End of School

Friday, May 27th, was the boys last day of school. I had received a call the day before inviting me to attend the assembly because Carson was receiving an award. He received the Presidential Academic award and was picked to be a peer mediator for next year. I'm so proud of Carson and his accomplishments. He is a hard worker, doesn't give up and is kind! Good job on a great year, Carson!

Last day of school!

Way to go, buddy!

The boys both had great years and learned a ton. Carson was pretty emotional when I picked him up from school that afternoon. He loved Mrs. Winland and will really miss having her as a teacher! We are looking forward to Carson having Mrs. Jody Croft next year and Travis having Mrs. Hinkley!

After the assembly, Landon and I ran to one of his friend's (Jordan) birthday party. They played at the park and had cupcakes!

Landon's little friends!

We are excited for summer vacation to be here and for warmer weather!

Fun Day!

Today was the elementary school fun day. We woke up to pouring rain, so I was a little scared that it might get cancelled, but the rain went away except for a few minutes of sprinkles, making it a pretty nice day! This year, I was asked to help with the running events. We had the kids do gunny sack races, hurdles, and good ole sprints on the track. The only bad thing about helping with an event, is that I didn't get to see the boys participate in the other stations. Luckily, grandma Foulger was able to come and watch them and take pictures for me. It was an Olympic theme so we started with a torch run and then broke out into the different stations. There were was running, throwing and jumping events, the obstacle course and swimming this year.

Carson at the gunny sack races. The fourth graders all wore orange this year.

Carson doing the hurdles.

Carson at the javelin throw.

Tossing rings.

egg and spoon relay

Travis starting out the obstacle course.

Travis on the hay stack. They changed up the obstacle course this year and had some really fun new things for the kids to do.

Travis doing the long jump.

Travis playing in the sand after the jumping events.

Getting some air.

Grandma came to help with Landon, but he was more interested in playing with his friends under the bleachers. He did walk with her and watch some events too.

 The "shot put"

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 The highlight of Travis' day was when he threw the "discuss" (a Frisbee) the farthest out of anyone who threw that day! He was so excited to tell me that he threw farther than the 5th grader that had the first place mark! Nice job, Travis.

Getting ready to throw the "discuss"

The farther flag was his!

Landon taking a turn on the obstacle course.

 After all the events were done, the kids, parents and volunteers enjoyed lunch on the field. When lunch was over, they headed back to the elementary school to watch Rio 2. I stayed and helped in the gym with the k-2 kids.

Travis with his friends Jensen, Kaeson, Wilson, and Cutler.

Carson and his group of friends.

Carson, Jack W., Jacob B., and Jared M.

Jacob's Wedding

Saturday, Christian's youngest brother, Jacob, got married in the Billings, MT temple to Mikayla Cook. We took the boys with us to the temple and they hung out with their cousins (and a babysistter)while we were at the sealing. It was a nice ceremony and we are so excited to have Mikayla in our family now!

Waiting for the bride and groom to arrive.

Travis, Christian, Emily, Charlene , Carson and Landon. Jay Monk and Grandpa Monk and Richard Busteed.

I snapped a pic of the boys before the couple came out.

 The bride and groom!

 Picture time!

Jacob and Mikayla with the brothers.

Some of our group hanging out during pictures.

 After pictures were over, we went and had lunch at a near by church with everyone. When we were done with that, we ran an errand and then made our way home. As we were getting on to the interstate, we got in the middle of a nasty storm. We ended up having to pull over because we couldn't see anything with all the rain and hail! It was crazy! We are just happy that we didn't have any damage done to our car like others did.

The reception was in Burlington that evening from 7-9. We showed up early to take some family pictures now that all the kids were there.

The kids playing around as they waited for the rest of the family to show up.

All the grandkids: Ian, Stetson, Stahle, Janelle, Travis, Britt, Chloe, Paige, Kandace, Landon and Carson holding Mya.

Grandpa and Grandma Asay and all the grandkids!

The entire clan!

Jacob and Mikayla at the reception!

Yellowstone!

Friday, we let the kids skip school and made a day trip to Yellowstone. We had been trying to go before it got too busy with tourists and there were still lots of animals out and about. All of our weekends lately had been busy, so Christian suggested that we just let the kids skip the day and go. They were super excited to get to miss a day of school. We had a very enjoyable ride and saw way more animals than we ever have! We made several stops along the way and walked around to see the sights. 

We finally got to take our picture at the sign. Usually when we go through, we don't stop because there is so much traffic, but this day there wasn't!

 We saw lots and lots of buffalo on our trip. This guy was one of our first sightings.

Our first sight seeing spot was the mud volcano. We stopped here a couple of years ago and they boys remembered some of the spots. Landon was too little then, so it was all new to him.

As we were walking, we came across some buffalo hair on a tree. The boys thought it was really neat to be able to feel some.

 Our second stop was at the Brink of the Upper Falls. We hiked around for a bit, checked out the falls and then got back on the road. We stopped at Canyon village for lunch and went through the visitor center.

As we were driving, we came up on a large group of people gathered on the road, which usually means animals. It was in a spot where there really wasn't much space on the side of the road, so Christian got out first to see what it was. He came back to get us when he found out it was a bear. The people there said it was a grizzly, but we think it was a black bear. The boys were so excited to actually see a bear out in the wild! Seeing a bear was our goal of this trip and we had finally seen one!

Not too much farther down the road, there were more people gathered. We found out that it was a black bear. He was settled in deep in the trees. A Park ranger told us that if we drove a little more, we would find another bear that would be easier to see, so off we went.

We found the bears not too far away. We got to watch a momma black bear that had two cubs with her. The cubs were up in a tree just hanging out. Landon was really concerned that they were going to fall out. A

The baby bears.

Some geese and 3 babies

We saw this momma and baby on our way to Mammoth Hot Springs.

 We drove up to Mammoth Hot Springs to find lots of Elk. We had some ice cream in town and then drove a little more to the hot springs.

Checking out the Hot Springs.

 We walked along the boardwalk for quite a ways and didn't see much more, so we decided it was probably a good time to get headed back home.

We saw a bull snake along the walking path that totally freaked Landon out. He didn't want to some back the same way because he was afraid of it.

 The best part of the trip was on our back home we came across a momma grizzly and two cubs. They were so fun to watch. They were out in the open playing and eating.

At one point, the mom laid on her back so that the cubs could nurse. It was so cool!

We had such a great trip through the park. It was fun to not have to worry about hurrying through to get somewhere and just take our time and check things out. On our trip, we were able to see elk, deer, moose, bears buffalo and lots of rodents and birds. We met grandpa and grandma Foulger for dinner in Cody on our way home that night.