Last Days of Summer

This past week we had a new addition to our family. We are now a family of 5, well for the next 10 months anyway. Jean, an exchange student from Switzerland, is living with us for the school year. He arrived last week. He is a great kid and we are excited to have him with us. Whitney and Ryan absolutely adore him. So this last week we probably have done more than normal for the end of summer just to show Jean the area.

We took him to enjoy all the splendors of a small town baseball game. It would have been better if we had won, but it was still worth it. Grandpa joined us for the game and spoiled the kids with cotton candy. Ryan actually wouldn't touch the stuff but Whitney sure enjoyed it. It was uncharacteristically cold that evening and I had not packed any jackets or blankets. Whitney complained of being cold so Grandpa took her down to the souvenir shop. I told Tom that she would most likely come back with a sweatshirt but to my surprise she came back with a foam finger. Apparently all of the sweatshirts were too big, but she figured she could put her hands in the foam finger to keep them warm.

I believe that Ryan's favorite part of the game was stomping his feet. He thought this was great fun and we were the start of the stadium rumble a few times. We did not get any pictures of the stomping but believe me he enjoyed it. The big bird was probably a bit scary but Grandpa was holding him so he was okay.







For our next adventure we went up to the Cress Creek hiking trail. This trail is really short, about one mile, and the first half a mile is paved. This makes it really easy for kids. This hike has a great view of the area. This happens to be the area Tom hunts dear and thanks to his quick eye we were able to capture a picture of this moose across the river. (How he can see this across the river while driving I will never understand!)

Our last adventure took us up to Mesa Falls and to the sand dunes. We went to Mesa Falls with some of the other exchange students. One of them captured my heart when she asked "who is your host family". Her native tongue is English so I know it was not just a translation problem.

Everyone had a blast at the sand dunes. Ryan was a bit cautious at first but once he realized that it was soft sand he jumped right into the fun.

We made sand angels, did canon balls off of the top, and played desert. We had an amazing amount of sand all over. It took four q-tips to clean out Ryan's ears AFTER his bath!!




There you have it, our last days of summer.