Happy 4th of July from Lost Trail Hot Springs

A fishing we will go!

Watchin' Dada fish

One of 20 little cut throat the gang caught

Little fishy!

We loved, loved, loved the pool!

Beautiful Bitterroot Mountains

Our little fisher lady!

We got the heck outa Dodge for the holiday.  Away from the fireworks and heat.  Into the mountains.  We swam...alot!!  Grayson and Dada fished.  We relaxed.  And then we swam again.  Fun. Fun. Fun.  And, we were the only folks around for miles.  Had the pool to ourselves.  Ahhhhh bliss!

Finally...Summer Has Arrived

Beautiful Dickey Lake

Despite the faces, the kiddos loved the boat!

Greer loves his buddy Bad Brad

Smores..the Morstein way...with Reeses peanut butter cups!

Two weeks ago we loaded the kiddos and drove north to Dickey Lake.  Beautiful little crystal clear lake near Eureka, Montana.  A bit out of the way, but worth every mile!  We were joined by our bestest, bestest friends Brad and Sheri.  We felt like foreigners.  Though still in Montana we were surrounded on all sides by our Canadian neighbors.  Apparently Dickey Lake is a weekend destination??  Anyway, the weather was splendid and we ended up spending an entire Saturday boating on the lake.  The kids loved it!  The adults loved it.  Todd and Brad skied until their arms gave out.  It was so nice.  Hard to drive the hour home to civilization.  Finally the sun has decided to come out!  Yah!

Big Boy Bed

Big Boy Bed.

The Empress and Lil Dude checking out the new  bed.

All tucked in.

Dude is ready.  He is a good sleeper.  12 hours a night, straight through.  He has been waking up dry and is potty trained.  So, big boy bed.

We talked about buying a bed.  I had a style in mind.  Todd insisted that he could make it, and it would be much cheaper than buying it.  I knew he could make it, he is a very talented wood worker.  But, did he have the time??  Hahaha.  Time is something Todd never has enough of, so I was rather skeptical.  He insisted and for the past two weeks he spent his free time (hahaha) crafting a bed.  He made it out of Poplar.  Lovely bed.  

So today is the big day.  The big boy bed day.  Little dude was sooo very excited.  Hopefully we have picked the right time to move him to a bed.  I hope he understands that he is not to get out of the bed.  All the rules have been explained.  He seems ready.  Fingers crossed.

Sorta sad.  My baby is growing up.  He has become a little man.

Banana Bread Babies

My kids love Banana Bread.  Little Dude often asks for "Nana Bread" the minute he wakes up in the morning.  We continually buy bananas and let two or three get over ripe just so I can make banana bread.  The kids generally park themselves in front of the oven and watch, which is good for us all as it takes an hour for the bread to bake.  I sometimes think I bake it just for the peaceful hour.  Yummmmmm.

Garage Kayaking

We had planned on remodeling the kitchen this summer.  It is in great need.  I despise my kitchen.  Very small, no storage, etc....etc.  So, we located the cabinets, decided on the flooring, even looked at sinks, faucets, drawer pulls, lights, and counter stools.  The remodel would also include new flooring in the entire upstairs, as our carpeting is pulled up, stained and generally awful.  But, time became the question.  When and how were we going to squeeze this in?  We also needed to redo the fence.  T is gone much of the summer working.  The remodel, minus the flooring, was going to be all him.  So, I conceded.  It would be done next year. 

The trade off.....well, the kayak we have had our eyes on for a couple years.  We have one sea kayak, and up until the arrival of little dude, we had used the cargo hold on it as the empress' seat.  Since dude's arrival there has only been one little outing and that was in a demo of the kayak we ultimately bought. 

So, I am sad about the kitchen, but happy about the kayak.  At the moment it is ensconced in the garage as the weather has yet to cooperate.  This weekend we are planning our maiden voyage...rain or shine.

Wet Weekend

Despite the weather we loaded up and headed to the woods for Memorial Day weekend.  We knew it would rain.  We hoped to get some breaks in the diluge in order to kayak, hike and enjoy a campfire.  Good news is, we were able to build a fire, roast hot dogs, and make messy smores.  The bad news is...it was short lived.  Saturday night, after we all slipped into our cozy beds, it started raining....and it never stopped.  It poured.  It dumped.  Ughhh.  So, Sunday, we had a cozy, relaxed day in the trailer.  Two parents, two kids, and a rain weary pug.  We watched movies, played games and napped.  By evening we decided we all needed some air and ventured into the wet woods.  We sloshed.  The pug paddled.  At the end of our walk we were all drenched.  But, in the end it was about spending time together, as a family.  We talked about staying home. But had we, I would have cleaned and washed, the kids would have played and Daddy would have worked.  In short, we wouldn't have spent much time together.  Not what we planned, but the wet woods turned out to be just what the family needed.

The Hair Affair

Well... before I continue I have to apologize to Nana Zana.  She has been patiently waiting for this post for so very long now.  Sorry Mom....I just haven't been able to carve out a single spare minute for a post. 

The Empress has had several (three to be exact!) prior hair mishaps.  She has been banned from the use of scissors for the very reason that she seems drawn to cutting her hair.  First time was in Dillon while visiting Nana and Papa, the second time involved a call from her school and another little girl's missing hair, and the third involved some gum and sneaking scissors outside to dispose of the problem...see, she is also not allowed to have gum.  When the most recent hair affair happened we had just finally successfully grown out her bangs and her hair was nearly to her bum.  Long, dark and lovely!

So, Friday morning a couple weeks back I prepared breakfast for the Empress and then, like usual, went back to her bedroom to pick out her school clothes for the day.  I immediately noticed candy wrappers in her bed.  Very unusual as I was unaware of any candy in our house, and she is not allowed to eat candy on any sort of regular basis.  So, I snatched up the wrappers and headed back towards the kitchen.  Before I could even open my mouth to reprimand her for the candy in bed, she popped out from behind the corner with a pair of scissors in one hand and in the other a fistful of hair.  What??  I was literally away from the kitchen for 30 seconds.  Apparently, according to her rushed attempt at an explanation, she had crawled up into the cupboard and found a bag of candy we had collected last year at the Labor Day Parade.  Hmmmm.  Didn't even know that was there.  She fell asleep with a sucker in her mouth and it had fallen out of her mouth and tangled itself in the underneath part of the back of her hair.  Ugh.  I was mortified and I quickly explained to her that I could of gotten the sucker out with a little warm water.  After my mother's tirade regarding lying, candy, rotten teeth, and missing hair poor little thing was reduced to tears.  I felt awful, she felt awful, and her hair...welll, her hair....looked awful.  In my limited and very sporatic wisdom I deduced that an apt punishment would be a haircut.  A short, short haircut.  So, after school I picked her up, we went to the salon and she got all of her hair cut off to her chin and had bangs cut in.  She loves it.  I love it.  So much for punishment!  And, it was free as we were able to donate a very long, dark, beautiful braid to locks of love.

So, the moritorium on scissors in our house stands.  Candy has been banned.  Hoping that we don't have another mishap as there is not much hair remaining!