Eastern Idaho

 After leaving Grandpa and Grandma Cows house, we spent two nights back at Grandpa and Grandma Chicken's house. This is the location of Ben's first-ever speeding ticket. It was totally lame, the cop was being a real grouch, you can't contest tickets in court when you're going to be  900 miles away on the appearance date, yada-yada. A friend later told us cops sometimes target out of state plates for that reason. More lameness. Onto the pictures!

Petting Grandma's "Pauline" before hitting the road. My kids love these chickens. It's their hobby when we visit. 

Ben had me drive the leg to Eastern Idaho. This is different, he usually likes to do all the driving. I didn't mind, it meant he had to take care of the kids. :)

 We got to my Grandpa and Grandma Hill's house, and after unpacking the car, headed over to my Uncle Kelly's place. This is a classic Gordon position when he's snuggling up on some pillowed surface.

 Uncle Kelly had a combine and that was very exciting.

 Learning how to greet and pet a horse.

 Kelly and his daughter Jocelyn (my cousin), were nice enough to saddle up Sisco for my kids to ride. This picture of Evelyn absolutely cracks me up. She needs sweeping background music to go with her wind-blown hair and the look of complete fulfillment on her face. I can't get over how funny it is.

 Jocelyn and Gordon on Sisco.

 Jilly really enjoyed her horse ride too, she wanted Jocelyn to make Sisco "run." This kitty was cute and playful too, and she loved petting and chasing him around the yard.

Grandma, Grandpa, me and Uncle Kelly

 After leaving my uncle's, Grandpa drove us over to the head-gates. This is where the main irrigation channel splits into smaller canals to irrigate the area. Lots of water here. 

 Lots of fast-flowing water and rocks to make me nervous. I had a hold of Gordon's shirt collar the whole time, which he didn't like, but that boy was not afraid of getting right up close. The girls were much more aware of the dangers, thankfully.

   My Grandpa told me this area near the head-gates was a place my mom and uncle spent a lot of time playing when they were growing up, making tree-houses and forts. I remember picnics in the area, with home-made fried chicken, scones, and home-made root beer.

On another day, we headed up to Rexburg to check out the new and mostly completed construction at BYU-Idaho. We found the only unlocked door into the conference center that looks just like the one in Salt Lake, and admired all the art they have on the walls there. It's hard to believe the amount of stuff that's been built or re-done since Ben and I were there nearly 10 years ago. (It's been that long?!) It was hot here, like everywhere else we went on vacation, and we attempted to try out the water park. It was so packed though, and they were going to make Gordon wear a swim diaper and plastic pants (which I knew he would not do and I was not going to make him, he's been potty-trained for over a year now) that we decided to try Porter Park instead and a new splash-pad there kept me honest in front of my kids. (I had told the girls if we didn't go to the water park we'd find somewhere else to swim. Lucky me!)

 Gordon was still kind of freaked out at first, and actually had a meltdown when he went up the yellow stairs and got soaked by the fountain you see in the picture below. A nice Dad up on the platform had to hand Gordon down to Ben because Evelyn couldn't convince Gordon that going down the slide was a much better option to getting off the platform of drowning fountains.

 The girls got brave enough toward the end to brave the drowning fountain and took on this fun slide.

 One of the nights here, I was trying to get the kids all ready for bed and they kept running in different directions, or I kept getting distracted (or both), and I found all of them eventually out on the front porch with my Grandpa, who had given them all a popsicle. I was waiting for them to finish and hurriedly get them off to bed, but Ben gave me perspective on the moment when he said, "How many kids get to sit on the front porch with their Great-Grandpa and talk about dogs and eat popsicles? I never did." This is one of the reasons I love my husband - he gives me perspective.

We let them sit until the sun had set and the mosquitoes were making their mark.

   

Feeding the ducks and geese across from the Idaho Falls Temple. 

Four wheeler rides with a bunch of alfalfa-chewing,wanna-be farm kids.  

Dress-up, Three Musketeer style. Thanks Brad and Bryson! We didn't break anything! (I don't think we did...)

Evelyn loved Grandpa's dog 'Spot.' He was really good with the kids. She was actually sniffling a bit when we had to leave because she'd liked him so much.

It was such a good visit with my grandparents. They're both in their seventies and in good health. I want to be in that kind of shape when I hit my seventies. It warms my heart to know that they may be around for several years to come for my kids to visit and have a relationship with.