As It Is The Last Day In July...

... And since I have been terrible about doing this so far, I thought I would post some updates from the last few months.

1. Got my green card though, finally. It is a 10 year card, but I can apply for citizenship next year. Not totally convinced by it yet (partly because of the ridiculous hoop-jumping required... but that is another post), but we will see.
2. Oliver is walking. This one is rather behind the times... Oliver has been walking for about the last two months, but refused to use it as his preferred mode of transportation until we went to San Diego at the end of June. There he had plenty of room to practice, and the furniture at Grandma's house was spaced sufficiently far enough apart that he was forced to let go of things. Now he is running.

3. We went to San Diego for 10 days. And it was great. Evan built a retaining wall with his Dad (and some other people), and the kids and I had a much needed break. We stayed long enough to celebrate July 4th, and watch the fireworks. And, by the way, perching on top of a 10 ft wall, and craning your neck to take pictures of fireworks with no tripod is not a walk in the park... More photos to come.

4. Lena started and completed swimming lessons. She loves the water. She hasn't figured out everything completely yet, but she can float, and propel herself around underwater. We are working on staying afloat whilst taking a breath... so trivial, and yet so essential... Grandpa P, if you could figure out how to get Hayley swimming for the next 11/12 years you can have your kick-@$$ relay team you have always dreamed about :D
5. Oliver is talking. Yes, talking. Words currently in his repertoire are (in order of length of time in use): "Dada", "Mama", "Nenen" (Lena), "KKKKKKKKK" (and increasingly now "kkkkkk-a" for cat), "hess", which serves the dual purpose of meaning both 'yes' and 'this'. Lena on the other hand has discovered the full mileage that can be gleaned from using the word "No", and has fully implemented it in her day-to-day life. Oliver, in true younger brother form, also likes to annoy his sister. This was an exchange I heard between the two of them the other day while Lena was eating her lunch.
Lena: (seeing that Oliver was eyeing her food) "No"
Oliver: "Hess"
Lena: "No!"
Oliver: "Hess"
Lena: "NO!"
Oliver: "Hess"
Lena: "NOOO!"
Oliver: "Hess"
Lena: "NOOOOOOO!"
Oliver: " . . . . . Hess"

I almost died from silent laughter.
6. Evan finished school. Winter semester went really well, and Spring semester went even better: He got a 4.0, and he got the highest score in the final exam. Evan is now confident that he made the right decision with Economics, and I couldn't agree with him more.
7. With no school during the summer term, Evan and I have been able to spend more time together, doing things like hiking and devoting time to postponed projects. Like our apartment. I am happy to announce that our apartment should (finally) be finished by the end of the summer!
8. Evan got a new road bike to replace his mountain bike that got stolen while we were away in San Diego (darn those Mexican gangs that hang around our neighborhood!), and he loves it. Now for me to learn how to ride one and we will be set!
9. Not really from our family, but from my family... My sister Hayley just competed in the World Swimming Championships in Rome in the 100m Freestyle. She smahed her NZ record for the event with a 53.91, and for those of you who know anything about swimming, on the first 50m of her heats swim, she was 0.01 seconds off of the NZ record for the 50m, which is phenomenal when you realize that her time included a flip turn, and was the first part of a longer race. (Don't expect Toni Jeff's record to be on the books for too much longer!) She made the semi finals, and placed 11th overall, which is great because that meant I got to see her race (they have only been showing the finals sessions here...), and she gets funding for the next year. On top of that though, in her semi final, she was the fastest split at the 50m and 0.01 off the world record split for the 100m (which incidentally was slower than her heats split), and was leading up to about 75m. That in itself may not seem like cause for celebration, but, in fact, is since even though she dropped a full second off of her previous PB (and NZ record), it was not a perfect swim, and there is definitely still room for improvement.

Congrats, Hayley! We are very proud of you!

The Last Relic of Baby-ness

When I was growing up my Mum decided to trim my younger sister's fringe [bangs] at home. It started out OK, but Mum insisted it didn't look quite right, and kept pulling hair forward to trim to try and correct it. By the end, poor Hayley, who had a lot of very thick hair, had a fringe about an inch and a half thick framing her eyebrows, that started almost from her crown, and incorporated most of the hair on the front half of her head. All that could be done was to let Hayley's hair grow out, and laugh about it (which we did... a lot). Fortunately, I think she was young enough that her peers at school didn't really notice, and thick skinned enough that those who did would never have been able to bully her about it. I just wish I had a picture of it, but I suspect my mother has destroyed all the evidence. So for this blog posts purposes it looked like this. Only... bigger. Just waaaaaaaay bigger... everywhere.


Having never cut hair before I was terrified that I was going to scar my son for life with a haircut like Hayley's that was beyond fixing. Added to that, I loved Oliver's hair. I loved that it had waves and curls, and I loved that it was wispy, baby hair. And with as abnormally large as Oliver is, it was pretty much the only thing that kept him looking like the baby he is supposed to be.

But, after months of chickening out and procrastinating, I finally had to face up to the fact that since his hair was now in his eyes, Oliver's haircut was long overdue (ha). So, we soaked his hair, sat him in front of the TV watching 'Dive Olly Dive', and gave him all the bananas he wanted. He was as happy as a clam, and fortunately Evan was great with the distraction techniques.

Here are some before pictures:

The curls above his ears were my favorite.

... When your son's hair starts getting long enough to tie
into a pony tail, you know it is time to cut it.

And, despite Oliver's face in the next picture, I think it turned out fairly well. I tried to keep it a little on the longer side (even though Evan spent the entire time rolling his eyes as I refused to cut his hair any shorter), because I prefer it that way, and I figured I could always come back and trim more off.

(Yes, it looks like there is a bald spot, but I assure you there isn't. It is just the way his hair waves, the fact that he was playing with it right before I took the picture, and the fact that his hair is growing in blond for some reason.)

And now I can relax, and stop having hairy nightmares. At least until next month, that is...

Three Years Already?

Family Home Evening

Evan and I went out to dinner early this evening. We went to Spark Restaurant Lounge, and spent far more than we should, but it was marvelous. I love the food there. It also helped that we had a 40% off coupon (yay!).

When we got home we spent some time playing with the kids on the floor... mainly because sitting in chairs was painful on our stomachs. Oliver exhibited his rugby scrum moves, and toddled around cackling. Lena giggled and told us how much she missed us while we were gone. Then this happened:

Evan: Hey, Lena. Shhhhhhhhhh....

[farts really loudly]

Lena: Hahahahahahaha!

[Oliver laughs because everyone else is laughing]

Lena: Hey, Daddy. Shhhhhhhhhh.....

POOP!

At which point Evan and I rolled on the floor laughing. Laughing so hard that I thought I was going to puke up those 4 courses I just ate at the fancy restaurant. Laughing so hard that Lena started laughing hysterically at us. Laughing so hard that Oliver wandered over and sycophantically upped the volume of his laughter.

"Pooooooop! Hahahahahahahahahahaha! Poooooooooooop!"


So much for the spiritual message...

Battle Creek Falls

Note to self: Be better about blogging.

Second note to self: Don't go hiking with a two year old after 8pm.

That being said, though, it was a good 'hike'. More like a walk, really, but we were rewarded with some fairly impressive waterfalls at the end of it. Even more impressive was the amount of water that was cascading over them. In some of the pictures I looked at of the falls before we left, it looked more like a dribble over a cliff. This evening the water was roaring over it. I heart Utah when there is lots of rain.

Oliver got packed in his hiking backpack (Craigslist, Kelty backpack, half retail price... score) and was a gem the entire time. Lena was a pill, and really the only success we had with getting her to walk up the hill was having her march her way up. "Come on, Lena... March, March, March, March". We felt like drill sergeants. I guess we should have expected nothing less with as late as it was...

One cool thing about going at sunset was that there were swarms of dragonflies around the trail from the creek that ran along side it. I tried to get some pictures of it, but with the low light, and with them buzzing around my poor camera had no idea what to focus on. And this pictures doesn't really show the extent of the swarm: there were literally hundreds along the entire length of the trail. (If you click on the photo it is easier to see the dragonflies.)


The low light and lack of tripod also meant that most of my pictures of moving things (read people, and pretty much anything but the mountains) turned out mostly blurry. But I did manage to take some acceptable enough ones.




And, yes, in this next one there is snow on Mt. Timpanogos... In mid-July... after a week (at least) of high-90's/100's F...


And some nice lady took a picture of our family.


Evan exhibiting his 'exasperated gesture'.


And finally, the 40-50ft high waterfalls at the end of our hike. (I heart the live view function on my camera...)


All in all, it was worth it. And we are planning on going back again sometime soon - next time with more sunlight, and happier toddlers.

Wise Words from a Wise Guy

"A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government."

- Thomas Jefferson

Most People In Utah Have No Idea How Lucky They Are

(Disclaimer: This post is LONG. I fully expect you to skim read, or to just look at pictures. No offense taken.)

Not the kind of blog post title you expected from me, huh?

On Friday, we had a reprieve from the daily thunderstorms we have been having for the last couple of weeks. The whole day was actually beautiful: warm bordering on hot, crystal clear skies, and (since there has been so much rain lately) everything was green. So, after Evan got home from work we decided to take a family hike to Stewart Falls, around the Sundance area.

We left at about 5pm, which ended up being perfect for us - not too hot or cold, enough sunlight to easily see where we were walking at the end - and it was beautiful! Now that most of the snow has melted, and with all of the rain we have had, the wildflowers were just starting to come in. In about a week the whole place will be multicoloured, and we can't wait to go back again.

Now, there are a lot of things about Utah that I loathe, but Evan and I remarked several times that when you are down in the valleys it is very easy to forget that Utah can actually be a very beautiful place. In fact, 'very beautiful' doesn't even cut it: 'Spectacular' would be more appropriate. Utah has 5 national parks, two of which are consistently considered to be in the top 10 national parks in the country. The fact that Evan and I have beautiful mountains, waterfalls, lakes, scenery, and wildlife less than 20 minutes drive from our apartment is an incredible thing. As beautiful as England is, if I had have wanted to see a waterfall on an even remotely comparable scale to Stewart Falls (or even Bridal Veil Falls for that matter) I would have had to travel to either Wales, Northern England, or Scotland: that's a 3 hour drive minimum for those who don't know, and for England that's a long drive. Sometimes I feel that, just as youth is wasted on the young, Utah is wasted on the Utahns (broadly speaking here). Not only are Utahns notorious for not taking care of the land in which they live, but they take for granted the fact that they actually live in a gorgeous part of the world, and have backdoor access to some phenomenal beauties of nature.

OK. Off my soapbox. Our hike to Stewart Falls, as I said, was beautiful. Lena did most of the walking herself, and apart from a snack break about an hour in, Oliver was really great too.
And, you look closely on the picture above you can see Lena's little builder bum. So cute!

As always, my photos never seem to do the adequate justice to how beautiful everything was, but I just have to share...
We also ran into a beautiful clearing somewhere in the Aspens that was full of little blue flowers (Forget-Me-Nots?).
Unfortunately, (as Evan found out, since I made him go an take pictures from the middle of the field) the whole thing was filled with stinging nettles.

It was also really cool to walk through old rock slide areas, and see trees that had been flattened by avalanches. There were also Aspens that had been (recently) bent double, which we suspect was probably from the heavy snow we got during May once the trees had become supple for growing season.
The falls were spectacular. Lena was very impressed: "Wow! Look! It's a waterfall! Oh no! It's so beautiful!"
The pictures kid of make the falls look pathetic and piddly. But they actually weren't. It has two tiers, and I guess it must be at least over 200ft tall. I believe that over the top of the main ridge there is another smaller part to the waterfall too. The roar of the water was incredible, and it was moving so fast that it was really windy.
This was about as close as we dared get. To get any closer we would have had to clamber over rocks, and between Lena, and Oliver throwing off my balance, we decided that maybe next time would be better.
And just because, here are some wildflower pictures. We can't wait until they are in full bloom, it is going to be amazing!
And if you click on that last image, you can see a bumblebee. And the flowers really were that blue.