Tuesday, August 17, 2010

New Little Nephew

Before driving home on Sunday, we stopped by my sister's to attend church since she was blessing her first little boy, Braden.  He arrived on Father's Day and it was so exciting to see my littlest sister as a mother.  He is a cutie and melting hearts all along the way.  Congratulations, Jenn and Kyle!

Lagoon

We hit Lagoon right when it opened on Friday.  It was a lot of fun to ride everything with cousins and Joe hadn't been for a long time so it was fun to go as a family this year.  The favorite ride of the day was Wicked and it was definitely that.  It was awesome.  Some other favorites were the Bat, Wild Mouse, old white Roller Coaster, Jet Star 2, and the kiddie rides, of course.


For lunch we had a yummy picnic near the pavilions and relaxed before heading to Rattlesnake Rapids for more river rafting and getting soaked, accidentally.
 
Uncle Charlie and Joe had the best time spending money at the games and tried to win every cousin a stuffed animal.  Several tries, hours, and dollars later, they succeeded and the kids each had a prize or two to take home as a souvenir. 
It was a great day at Lagoon and on the way home, we had to stop at Maddox again for another yummy steak sandwich.  I guess we need to fill up with those before heading out of town!

Bowling and Shopping

On Thursday we headed into Ogden for some shopping and bowling at Fat Cats.  This is one of our kids' favorite places that we have to visit every time we go to Utah.  They had a great time competing against their cousins and collecting tickets from the arcade to turn in for cheesy prizes (I despise arcades, by the way, but my husband and children love them!).  After some shopping at the mall for some good deals (there were none), we hit Maddox Drive-In for a good ol' steak sandwich, fries and lime rickeys. 

Monday, August 16, 2010

Chesterfield, Idaho

Wednesday morning, we packed up and cleaned the house.  Before heading back to Brigham, we decided to follow the Old Oregon Trail and visit Chesterfield, a historic pioneer town.  We loaded up in the cars and started on our way.  Right as we were turning to go on the main road out of town, we looked back and saw that Grandma wasn't with us.  We gave her a call and she said that she had lost the keys to her car.  We all turned back around to help in the search.  Twenty-two people got out of the cars and turned the house upside down looking for her keys.  They were nowhere to be found.  Our last resort was to check the garbage.  We thumbed through it a bit and then decided to take it out piece by piece and transfer it to another bag so we wouldn't miss anything.  Carrie and I were going through the first bag and right at the bottom of the bag was the jingling of keys!  We were so lucky we didn't make it to the dumpster with all that trash!  So we were off to Chesterfield . . .


The pioneers settled this town back in the early 1900's and some of the building were still standing.  It was a quaint little place and the people there were happy to give us a walking tour of the homes, log store, and museum.  The first top was the Barlow Log Store where everybody played with the limberjacks, ate peanuts, drank a sarsparilla, and picked out a bag of their favorite kind of candy.  


Carlee and Tyler eating peanuts
Megan trying to balance her sarsparilla
MMMM!  That's good stuff!
Carlee and Owen checking out their candy
The whole crew




After hearing about some of the town's history at the store, we started on a walking tour to visit the original homes that were built by the pioneers that settled the area.  One house had a living room/parlor, small kitchen, and bedroom for the parents and nine children.  It was unbelievably tiny and I can't imagine that many people living in that small house.  I am so spoiled to be living in this day and age where we can have everything we want and need with lots of extras.  I never would have made it as a pioneer.  It was very humbling to see how they lived and the hard work and sacrifice they gave for that way of life. 
The stove and oven (Clark is laying on the only bed in the next room)
The parlor or living room area
The kitchen table with a storage cabinet and the refrigerator to the left.  The bathtub was on the floor next to the white storage cabinet in the corner. 
There were no public restrooms anywhere so the kids enjoyed using the outhouses scattered around the town.  (At least the boys did.  The girls had a different idea of them.)
One of the bigger homes had a large loft in the attic where the children slept and played.  It was very similar to "Little House on the Prairie".  The kids loved climbing up the ladder and playing in the "fort".

I can't believe I got a picture of Owen wearing that outfit!  We were so embarrassed to have him walking around with us ;)  Luckily he is dang cute or we would have left him. 
Tommy and Jake taking a rest
Some worn-out boys
After our tour of the town, we stopped for lunch at Subway and A&W and headed back to Brigham to rejuvenate for the rest of the week's activities.