Campouts and Sleepovers

May 18 - 19, 2012  - This was the weekend of the ward Father-Son overnight camp out.  Logan looks forward to this every year, and even more this year because last year's was cancelled because the water was too high where they were going to be camping and they ended up sleeping out in our backyard.  This year, they ended up going to a lodge in Bear Lake owned by the University, so it was pretty fancy and Logan was so excited!  They had so much fun and Logan LOVED sleeping in a tent.  They had the option to sleep inside in the bunk beds, but Logan REALLY wanted to sleep out in a tent.  They had to get up in the middle of the night to move the tent because a sprinkler went on at 3 am right outside the door, and they ended up having to move it again, but Logan didn't seem to mind at all.  Other than that, it was awesome for them!  Logan was just bummed that Bronson couldn't go, too.  He is really excited for him to join in on their fun boys trips.  Maybe next year...

Logan LOVES to sleep in a tent!  He goes to bed really early and gets up early. 

The lodge they stayed in at Bear Lake.  Pretty nice! 

Since the boys were having fun, the girls and I had a little fun of our own!  Grandma Boman came up for Logan's piano recital on Friday night, so she stayed over with us and we had a fun girls' night and sleepover with Grandma! 

 The girls all dressed up for Logan's piano recital.  I loved these outfits!  

And I love all their funny poses! 

For dinner Friday night, the girls chose Kneader's.  (Or MEE-ders as Avery calls it) Bronson was getting really fussy so we had to take it to go and they were a little bummed about that, so when we got home we decided to make it a picnic and that helped make it a little better.  We had a picnic and watched a girly movie.  I let them pick and Rylee chose the movie "A Little Princess" on Netflix.  She is really liking a bit older movies lately and not just cartoons.  I was pretty excited because I love that movie.  Rylee loved it, too.  I think it was a bit old for Avery but she did pretty good with it, too. 

After the movie, we made a trip to Charlie's Ice Cream for a late night treat.  Its pretty fun to have special nights and get ice cream at 10 pm when you are 5 and 2 years old!  They were in heaven!

Cute little Bronson joined in on all our girly fun.  We didn't mind.  He is just so sweet!!! 

The next morning, I planned to get up and make a yummy breakfast, but by the time that Bronson was fed and stuff, it was getting pretty late, so we made another trip to Kneader's for their DELICIOUS french toast!!  Yummy!!!  What a fun weekend we had!

Roughing It

September 3rd - 5th - Over Labor Day weekend, my family reserved their stake campground up Ogden Canyon. The kids were so excited to go camping! However, this was much better than camping. We had a really nice lodge to hang out in with a kitchen and we even ended up sleeping in there. There was another family that was supposed to be there, so we were planning on tents, but they ended up leaving early so we had the whole place to ourselves! It was great! There was also a heated pool, indoor toilets and showers. That is my idea of roughing it!

On Saturday night (Sept 3), we headed up to meet my family. They had gone up the night before, but we weren't quite ready to spend the whole weekend camping with Darren's knee and 3 little kids. Darren went to a Real game Saturday night, so I had him drop me and the kids off so we could go play with everyone for a little bit at the campground while he was at the game. We had a great time!
Avery is such an independent girl these days. I loved watching her bear climb up these steep steps. She had to do it herself! Rylee with Uncle Brad and cousin Ethan
Avery just playing outside
Uncle Jeff had Avery and Ethan doing some serious dancing. I think he was trying to impress some girls from the other family that was up there that left later that night.
Rylee just being cute
Someone was chasing Ethan and Avery around the island in the kitchen. They thought it was hilarious!
Avery munching on some corn on the cob and chocolate licorice while we waited for dinner. What a combination! That night, my grandma and aunt and uncle and some of my cousins came up. We had a really yummy dinner and then some delicious dutch oven cobbler and ice cream. Avery really liked playing with my cousins and they were so cute with her . Here she is hanging out with my cousin, Elise. Her and Ethan were also having so much fun with my Grandma Mary. She was throwing the ball for them and they would run and get it and bring it back to her. They did it over and over and were laughing so hard!
Enjoying some cobbler and ice cream

September 4th - I don't really know why we did this, but we went back home on Saturday night and then came back up on Sunday. It seems kind of silly. I think we had to be at church for some reason. Anyway - We came back up on Sunday night after church for dinner and to stay the night. The kids were super excited! We had planned to sleep in a tent, but there was a perfect little upstairs room in the lodge that was empty so we slept there. It was great because the kids could go to bed at a good time and we could stay up late and play games. I think Logan was pretty disappointed that he didn't get to sleep in a tent though. Darren and I had a fun time playing cards and games with my family until pretty late. We mostly played Scum. An hour or 2 after the kids went to bed, we were awakened by some screaming.... I ran upstairs and Rylee was screaming. I couldn't get her to stop and she was freaking out, so I ran her downstairs so she wouldn't wake up the other kids because I couldn't understand anything she was saying! She kept saying something about her nose and something about yellow, but I couldn't put together what was wrong. We finally figured out that she had ripped a piece off of her foam mattress and stuck it up her nose and it was stuck there! I have no idea why she thought that was a good idea or what she was doing. Luckily Grandma Boman had some handy tools with her and had something that looked like scissors on the end, but were skinny on the other end and Daddy did a little surgery and we were able to get it out! I don't know why she put it up her nose! Once she got it out, she told us she had done it before and it had come out. Silly girl! These pictures make me laugh! That night Avery also threw up twice so it was pretty eventful! Thank goodness we weren't out in a tent!

September 5th - The next morning, we spent the day playing at the campsite. We had a yummy breakfast and then FINALLY headed to the pool! The kids had been BEGGING to go. We got there too late to swim on Saturday and then couldn't on Sunday so they were dying to get in!
Avery wanted to swim so bad, but she did throw up the night before and had a little bit of a fever. It made her so sad to not go when everyone else was swimming that I gave her some Tylenol and let her swim anyway. Maybe not the best parenting choice, but she was much happier after that!
My brothers had this raft for some reason. The kids thought it was so fun to go for rides around the pool in.
Logan swimming away from Uncle Kyle - The Shark! His swimming is getting so much better!
I don't know what Uncle Jeff is doing here...
but Rylee sure thinks it is funny!
Grandpa Boman - He is not always this grumpy looking but this is the only picture I got of him.
My brother Dean and his cute wife Laura
Jeff going for a row
Jeff throwing Logan in the air - The kids have so much fun when their uncles are around!
Avery got a little tired after swimming for awhile and cuddled up with Grandma for awhile.
Rylee loved the pool!
Uncle Kyle thought snorkeling was a good idea...
Rylee really liked hanging out on the steps. She was doing some serious posing for Aunt Vanessa who had my camera.
Logan was trying out some human surfing on Uncle Jeff's back
Going down the slide
Mom and Avery by the pool
The boys thought it was fun to jump up and down over and over and make a giant whirlpool in the pool. Logan and Rylee liked it, too. Someone had brought up some kind of skim board so we all decided to try it. The boys were trying it all day and somehow convinced all of us girls to give it a try. Here is my sister Vanessa trying. Fortunately for me, there are no pictures of my attempt! It did fly out from under me and just about took off someone's head though... Too bad I didn't get pictures of my mom's attempt. It was pretty good. I did get it on video so I have some good black mail material.
Avery getting a ride from Uncle DeanA rough raft ride for Logan and Rylee. They thought it was so funny!
Logan trying out the skim board like a surf board thanks to Uncle Brian's helpTime to get out of the pool!
The girls all swimmed out and drying off. They are so stinking cute!!!
Avery reading to Uncle Dean outside the lodge
Before we left, we had to make some S'mores. The kids don't think that you can count it as camping if you don't do that! It was crazy windy so it was a little tricky, but they were thrilled to make their own! Logan says Thumbs up! Rylee was really getting into hers. After S'mores it was time to head home. We had a great time and it was so nice to camp with showers and a pool and a real kitchen! This was our only attempt at a family picture. It was right before we got in the car, so we really look like we have been camping. It was a great Labor Day and I think it might be a fun new tradition for our family.