First Day of School and Piano Guys.

Mid to end of August alway is a sad time of year for me.  It's the time when my chicks go back to school after having them around all summer.  I am odd in that I love having all my kids at home with me.  Too bad I am not more disciplined or I would homeschool.  This year, all of my kids are in school again (boys went to pre-school last year).  Last year I got the boys for half a day, and the same is true this year...so I get them most of the day for another year.  That makes my heart happy.  We have a Sophomore, 8th grader, 5th grader and 2 kindergarteners!

 They did not even want a hug, too busy and ready to get school started.  They had places to go and things to explore.  Boy were they ready.

Depending on where we live next year, and what their middle school is set up like, this potentially could be this girl's last year in elementary school.  A little heartbreaking.  She has always been and will always be Daddy's little girl.

My three elementary kiddos at their bus stop.

Knowing that this is a difficult time of year for me (close to January after Christmas is all put away) Matt surprised the girls and I with tickets to see one of our favorite groups in concert.

Piano Guys!!!!

We were so excited, and to make it even cooler we got to go to the famous Red Rocks Amphitheater in Denver.

 We found a babysitter for the boys, and 5 of us went.  It was a late night for a school night, but well worth it.

You can kind of see Jon playing his grand piano and Steve playing his Cello.

 Not much better!

These pics were all taken with my phone.  I had my really nice Nikon zoom camera with my spy lens and they told me I had to take it back to the car?!  I guess camera's with detachable lenses are not aloud, who knew.  I was super bummed, since I couldn't get a real nice pic.  Our seats were general admission, but we got there super early so we actually had pretty decent seats.  I was very pleased and excited.  It was a great night for all of us!

 We loved the show, even though we are getting home at midnight on a school night!  It was worth it!

Doesn't this rock remind you of Disney's "The Lion King"?

Such a great venue for a concert, I highly recommend any to go if the opportunity arises.

Rocky Mountain National Park

The weekend before school started we went camping in the Rocky Mountain National Park.

I am not much of a camper, but the kids sure do enjoy it.  So I grit my teeth and go along with it every once in awhile.  It is a good reminder of how to use survival skills during the Apocalypse I suppose... 

 Look at those happy faces, waiting for the fire to be built.

 Supervising the wood cutting.

 We always end up camping next to a creek, no matter where we go.  Luckily, this time, my kids stayed dry.  Usually they are water hazards.

 Enjoying dinner.  We had tin foil dinners, roasted hot dogs, had smores and we even cooked a cobbler in the dutch oven.

 After dinner relaxing.

 For breakfast we made hotcakes.  I remembered to bring everything but my camping spatula.  It is super hard to flip hotcakes with plastic forks.

 We enjoyed the weekend hiking around the National Park.  We even saw some moose!  It was a beautiful weekend.

 Anya up on the Tundra.  It has taken the grass 500 years to grow as much as it has, according to the literature we read.

 Hiking the Tundra

 We can definitely see why it's called the Rocky Mountain National Park.

 observing the Tundra.

Riding home in style.  We sure do love traveling in our Wanda the Traveling Honda.

New Arrivals!

We had two new arrivals in our extended family over the summer!  

On July 10th, her big brother's birthday, Camilla Jane arrived.

She is my brother's second kid and we love her to pieces.

 The proud papa...

 Big brother loves her too!

In August, my sister had her first baby.  He arrived before his due date like a good little boy!  Lots of dark hair and looks just like his dad.  I had the privilege of being in town when he was born.  It's so much fun to love on a newborn.  Babies just don't stay little for very long!

 Jonathan Ezekiel Victor Sebastien 

Anya was in town with me, so she got to meet her new cousin too.

Yellowstone!!

Our summer trip this year was to Yellowstone National Park. 

It was fabulous.  We ended up renting a big cabin with Matt's sister's family in Island Park, ID.  It was so fun to spend that time with them enjoying the awesome sights of Yellowstone.

The whole gaggle of us waiting for Old Faithful

Who needs to see it when you have the book mark of it!

There she blows!

The Grand Prismatic Pool

Gibson Falls

Norris Basin

I think this is all of us!

Mammoth Hot Springs

Upper Falls at Yellowstone's Grand Canyon.

Yellowstone's Grand Canyon

What?

Love these two!

Norris Basin again!

Swimming in the Firehole swimming hole.

Bison traffic jam.

We saw a Grizzly!

This was taken from our car with my normal camera lense.

We saw another Grizzly eating it's kill.  I think it is or was an Elk.  This was taken with my "spy" lense.  He was actually just a brown dot to the naked eye, very hard to see.

The Saphire pool

The loft in our cabin rental!

It was a great cabin.  It inspired us to look for a cabin to buy that we could rent out, but also use for family events.  It may never happen, but it sure is a nice dream!