July Activities

Work has been so crazy I needed to get away. We weren't able to make it to Brashear Beach Week this year with the extended family so we opted for a mini vacation ourselves.

Destination: Farragut State Park (Athol, ID)

Idaho State Parks are amazing!! They are by far the most well kept. We stayed at the Whitetail Campsite #36. It was a prime location. It was close to the showers, restrooms, water spigot, and the Tot Lot for kids to play on. Yet it was far enough away from those things not to be bothered.

Our campsite.

Jake setting up the tent

I'm tying the poles in the inside.

1) We're getting the fire going for foil dinners

2) Creepy spider that must have been dangling in front of the camera.

We didn't notice it until today!!

Foil dinner. Yum!

This park has a ton of history. It actually was a Naval Training Station in 1940's (and other things after the war ended). It is the only land locked Naval Training Station. In fact the Navy still uses it today. They chose it because they were afraid the coast would have been attacked.

After the war the government removed all of the buildings in each camp. The National Guard came in and reseeded and planted trees to bring it back to it's original beauty. They did an amazing job!

This is a picture of Jake and I at Camp Bennion.

On one of our many hikes Jake and I found this double chimney tucked back off the trail. We later found out it was for the Officers.

This was a statue (obviously) dedicated to those who trained at Farragut and served in WWII.

This is the lower tip of Pend Orielle (pronounced Pond O Ray).

Us!

This was at the lower bend. It opened up to a massive lake. It was awesome.

Jake enjoying the view.

Making my signature scrapbook opener page.

Scrapbook opener page:

I found two rocks in the shape of hearts!!

We drove up to Bayview. I couldn't believe there were houses on the water like this. I know I'm a little late on things... Oh and the white building to the right is the "garage" for the boats. Crazy.

Then we ventured to Silverwood. Silverwood is a theme park. It's a Six Flags meets Wet 'n Wild. Although not as good as the two. Still extremely fun.

I made Jake drive me around in this car.

(it was a kids ride and we were the only adults without a kid in line)

Jake's favorite ride . . .

And how he felt after it . . .

Even though it rained on us while we were there we still ended the day with a Snow Cone!

On to our next adventure . . . Jacob's birthday!

Kicking Off Summer

We've spent time at the river.

Played with Fireworks.

Hung out with friends.

And relaxed.

It has been very enjoyable so far. I've been working some crazy hours but we've still managed to hit birthday parties, bbq's, and catch a couple of movies.

Dear Mother Nature,

Really? It's June 1st. Can we get some SUN?

Today Chance Tstms Hi 63 °F

Tonight Chance Showers Lo 44 °F

Thursday Chance Showers Hi 57 °F

Thursday Night Chance Showers Lo 40 °F

Let's be honest. 50% chance means it's going to rain up here! And I love the rain . . . but I would also like to run outside and not come home soaked. It would be much appreciated if you could allow summer to come a little early. I'm really missing the dry heat of the desert.

Thanks,

Emily

A Vegas Vacation

In April we took a trip to Vegas to visit family and friends.

It started out a little rocky by almost missing our flight there,

Waiting over an hour for our rental car,

Paying extra for coverage we didn't need on our rental car,

Finding out my phone broke and I was unable to call or get any numbers of my friends or family,

and we were starving!

But once we were there we had a blast!

We hung out with Mom and Brian.

We forgot to take pictures with all of our friends but . . .

Stayed with our favorite family and played with these awesome kids!

We cruised the strip once.

Ate at restaurants we don't have

(Claim Jumper, Fuddruckers, Smash Burger, some taco joint, etc.)

Went to places that weren't complete when we left.

(Hoover Dam and City Center)

And then flew back home to a little more color.

I had forgot how brown Vegas is.

We had a lay over in Seattle and decided to take advantage of the restaurants there too!

Jake about to enjoy Swordfish at Anthony's.

From Seattle to the Tri-Cities we got to fly on a new plane! It was only two weeks old and smelled so nice!

Even though it started out rocky we ended up having a great time. I was able to meet up with my friends, see family, and relax. In the end it was pretty stress free and relaxing.

On to our next adventure.

March was Madness

So it started pretty tame. Well if you call a ton of snow tame. Although it was pretty much melted by the next day.

A benefits of working at the station:

if your car is buried you will get a ride to work.

We drove to the Tri-Cities for Jake's dad's birthday! Enjoyed the family time and whisked back home.

We went to the last couple of basketball games here. Basketball soon turned into this non-stop, based our lives around it, craziness!

The student section . . . always great entertainment during the game.

Klay Thompson. He's our star player and might be drafted to the NBA.

The WSU Cougars didn't make it to the NCAA, which I'm thinking is okay because they would have lost in the first round. They did make it into the NIT tournament (aka Losers Bracket). We went to the first three games and it was pretty exciting. Then they went to NYC and blew it. Royally. We played Wichita State, which just so happens to be where my sister lives. I guess I could have cheered for either team. WSU was taken to the cleaners and couldn't recover.

We had the NCAA games on non-stop. We usually have dinner on Sunday with Jason and Andrea. So much for turning off the t.v. This is what it was like during our dinners in March . . .

The Brashear Family fills out brackets every year. This year not one of us had a team in the final four! That's pretty bad for 7 brackets (not everyone filled one out this year).

Sometimes we like to purposely watch movies with animals in it just so we can watch our dog watch the movie. I'm pretty sure the dog was talking to her.

Our dogs were invited to a dog party. It was formal and they were given pearls and bow ties to wear. This is another sign people should have kids.

And if we lose all hope in finding a job when Jake graduates . . .

he and Belle can join the circus!

We ended the month on a rather interesting note. Jake was notified that his birth father passed away and he was the only next of kin they could contact. Jake is child #8 of possibly 15+ (we don't have an exact count yet). Jake had never contacted his birth dad but knew where he lived. The doctor did contact one ex wife and as far as she knew he didn't have any other family. Well it was a bit of a surprise to her to find out he had a big family. In the end we added two more kids to the list! As of right now Jake's youngest sister is 15 and we're hoping she's the baby of the family.

WSU Basketball

We've managed to keep our Thursday nights busy by attending the WSU Basketball games. They were a lot of fun and was even better when we won!

These were from the Stanford vs. WSU game.

The Cougars always kept it close.

And as usual, we lost!

We coug'd it!!

(a term used frequently meaning we do so good and then blow it at the end)

We went to all the games with our friends, Jason and Andrea.

One game Jason bought our tickets and we got a good laugh when we found out we were in row II. He thought it was roman numeral 2! Although, there really isn't a bad seat in the house.

Our photographer (Andrea) couldn't seem to focus!

So I guess now that we've become "professional" college basketball analyzers we can move on to the baseball season.

Go Cougs!