Park City

For Memorial Day Weekend my sister flew in. We picked her up from the airport and headed to Park City. It was a nice getaway and we experienced some new things. Because my sister is a die hard shopper, we went to the outlets first, but after a couple hours there Brad was a little tired of the boys, plus Ian sat in something:) We checked into the Governor's Suite at Hotel Park City, then headed out for some dinner. Brad chose the Hapa Grill which was really great. I tried sushi for the first time. I was feeling daring and it wasn't bad. The boys have decided they really like chopsticks. After ice cream we hung out at the pool (mostly the hot tub, really). The boys had waited all day for the promised pool trip and were not disappointed. Sunday morning we had brunch at Stein Erikson and it started snowing. Crazy, huh. We walked around Main Street, then the boys were ready for some rest. We all took a nap until almost dinner time when we tried out Ruth's Chris, a famous steakhouse. It was nice to get away from home and great to have a fun time with Aunt Sara. Here's some pictures.

School's out!

So, Aaron's preschool is out for the year. He's really going to miss all his friends and I might miss those three hours. He tells me now he's a kindergartener. Here is a picture with his class. Technically, I'm not supposed to share it (because I don't have the other parents' permission), but I don't really know any of them anyway. Aren't they cute?

80 Degrees, Lani, and a Bowl

The other day the temperature reached 80 degrees, and we felt Summer had finally arrived. (We just assumed Utah's week of Spring must be over.) We got out the water guns and the bathing suits and went outside for some long awaited water fun.
Growing up, in the sticks of South Carolina, I remember a game we invented to cool down from the heat and humidity. We would fill all the buckets we could find up with water, draw a battle line, someone would yell go and we would start throwing water at each other. This lasted about 15 seconds before the water was gone and we'd have to go refill. Anyway, since we hadn't gone to get this year's baby pool, yet, I decided to try a version of this with my kids. No battle lines, just cups and bowls of water to play with. Amazingly, they didn't even throw water at each other. But Lani did have a new adventure with her own bowl.

The boys were very helpful in filling up Lani's bowl.

Yes, she sat in the bowl all by herself.

Before you buy a fish...

...a few things I wish I'd known...
1. Realize there is a lot involved in owning a fish for example, all the supplies needed (filter, aquarium, food, plants, heater...) . In addition, there is a perfect water temperature and ph level and nitrate and ammonium level, and other stuff I still don't get.
2. Goldfish will die. And then, your kids will cry. In Aaron's case, he cried a lot. Goldfish number one died the day after we got him. And Aaron worried and worried that Goldfish and Cool Buddy (his names for his two goldfish) would be apart and he was not relieved much when Cool Buddy's death followed the next day, despite that they were now "together." He was so sad and even prayed that they would come back to life. And here began a lesson on the resurrection which Aaron is very excited for because he wants to see his goldfish again.
3. You will spend money. Following our goldfish' deaths, we felt bad and had to promise them more fish or better fish and we went out and spent more money on fish that I thought would be easy to take care of and not require much work (so wrong).

Well, the cool thing is that they love the remaining fish (a koi named po po). We hope he lives for a while at least. He is great entertainment for the boys. They will sit and watch him swim back and forth for a really long time and even talk to him. It's kind of funny. Even Lani seems to like scaring him as she pounds on the glass and laughs at the moving fish.

Jungle Jim's

So, there's this place in Midvale (about 2 blocks from our old apartment) that I never even realized was there. It's called Jungle Jim's and they have a roller coaster, bumper cars, a carousel, and some other rides I can't remember. It's all indoors (because we live in Utah) so it's like a glorified Chuck E Cheese. We went last Friday and it wasn't even crowded so we didn't have to wait in line for the rides or anything. We took a friend of Aaron's with us and the three boys had a blast. Needless to say, just watching the boys go crazy really tired Lani out.

Haircut Time!!

Disclosure: I fully admit to creating this post, thereby absolving Tara from any and all responsibility associated with its content. For the record, said wife was in much disagreement over this post from the start.

Anyway, time for the annual summer buzz cut - basically a rite of passage for young men, crazies and Buddhist monks the world over. Thus begins the summer haircut...


Here's the start



Against EVERYONE'S better judgment (should tell you enough right there about why I did it)...



Aaron basically freaked out when he saw that I had channeled his inner B.A. Baracus (no faux- about it) and made me cut it off. Guess he's not quite ready for the post-punk era. (Props if you can name the movie without cheating.)