A week after Melissa left, my parents came to play with us for a week. {{{sigh. how lovely to have family come stay!}}}
The first evening they were here, as we were driving to dinner, a bear ran across the road in front of us! It's the first one we've seen since moving here (although we have ward members who often talk about them being in their yards). Welcome to SANDPOINT!
The next morning, the girls began the day bright and early by asking Grandma to help them stitch up a couple of their stuffed animals that I'd refused to patch because A) I'd already done it once before or B) I was just waiting to throw them away. :) But not Grandma! She saved all of them. And in the process decided to teach my girls how to hand-sew some little finger puppets with my stash of felt. They LOVED it. When I asked them if they wanted to keep sewing or go to the beach, without hesitation they exclaimed, "SEW!!! YAY!!!" :)
It was a lovely day spent enjoying the sunshine on the back porch in pajamas.
My parents brought with them their inflatable kayak and since we have our raft, the next afternoon we decided to float down the Pack River. It was a perfect way to spend a hot day.
About halfway down the river, we stopped at one of the many little sandy washes to play and swim for a while. The water was perfect and so, so pretty!
Dad and Nels enjoying this perfect swimming hole!
Nels worked on perfecting his dive. :)
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| His Swan Dive begins with such fabulous form . . . |
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| . . . but look at those feet! His entry really needs some work if he really wants to expect high ranks. :) |
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| Clara LOVED climbing up the sandy banks! (and being out of her life jacket!) |
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| There were so many animal tracks. This is a raccoon, but there were also various birds, deer, and moose ---- and a lot of little Chick tracks. |
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| I know I should be ashamed for letting her do this, but she was just SO HAPPY! :) She had a grand time slurping up river water out of the sand. :) |
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| Nels decided it was easier to steer our raft lying down in the front. :) |
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| SO PERFECTLY BEAUTIFUL! |
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| The girls loved riding with Grandma and Grandpa! |
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| Waiting for pick up at the end. |
The next day we headed down to Farragut State Park. That morning, while working out, Nels had pulled a muscle in his back. - I think that his back was just really tired from all the rowing the day before and while working out, the muscles were so fatigued that he tweaked it the wrong way. He spent the day drugged up with ibuprofen, in pain, flat on his back at home. Poor boy!
Oh well! Can't let that end our fun! :)
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| Lilie's fancy knots at the Brig Museum. |
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| My kids are so awesome! They don't need anything more than a drinking fountain to get soaking wet. :) |
Aside from the WWII historical significance of Farragut, my dad had another connection with the park that made it worthwhile to spend a hot afternoon here.
When my dad was 16, he attended the 1969 Boy Scout Jamboree here. I really enjoyed him telling us about it. Below is the Friendship Tower constructed during that time.
The girls were disappointed that I didn't have swimming on our list of to-do's while in Farragut, but we did find this playground in one of the beautiful campgrounds. All around were the most gorgeous bushes blooming underneath the pines. It took us a while, but my mom and I finally tracked down their name. Ocean Spray. Gorgeous!
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| According to Elsie, this is how princesses swing. So serene! :) |
The girls were pretty bummed that we only stayed to play for about 30 minutes, but we bribed them with huckleberry ice cream in Bayview on the way home.
The next morning, we woke up with the power out. - It seems to happen here quite often when there's a big rain storm. - So we packed everyone up and headed to the Panhandler for breakfast!
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| Yes. Hazel is wearing a cape. :) |
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| He may look to be "smiling" but that's actually a grimace. :) He was still in a significant amount of pain and sitting in that hard booth was kind of excruciating. |
Since Nels was out of commission again for the day, my mom and I didn't feel too bad about sending him and my daddy-o back home with the kids to play video games and watch movies while we spent the day downtown shopping. :) I'm going to believe that getting 40% off at the Coldwater Creek store is only a "perk" of coming to visit us and not her sole purpose. :) Just kidding. We had a great time together and it was really nice for me to be able to browse around downtown without my "entourage" and 10 extra hands trying to pull everything off the shelves. :)
Sunday after church, we again left Nels at home with Clarie while we took the girls hiking at Gold Hill in Sagle. It was a really fun evening and the girls did SO great. They sang and skipped and pretended to be dragons mile after mile. :) I was extra happy that with all the noise the girls were making we didn't run into any bears. :) We weren't able to make it all the way to the lookout point, since we'd started so late in the day, but it was wonderful anyway.
Monday morning, amid my tears, my parents headed home. Thank you so much, Mom and Dad! I love you both so much and having you here was just perfect!
