Camping on the island at Priest Lake

We started planning this camping trip 7 months ago, and I think there was nervousness on the part of everything involved. For us, it was how to camp by depending on everyone else to provide tents, sleeping bags, and whatever else we may need, and how Micah would do being so close to the water for 4 days (dangerous boy!), and how night times and nap times would be. Everyone else had their own concerns, but the entire Passey family was coming. 16 adults (okay I am not counting the adult grandkids as adults), and 27 grandchildren, and Sarah, the only granchild spouse. So getting that many people and all their camping gear across the lake and everyone having all they need, seemed tricky. But this camping trip was SO much fun! I thought everything went amazingly smooth as far as getting everyone there and set up and back. Micah did awesome with naps (except the one incident, later) and with nighttime, and everyone else did so great too.

There were 2 boats, a jet ski and 2 kayaks. The kids spent hours in the water just playing on the tubes.

Trav's brother Allan, taking some people out to tube...David and Val by their boat.

Trav and Noah kayaking.

Noah and lots of other kids spent lots and lots of time catching frogs and snakes. That was probably their favorite part of the whole camping trip.

Noah and Taylor and their frogs.

Ammon wishing someone would help him catch his own frog.

Trav taking Kaden out on the kayak. He decided Kaden is still a bit young, especially on windy choppy water.

Micah's turn. Oh yes, so this little boy pretends to go down for a nap so nicely. I decided to go on Allan's boat because Noah and Kaden were both tubing. Travis said they were just sitting and talking and his Brother David said "Travis, didn't Angela go on the boat?"..."Yep"...."Then who's watching Micah?". And Micah was just moseying along the shoreline. He climbed right out of the port-a-crib and out of the tent, that we hadn't been zipping up all the way. We are lucky he likes to be around people and didn't go the other direction!

They did all get little rides on the wave runner...

I know this has no place in camping, but it was still fun for the kids. On the last night, David somehow set up a little movie for them to watch.

Ammon, after all the watching and waiting for his turn tubing, finally got it. It was the very last morning and Trav took him out on the wave runner. I sat by him and at first he refused to hold on at all, and then I finally made him hold on, and every time his face got splashed he lifted both hands to cover it and almost flew off.

He had so much fun, though. He was beaming ear to ear.

Cheney, Washington

Noah spent at least an hour up in this tree throwing cherries down for his cousins.

April who is less than 2 weeks younger than Micah and talking in paragraphs long ago. I loved my conversations with this little girl.

April had to get used to sharing Grandma with Micah, but they worked it out.

Jared and Sarah's dreamy garden. Let's just pretend these are really pictures of MY garden...

They have even planted an orchard of all kind of fruit trees.

Ammon on the swing set.

April and Micah with Grandma and Grandpa Passey.

I don't know why I though watching a movie was picture worthy. I just like how Micah made himself comfortable.

Blog overload--Our trip out west

Well here it comes. Almost a month of vacation out west to catch up on and post about. This may take awhile. We flew into Spokane July 13th. It was a 12-13 hour day of traveling and we were shocked and very happy with how good all the boys did on the trip.

The last time we flew, Ammon got sick and threw up every time we landed. This time we were watching as his face went from pure excitement and elation watching the ground get closer, and suddenly the smile disappeared and his face frowned and crumpled a bit, and he turned away from the window and started wimpering. But he never threw up. He cried through the airport as we went to our next gate, then crawled under the benches and fell asleep for the entire 4+ hour layover. Poor kid. Then just before boarding the next plane, as I was holding Micah and he was finally acting sleepy and cuddly, he decided to throw up instead.

This was already past everyone's bedtime in Virginia. It was 3 a.m. for us when we finally put everyone to bed at Grandma Passey's house in Washington.

The Living Museum

We took a little break from our Living Museum membership but then decided to renew it. This place is such a good place to go when it's too hot or too cold or rainy outside. The kids never get tired of the animals and exhibits. There is a front exhibit that changes every 3 months, and this time they did the dinosaur ages. I brought just one extra kid with me but 2 toddlers that don't stay by me, limits the pictures I take....I didn't even take a picture of the big T-rex that made Micah cry!

This place is always a favorite spots. They have spider crabs, hermit crabs, starfish, conk, and different things that they will take out and let the kids feel with their hands.

Our harvest

My constant dream and challenge is to be able to grow things well. I just don't have he natural knack for it, and yet really love trying and the rewards of success every once in awhile. This year, we tried again to do a little garden, which did give us a few pea pods before those dried up. We planted them a little late and it gets so hot so fast here. The beans and corn made cute little plants and that's as far as it went. and the zucchini and pumpkin in the ground almost died and then cam back to life and gave me hope before we decided to take off for more than 3 weeks. They missed me apparently.


I always have a little more luck planting in pots it seems, and our pots were doing all right, but this year I also planted cucumbers and tomatoes in a couple of home made earth boxes that someone had given me. We had to have gotten 30 cucumbers from it before our vacation and both the cucumbers and tomatoes grew about 10 feet high before tipping over. It was awesome. And my zucchini in a pot gave us 2 zucchinis (I know ANYONE can grow zucchini....apparently I am not just anyone.

Anyway these are just basking in the fun of homegrown vegetable. I accepted the fact everything might die if we left for almost a month in the heat of the summer. I did. A friend was so nice to come over and water, but alas, we came home to just a few things surviving. And Kaden asked what happened to our garden and why it's just a bunch of weeds out there....

Fine Arts Day

For a squadron playdate in the beginning of July we went to the Fine Arts Center, where they have 2 days a weeks that you can bring the kids and just let them go in a room full of supplies. This was so much fun, and is something I really don't let them do at home as much as I maybe should. Here is our friend Grace making her masterpiece.