September
Farewells, hunting, girls trip and more
Farewell Uncle Ryder
Mission farewells are always memorable and saying goodbye to Lauren’s brother Ryder was no exception. We were able to meet up with most of the Stringham clan at Molly’s. He’s going to the Angola Luanda Mission. It’s always fun seeing another missionary go to Africa on their mission.
So the interesting story about the picture below, is that Roxy for last almost 2 years has been petrified of Uncle Ryder. If Ryder were to so much as look at her she would turn her head and if he were to try and hold her, she would cry. But for one tender moment, she built up the courage to give her Uncle a big hug before he left for the MTC.
Sadly, as soon as we got done saying goodbye and we were nice and emotional, we got the news that Charlie Kirk got shot, and on the way back to Lehi from Provo we drove by UVU and saw the madness. Very tragic.
Bonfire
Since we didn’t do a campout this year, we opted for a bonfire instead. There’s something soothing to the soul about being outside, around a campfire with good friends, good food and good conversations. It’s sad to see how populated the mountains have become, but luckily we still found a spot and the Dennison’s and Mickelsen’s came up to join the fun.
As my babies get older and older, I’ll oftentimes find myself missing how little they used to be, but then I see my kids growing up, learning and playing together and I realize the joys of watching them develop. Donovan and Conrad, randomly busted out the chess board, learned out to play chess and were hooked.
Girls Trip
For Mother’s day this year, Kristi (Lauren’s Mom) gave all the girls a surprise girls trip down to St. George to go see Little Mermaid at the Tuacahn Amphitheater. They had a great time and had almost everyone drive down together in a big ol’ polygamist wagon for a fun little roadtrip. The only complaint from Lauren was that her travel companions had to stop a bunch of times. She truly is remarkable, despite being 37 weeks pregnant and on her 5th pregnancy, they never had to stop for her to pee. She truly has an iron bladder.
While Lauren was doing her girls trip, the kids and I made the most of our time and went to the Curiosity Museum and discovered a whole new section, full of Coy fish, caves, tunnels and sand pits. Afterwards, we treated ourselves to the some ice cream. Lauren and I always joke how we are too clingy to each other, and her she was definitely missed. Although when she came home, she said she needs to do more stuff like the girls trip. So I guess I’m the clingy one after all.
Kids imaginations are a wonderful thing. Sometimes I wonder why we give kids anything other than a cardboard box for presents. On this particular occasion we received a box full of diapers and Lou and Roxy decided to make it their new home. Lou went around telling everyone, “this is my house, it was made in China.”
If you know Lou you’ll probably know he love carrying his little Book of Mormon around. One night, as we were trying to corral the kids and get them to bed, I couldn’t find Lou and low and behold he was in bed reading his Book of Mormon. I wish we could claim that Lauren and I are amazing readers of scriptures with our kids, but we are not. In fact, he can’t even read, but every night he opens it up and just like to look at the pages.
Hunting
Hunting has become a passion of mine. I love getting out in the woods enjoying the fresh air, admiring God’s good earth and hunting. It is a good reset for me and this year I didn’t draw a tag or buy an over the counter, but went with Dustin on his limited entry tag. For whatever reason, I keep having children right during hunting season in October, to which I receive a lot of flack from Dustin’s grandpa Randy, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Dustin and I went bush wacking through some dense pine and called in 2 elk. The first was a 4x5 that came within 40 yards of us and just stared as us for 2 or 3 minutes. But since it was only day 1 of the hunt so Dustin passed on it. Then we called in another one that sounded bigger that was crashing through the dense foliage, but we never got eyes on him, but he was snorting and sounded like a big bull. Eventually Dustin got a bull later on in the hunt, but I had to end the hunt early so Lauren could go on her girls trip to St. Geezy.
I’m not going to lie, I totally got spooked as we were trekking back after a good hunting session in the darkness. As we were walking back, I was in the lead, and saw this big black animal jump out in front of us and turned and stared us down. It was so dark that my first thought was that it was a black bear, only to find out that it was a moo cow. I will say, if I were to run into a bear, there would be no other person I’d rather run into a bear with than Dustin, who is a large as a bear himself.
Tesla Truck
Ever since the Tesla trucks came out, Donovan and Conrad have been obsessed with them, so when Uncle Auddy got to take home the company car, he offered to take us for a little joy ride. We all had a great time and it legit feels like you’re in another world mixed with a roller coaster. We went from 0-60 in a matter of seconds and felt our whole bodies push back against the seats with such force that we couldn’t help but laugh. Not to mention the kids had a good time playing chess on the screen in the back.
Random Photo Dump
We are so grateful for our family, friends, country and most importantly our Savior Jesus Christ. Also, we have Lauren’s birthing story coming in October’s edition of our blog. :-)
I love Hudson “reading” the scriptures! His house is awesome too!
I hope I can make it hunting next fall!