Peaks, Creamies, and Dancing

These pictures are from our 3rd day with our dancers. :) They really wanted to go shopping, so we took them to a few different stores in the area. Their favorite store was Ross, by far! They loved going in there so much that we ended up spending about an hour in there this day and then we had to go back the next day. We had planned on also going to Seven Peaks, so we had to shuffle everyone out of the store to make sure we'd have enough time to swim. We ended up eating Little Caeser's pizza on the grass outside of the store and headed over to the waterpark.

I guess our friends don't have a waterpark where they live in Paraguay and they were very surprised/nervous/excited about this place. Jeremy and I made sure they tried several of the different slides and pools. They seemed to like the wave pool the best. It was really fun to watch them trying out waterslides for the first time!

After Seven Peaks, we wanted to take them out for ice cream, but when we got there the line was so long and we just didn't have enough time to wait. We ended up buying a few boxes of creamies and sharing them in front of the store. They definitely hit the spot! Here are Tati and Ale enjoying their creamies.

Samantha and Alex are busy attacking their creamies too. :)

These are all the girls we had with us (between us and our friends). In order across the picture is Samantha, Made, Clari, Pao, Tati, Ale, and Me.

We went to the folk dance festival every night. You would think it would get old, but the show changes every night. Here are some of the dances from this night. This is a dancer from the Morning Star group. They are the Native American dancers.

Here is the Polynesian group. They are from this area - same as the Native American group. They are performing a Tahitian dance - one of my favorites to watch!

This group is from Spain. I know it looks boring, but they were actually quite entertaining. :) The guys were funny. We looked forward to them each night.

And here are our dancers from Paraguay! This is Ale doing her dance.

Here is Tati in the middle of the bottle dance.

They also added a little spunk by stacking the bottles. This girl ended up balancing 9 bottles on her head! The bottles were screwed in together, but still, can you do that?

Grand finale!

Each day was tiring, but still very entertaining. After the performance, we went home and ended up talking on the computer (through google translate) with Ale and Tati until about 1:30am. Good times!

Hiking Day with Our Dancers

The second day with our dancers we decided to hike from Sundance up to Stewart Falls. Here we are fresh and ready to go!

When we arrived the ski lift was closed because it looked like a big storm was closing in over the area. The clouds were really dark in the valley and we pretty much just planned on getting rained on. We started our hike anyway and figured we would just take what comes.

As we hiked, we kept on watching for the awful storm to come sweeping over the mountain. Surprisingly, it never did! We got really lucky! :) On one of our rests, Nathan quickly took the opportunity to arrange the rocks into the letter "U".

After about 20 minutes into the hike, the prize came into view. See the pretty waterfall behind the kids and the girls? Tati is in the yellow and Ale is in the pink, standing with our kids.

Alex and I got behind everyone else for awhile because she was getting whiny and her legs were tired. We found this huge dandelion and it kept her occupied for a while as we continued our hike. I love that she could blow and blow and blow and I didn't even have to care where the seeds went.

After about 45-50 minutes we arrived all hot and sweaty at the waterfall. Ahhhhh! So refreshing!

A boy and his walking stick.

Me and the girls. :) Even though I didn't speak Spanish and they didn't speak English, we managed to have a good time together. I did buy an emergency Spanish-English dictionary at Walmart before we left and it helped out a lot.

Nathan and Alexandra really enjoyed throwing rocks into the river. This is an endless activity that keeps the kids occupied every time we are at a waterfront. Thankfully they didn't peg anyone in the head, either.

Isn't this waterfall so pretty? Here it is from top to bottom.

This is our whole family with our dancers from Paraguay.

Jeremy and Ale enjoyed getting in the icy water. Not my cup of tea! But really they didn't even get wet - just a few drops. Jeremy was especially proud of himself for walking behind the waterfall. Way to go Jeremy!

Athena enjoyed this very picturesque spot as well.

We stayed by the waterfall about 1/2 hour before beginning our descent back down the trail from whence we came. This picture was taken looking back on the mountain - the back of Mt. Timponogos.

We drove home after Sundance and everyone fell asleep in the car. We were home for just a couple of hours before it was time to pack up and head off to the folk dance festival for the night. When we got home I enjoyed chatting with Ale and Tati for a little while. Thank goodness for google translate and a laptop! That tool is amazing! We got to know our girls so much better despite the language barrier. This is what we did for most of the time when we were home together.

When it was time, we all got ready and headed to the festival. We took just a couple of pictures of the Paraguay team dancing. Don't they look great?

Here they are doing their jar dance. Their dances were all really entertaining. Athena and Samantha especially liked their costumes!

Last picture - we were sitting on blankets on the hill to watch the performance. Alexandra was all engrossed, just laying on the blanket when I asked her to look up for this great photo opportunity.

Our First County Swim Meet

This year Athena and Samantha have been on the swim team for the first time. They have been very dedicated about going every single morning and haven't complained even once. We attended 2 swim meets during the summer, which qualified them to compete in the county swim meet. The county meet just happened to fall on the same day we got our dancers from Paraguay who were staying with us, so they came too! Sorry, Jeremy about your lousy picture, but I think Athena and Samantha look cute. They are so excited. :)

Here are the girls who stayed with us for a week. Tati is on the left and Ale is on the right. We brought video games along to keep them and the little kids entertained. They really liked playing Jeremy's PSP - Pac Man!

Samantha was the first to swim. She competed in the freestyle and did really well. I tried to enforce with Athena and Samantha that they needed to try to improve their own times and not worry about whether or not they came in first, second, third, etc. Well, Samantha swam the freestyle 5.5 seconds faster than her best recorded time and came in 2nd place for her heat!

Then it was Athena's turn to swim the freestyle. Her form was awesome and she pushed herself really hard. She finished a whole 16 seconds faster than her previously recorded time! She also was first in her heat and received a ribbon. I really enjoyed watching her race - she was a full body length in front of the other kids in her heat.

Here is Samantha waiting to get into the water for her backstroke. She looks so small to me!

Samantha also improved her time on the backstroke by 6 seconds and came in 1st place for her heat. She was thrilled to get a ribbon, just like Athena did before. :)

Last, but not least, Athena swam her backstroke. Not to brag or anything, but she was 5 seconds faster yet again AND came in 1st place for her heat!  The unfortunate thing is that it was a very close race and the computer recorded Athena as being first, but by human error, someone gave the "heat winner" ribbon to another girl. Athena was very gracious about it and chose to be happy with the ribbon she already had, knowing that she won in both of her events.

I'm very proud of both Athena and Samantha for working hard on the swim team. They look great in the water and have pushed themselves without getting too competitive. I'm glad it's been fun for them and not a chore. I have to admit I'm a little jealous because I'm an awful swimmer - so I guess I'll live vicariously through them on this one and enjoy watching them excel. GREAT JOB GIRLS!!!

Trick Class Review

The theme for Nathan's "trick class" review this year was a circus theme. It's really gymnastics class, but since he learns all kinds of cool tricks, we call it his trick class. I took this picture before the performance started.

 

I thought the ball idea was kind of silly. It went along with the theme of the performance, but the kids only used the ball when they first marched out to do their warmup, then the balls were put in the back room. I wouldn't have thought anything of it, really, except for the fact that as each parent came into the room to take their seats, the teacher handed us each a ball to blow up. We all spent about 10-15 minutes getting completely winded and light headed, and then the performance started. They used the balls for about 4 minutes, then cast them aside for the rest of the hour. LOL

I really enjoyed watching Nathan this year. He has learned a lot and is getting stronger. I can see that he is less afraid on the equipment and he really enjoys it.

Great balance! Notice his shirt? It looks like a dress! All the little girls shirts fit perfectly and looked really cute. For some reason they don't make T-shirts in little boy sizes? Hm . . .

Here is Nathan waiting for his turn on the next activity. The poor little girls sitting next to him! He was teasing them relentlessly!!! Maybe when they are all older they will appreciate the teasing a little more.

Ta da!

At the end, all of the kids got a trophy. Nathan was SO PROUD of his trophy! He wouldn't let go of it for even a second to let anyone get a look.

We tried to take a picture in the hallway after the performance and Nathan wouldn't stop looking at his trophy long enough to look up for a picture.

Nathan is a fun little boy and I'm proud of him for completing another year of gymnastics. He has done very well and is looking forward to starting up again at the end of the summer.

Sunday on a Trip :)

I'm still blogging about the trip we took over Memorial Day. Would I just hurry and get it over with?!! Sorry, you will have to suffer a bit longer. This summer has been so insanely busy that you are lucky I'm able to sit down and put this up even now.

So . . . these pictures are from the Sunday of our trip to St. George.

On Sunday we woke up early and went to a local church. It was weird to be there because it was like stake conference, but it was a normal ward. There were so many people in the sacrament meeting room that they had to open up all the dividers and it filled up to the back of the gym. We only planned on staying until the end of sacrament meeting, so when it was over we got up and filed out along with about 2/3 of the congregation. They must love it when vacationers come to town. I'm sure it really boosts their budgets, but I do wonder how many people there were actually IN that ward. Crazy.

When we got back to the condo, Jeremy and I were so tired from the previous day so we just sat around until it was time to put the little kids down for a nap. Then we zonked out too and left Athena and Samantha up to play on the DS and watch TV. Thankfully they are old enough now to handle themselves. When we woke up it was really quiet except for a few giggles in Nathan and Alex's room. We came in to find them also entertaining themselves on Alexandra's bed. At least they didn't wreck the place.

We ate lunch and headed downtown to visit Brigham Young's winter home. We have been there before, but it is still neat visit and the kids enjoyed it.

This is the front entrance at the start of the tour.

Side of the house, and side of Jeremy's head.

On the outside of the house they had a pecan tree with a bunch of pecans on the ground below it. We all enjoyed cracking open the nuts and trying them out. They were so fresh and good! I'm not much of a pecan lover, but after tasting those ones, I wouldn't mind having a pecan tree of my own.

We took just a few pictures of the inside rooms in the house. This was Brigham Young's dining room.

Here is the kitchen. I very much prefer the kind of stove I have.

This is a spinning wheel and sewing maching in the hired hand's room.

Here is a better view of the front of the house. It's really neat for a pioneer home. I like to imagine the people back then living in this house and carrying on daily life.

After the tour Athena and Samantha wanted to get pictures with the missionary who gave us the tour.

So, that's pretty much our Sunday activity. We came home and swam. :) I prefer the hot tub and the rest of the family preferred the pool.

Alexandra was jumping in and swimming to Jeremy. She swims with her head under the water for a few feet and then we have to pull her up out of the water because she doesn't really know to come up and breathe. Jeremy was done catching her for awhile and told her to go to the shallow pool. He was on the other side of the pool playing with the older girls when he started yelling at me to hurry and get Alex. She had decided to jump in and swim where it was too deep. I ran over, jumped in, and grabbed her just as she was sinking in the middle of the pool. She made it that far by swimming and couldn't stay up any more. SCARY! I held her for awhile and tried to scare her into not doing that anymore but it didn't work. Within 5 minutes she was ready to go back and jump in. I look forward to when she is a bit taller and I don't have to worry so much!

That wraps up Sunday on our trip. We did pack up and get ready to go the next morning, but I won't go into those details. It was a lot of collecting and putting into bags. Yeah, fun.  I'll include just one more picture from our balcony.