The Goat People

Meet Gary-



Say Hello to Weepers-

These are our 2 newest pack goats. They may look a little intimidating with their big horns and all, but they are the sweetest and most gentle big guys. They carried Kamryn and Dallin 6 miles on our hike along the Alaska Basin trail Saturday, and did it with grace and ease. We did get a lot of attention from fellow hikers on the trail. As I was holding back a little to take some pictures, a group of people passed, and one of the kids with their party asked--"Are you with the goat people?" I unashamedly answered in the affirmative, so thus have deemed us "The Goat People".

Ryan finished up the semester of teaching Friday, and this hike was our kick off to our outdoor adventure season. Yahoo!! We've decided the best way to get the whole fam out into the mountains is to use these big boys to carry all the essentials. Ryan was the only one who had to carry any weight. It was rather precious and darling weight! I did have to carry the camera, hence the array of pictures.

We are so blessed to have this amazing back country to take our kids into just 45 minutes out our back door. Love it!!


Kammers and Weepers have a deep bond as you can tell.

Dallin was a little nervous at first, but after the first few minutes thought he was pretty hot stuff to ride a goat all by himself.




What would I do without my Lindsey. She loves this little guy.


Way to go guys!!

Date Night

If you are married to Ryan, which I am, you have to understand something. His idea of break or vacation has nothing to do with relaxing. That's why I've been training for our date night for some time, just so I can keep up with him. No, not a marathon, 10k, 5k, 3k, 2k, 1k or anything with a K in it. Well actually, it does have a K in it. The word is hike. Not just any hike. Think hike Ryan style. Intense and most definitely extreme.

Climbing Table Rock.

Just because he's done it multiple times in record time does not mean it is easy. I found that out on our most recent Friday night date. And I really do mean night.

Take off time from the trail head: 3:15 pm.

Wow. By the first ten minutes of climbing the face my thighs and calves were burning like Ryan's dutch oven cooking when company comes over and he's distracted talking. Not just any burning. Bad! So much for running 4 miles in the mornings. I should have been running up vertical hills. Oh well, too late. Only 4 miles to go ....most of the way with snow shoes clinging to my boots.


3 hours later we are almost there....you can see table rock behind me, and the top of the Grand Teton right behind that. That tells you how high we are!

7:30 pm and we join a marmot on the summit of Table Rock

Beautiful views and cool mountain breeze make all the pain worth it....Now we have to go back down!








The way back down was much more pleasant. The snowshoes helped as we glided down the mountain. By the time we were back down to the face we had to turn on our headlamps. The stars were beautiful and the air peaceful and quiet. We finally reached the car around 10:45 pm. At home we put in our take and bake pizza and had a real live midnight snack. Then he asked me out again. I said.... yes! This time for August. Same thing, minus the snow. Hopefully next time I won't still be sore 3 days after!!

Going Ons

It's been quite awhile since I've put up a post,
Summer's so busy- with warm weather and gardens, and hot dogs to roast...
There's been so much going on but not much time to boast!

So finally some pictures of summertime fun-
To get an idea of some things we have done!


This year we decided to have some dirt hauled in for our garden to make up for our horrible rocky soil. We spent a couple Saturdays building 9 boxes and filling with dirt!! A nice joyful family activity to be sure.

The kids had fun picking their own seeds to plant in their boxes, and have been taking care of them. Such excitement on the first morning spotting a tiny radish sprout! Since then we've had carrots, lettuce, cabbage, zucchini, pumpkins, beans, peas, and cucumbers come up. Fun stuff.







Ridge. The cutest lil' thing you ever did see. He loved sitting in this camp chair for the 4th of July parade.

Parades are about candy. Not watching floats. Candy!



Our little plop scooter took his 1st steps on the 4th of July, and it was so cute to watch his little face. The tongue must be a sign of intense concentration, and balance.













Porter's stilting interests have been put on the back burner as he has discovered the new sport of trim climbing.


Kami and Porter ran in the Hershey's Track meet. They both had fun and placed in the top 3. Way to go little runners.


It's easy to come in 2nd when there only 2 of you!


Our good friend who has a private pilots license invited the kids to come fly. The 4 oldest had a great time flying over Rexburg and seeing things from a different angle!




Happy #12 Lindsey! She's growing into a beautiful young woman, boo hoo. She decided to go shopping for clothes instead of open presents this year. I knew it would happen one of these days.


She had a blast a Girl's Camp, and even went on a Snipe hunt and learned about pine mice that eat your toes in the tent at night. Sounds like the older girls had some "fun" with the 1st years!


The big chop!!




And last but not least, Happy 14th Birthday to our sweet teenager!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAYS!!!!

We've had 2 birthdays this week. Porter and Kami have been waiting since Christmas was over for their birthdays to come. In Kami's mind, Christmas is when it's really snowy, and her birthday is when the flowers finally come out. These past couple of weeks we have finally seen some flowers, so it must be birthday time!!


Porter turned nine.


Besides loving the outdoors, his latest crazes have been STILTS--

(He is very persistant and practices daily.)


and ART--

He loves to draw and watercolor, and most days I can find him deeply engrossed in a sketching project. These are a couple pictures he did in the past couple of days.

Kami, our happy 7 year old!! Loves playing with friends, riding her bike, and the latest thing she gets soooo excited about--checking on the robin eggs that just hatched in a nearby tree!!





She is patiently checking the killdeer eggs in our pasture for the day they hatch.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY KIDDOS!!

Fun With Our New Camera

One of these days I'll catch up to what we have been up to. Until then, here are a few of my favorite things (besides raindrops on roses and brown paper packages tied up with string)----