Such a fun day! Until next year Franks!

It Was A Good, Good Day

Yep, it was a great day at Cherry Hill. Low enough temperatures to keep most of the crowds away.

So my kids could do this over, and over, and over again. Twenty-four times for Brittany Matthew was a "tank" hauling the smaller kids around.

Yep, a perfect Summer Day!

Summer Ideas

I am working on a list of things for to do during the Summer when we are not lazying away the day at Cherry Hill. Thought I would share.

1. Visit Michaels Craft Store and let each kid pick out a project. They had lots of little wood kits under three dollars, a lot for just a dollar.

2. Visit BYU for one of our field trips. William and I are both alumni and yet our kids are completely unfamiliar with the school.

3. Go to the thrift store and let each kid spend three dollars anyway they want.

4. Have art day and paint canvases-the canvas covered cardboard ones are really cheap at Wal-mart.

5. Once at our house in California I let the kids fish in the backyard. Posted it here. I am considering doing it again.

6. I think we will do hot rocks again.

7. We will definitely be having an art day with my nieces.

8. This marble launcher looks fun.

9. Tye-died cupcakes. Or maybe just a cupcake making day. The rainbow cupcakes were fun too.

10. This is the Place Heritage Park.

11. I signed up for the free bowling at Orchard Lanes here.

12. Trying to decide if I am brave enough to try these Marshmallow guns here.

What are you doing for fun this Summer?

Swimming and Shaving Cream

What a week! I got the crude this week. Why is being sick in the Summer the worst? This bug has been especially fun as it has left me with very little voice. And I use my voice. A lot. Funny how if you whisper at your kids they start whispering back. I may have to use that once I am not the undead anymore. Oh, and William was gone so I was the only adult voice, that was fun. So not a lot of blogging happened. We have been busy though, you know that if you are the mom life still goes on, sick or not. There have been swimming lessons(look at how straight that Brittany's leg is!)

Matthew learned how to dive too.

Josh really liked the slides the last ten minutes of the last lesson the best but I have to say he did better than his older brother and sister at this age. Happily everyone will be advancing to the next level next year. That is if I don't lose the paper they gave me to remind me.

Brittany has been camped out in the basement with my laptop watching Cake making shows on netflix and building things with cards. And declaring her love for her little brother.

Oh, and spending the day in her swimsuit.

Today we finally broke out a craft. First time in weeks I think. This is shaving cream that we drizzled acrylic paint over. The instructions I found on a blog said to use tempera paint but we didn't have any and my kids are pretty good with the acrylics. So then you swirled the colors, place a piece of card stock on top to "print" it. Then wiped of the shaving cream.

It left you with a swirly pattern. I have to say it wasn't actually our very best craft ever but the kids had fun and that is what we were going for. Made my house smell like a barber shop though.

Summer List of Fun

I have been working on my ideas for keeping kids from uttering the dreaded "I don't have anything to dooooooo". Here is what I have come up with so far.
Lots of art projects, here are a few I like.
This awesome batik project might be first on my list. Her whole blog is amazing and I think it is where I am going to look anytime we need a craft project this summer.

We may have to make bubble machines again.

We may have to make slime again. I also saw a recipe that called it Gak and used liquid starch here.

This is corn syrup painting from eighteen25.

Agirlandhergluegun had these great ideas out of a book she had.

-Field trips to Salt Lake

-temple square

-Hoogle Zoo

-museums at the U

-Davis County Summer Reading program, we do this every summer and it is great! The schedule is here. My endorsement has nothing to do with my mother being the library event scheduler.

-Helen's Pool (my mom's friend who graciously shares her pool)

-Field trip to Provo

- Bean Museum

-Museum of Fine Art

-This is the Place Heritage Park

-Swimming Lessons

-Park Days with friends

-Free Bowing at Orchard Lanes in North Salt Lake. Free all summer if you register at www.KidsBowlFree.com/orchard

-Read a book aloud as a family (instead of TV)

And last but not least I caved in to peer pressure and got us season passes to Cherry Hill , the local water park. I was really reluctant to consider spending a far part of my summer in a swim suit but the last few days have been so fun and the amount of sibling bickering has been so small that I think I am fan. The deal is the kids have to complete a chore chart every morning before we can go so I get a clean house without nagging plus they seem less inclined to mess it up when they had to help clean it!

So those are some of the things we will be doing, I posted them so I can look back when we are out of things to do and maybe there will be something there someone else can use.

Let the fun begin!