4th of July in Boise

After the family reunion we drove half way home and stayed 2 nights with Rob's brother Chris and his wife Lexi. The kids had fun playing with their dog Yella. (A rescue dog and they chose a name close to what he was called before.)

Lexi showed me a pic she had with Emma last 4th of July, so we had to recreate it.  And I forgot to ask for a copy of the one from the year before.

Chris bought some water toys so the kids (and Rob and Chris) could have a battle.  Here are a ton of pics from it. We also had BBQ, the older boys went mountain biking, we all went to a skatepark, and really enjoyed Chris and Lexi's hospitality.

 

Camping

We went camping with Rob's parents back when it was cold enough to snow on us in the morning.  We found out later that my brother Taylor and his wife Kalianne were camping somewhere in the connecting canyon and also got snowed on.  In this picture Michael and Matthew were playing with lego grass.  Then that table tipped over with all of our clean water.

Christopher working on the fire.

Emma climbing on a rock.

Cheese!

That night I learned it's hard to sleep on an air matteress when pregnant and needing to roll over alot.  Emma slept next to me and Rob and slept well.  Several kids cried out in the night, and we just shush'd them back to sleep.  The next morning we had oatmeal and hot chocolate with boiled creek water.  Right as it started to snow, we went on a hike.  Zachary started crying as we were preparing to leave because he wanted to curl up under the covers again.  I just dragged him along, holding his hand because I knew he would like it once we got started.

He's in the yellow coat already enjoying the hike.

Maybe I spoke too soon.  We were hiking up a wash that Rob and the kids explored a year or so earlier.

I have a hard time smiling in selfies haha

Here are the kids on the hike.  Yes, in my 3rd trimester I climbed up those rocks to continue our hike.

Matthew "hiding"

The creek, right before we were leaving our campsite.

I wouldn't let the kids play by the creek until right before we were leaving because I didn't want to deal with wet clothes, but Makayla had fun crossing when I allowed it.

Rob, his mom, and all the kids except Emma crossed on a log.  There were 2 different crossing points.  This was easier, the above by Makayla was harder.

Family Reunion!

We shared all our pictures so we could make scrapbooks of our Loftus family reunion, but that would be too long of a blog post, so here are the ones I took, plus a pic of everyone at the end.

We had to wear masks when we stopped at a McDonald's to go to the bathroom and order dinner (It would have been hard to get the enclosed trailer through the drive through.). My mom made the kids these cute masks!

Playing at the lake.

How many kids can Grandpa fit on the canoe?

Aunt Kalianne has several on the paddle board as well.

Cielo found a little obstacle course.

Zachary and Matthew are in the back.

This is where I hung out.  In the shade, on a camp chair.

Michael paddle boarding with his cousin in the background and Zachary enjoying the water closer to shore.

After we finally got the kids to bed, the adults played. we are playing telestrations and it was soooo funny because I am such a bad drawer. (Emma learned how to climb out of the pack n play, so she was running around at 10:30 with barely any sleep before we could get her to go to bed (after the other kids were asleep.)

We had a fun campfire & songs one night.

Grandma brought stuff for crafts, so Christopher decorated a hat and made as many Y's as possible.

Yes, 3/4 kids there are mine.

The boys played Corn hole outside.  My bil, Spencer made a beautiful set.

One afternoon we made homemade ice cream.  The girl cousins are each 6 weeks apart and had so much fun together!

Everyone making ice cream.  (Then the boys went mountain biking nearby, we were staying in Sisters, Oregon.)

Emma loved that she was the youngest (by a few weeks, but her cousin Mark was shy, so she took all the attention.)

Our hike to a look out of the 3 sister.  It was easy and the perfect length for our group (and very pregnant me.)

Emma probably would have enjoyed hiking, but she enjoyed the backpack too.

We kind of hiked in 2 groups.  This was the 2nd group.  Notice it was heavy in the adult category.

Here was the first group.  Heavy on the kid category.  The girls and I were there for both pictures.

Emma and Michael's hats.

Decorating hats.

One night we had a mission dinner, which had a nice variety from so many different cultures. Pictured: Brie, enchiladas, fried dumpling, something from Estonia that had a sardine on it (not bad...I had 2-3), and adobo.  Also, we had Aloe juice and 2 desserts...flan and Blini (basically Russian crepes)

Emma kept calling Mark "Baby," which he didn't mind because his siblings call him that.  Now, 6 weeks later, when I ask her who it is she says Mark.

We hiked at some volcanic flow, way up in the mountains, but not too far from where we were staying.  It was FREEZING though, so it was a very short trip.  It looked so cool in person, too bad the pics don't do it justice.  My mom said one time they came and it was sweltering, so since the weather was comfortable at the house we stayed at, we assumed it would be the same.  Nope.  We just did the short hike because of that.

 

Family Picture!  What's hilarious is the neighbor's baby Emu (the kids named Lightning, but we found out is really Erwin), Played with the kids all week.  When we did our picture, the Emu suddenly came running out of nowhere like "Don't forget me!!"  We love that he made it in the picture, because he was a big part of the week.