Summer fun

We took the family on a one night camping trip to Idaho City with the Mennear family. We didn't arrive to the campsite until late that night. We grabed some food on the way out of town and the dinners we had prepared we ate for lunch the next day. We cooked a great breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and sausage. We took turns on the dirt bikes. Dan and Dustin got a ride in the first day before dusk and Dustin and I took a ride after breakfast. Carrie even tried out my bike and only dumped it once! For lunch we ate the foiled dinners intended for dinner.

They tasted great!
sliced potatoes
sliced carrots
ground beef
mixed in cream of mushroom soup and lipton onion soup mix

Carrie tries out my bike! She had a 15 minute lesson from Dan and they were off. I think she did pretty good. She didn't like turning it and tipped it once. Thanks guys for a fun adventure!

The Blad 4th of July Reunion

July 4th we had our Blad family reunion at our house. We did lots of activities like floating the Boise River, 4-wheeling at Tripod Meadows, swim in the subdivion's pool, date night with all adauls to play glow-in-the-dark miniture golf, spend evening at Eagle Island Park to watch fire works, and went to Idaho City to 4-wheel and dirt bike. Also each night we played games and one night played hand and foot for the championship game, which by the way Dustin and I won! We have the hand and foot trophy set up in the living room! Try and take it from us at Christmas!

Grandma and Grandpa Blad

Eagle Island Park

Grandma brought all kinds of things for the kids to play with. She had a cool glow in the dark ball attached to a string that the kids wore around their necks and glow in the dark sticks which we made funny hats and necklaces out of.



Dustin and I decided we would host the Blad reunion at our house this year! We took them exploring around the foothills on dirt bikes and 4-wheelers. We floated down rivers and lost expensive sunglasses! Both Ryan and Shawn lost their best sunglasses on the river trip. They rolled in their tube and when they came back up, no sunglasses! Shawns were even perscription sunglasses.





Dustin's youngest Brother Ben and Laura have one child,
McKayla. They brought up their own 4-wheeler and even took McKayla for a ride. They have a backpack for her and she goes with them on almost all their 4-wheeling trips!






This is Dustin's sister Dannene and family. They have two kids and one on the way (we found out in August) Cashton and Bronson.







After the river trip we ate some watermelon at the park with all the kids. Grandpa got to stay back with the little kids (McCall, Bronson, and Lucas) while we journeyed down the river for 2 hours.




McCall enjoyed the wrine and all! She gets right in there with the boys and loves to be outside exploring. She would have loved the rafting trip but she got to take a nap instead. She hung out in the shade of a big tree with grandpma Blad.

This is our attemp at taking a shot off all grandkids present. It was a huge challange but we did it!
We took the clan to Tripod Meadows all day Wednesday. They kids played in a little stream and the adults took turns riding in the hills. Eveyone loved how beautiful the trails were.



McCall and McKayla - The only two girls grandkids on the Blad side!

Summary of June Events

Andrew just loves this 4-wheeler that Grandpa brought and dropped off on his way to a rafting trip before the big Blad reunion hosted at our house. Andrew gets to ride this every time we go to Grandma and grandpa's. So he was loving having it at his house for a while. When Dustin was done working for the day Dad and him would ride it on the dirt roads by our house.


The boys really enjoy their bikes this summer. Andrew took off his training wheels this spring and Jackson followed right behind him. After this picture was taken Jackson's training wheels came off a week later (end of June). He rides all over the place now. Older brothers push along the younger one a lot faster. Jackson was potty trained by 2 1/2 and riding a bike before 3 1/2!


Drew made a trip up to Burley to sing with his coir for the opening of the new Albion Family Reunion camp. Kent along with his brother purchased the old Albion college and is turning it into a huge family reunion camp. The first building renovated is amazing! Dustin suggested to have his Dad's coir come sing for the grand opening so we drove down, took the tour, and listened to them sing.

We had our first ever Gaskill family reunion (my mom's side). Kent and Carol offered to have everyone stay on their yard right by the river in trailers. We kayaked, ate, skied, ate, made funny hats out of pipe cleaners, and ate. All the meals were excellent. It was good to see everyone again and talk about Grandma and Grandpa Gaskill whom we all miss and love dearly.

Summary of May Events

Dustin took the boys to the Father's and Son's camp out. They had lots of fun hiking and roasting smores by the camp fire. They slept in a cabin with bunks and got to stay up very late, they were asking to go to bed.





Andrew felt a little out numbered for his Preschool program. The only other boy in his class did not make it for the last day of school so Andrew had to stand up there with all these girls. Ella was his favorite (last one on the left) and he frequently asked if she could come over and play. Andrew's riding partner all year was Callie (second from the left). Andrew never did warm up all the way in class. He did get to where he would speak to Mr. Douglas and tell her things about race cars or trips we went on. He never did really get comfortable enough talking with the other kids.
For memorial day weekend we drove to Hurricane, Ut and spent a few days at the Blad plantation! We went hiking up in the Red Hills and played around the house with Ryan's family, Ben's and Dannene's. We even roasted smores up on the property one night with the older boys. Andrew thought that was pretty cool that he could stay up later than most of the other kids, especially Jackson. We drove back the old 1996 Crystler mini van in hopes to sale our Dodge Durango. We ended up selling the Honda Fit instead 7/08. No one was interested in paying $4 a gallon to fill up the Dodge!



On the hike we had nothing to carry McCall in so we made a sack out of McCall's blanket and she rode on my hip.

All the kids take a break after a long day of playing. We slept in the basement of grandma's house and the boys slept in our room on bunk beds. Andrew fell off the top bunk one night and after that I didn't sleep very well in fear that he would fall off again.

McCall liked to ride around in Grandpa's toy fire truck until Jackson or Andrew start pushing her in it really hard from behind!

Grandpa and Grandpa are the emergency preparedness specialist in their ward. They often have the dry pack sealer at their house. We brought back two bags of White wheat and canned them here with the Garden City Cannery dry pack sealer. We had people over all week from the ward using it! We got some young families thinking about their food storage!

The boys had a blast with some Beebe guns that Danna and Drew brought with us on a 4-wheeling adventure.

Andrew and his love for CARS

Andrew has been talking about becoming a race car driver for quite a while now. I recently rented a Nascar biography movie and after watching the video over a two day period he came up to me and said, "Mom, I don't want to be a race car driver, I want to be a pit crew guy." The biography was pretty intense and showed the struggles that these young boys had trying to make it as a racer. It was pretty funny that he changed his mined so quick after talking about it for months!


McCall loves to walk into daddy's office and find wires and cables to pull on. She was in there one day when daddy was working from home and he put his sound muffling headset on her. It was a funny sight. She left them on for a while...she must have been entranced by the music he had going.

Summary of March Events

McCall looking cute in her pioneer hat

Grandma Blad bought for her

Jackson celebrated his 3rd birthday with Grandma & Grandpa Blad and family.

Jackson requested a Pooh Bear cake. The cake was acually very good tasting.

Grandma & pa went in on a race track for his birthday present and they also bought him a new bike with training wheels. He picked up on it right away. He'll be riding without training wheels before his big brother!

The week before easter we went over to our old neighborhood and took part in their annual Easter egg scramble. The boys brought their baskets and filled them with eggs. They raced for eggs in age groups 0-3 and 4-7. They were even able to meet the Easter Bunny! McCall was at home sound asleep! Maybe next year McCall.

Summary of February Events

February Fun

The boys really enjoyed sledding this winter

The picture is at my moms house in McCall. The window at the start of the hill is looking out from the kitchen window.

McCall had soo much snow that the burms in the driveway almost reached the top of the car!

We made Grandma Lindy's famous Valentine's Day cookies this year!

We were able to celebrate with Kylie (my oldest niece) when they took home the state basketball championship. Kylie did awesome!

McCall turned one this month and loved her healthy muffin made with apple sauce!