Gale Reunion August 2011: 1 of 3

So I am finally attempting to post about the wonderful reunion we had back in August. Then I will try to catch up through Thanksgiving before Christmas is upon us.

We went to a resort near Yosemite National forest this year. We had access to a lake, a pool, a creek and a wonderful national forest. We took advantage of all and of wonderful company. We were only missing 4 family members this year. Corinne and her family weren't able to make it this year due to work and David wasn't able to make it because he is serving his mission right now in Brazil.

I will be posting a ton of pictures because I am too lazy to pick just the best ones:) Also they probably won't be in chronological order, but more grouped by activity. But at least it will be documented:)

The POOL was a hit. Jessi and Tanner had been taking lessons all summer, and Jessi has gotten to the point that I trust her in the water with out MJ or I, so that made it a lot easier for us to go to the pool with our three. Tanner was also more comfortable, but he opted to stay in the baby pool most of the time. I didn't complain about that either. Here were are in our glory, I bet everyone else at the resort were glad when we left.








The CREEK. Down a little slope near our rooms was a little creek or stream that the kids and dads had some fun playing in and building a little dam. There was a lot of "fool's gold" in the water that was pretty cool to look at too.

Canning Pears

From this:

To this, with a lot of help from Chris and Melissa:

We bought two boxes of pears this year without thinking about it and so after this process:


I can say I know how to can pears now and we have a little bit more food storage. Now to see if out kids will eat them.

I ended up giving away half of the pears to save myself the work and headache. We learned our limits on this project.

Garden

Here are some more pictures of out produce from our garden this year. I have been slacking on the picture department lately.
We have gotten a lot of tomatoes, at least more than we can use. More than enough Zucchini for 3 families, but enough green beans (they are my favorite, they are so good steamed), and a small amount of corn.

The tomatoes are still producing but I think they are almost done, as are the green beans. We are still trying to grow our pumpkins. We have a few good sized white pumpkins, but not a single orange one. Also the cucumbers are starting to produce a little too. We didn't get any watermelon, or cantaloupe this year. Now that we have the garden box, we can be better next year and hopefully get a good amount, but not too much.

Tanner's first day of Preschool

So since I don't have anything else going on, I decided to be in a little preschool co-op with some friends of Tanner's. There are 4 kids total, so I only have to teach once a month for two day. Tuesday and Thursday are our preschool days from 9:30-11:30. This week will be my first week to teach and so far all the moms have said that it is going well. I hope that Tanner will do well for me as the teacher too.

These pictures were from his first day of school. He had to take a crazy picture before he would smile for me. I love this little ball of energy. I just wish I was better at harnessing it for good:)

Hunter escapades

Along with getting less sleep and being more cranky that normal, Hunter has been getting into a lot of mischief. To the point that if I shower when he is awake, I worry about his safety because I haven't checked on him for over 5 minutes.

He as climbed into the kitchen sink (while I was in the shower). Luckily I had done the dishes that day.



The same day he also climbed onto the kitchen counter and was getting the knives out as I found him.

Today he learned how to balance on his ride-on train and climb on my bathroom counter.

He also loves to play in the backyard and has no fear of being out there by himself. He loves to play with the ride-in cars out there.

He also likes to bring things in sometimes too that aren't always welcome in the house.


Last week I was getting something down from the rafters. I tried to let him stay in the garage with me but after he following me up the ladder I put him inside. When I got down what I needed I went to come inside and found that he had locked me out. So Hayden and Hunter were inside by themselves. It was a little scary. And after telling myself to be calm and knowing that Hayden was safe and as long as I heard Hunter on the other side of the door he was safe too, I started to thing what I was going to do. After no success at trying to get him to unlock the door, I went around to the back slider. I had to teach him to unlock it with some coaching and him getting a chair to unlock the door. At least I was back in. Now I worry that he will go outside by himself when I am not with him:)

Anyway, the adventure never stops here in our house. If it isn't one thing it is another. I guess that is what parenting is all about though right?

Sleeping adventures with my boys

We have had some challenges getting the boys to bed lately. It started when Hunter learned to climb out of his port-a-crib while we were camping. I wasn't too worried about it because he was still staying in it at night, nap times were just a little more challenging. But then he decided to climb out of his crib when we got home too. After fighting him to stay in his bed and worrying that he was going to hurt himself after watching him climb out and fall on his head once, I decided to just take the front rail off the crib and see how he does.



Well, the answer is, not good. Not good at all!

We were already having problems with Tanner going to bed,



and now that Hunter has thrown this wrench into the mix we have a lot bigger problem on our hands. I have tried a few things but nothing is seeming to work except putting Tanner in another room at bed time and transferring him after Hunter is asleep. But I worry that this is going to be causing bigger problems down the line. I guess the only thing I can do is keep trying. I wish sometimes that my boys weren't so stubborn:)



I never know what I am going to find when I open the door after I leave Hunter in there for nap time or bed time. The above picture is where I found him tonight. He has started emptying the trash can, the wipes, pulling everything off his dresser and will open and clothes drawers instead of just laying in bed and going to sleep. I hope that he figures this out soon, or that I can find something that is a better solution. I am running out of patience.

Watching Baby Hayden

Now that school has started, Tia has gone back to work and we are lucky to have baby Hayden with us most days from 7:15-4pm. He is a really easy baby, and usually sleeps 2-3 hours for me in the morning and an other 1-2 hours in the afternoon. The boys are loving having the baby around for the most part. Occasionally Hunter will push his limits or want to be held while I am feeding Hayden a bottle but for the most part we are adjusting well. So when you see more pictures of this little guy, you will know why.