Merry Christmas

Wishing you a Merry Christmas! (with a little Rudolph thrown in)

Meet Inkie

We have a brand new member of the family! Meet Inkie the 8wk old kitten. He will soon become a mouser extraordinaire, taking care of the old homestead in the back yard. Inkie is also joined by Missey (coming to us from another home) a two year old black and white who wants nothing to do with us people and especially nothing to do with Zeta the excitable shiloh. Hence, no pictures.

Moab

We went on a quick getaway to Moab for some outdoor playing. Gray and I were greeted by this sign on the cabin door from Naomi. She would have included Kory in the sign, but he was still sleeping.




No, Kory is not pushing Gray across Mussleman Arch, he's holding onto him just in case. It's hard to tell from this angle, but this arch isn't that wide. We drove part of the White Rim Trail in Canyonlands, a 100 trail we hope to someday experience by bike.


Hiking to Corona Arch, the only place we went where the dog could go too. National Parks and pets are not a good combination. In parts of Canyonlands you can't even have a pet in your vehicle so Zeta spent a lot of time at the cabin.

More of the hike to Corona arch.

The kids loved Arches! This was after playing at sand dune arch. I remember as a kid that you could jump off the arch into sand dune, but not anymore. There's not much sand left right under the arch.


This was Gray's first time riding Slickrock and he LOVED it! I'm sure we'll be going back to southern Utah soon.

Bronson Reunion 2009

We had such a fun family reunion. Instead of posting the 100 pictures I took, I've put a sampling into a video. This years theme was Rednecks and it was a blast!

Summer's going by in a hurry so here are a few snapshots of what we've been up to during the past two months. Naomi's been loving her new bike with gears and front suspension. Here she is riding in Green Canyon.


Gray went to scout camp with his new den and had a great time.

We've done some hiking. Here we are on the Old Juniper trail in Logan Canyon. Beautiful night, but lots of bugs and a disgruntled bear.

I can hardly believe it! Gray has reached the end of his cub scout days. He only has one more den meeting before moving on to 11yr old scouts. Here he is receiving his Arrow of Light. It was a great presentation and he has worked hard to earn many badges, pins, beads, arrow points and belt loops.


This summer has been the summer of the Mustang. The kids are always on the lookout for a good car and loved going to the local car show where they saw many many Mustangs, in particular '65s. Here is one of their favorites.

We were able to take a weekend and go up to Yellowstone, a park I will never tire of visiting.





Gray and Naomi got to ride on the firetruck for the Hyde Park Pioneer Day parade. It was Naomi's first parade and she loved it! Naomi's just about center above the ladder and Gray is closer to the front of the truck wearing a red shirt.

We've also spent lots of time walking and riding bikes on the canal trail above our house. The kids were able to do art camp and a sports camp. They both loved pottery at art camp and at sports camp, track and field was Gray's favorite while Naomi said she liked swimming the best. Gray starts an extreme sports camp tomorrow as part of the incoming sixth grader program our middle school does. Crazy that he's going to middle school in just a few weeks. Naomi will spend the week with Kory, acting as nurse while he works on recovering from the flu (yep, the swine variety). I'm still busy at the USU library and have been spending my spare time learning how to repair sprinkler heads and water pipes.

Gray and the hens

Gray's been busy with the chicks, which are no longer cute little fuzzballs. He had fun one day setting them all up on the bike rack. Notice Zeta in the background thinking that it looks like a mighty fine buffet.

We're suspicious of the black and white one on the end, thinking it might be of the rooster variety.

Kory's been busy building a chicken coop. Yippee, the chickens are finally out of our garage!

Spring Break

I'm finally getting my quarterly post together. It seems like the past few months have been full of spring breaks. Our first spring break was an Olsen family reunion where we met up in Arizona then drove down to Rocky Point Mexico. The weather was great and it was so much fun to spend some time with family.

The kids are ready to party! They drove all over town with these wigs on, it was priceless.


Here's our sweet beach house (the one on the left) at low tide. When the tide came in, the waves would come up the retaining walls.

Here's Gray taking it easy on the deck.

Amelia and Gray busy building in the sand. The cousins had so much fun together.

Gray and I heading out for a morning walk.

Of course no trip to Mexico is complete without going to the market.

I could have spent many more hours right in this spot. It was so beautiful.

Amelia and Naomi had a great time playing on the beach.

Naomi's shell drying set-up.


Naomi and Grandpa relaxing. I think this was the last time I remember seeing Dad outside before he became bedridden with pneumonia.

Naomi and Gray at the Tempe Town Lake park.

We took the scenic way home and stopped at the bridge near Lee's Ferry.

Two weeks after our trip to AZ/Mexico, the kids had their spring break. We played around Logan mostly, going to parks and movies, but did take one day and explored the Dinosaur Park in Ogden.


Watch out Gray!!

Yep, we have chicks. These were the first batch, seven little chicks. The kids loved playing with them when they were just little balls of fluff. They are much bigger now and not so cuddly, but we got two more a few weeks later so we still have some cute ones around.


Gray has been breaking out his longboard. We've got some pretty good hills around here for him to ride and he's hoping he'll get some sliding gloves this summer.