When The Students Are Away...

This has become a summer tradition for Dan and I:

 


After the guys head to bed at night and leave for summer school and work in the morning we sit down and play a few rounds of Dutch Blitz. So far I'm up 6 games to 2. (If I did hastags they would be: hekeepstrying; winnerwinnerchickendinner; dutchblitz; morningritual; whenthestudentsareawaythehouseparentsplay; practiceforthegameswiththegirlsinthefall; solongasIkeepwinning; janaewinsmostgamesweplay hesagoodsport)

Everything's a Competition

This summer we have a house of 8 active high school boys. We made that choice last August before we knew we would be placed with girls. It's been fun, especially for me! The guys will come ask me for various household supplies and I get to defer them to Dan since they are kept in a locked closet in the bathroom. It's been a much better division of labor.

It's also been fun to find creative ways to determine who does various chores in the house. Once night Dan challenged the boys to a game of knock-out (aka lightening) to decide who had to clean up the snack. Out they went to practice their shots. About 20 minutes later I joined them to watch for a bit. It was fun to hear them cheering each other on; "Come on, Mr. you can get him out!" "Hurry!" "Mr. are you out already?"

The beauty of this is that once they all start playing, they will continue to play for 45 minutes or so and they end up tired and ready for bed!

Another time the competition was Tenzi but this time it was for the house chores.

The chores were all ranked from easiest to hardest and the 1st person to the the designated number received that chore. The competition was fierce as most of them wanted an easy chore. Then they willingly headed off to accomplish their chores.

We haven't gotten to eating competitions yet, and hopefully we won't ever get to those.

A Natural Campus

Several areas on campus the grounds crew have left to grow wild. They are interspersed between areas of cut lawns and other maintained grass areas. As we drive from our apartment to our student homes, we get to enjoy the beauty and changes that occur to these areas. Today we finally captured one section we drive by regularly:

The wildflowers and other foliage have been striking. It's mid-July and there is none of the brown grasses we are accustomed to in the west.

Sid's Wedding Stuff

Earlier in the year we received a phone call from Sid letting us know that he'd found the girl he wanted to marry, but to not tell anyone yet. For several weeks we discussed wedding plans, made arrangements to be off work, and waited to be able to spread the news!!!

With this information, our time out west changed from a 10-14 days to all three weeks plus extra days to be in attendance for the wedding festivities.

The festivities included Liz receiving her endowment in the Logan Temple,

a Horrocks Family Wedding Shower,

an open house in Pocatello,

a wedding reception in Salt Lake,

 and the wedding itself, in the Salt Lake Temple.

For the Idaho Open House, Sid and Liz had a soft serve ice cream machine. Our job was to bring toppings. Off to Chocolate World to shop for all that might be needed for a sundae. We distributed the toppings, syrups, and sprinkles between our checked and carry-on luggage. Luckily all arrived in tact.

Yes, there was a Resse's theme. When it's the bride and groom's favorite, many must be purchased.

A very full few days but worth every minute to celebrate these two lovebirds.

Welcome to the family, Liz, we love you!

Non-Wedding Summer Fun

Between all the wedding festivities, we managed to fit in some other vacation-type things; meeting Liz, visiting our families, Yellowstone, and Bryce Canyon.

Dinner with the kids. Jake's a Party Pooper sometimes.

Chipper LOVES Dan. Too bad the feeling isn't mutual.

When visiting from out of town, it's always a good idea to check the Temple schedule before showing up.

When we headed to Cedar, we helped Deb with her children which included a stop in Scipio to visit a petting zoo:

Bryce was beautiful. It was fun to reacquaint Dan with the canyon I heard so much about growing up.

While in Cedar we enjoyed an evening with The Bard at the Utah Shakespeare Festival.

The Green Show

Before the Performance of "The Comedy of Errors"

We joined Mom and Dad at the Cedar City Cemetery. I got to see my grandmother's new headstone that had been completed earlier in the year.

We took some of my nieces for an outing at Classic Skating. I roller-skated too, what was I thinking?!

Our time in Yellowstone was quick but great to be back in an area that played such a big part of our courtship. We saw a couple shows at the Playmill (Les Miserables and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat), we went on a hike, drove through the North entrance of Yellowstone, and visited Old Faithful at night. 

With all we did, planned and unplanned, it was tough to return to our "normal lives."

Another Full Summer While Working in PA

This year we decided to work the first half of summer break. As it turned out, it was a good decision since Sid notified us in April that he would be getting married in August. We had three boys most of our time there (a couple came and went with sports camps) and we had a great time with them. Our dinner conversations were lively as one of the guys was working with goats in the Ag Program so his stories were very funny; the goat that refuses to move unless he's carried.

We had a limited amount of money to use with the guys for activities but we gave them the option to select what we did. They wanted to do go-carts and laser tag. We found a discount for a location that had both plus some other activities. Dan and I talked with the guys to decide how to make our money stretch. They opted to do the 1 more expensive activity rather than lots of little activities. We were proud of their decision and had a great time together!

Go-Carts, Laser Tag, Mini Golf, Arcade games...a little for everyone and we all had a great time!

One of the evenings we invited other student homes over for a "make your own calzone" night. It was fun to watch the students interacting together and trying something new. They had a good time laughing and teasing each other as they tried to create a delicious master piece.

One evening Dan and I were playing cards with a couple of the guys. I look over and all three of them are more into their electronics than the game we were playing:

Next time they'll have to put away their electronics so we can really have a game. And by away, I don't mean on the chair next to them.

Of course we caught the fireworks on July 4th. Before they started, we roasted marshmallows, hot dogs, and such around a campfire with a couple other student homes. We do our best to keep our summers full and enjoy every moment.

Summers Were Intended for Road Trips

As the summer came to a close, we managed to squeeze in a few final activities such as a trip to Lititz, PA,

the Victoria Jackson/Big Time Rush Concert (yeah, we hadn't heard of them before either..and we wore earplugs) and we admired the beautiful sunsets,

and a weekend in Washington, DC (long before the shutdown):

Day 1-Driving through DC, National Mall:

So which direction are you driving on this street?

We found the motto on the license plates pretty funny.

Day 2-Library of Congress, Capitol Building, Canadian Embassy,

Supreme Court, National Archives, Naval Memorial, Riding the Metro:

 

Dan's back was killing him by this point so we took the elevator up to meet a shuttle that would take us to the front of the Capitol Building; any break was desirable at this point. Dan's never been very mechanically inclined, can you tell?!

We are looking forward to spending more time in our Nation's Capital while we are here.

Ag & Zoology Related

So the saga of the double yolks continues...

When I finished the dozen, 10 of the 12 were double yolks!

We live among corn fields:

The corn might not be quite elephant eye height but it does surpass Dan's eye:

Over the summer there was a orange bullfrog outside the student home. Well, since then we've seen two outside OUR HOUSE! The first one appeared at home on an night out for Dan. I wondered if maybe I'd have to kiss the toad to get my prince back:

 

 

 

 

Lately they've gotten a little bolder...the two frogs were guarding our door:

 

It's kinda cool to have them here but kinda creepy at the same time.

We've seen a hawk seen several times outside our house. It's remarkable to see it just resting on the wires looking for something to eat. One day we even saw a couple of them a few feet apart:

I won't post the pictures of the huge spiders we've seen so far; just know they aren't big, they are HUGE!!!!!