A Starry, Musical Night

One of the benefits of living in the desert is the lack of atmosphere. That means low humidity and clear night skies, without too much bending of light rays and so forth. I'd try to explain further, but I don't want to confuse you with all the technical jargon (ha, ha). I just know that I really appreciate our nighttime temperatures dropping by 20 degrees or more so we can sleep well during the summer.

And when you live out in the middle of nowhere, you also have very low light pollution, making it a wonderful place to enjoy looking up at the night sky. When you see the myriad of stars in the vast night sky, suddenly all your problems seem quite minor.

To celebrate the great night skies, we went to the first evening of an Astronomy Festival at Great Basin National Park last night. There was a concert with a variety of sky- and star-related musical acts, and Desert Boy even got to participate.

He was so eager to sing, he sang the first time all by himself. Then we told him he had to do it again with the other kids, and he willingly obliged. He likes being on center stage, our little drama king (and with the three-year old tantrums he's been having lately, drama king is the perfect nickname for him right now!).


To see more from the concert, click here.

A Good Day

I was going through my July photos and realized I still needed to post the last full day of my brother Ed's visit. When you take a lot of photos, they sometimes overwhelm you. Someday, when they develop a system when you can just think "Delete," and the computer deletes the photos for you, or "Name it this" and the photo is automatically named, or "Crop" and the photo is cropped perfectly, I might not get so far behind.

We got kind of a late start that day, and it wasn't until after lunch that we made it up to the trailhead. Both Desert Boy and Desert Girl fell asleep on the drive, so I told my brother to go ahead and we would meet him later. I enjoyed taking photos of flowers and the time passed quickly. Then they woke up and it was time to hit the trail. It was cool, and I had forgotten to bring a jacket for Desert Boy, so he wore one of my shirts. He thought it was fun wearing mommy's clothing.

Hiking with Desert Boy is a series of distractions. He hikes well if he doesn't think about it. So we are always looking for games, like counting how many dead, hollowed out logs we can find. Or crossing bridges. Or moving wood around. Or looking for insects, especially butterflies, he can chase. Or thinking about the snack that he'll get if he goes to the top of the next hill.

We reached the trail intersection and sat down to have a snack. Shortly Ed came down the trail and met us, and we decided to go a tenth of a mile to a subalpine lake.

Desert Boy was all for that plan, because it meant he could have yet another snack and play the squishing game. The squishing game is a favorite, and Desert Boy is equally happy being the squisher or the squishee. As long as he isn't squished too much.

Soon it was time to go, so they posed for a photo by the nearly full lake (a bit of a surprise for early July--often more has already evaporated) and we headed out.

We were a little late for our next activity, so Desert Boy got to ride on Uncle Ed's shoulders until the end. He thought that was a good way to travel!

Our next activity involved canyoneering with a five-month old. Sounds reasonable, right? Okay, we were actually having a picnic at the reservoir and the steaks were taking forever to cook. So we started on a little hike, which led to this gorge, and we couldn't resist going to the bottom of it to check it out.

Ed passed Desert Girl down to my husband.

Then it was time to find a way down with Desert Boy.

There were little waterfalls and pools of water, just perfect for playing in on a summer evening.

While we were playing, my husband and Desert Girl were taking a little break.

Desert Boy got plenty wet.

Then I ran back to check on the steaks and they were done. Yum.

Emma enjoyed licking one.

It was relaxing, a good way to end the day.

Emma wasn't too sure at first about her uncle holding her. She definitely has the concerned look down pretty well.

But then she decides, I like my uncle holding me.
More steak, please?

Cheesy Smiles

The kids and I went on a little hike the other day, and they were cooperative enough to pose during one of our many snack breaks. I figured what were the chances that they would both have their eyes closed and a cheesy smile?
I wandered around for a couple minutes taking photos of flowers, and when I got back to Desert Girl, she was stuffing a fistful of dirt and grass in her mouth. Apparently it tasted good. Desert Boy was eating chips and oblivious to everything else in the world.

Vacation Interlude

Our vacation with Ed continued after the Grand Canyon and other adventures, but we're going to take an interlude with this post and show some more recent stuff we've been doing. It's been a great summer, with so many fun things going on.

Nomi organized a play date up where she lives, and we were happy to accept. She has a whole area for a variety of activities, and Desert Boy was delighted to try out the play dough ice cream maker. Playing with different toys is always a real treat.
Emma agreed. She thought the big orange bubble wand would be a wonderful chew toy.

Or at least fun to lick! There were some bubble remnants on it, but she didn't seem to mind.

Brandon had fun wearing one of the animal masks. Sometime in the future I can imagine the kids playing a game and pretending they're the animals they're wearing.

Desert Boy couldn't resist playing with the water toys. He did listen to his Mama, who told him that he couldn't get wet until later. But you can see the glitter in his eyes. He's already imagining the moment when he can splash and jump in.

Isaac and Emma hung out together on the soft blanket. Isaac has mastered sitting and is really good at grabbing what he's reaching for.
The older kids started painting.

Desert Boy was busy painting on one side. Do you like his attire? Nomi provided painting shirts (thanks, Nomi!), and so that is on correctly. Desert Boy did the rest of the dressing himself. His pants are on backwards and are a little big, so he wanted the belt. The belt is also on backwards and somehow didn't manage to go through any of the belt loops. It made me smile.

Getting the paint on the canvas obviously wasn't the highest priority for Charlie and Ava. They were having a super time playing in the paint. Still photos don't really capture the energy level, but the video does a good job of it:



And then it was finally time--time to get wet! The kids stripped down. Desert Boy happily did that all by himself, and to my great surprise kept on his underwear (backwards, of course). He likes to run around sans clothing at home at times, but he has been very proud that he's a Big Boy and wears underwear now, and that might be why he kept it on. He tells me at least once a day, "I'm a Big Boy and I wear underwear." I smile and nod and agree heartily. This is something we'll be happy to go along with.

Elizabeth didn't want to get wet, but she had fun mixing paint colors and pouring them from one container to another.

It was a really fun play date, with so many neat activities. I didn't even photograph them all, and Desert Boy left crying because he didn't want to leave.

The next day we were ready for some more fun, with a foray to the nearby playground. Charlie and Ava had fun bouncing around.

They are so cute!
Desert Girl wanted to sit up and make sure she didn't miss any of the action.
And it was quite some action. Jenny had brought a swimming pool and put it under the slide. We filled it up, and presto, we had a water slide! It was a hot day, perfect for a water slide. Desert Boy went splash.
Charlie went splash.
Ava went splash!
Meanwhile, Brandon was checking out Isaac and Emma under the shade umbrella (with Henry nearby).
Both of the little ones are teething and are constantly chewing on things.
That gave Jenny time to try out the water slide. What a great idea, Jenny, thanks for bringing it!
The hose made the slide extra slick and even the adults when splashing into the pool.
We soon had a huge group of kids enjoying all the fun.


Meanwhile, Hector was trying to figure out the bouncy ball.
I think everyone had a great time.

Preschool Fun

School ended this week, along with preschool. Desert Boy really enjoyed his first year of going to preschool and learning how to better interact with other kids and have a little more structure. One of the best things he learned was that before he could play with a new activity, he had to put away the one he was playing with. We reinforce that at home all the time.

He also learned his colors, more numbers, and how to say the alphabet correctly. He misses Teacher Gwendy already and was sad when I told him that there was no school for the summer.

On the last day of preschool, we went to the school for the kindergarteners, first graders, and second graders. There are seven students in total for the three grades.

During recess, all the kids had fun playing together.

The girls had fun posing for the camera.

Desert Boy hung on every word that the teacher said. He was so excited to be in the big kid school.

Meanwhile, another mom, Chayo, was helping me with Desert Girl.

And then Isaac came and we thought it would be fun to have a little photo shoot. We honestly didn't plan their outfits. We just were thinking on the same track, I guess!

I think Isaac is telling Emma that he has some news for her.

"In just a couple years we'll be in preschool and get to have all the fun."

But for now they can lean and drool and chew on things. Life is good.