Background

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Family Get Together at Bob and Buffy's Homestead in Danville, WA

This year we planned to have a family get together at Bob and Buffy's place in Danville, WA.  Danville is located one-two miles away from the Canadian border, as Bob is a Border Partrolman...(is that the correct term?)  We had a great time with some of the best food and certainly the best hosts ever.
 Bob and Buffy's Homestead.  They have a great barn, huge shed and a little cabin on the property.
 View from the stand point of Jeeping...
 Dear Sweet Hannah!  She camped with us in our tent trailer.  We love her!
 Just one picture that needs to portray the listing of numerous animals on the property....rabbits, bunnies, chickens turkeys, a horse, dogs, cats, and I'm sure, may other animals unknown to the human species...did I miss anything?
 some brand new bunnies, just barely old enough for us to hold - sooo cute!
 amazing awesome garden!  One Telisha would be drooling over...
 once we got Hyrum and Hannah in the Jeep they loved going with Landon and Uncle Eldon everywhere!  Landon became Hyrum's hero, at least for the weekend, if not for all time.
 Here's Tami and us below all looking for plant fossils...hacking away carefully to hopefully unfold a beautiful mystery....but some of us didn't have enough patience for the task....
 as you can see, here is Landon, just hammering at the rocks.  I'm not sure he's going to find any fossils this way...
 If you look close, you can find Buffy, Grandma Berry and Bob diligently and carefully trying to uncover the fossils.
 We then went to a campground to relax and enjoy the rest of the afternoon.  Here is Hannah loving Landon.  The goggles are for the lake Hannah and others played in.  Too cold for most of us to jump in.
Meanwhile, Hyrum runs around trying to catch a yellow butterfly.  Hyrum eventually wins!  The butterfly is caught only to be released shortly after.

 Leave it to Uncle Eldon to find something fun to do.  The wind was slightly blowing so he decided to put together a sailboat with our dinner plate and a piece of wood and a stick.  Always the clever guy...love it!
 Perfect sailing.
 Landon as we know him best....jumping.
 Our little nature walk around the lake that ended up taking us two hours?  I loved it!
 Seriously, there is a beaver in the center of this picture.  I kid you not.
and then there was the strange bugs found here and there....this one landed on Landon.  Why does he get all the action?
Thanks for the great time Bob and Buffy!
I should have taken pictures of the meals they fixed, they were incredible!  I mean incredible!  Now, why didn't I think of that sooner?!?!?!?!?

Our favorite moment was when we were getting ready to go to church and Hannah just kept repeating the words, while pacing outside...."If I don't get to ride in the Jeep, I'm not going to church."  "If I don't get to ride in the Jeep, I'm not going to church.".....etc., etc., etc. Then noticing that no one had paid much attention to her, stated, "I'm very distraught!"
Love that girl!

Enumclaw 1st Ward Annual Beach Trip...usually not so rainy...

The Youth packed up their gear, food and clothes and headed to Ocean Shores, WA for the annual Youth Beach Trip....little did they know what this year had in store...but these youth always "rise above the clouds" and make everything they do memorable!
 Landon, Addison Dickson, Jeremy Koontz, Steve Thompson
 Stacy Dickson, Sammy Johnson - and yes, it was that kind of weather...
 playing games in the tent trailer...thank heavens for a dry place to land...

 and Hatch's van, the second dry place to hang out.  We're not quite sure what they all did in there for that many hours with that many people, but we never heard one complaint, nope not one the entire wet weekend.  I love these youth!
Rob Tuttle, Jordon Koontz and Scott Harston
 Keith Harston, James Packer, Landon

 Rebecca Johnson, Jordon Koontz and Sister Johnson
 Keith Harston, Jeremy Koontz, Cory Smith, etc....



It rained the moment we drove in and the sun came out 5-10 minutes before we drove away.  But seriously, I never heard one complaint from any of these wonderful youth!  Give it up for having a great time at the beach, come rain or shine!

Semisi Plays Soccer in Seattle!

We had the rare priviledge of having Semisi in town to play in his soccer tournament.  They played in Tukwila, which is about 30-40 minutes away from our home.  We loved going to watch him play!  We were able to find him, because he seemed to carry himself just like his Dad, Kevin.  Here's some pics of his great playing skills!  Love it!
Misi's number 13.... 



Looks a lot like his dad!  Handsome guy, don't ya think!
 



 We could not believe how fast this guy could run!  He could go from 0 to 60 in 4 seconds...I swear!


We also got to pick Misi up from his hotel room and take him Jeeping for a morning.  Thanks for the fun times!  Semisi is awesome!

Landon Hard At Work...Summer of 2011

Landon has been working for the Findlay family in our ward.  Recently he's been doing a lot of pressure washing....needless to say, he's really gotten into his work....
 Yes, these are jeans covered/caked in mud.

Gotta love good hard "clean" work.

4th of July on the EastSide of Chinook


 Here we are at the summit of Chinook Pass.  There was still 15-20 ft high snow banks, and here it is the July 4th weekend!  Amazing!
Andrew Johnson came with us for the weekend.  Love having that boy around...

 These are the fish ladders that are located at Little Naches, where we camped for the weekend.

Jeeping to our hearts content.  The weather was wonderful, company and food was great and we hardly ever saw another Jeep on the trails.  Couldn't have asked for anything more.  And if you come home with a clean Jeep, well....then you haven't been Jeeping....
 Andrew watching Landon do the work....Andrew kept busy carving me a canoe and paddle, which by the way, turned out amazing!  Way to carve Andrew!


 Boys and their toys...
 Landon suddenly climbs tree!

 Eldon wishing he could climb tree....

Of course, we got back in time to enjoy some fireworks!...just the explosive kind though....nothing that was pretty....We enjoyed a safe, happy, festive, sunny weekend!  We hope all of you did too!