Foam Fest 5k

 We went up to Idaho Falls this weekend to run in the Foam Fest 5k on Saturday.  Paul put together a family team.  It was so fun to have everyone there and all those who came to watch.  Dad and Diane drove up EARLY Saturday morning to come watch us race.

 Here's our group at the starting line.  I was expecting this race to be as crowded as the Dirty Dash.  Nope.  That's okay - it gave us better odds of winning!  Paul actually came in 2nd place.  He would have been 1st if he didn't fall at the slide.  So close!

 We are just about to go into the Sand Dunes.  What a nightmare!  There was about 2 miles of this race in the sand!  Your feet would just sink in the sand.  It was next to impossible to run in it.  I wore my water shoes to this race instead of running shoes.  They filled up VERY quickly with sand.  The only good thing about it was I was able to take them off and on really fast to empty them out.

 I was so surprised to see Grandma and Grandpa come out and watch us race!!!  It was so great having them come out and support us.  Grandma looks great in this picture!

 Ahh the mud.  I had strict instructions to Aubrey that she was not allowed near the mud.  As you can see in this video, she did not listen.  Grandpa and Nana who were watching the kids while we raced took a video of them in the mud. 

After running in the sand we came to the mud pit.  By this point you are just exhausted!  Justin, Lisa and Andrew made it there before me.  The whole time I was running I kept on seeing my 11 year old nephew with all the energy in the world just running fast.  I didn't want to walk in the sand until I saw him start walking...I ended up walking a lot sooner than he did.

 By this point I was grateful for the "break" in the race where we were allowed to crawl.

 The entire time I am in the mud pit I could hear my kids cheering, "Go Mommy!"  That's when I looked and saw Aubrey covered in mud.  Dang girl.  Way too tempting for her.

 After the mud pit we stopped for a photo.  Mike is putting mud in Jordyn's hair as the picture is being taken.

 The water was so cold!  All the kids were shivering.  Eric, Madison and Andrew were getting ready to run the "Rugrat 1mile" race at 11:30.  Right when they ran past the starting line, Eric fell and got hurt.  Not bad - he just scraped his hands and knees.  It was enough though to make him want to quit running.  I didn't want my race money to go to waste, so I slapped Eric's race bib on Aubrey and made her run the race.

 This is Aubrey in the foam.  Notice the camera man.  He was following Aubrey around like crazy.  He is in almost every one of my Dad's pictures of Aubrey.  That is Aubrey crossing the finish line.  She loved it!

After the race we went back to Justin's house.  They watched football game after football game after football game.  Lisa and I caught a matinee during one of the games.  It was a great weekend!  The kids had so much fun playing with their cousins.  It was great to visit with my grandparents as well.  Aubrey loves going over there.  She was so excited when Grandpa Parry let her eat raspberries.

1st day of school, hiking and salsa.

 Eric started 3rd grade this year and Aubrey started 1st grade!  They were so excited to go back to school and see all of their friends.  Eric was able to get one of his best friends in his class.

 Eric has Mrs. Jackson.  She has MS and has explained to the kids how they all need to be very patient with her. 

 Aubrey has 2 teachers this year.  She has Mr. Kingsford in the morning and Mrs. Larsen in the afternoon.  Mr. Kingsford used to be the Art teacher for the school, but they cut the funding for the extra programs.  He is such a good teacher though, so the school was able to have him teach 1st grade for the morning and art to the rest of the school in the afternoon.  When we met him at back to school night he had this HUGE beard.  Aubrey goes up to him and says, "Why do you have a beard?"  Apparently he is also an actor and is currently filming the latest Church film of the New Testament and he is suppose to look Jewish.  Every morning he claps his hands together and says, "Today is going to be a great day!"  Aubrey adores him.

 2 weekends ago I went up with Dad and Diane to cheer Amy on in the Jordanelle Triathlon.  On our way back we got to reminiscing about the last time we hiked to the top of Mt. Timp.  So I planned for last Friday for everyone to get together to hike it.  Unfortunately, for me, I either tore or pulled my calve muscles on Wednesday morning.  I couldn't walk.  I was crawling around on the floor and Jennifer kept on wanting to go on horsey rides.  There was no way I could hike to the top of Timp, let alone go up or down our stairs.  So I sent Zac off on his way with my Dad, Diane, Heidi and Amy.

 The first thing Zac says when he gets home is, "They had to take a picture of every stinkin waterfall!"  He only had one with a waterfall.

 They made it to the saddle.  So pretty.  That is Utah lake in the background.

 I am grateful that he got a couple of good pictures.  The majority of his pictures were of GOATS.  This is why I should never send Zac with the camera.

 

Zac and Amy at the top of Mt. Timp

 Zac wanted to be the tallest person in Utah - for a second.

 Since I am home for a month, I have been wanting to harvest my garden.  I started on Saturday by making salsa.  There is something so satisfying growing all of your vegetables.  My peppers have done amazing this year!  We have SO MANY more!  My bell peppers are huge!

 My 1st batch of salsa.

 

I know this doesn't look very appetizing.  Believe me though, it tastes like regular salsa.  Zac planted several "lemon boy" variety of tomatoes.  I have more yellow tomatoes than the red.  So I made a 1/2 batch of them to see how they would turn out.  I don't know if I can get over the color though.  

Every time I make a batch of salsa I always have 1-2 jars burst in the water bath.  It is so frustrating!  So much salsa gets wasted.  I pour the hot salsa in hot jars then put them in the boiling water bath.  I fill them up to just under the neck of the bottle.  Does anyone know why I have some bursting???? 

We went to Stephanie's house for dinner on Saturday night.  It was so much fun.  The kids loved the pool.  I honestly don't remember the last time I went swimming.  Lily loved splashing around in the pool.  We put her in a floaty and she would lean WAY over to dip her hair in the pool.  So cute!  Jennifer wanted us to hold her the entire time, but she had fun.  She keeps on asking me when we can go swimming again.  Aubrey was so mad when we got her out of the pool. It was so nice to have a private pool.  No weird strangers coming in while you were there.  Thanks again Steph for a great night!

Random pictures

These aren't in any particular order.  They are just some pictures that Zac took while I was at work and I don't know the story behind them.  I know Zac is working hard to get his Mustang finished before Christmas.  He found a guy to do the upholstery on it for a great deal.  He is really excited!  He is hoping to have it painted before I go back to work next month.  I ended up taking 4 weeks off work after this trial.  I have put in so many hours at work that I need to be with the kids.  The verdict came back Thursday night at 9:30-10:00ish.  I am so glad it is finished and I can have a semi-normal life!

Family Cruise!

 

 Dad and Diane took all the adults on a cruise to Ensenada Mexico 2 weekends ago!  It was so much fun!  We had 5 of us to a room.  All of us slept on twin beds, two of which came out of the wall like a murphy bed.  Zac and I flew into Long Beach before everyone got there.  Early check-in was at the Queen Mary.  After we checked in, Zac saw the engine room below us, and some stairs.  On the wall was a sign that said, "Self-guided Tour."  We had 3 hours to kill, so we toured the entire ship.  The entire time we were on the ship Zac was trying to figure out how they made any money.  As we were leaving the Queen Mary, I saw a ticket booth.  I went up to it and saw, "Self-guided Tour $24.95/adult"  Whoops. 

 

Back Row:  Devin, Heather, Zac, Amy, Cliff, Nathan, Dad

Front Row: Lisa, Justin P., Justin C., Heidi, Bobby, Diane, Becky, Steve

Our first night on the ship they had a game show.  I was selected to be on it!  I thought I would have a pretty good shot at winning since the other contestants were drunk.  I started out strong, and slowly lost.  It was fun either way though. 

After dinner we would go and see the shows or the comedians.  Since there was so many of us we would have to go early and save seats.

The comedian was so funny.  As soon as he found out that our big group was all from Utah and we were all Mormon he stopped and said, "I've got about 90 jokes going through my head right now."

 Zac and I did the "Taste of Mexico" excursion.  We went to a restaurant and learned how to make Mexican food.  The chef was on a table in front of everyone with a microphone and we all followed along after him cooking away.  It was a lot of fun and the food was delicious!  Afterward we were able to go shopping for a couple hours in downtown Ensenada and do some sight-seeing.

We got to the airport 6 hours before our flight.  Zac wanted to save $$$ on the taxi ride so he had Dad drop us off when they were leaving. 

The cruise was so much fun!  Thanks Dad and Diane for putting this together, we will never forget it!  And a special thank you to Zac's sister Barb for watching our kids!  Going from 0 kids to 4 kids is a huge undertaking!  She did a great job and the kids had so much fun!