Dangerous Toffee

Teresa, your toffee was SO GOOD! The good thing about it is that it was sooooo good!!! The bad thing about it is that I ate almost all of it today ALL BY MYSELF! I'm hoping that it all counts towards only today's calorie count and I don't have to punish myself for it tomorrow.

Christmas Carnage

We had a wonderful Christmas. Everything went much more smoothly than in years past. Maybe it's because the kids are getting older.

I got an iFlip and just had to share this great new video I took after everything was opened! :) I think I'll have a lot of fun with it. Feel free to scroll down on my blog and pause my music to better hear the video.

Up and Moving

We finally got our Windows 7 CD in the mail, but unfortunately I was too sick to do anything about it. I am just getting over being sick for 2 weeks. I came down with the flu. Then it turned into bronchitis and by the time I went to the doctor he told me it was settling into pneumonia. 11 stinking days with a fever and just being able to lay on the couch! At least I've been able to still eat through the whole ordeal, although I haven't had much of an appetite. Also, thank goodness for facebook. At least I didn't feel completely isolated!

I looked at my posts for November and it's shameful. I MUST get on top of this blog thing! I really do like to blog . . . so once I get this Windows 7 installed, I will also go ahead and install my photoshop, microsoft office, and my homesite. Then I will truly be up and running with nothing hanging over my head. :)

I've had to take a little leave from my exercising which I love so much and I hope to be able to return on Monday. Last night my visiting teachers were so kind and they brought in dinner - which was quite tasty! Also, there was so much food that we get to eat leftovers tonight and I don't have to get up and cook. It really was a relief to have one thing less to do when right now I get out of breath just standing.

I'm hoping that by the time I post again I'll be going full swing and will be able to post some nice, colorful, happy, long-awaited, already-behind-the-times pictures of my family and of our trip.

I'm All Backed Up

I just don't feel like I can get on top of anything!!! Here I sit in my very messy house with luggage still to be unpacked, an empty fridge, coupons needing to be clipped, piles of dirty laundry in various areas of the house, and Halloween costumes still where we left them when we took them off. Not to mention the phone list of people to call for primary and the shopping list for the dinner we are hosting. Oh and I also need to find some time put together a project for Athena on Rich County and prepare a spiritual message for my presentation on Friday.

I have over 750 pictures waiting to be posted and talked about, but I haven't yet downloaded Photoshop onto the new computer because I am waiting to receive my Windows 7 in the mail.

Yet . . . here I sit on facebook, IM, and blogspot. Hmph.

How is it the Christmas season already? Where did the past few months go? Does life ever really slow down or does it just continue to get busier and busier until we all just pop?

On a good note, Jeremy and I just returned home from a wonderful vacation in Mexico. We got to experience our first tropical storm turned hurricane, but still had a good time. The kids are all so happy to be back in their own environment and I am working on finding my routine again. Thankfully the Lord has blessed us all to be back together again safely and in good health. :)

I think I'll go make some lunch.

More Laundry Now :)

This little sweetheart is adding to my laundry load by being POTTY TRAINED!!!! :) I started potty training Alexandra last Monday and she is doing awesome. :) So now I get to throw a few little tiny pairs of panties into the laundry instead of having a garbage can full of dirty diapers. I'll take that for sure.

She has actually been ready to potty train for a couple of months now, but I kept putting it off. I finally found a week where we would be home for most of the time and decided to go for it. She was so excited!!! I set the timer for 45 minutes and every 45 minutes we would go into the bathroom and have her sit on her potty. For this week she has only had about 5 accidents and is even starting to go on her own. She even told me yesterday that she needed to go!

Usually I'm so ornery when I potty train a kid because it's so stressful for me. She has really been wonderful and I'm glad to see diapers coming to an end. :) Now we only have to buy them for night time.

Hooray!!

Another Member in Our Family!

I'm so happy! Last Saturday Samantha was baptized and given the gift of the Holy Ghost. :)
Everything went really well, and luckily for her, the water in the font was warm. Both of her Grandmas were able to give talks for her program because she was the only kid in our ward getting baptized for the day. It was nice!

Our bishop conducted and he also shared this spotlight about Samantha that she and I filled out that morning:

I was baptized on October 10, 2009.
Favorite food: meat and philly steak sandwiches
Favorite color: all the colors
Favorite place to go: Yellowstone and West Yellowstone
Favorite book: Horses & Ponies
Favorite primary song: Scripture Power and When I am Baptized
Favorite scripture story: Prince of Egypt
Favorite vacation: California
Favorite things to do: play barbies, My Little Pony, Polly Pockets, go swimming, vacations, learn
Some things my parents think are especially great about me:
strong testimony, always gives it her all, strong willed, loves to learn, outgoing, happy

This is a picture of all who attended Samantha's baptism (minus the primary presidency and the bishop). You can click on it for a larger view. Thank you all for coming!


Here is Samantha with the priesthood bearers who stood in the circle to assist in her confirmation.

Our little family.

Just Jeremy and I with Samantha.

I'm so grateful for the blessing we have of having another baptized member of the church in our home and for the spirit it brings into our home. I love Samantha very much and can't imagine my life without her. She is a wonderful part of our family!

We Have an 8 YEAR OLD!!!

Samantha had a birthday!!! Her birthday was really on September 25th and I'm just really late in putting together these posts, but the birthday pictures were REALLY taken on her actual birthday.

Samantha is a very unique little girl who knows exactly what she wants and isn't afraid to ask for it. She has always been this way and as she gets older she is definitely using this trait for good. She has a strong testimony of the gospel and tries her very best to do what's right. I'm proud of her. :)

One funny thing about her is that she has pulled all of her own teeth. I don't even know when her teeth are loose anymore. She just comes into the room holding a tooth and shows me the bloody gums in her mouth! She just prefers to do things on her own no matter what the results will be.

For her birthday she knew exactly what she wanted for dinner/dessert. No beating around the bush. For dinner she picked Dip Sandwiches (homemade philly steak 'n cheese sandwiches dipped in au jus). Dessert was Pumpkin Chiffon Pie with cream on top. YUM! Because of her pick, I spent most of her birthday morning in the kitchen, cooking . . . but isn't that what moms are for?

We all went for a movie in the afternoon and invited the grandparents to come over dinner and gifts in the evening. As you can see, she had a great time opening her presents. Here she is holding up some new barbie clothes. The package even includes a suit for Ken!
She was happy to be able to read the cards herself.

Until she got to the cursive! This is when Athena stepped in to help. It was so cute to watch them try to read the birthday card together. Finally neither of them could figure it out so they had to hand it to Grandma to have her read her own writing in the card to Samantha.

After presents we delved into the pie! I like that Samantha chose pie because cake has never been a favorite of mine. Little kids like decorated kids. Older kids get a little more sophisticated and request treats that actually taste good. YEAH!

Thank goodness I could only fit 3 candles on this piece of pie instead of 8. She barely got them all out.

I love having Samantha in our family. She is a blessing to us all and I love seeing her learn and grow. I'm especially excited to have another baptized member of the church in our home. I look forward to watching her take more responsibility and grow in her gospel knowledge.

Fruits of My Labor

Here are the fruits of my labor during conference.

I made grape juice for the first time unassisted! :) It was fun, but extremely time consuming. I juiced 2 bushels of grapes and came out with 38 bottles of grape juice! It's really good, we had it for breakfast this morning.

With all of my leftover time, so for one session, I worked on this puzzle. I love puzzles and that's really my favorite conference past time - not making grape juice. I guess you do what you have to do, right?

The kids were actually not too bad this time for conference. We did have plenty of moments where they got "shushed", but for the most part it didn't get out of hand to the point where I was wondering why we watch it at all. It certainly helped that we still have naptime for 2 of them! Athena and Samantha were really good about finding quiet activities and listening. All the kids were quite interested in the grape juice making process and they took turns helping me wash the grapes. If I dared turn that whole job over to them I would because it's my LEAST favorite part, but I'm too picky about how the grapes get washed. Overall, I'd have to say it was a good and productive weekend!

Things That Are Sharp

Today at Macey's I got a balloon for Nathan and Alexandra. Nathan kept hitting Alexandra in the head with his balloon and I told him he had better stop it or I was going to pop his balloon.

We got in the car and as we were headed home he asked me:

"Mom, what pops a balloon?"
"Things that are sharp." I answered.

He thought for a minute and then asked, "Are toenails sharp?"

Nice Addition to My Day

Today I was in the middle of my scripture reading when the doorbell rang. Standing at my door were 2 nice ladies who were knocking doors in our neighborhood sharing spiritual messages from the bible. I told them that I just happened to be in the middle of my own scripture study. They asked what I was reading about and I told them that I was reading in the Book of Mormon, which is another testament of Christ. I told them that I was in the middle of reading about Korihor and I gave them a summarized version of that story. I also added how everything on our earth denotes that there is a God and how interesting it is that people can act like they don't believe when there is evidence all around us that He lives.

They then related that to a story in the bible and started talking about how angels visited people in the bible and it's so important for us to read the word of God because angels don't visit us now and we need to learn from the people who have been visited long ago.

I told them - oh, I do believe that angels still visit us. They looked a little surprised and said, "Well, they don't visit people on earth anymore, but we can read about them in the bible and learn from what they tell us." I said, "No, I believe that God loves us just the same now as he did then. Our world has changed so much since then and I believe that God has a continuing interest in us. There is no reason why he wouldn't be talking to us now just like he did then. We can receive personal inspiration from him and I do believe that He and his angels still talk to prophets today."

They just stood there with a nice smile on their faces. I then thanked them for being willing to come and spend their time sharing spiritual messages with people and told them to have a nice day.

I didn't really know that I would have the opportunity to share my testimony with someone today because it doesn't seem to come along that often. The knock seemed to come at the perfect time. I do know that God lives, that he loves us, and that he continues to reveal His word to us so that we may know the truth and live righteously. He wants us to return to live with Him again. I love the Lord and am grateful to have this knowledge in my life instead of having to wonder and have unanswered questions.

Busy Brain

I have so many things going through my head lately that I have to remind myself to take it all just one step at a time. I really like being busy and I'm actually considering starting to make lists! I just got called to be the 2nd counselor in the Primary for our ward. I'm excited about the calling and I'm excited to serve my ward. In thinking through this week, I just started to feel so super overloaded, so I thought maybe if I write it out I won't be quite so overwhelmed with everything that I need to be doing.

Here is what is in my head for this week:

Monday:
-Cut coupons from 15 coupon magazines and file them in their correct categories in my coupon book.
-Reorganize Nathan's closet by taking out clothes that are too small. Replace all the old little hangers with the new normal sized hangers I bought at Walmart on Saturday. Hang all hand-me-downs that fit now in their new reorganized places.
-Keep eye on Max for every time he has to go potty so he has no more accidents and take him out
-Fold laundry, clean, vacuum
-Post to blog and index 50 names
-Come up with dinner and dessert for FHE
-Teach aerobics to community class
-Preschool for Nathan
-Contact everyone about Samantha's baptism and plan big family meal

Tuesday
-Go visiting teaching to Jenn at 9am
-Read through some of primary manual
-Athena choir
-Samantha dance
-Make dinner for family and then make casserole to furnish for Enrichment night.
-Go to Enrichment meeting
-Primary meeting to discuss writing primary program
-Make it to Macey's and hope they still have the eggs for 58 cents/doz, oh and buy sour cream

Wednesday
-Go visiting teaching to Laura at 9am
-Read through more of primary manual
-Sort through 4 big bags of hand-me-down clothes for Athena and Samantha
-Athena dance
-Wedding shower for good friend
-Athena, Samantha, and Nathan soccer pictures
-Athena, Samantha, and Nathan soccer games
-go to aerobics and possibly teach kick boxing

Thursday
-continue reading primary manual and hope I'm retaining some of it
-Nathan gymnastics
-Athena, Samantha, and Nathan soccer games
-Bring treats for Athena's soccer game
-teach aerobics to the community class

Friday
-breath and play settlers with Daddy for the afternoon

Saturday
-Play 2 volleyball games with the relief society for stake volleyball
-Go to BYU game with Jeremy

I think by the time Friday comes this week I'll be so grateful! And yes, it most certainly did help to type it all out. I hope I didn't forget anything.

Playing School

I am a cheapskate.

I had Nathan signed up for preschool this year, but the $50/month chunk of change wasn't sounding so good to me, so I called and cancelled and decided I can teach him some things at home. Well, I think that preschool would really do both of us some good - him for the learning, me for the sanity - but it's really hard to justify spending that much money just so I can send him off.

Anyway . . . I told Nathan I was going to teach him preschool from home this year. He was pretty excited. I planned on starting doing extra things with him after Labor Day. So, yesterday he came upstairs with Samantha's old backpack on his back and said with a big grin, "OK Mom! I'm ready for school!" I knew he was pretending that he was going to school, but he just looked so cute and excited and I decided to play along.

I told him that he would be going to pretend school in just a minute. I got a few things out of the cupboard for him and started talking to him in my "school teacher voice". In a very orderly fashion I told him to find a hook to hang his backpack on, sit quietly at the table with his arms folded, and then wait for the rest of the class so we could get started. He went and hung his backpack on the pantry doorknob and very quietly sat down at the table with his arms folded! I've never seen this side of Nathan! It was so cute!!!

We continued playing teacher and student. I got him to write his name (which he was SUPER excited about) and then I got out the paints and let him try painting a little. He was very respectful and obedient the whole time. At the end of "school" I told the "class" that I would call their tables to get their backpacks and sit back down. His table was the green table. I called a bunch of different colored tables to get their backpacks. When I said, "OK . . . now green table go and get your backpacks" he hurried over to where it was hanging, put it on, and sat in his seat. Then I had him line up behind me with his backpack on and we walked to the front door like he was headed out to meet his parents. Then I went in the house and left him outside.


When he came in the house to be home from school, I was back to being his mother. I asked him how school was and what he did at school and he sat and told me ALL about it. Then he said with a quirky giggle, "Mom, it's funny. My teacher looked just like you. And she had the same clothes as you."

I guess if this works to get him excited about school, then we will be doing this a couple of times a week!

Just For Fun

I was looking at some of my summer pictures and came across these beauties.

This is when we went up to Grandma Lynda's campsite for dinner. I love this picture because it has all of us in it and we all look decent. That's quite the requirement for a blog!


Jeremy's mom goes up the canyon quite often and everyone is always welcome to come up and spend the evening. We went up and roasted hot dogs, hung out around the fire, and later made smores. It's nice that our kids are getting a little older and can be more responsible around the fire pit (for the most part).

This was taken the next day. We were all playing outside and I sent Alexandra in to get some shoes. She found Samantha's boots. I guess if she is able to walk in them, then it works!

They're All Out to Get You

This year has been the year of the wasp at our house. We have them swarming on everything! It's been very frustrating because they especially seem to love our back deck and the playset. Every time we go outside, there is always a wasp coming to check us out. I have had to keep the kids away from the playset for fear of them getting stung. Jeremy has sprayed all the hives he can find and has knocked them down, but they still are everywhere and seem to be constantly scoping for the next building spot.

I was outside in our front yard and noticed that the wasps are now swarming around our trees - the white birch and the maple. If any of you know a special trick that REALLY works to get rid of them, I'd love to hear it!

Well, all of this stupid swarming did actually claim a victim. Jeremy took Max out to go potty and he was sniffing around as usual. He got curious about something in the grass and then started whining after a minute. Jeremy brought him in and sure enough, he found a wasp and there was a little stinger hanging out of his lip! Jeremy removed the stinger while I held Max down. He was putting up quite a little fight. Once the stinger was out, Max just laid down and didn't want to move. I looked over and saw the damage. Notice the fat lip?

Here is a little better view. Sad as it was, it was kind of funny to watch Max because he just couldn't figure it out. He kept sticking out his tongue and licking his lips, then shaking his head.

I just hope he is the only victim and rest of us are spared. Dumb wasps.

First Day of School

This year Athena is in 4th grade and Samantha is in 2nd grade. It's so crazy for me to see them growing up so quickly! As usual, they had their school clothes all picked out a week ago and have been so excited to put them on.

I always tell the girls they can't wear their new clothes until the very first day of school. They say their clothes are "locked". They are very excited to have their clothes "unlocked" now.

I curled both their hair special for their big day. Athena was saying to me this morning in a very grown-up voice, "I bet all the girls will have their hair curled today."

Here they are at the school ready to go in.

It's a little sad to have them back in school again. This summer went so fast, but I think it mostly went so fast because we were busy doing so many fun things. So, I guess it's a good thing that we had a lot of fun together. The structure of school will be nice too - I'll just miss having them around.

What I've Been Doing

I haven't posted to my blog lately because I've been playing FarmVille on facebook. Thanks a lot, Cynthia, for getting me hooked!

I have also gotten back into indexing and I finally indexed another 150 names this past week. :)

We finally finished school shopping and I got the girls enough clothes to allow them to express their individual styles without spending an over-the-top amount. I'm just glad it's done because spending all that money REALLY stresses me out!

I've been canning the stuff from our garden. I have finished 14 jars of tomatoes and have another big bowlful to work on with plenty more tomatoes still ripening in the garden. We attempted to grow and bottle green beans this year, but all of our beans turned out gross. They were kind of hollow and tough. I think we picked them too late and also didn't have a very good variety. My mom and dad were kind enough to give us some beans from their garden to bottle this year. I don't even like green beans and claim to be allergic, but Athena and Jeremy both gobble them up.

Unfortunately this week hasn't been warm enough to go swimming, so we have been spending a lot of time at home finding other things too do (FarmVille). LOL I decided this last week of summer I would let the kids get in a lot of playtime. They have played outside a ton, played with friends, enjoyed the DS, and the playstation. I hope they have had a great kid summer and will be ready to go back to school.

Gummi Bears Work Wonders!

Tonight for family home evening, our lesson was about reverence. All 4 of my kids were reverent throughout the whole lesson! Even Nathan (4 yrs old) and Alexandra (2 years old)! That is a MIRACLE.

Why? Good old fashioned bribery - and it worked like a charm! At the beginning of my lesson, I asked them all to zip their mouths closed and fold their arms and I was going out of the room to get something they all want. None of them moved a muscle as I went to the kitchen, shuffled through the cupboard, and found some gummi bears.

For the rest of our lesson, the 3 older kids were quiet, respectful, listened, and even answered my questions by raise of hand. :) As they answered questions or were sitting nicely, I would throw out a gummi. Upon seeing this, the other kids were prompt to sit up or refold their arms. Awesome!

My New Job: Wedding Photographer

Before the ceremony got started, I took a few bridal shots.
What a perfect model, she looks so blissful!

On second thought, maybe she is having doubts after all.

Looks like we are going through with it. The wedding is about to begin.

Here is the wedding party.

Samantha had the privilege of helping them take their vows.

Then the pretend ring exchange.

You may kiss the bride!

. . . and off they go!

Athena and Samantha put together this wedding ceremony. They dressed the bride and groom in their best attire and then got themselves dressed to the hilt as well. I especially thought it was cute to watch Nathan. He was the first one they dressed and he was so proud to be wearing such a handsome suit. Then as they got Alexandra and themselves ready, he just patiently sat and waited the whole time - in his suit! He was actually excited to play this game and he just played along the whole time - happy to be the groom. Alexandra wasn't especially fond of her wedding dress, but she managed to make it all the way through the wedding before ripping it off.

Ahhhh . . . summer! Kids are forced to be creative with all their spare time and they actually find that it's a lot of fun. :)

Our Last Day Together

After going to the mountains for 2 days in a row, our Hungarian girls were really wanting to see the lake . . . as in, Utah lake. We told them it was gross and really wasn't worth seeing. Apparently they have a large, beautiful lake at home where everyone goes to swim and play. They really wanted to go to Utah lake anyway, so we packed up all our stuff and drove out there. Right away, they understood why we told them it wasn't worth visiting. The beach was really disgusting and the water was green and too shallow to swim.

We tried to make the best of it, so we unpacked our chairs and stayed for a little while. The kids didn't seem to mind the conditions and had fun playing in the water anyway.
This is our little area. We moved from the first area because there was a rotten watermelon sitting on the ground and a bunch of roofing pieces and nails scattered everywhere. So, this is the "better" spot.

Athena and Samantha gave us a good laugh. They took the noodles out into the water and sat on them. Then they would blow water out the ends. So all we could see is a little fountain of water and then a bunch of giggles - over and over.

We stayed at the lake for about an hour. I apologized to Bori and Aggie that the lake was so yucky and Bori said, "Well you did warn us!"

We thought it would be fun to have the girls cook for us and they were excited to do it, so on the way home we stopped at Walmart and got the ingredients they needed and they cooked up a quick Hungarian meal for us.

It was a tasty combination and really simple. They just cooked up some pasta and bacon. Then they made a sauce with cottage cheese, sour cream, and basil. They put the pasta in a casserole dish, poured the sauce on top, the bacon on the top of that, and cooked it for about 1/2 hour.

It was actually really good and the kids loved it! Bori said it was just a fast meal because normally they eat things that take quite a bit longer to put together. We really didn't have much time, but it was fun to let them make something for us. :)

Sundance With Our New Friends

The day after Payson Lakes, we found ourselves in nature again - this time on a grander scale. Bori and Aggie wanted to meet up with some other dancers and go to Sundance, so we left early and went to meet their friends. We all drove up to Sundance and decided to ride the lift and then hike to Stewart Falls. The other host family didn't come with us, so it was just our little family and 7 of the dancers.

This is the back of Mt. Timponogos from the ski lift.Jeremy, Nathan, Alexandra, and I shared a lift chair. Nathan and Alex were so excited to be riding on the lift. They both held on the whole way and they kept just looking all around and giggling. Nathan got a real kick over the mountain bikers that were riding on the trails under the lift. He kept yelling out to them and laughing when they would go off jumps.

This is the view looking behind us.

Once we made it to the top, the views were spectacular! Turned out to be a perfect place for pictures.

This is the Hungarian group we went with. I didn't ever get the names of the men in the group! LOL! We just spent the day with them. The girls from L to R are Agnes, Bori, Katie, and Dalma.

I didn't know there were monkeys up here, but Jeremy found some and took a picture really quick.

Once all the pictures were done, we started our hike towards Stewart Falls. Jeremy and I have never hiked to the falls from this direction, so it was an adventure for all of us.

I had Alexandra on my back, and within about 10 minutes of hiking, I could feel a deadweight little blob on my back. Sure enough . . . she was fast asleep.

Check out how big this tree is! The girls had a little fun trying it on for size. I would have been up there, but Alexandra was still on my back.

And look at the size of that stump! Cute Nathan.

Once we stopped at the big tree, Alexandra woke up. Aggie offered to give me a break, so she took Alex and I took her bag. She carried Alex for quite awhile up on her shoulder. Jeremy asked her if Alex was getting too heavy for her and she replied,"Not at all! My costume is heavier than her."

Here we are bringing up the rear. Nathan discovered these giant dandelions on the hike and LOVED them. He was trying to collect them and kept getting behind.

Ahhhhh, sweet. I got this lovely flower from my sweetie and had to check out how I looked with the camera. What else do you do when you don't have a mirror?

Very pretty terrain. I wasn't sure we were even following a trail at this point.

At last, after about 40 minutes we made it to the waterfall. This is Stewart Falls. It is gorgeous and definitely worth the hike!

We all got to cross that river and the water was absolutely NUMBING! I was standing in the water while I helped Athena and Samantha across and I couldn't feel my feet. BRRRR!

Jeremy wanted to try to get under the waterfall, but stopped here. It still makes a cool picture. :)

Lovely cowgirl, Athena. She borrowed Aggie's new hat for a little while. It suits her nicely.

Of course, the little kids enjoyed throwing rocks in the water. I had quite the time with Alexandra. She would go in and get her hands wet, throwing rocks. Then she would climb up the banks by putting her wet hands down onto the ground and all the dirt would stick to her hands. So I would take her down to wash off the dirt, then she would immediately turn around again to climb up and put her hands in the dirt for leverage! It took a few tries to get her hands clean.

Boy time. I think Nathan was trying to be funny, but really I wonder if he was secretly trying to catch a dragonfly in his mouth.

After spending a fair amount of time at the waterfall, it was time to head back. The trail back to Sundance is 1.5 miles. When we were almost to the middle of our descent, Nathan started getting really tired and whiny. He was having a hard time and I just didn't have enough left in me to carry him down the mountain. This nice boy from our group offered to carry him for a little while. I think his name is Daniel. He knew that Nathan liked the big dandelions, so whenever he saw one, he would stop and pick it for Nathan. It was so cute! Nathan seemed to be in his own little heaven, just riding through the forest with handfuls of dandelions to blow and blow and blow.

Needless to say, we finally made it to the bottom. All of us were completely worn out, but had a good time. I snapped this picture in the car shortly after we left Sundance.

All of us were quite hungry, so we stopped off and ate pizza before heading home.

It was a lot of fun to go hiking with this group and just our family. All of the Hungarians were so nice and helpful too. I enjoyed the opportunity to spend time with them and get to know them a little bit better. Especially in such a beautiful setting! The kids also had a wonderful time and hopefully learned to appreciate our world and our new friends a little more. :)