Luckily our little friend didn't manage to get the lid open. The kids thought this was the coolest thing they'd ever seen. The next day they went to see if the prints were still there. They were. (Even through much rain, they didn't wash off.) Josh couldn't believe it, "I think the racoon came back again last night!!"
I realize Lord of the Rings is so 6 or 8 years ago, but I haven't seen the new Harry Potter (yet!) and I thought this Etsy offering was cute.
Lydia likes to make up songs. Often when we're in the van she can be heard singing about various topics on her mind (like, "My best friend Maya moved to Arizona" or "I'm shy of Brad but that's okay"). For a long time I've wanted to capture one of these ballads before she loses the habit. Finally on the 4th of July I: a) had the camera with me and b) was not driving and c) remembered. This is a snippet of her musical contemplation of the parade we were on our way to. Usually her songs are longer (like a five minute long run-on sentence) and kind of flow between topics, but she was in more of a la-la-la mood this day. So this clip is not actually the most accurate representation of her normal car songs, but I wanted to document at least something, since I may never catch it again.
I thought it would be nice to include also another common/favorite van occurance. Josh always begs to hear Pork and Beans by Weezer over and over again while we're driving. I usually say, "Okay, but only if you rock out."
This video clip demonstrates a number of things:
1. Emma's proficiency on the recorder (thank you very much, third grade music teacher)
2. Afton's amusement when Emma plays (she usually laughs longer than this clip, actually)
3. Afton can sit up
4. Afton can crawl
5. Josh likes to bounce around
6. Not many people around here see a need for getting dressed
...complete with nail polish and bows.
Lydia puzzles over how they will get the extra-tight lid off of the purple polish:
Tied the knot this morning in the Mt. Timpanogas Temple. Congrats guys!
Meet my new associates, On Easly and Arry Otter. I don't know where they came from, but they showed up at my house one day and they're willing to help with the cleaning so I let them stay.
As we anxiously waited for something to happen we were entertained by a pair of helicopters which went up and down the parade route. 
The big one would occasionally hover right above us. This was simultaneously scary and wonderful. It was hovering very low. The rotors gave us the most fantastic, strong, cooling wind (it was a sweaty day), but it was so low I couldn't help playing out the worst-case scenario in my head and trying to figure out if we'd have time to grab all of our children and fling them to safety if the huge whilrlybird should suddenly drop from the sky.
Lunch and games:
The intermission:
We crashed at home for a few hours to regroup and watch The Sound of Music (Emma and Ben: loved it, Josh: kind of really boring (except for the doe-a-deer part), Lydia: MIA).
The dinner and show:
Then the fun day continued as we grabbed our good friends from the ward, the Stoners, and headed up to the Cruze Compound. There we met the Conan and Callys, the Rachel and Terrys, and a family the C&Cs brought (I don't remember their names, but their one-year-old threw up at the end of the night...how's that for first impressions? Now any time we happen to see them again we'll say, 'Oh yeah, you're Pukey's mom and dad.'). Here we first had a delicious picnic dinner,
then started our fireworks fun in the waning twilight. First the snap dragons and smoke bombs:
Next came sparklers, then it got dark enough for the heavy artillery. No photos of this portion of the fun except for this one of Lydia enjoying the privilege of staying up way past her bedtime and eating tons of candy.
The show was spectacular, but the minor burn injury of one member of the audience (I'll leave the particulars to his parents to tell) due to a rogue firework shooting sideways left us feeling like maybe it's time to hang up our pyrotechnics hat and try something like this next year instead.
Last Saturday was great. Earlier in the week Scott suggested taking a drive up to Natural Tunnel State Park, somewhere he'd gone while he was growing up (as it is close to Kingsport, the Cruze homeland). Never had an idea sounded more wonderful. We soon expanded our plans to include a quick tour of his old stomping grounds on our way home and got the Fake Cruzes in on the deal.
It was a perfect day. Nice and sunny (not too hot in the shade), everyone was happy. We started out with a picnic lunch and playing on the playground. 
Then we went over to a trail so we could hike down to the tunnel. The trail was a bit steep and not at all stroller-friendly, so the moms lucked out and took the little girls down on the chair lift. We passed right over our rugged hikers (see our shadow?).
The tunnel itself was much bigger and much blacker than I imagined it. We thought we would be able to walk in it, but were disappointed (or in Josh's case: relieved) that we could not. Looking in:
Looking up:
Looking goooood:
Looking similar:
Looking:
Apparently they get tired of questions about the train...
So we really lucked out to see one.
A little power-struggle involving hugging rights to the lamp post.
We spoiled four rode back up the chair lift while the rest sweat their way up below us.
Next we hopped down to Kingsport and went on a Cruze childhood tour, hitting all four houses (which I'm really mad I didn't take any photos of). For Scott and Conan it was sweet nostalgia, disbelief at how big the trees all were, how small other things seemed, what had changed and what remained the same. For me it was completing the mental pictures I've had from all the stories (now I know where the pig farm was). We also made rounds to the mall, the church, the elementary school and best of all the high school. Here we got out and spent a long time running around the track and on the field and all over the bleachers.
Good day.
Pioneer babies are extra cute.
