McCall with My Littles

Our week in McCall came a little early this year.  It was 52 degrees when we arrived - a bit cool to swim but lovely to escape the heat of the valley.  Kate stayed behind to go to Evan Hansen with Lyla so I got to enjoy McCall with just my littles.

We had a blast doing puzzles, reading, picking out movies and meals without debate and just chilling.

Wouldn't be McCall without toaster strudels (a tradition started by the Iversons), but the strawberry and whipped cream was a new addition.

The girls spent so much time on the beach.  I got to sit in the sun or shade, read and enjoy the beauty.  It was kind of cold but that didn't stop the girls from getting into the lake.

While we were playing in the sand Kate and Greg went to Dear Evan Hansen with Tom, Lyla, a friend of hers and Annabelle.  Kate loved it and has even added the songs to her playlist after all her years of complaining about the music Natali played she has succumbed.

The next day after work Greg headed up to the condo with Andrew and Kate in toe. We pulled out Kubb so Andrew and Kate could crush Greg, Emily, Lily and I.

The next morning we went on an epic hike.  The trail was muddy here and there but the 7 miles were worth it we saw all sorts of animal prints in the mud and no human prints.

Cougar, bear, bobcat, wolf not to mention the usual elk, and deer.

For the last 1/2 mile we left Kate with a grumpy Lily and hustled to the end of the trail into a beautiful valley.  So beautiful.

All the hikers deserved some  food from My Father's Place and ice cream from Ice Cream Alley.

Lily may have got double ice cream with the kids cone with her kids meal.

The next morning we played a lot of pickle ball then Emily and I took a walk on the trails behind the condo.  We may have taken a few too many turns away from the condo so we had to do some bushwhacking to get us on the right path but it was a fun adventure.

Lily made a foot bath for Greg and we worked together to creative this fabulous sandcastle complete with mermaid.

As usual I loved every minute of our week at the condo, only wished we could stay longer.

Super Mega Wowie

It's Super Mega Wowie Birthday Party time!!!  The kids enjoyed swiming and four wheeling.  Lily was especially excited to have side by side lessons from grandpa.  

Grandma was wonderful and made all the cakes this year - the decorating is getting better every year, but I think most of the kids care more about all of grandma's ice cream than the cakes.

Andrew and Mack came straight from work to enjoy the pizza I ordered.  It had been a couple months since Wildfords had seen him and they were loving the new long hair under the Woodgrain hat 😂.

Copying an idea from the cruise I emceed a "Finish the Lyrics" game.  Everyone had sumbited a few songs which I used to compile a playlist.  Then we split into teams and went back and forth trying to finish the lyrics of the song wherever I paused it.  It was such a hit.  I had addred several extra songs just in case so we had 37 songs and we did every song; I was suprized we lasted that long but it was such fun.

After presents we had the piñata- it was hard for the girls to wack that cute penguin but they did eventually destroy it.  Mack had us all cracking up with his silly little jokes and poking fun.

 

Another Super Mega Bday hit!

The Kids of to Utah

While Kate and I were in the Bahamas the rest of the kids headed to Utah for the boys soccer camp.  Lily may have been a bit sleepy - she loves that Mack boy.

The Petersens had a good laugh comparing their dog and Mack's hair.

The boys enjoyed their time on the Real field even though they and John were the oldest kids participating by far.

While the boys were enjoying soccer the girls spent the day sewing and cracfting at Parkinson's house.  Greg drove up to Park City after the game and they all stayed the night and woke up to a layer of snow.  

Emily, Harper, and Hazel even slept out in a tent out in the snow!

I guess they managed to have fun without us.

Check Mall of America off the Bucket list

 Sunday, June 6^th

Kate and I woke up and got ourselves on the plane for our first leg of the trip home – finally.  Fate had other plans though.  Turning my phone on after our plan landed in Minneapolis I had a bunch of texts from Greg – “So sorry”, “Got you a hotel room”, “Call me when you can”.  Sure enough our flight to Boise had been canceled – still no clue why.  I spent some time on the phone with Delta but no matter what I did we were spending the day in Minnesota.  Luckily the hotel had a room ready for us to drop off our stuff before we headed to Mall of America.  I’d never been there so check that one off the bucket list.

Kate couldn't beleive there was an entire amusment park inside the mall.  She loved all the old Nickelodeon characters and had to pose with all of them.

And Avatar!

We enjoyed some delicious mango chicken while watching all the rides and people.  Kate isn't into rides so we just wandered the mall.  Her favorite store was the LEGO store.

I send the boys tons of pictures of all the Lego futbol stadiums we could have bought but the Adidas shoe was my favorite - it came in an actual Adidas box.

This moose is made entirely from single piece legos - wow right?!

This bath store was incredible- the bathbombs looked edible and they let us try out a bunch of their products.  Our hands felt so smooth and soft afterwards, and they smelled delicious too.

Llamas anyone...

The M & M store was a hit - she even grabbed some tasties for Greg for Father's Day.

We debated for quite sometime but eventually ended up back at the Lego store to buy a Harry Potter Lego for the littles.  Kate just couldn't leave without buying something from the Lego store.

Kate may be related to me because she lasted just over 3 hours before she called it a day.  We hadn't even dented the vastness of the mall but she isn't much of a shopper and somehow, regardless of how little we had done that last two days, we felt exhausted.  Back at the hotel room we crashed for a long afternoon nap.  Rather than get another Uber we found a place that delivered so we watched movies and talked to dad while we waited for our food.  And waited and waited – I got a call and headed to the desk but no food.  It took some patience and a lot of phone calls to realize the food had been delivered to the wrong hotel (my bad).  They were supper nice and brought it to us, but it had been a two hour wait by the time we were eating.  Our adventure was finally going to end – we loved the time with Teresa and Addy, weren’t complaining about an extended vacation and were grateful for the friends and family who filled in for me when I didn’t get home on time, but we were ready to finally get home.