Boise

So over Memorial Day weekend we went to Boise, well kinda.  We planted watermelons on Monday,  and by we I included myself this time.  I helped Peter do the planting--in the greenhouse.  But onto fun, we did this a little anniversery present to ourselves and made a family weekend of it.  I only took pictures of one day because as I mentioned our camera is broken and were using Micah's.  He hadn't recharged his battery and there were a ton thrown away to boot.  

But we had a lot of fun!  On Saturday we went to Cracker Barrel and then headed to the Discovery Center.  The interactive items were mostly about kinetic energy.  The boys enjoyed manipulating all the displays.

This is not your typical arcade grab the toy game.  It was an actual robotic arm with shoulder and elbow joints included.  Micah did much better than I did.  Who's surprised?  No raised hands, hmm.
This was, umm--I can't remember, but I did have to pull him away from it.
Esther's favorite item.  She was learning about being even cuter, oh wait-- no, it was reflections.
Abraham learning about centrifugal force.
Esther spending more time being cute.  When I shot this I thought, "What if there really were four of her?"  Mommy would be in big trouble!
If you look closely you can see the bubble that Samuel is blowing.  The kids really liked this one.
Then we stopped by some friends' house.  They moved to Boise in December.  They are all really happy there.  It was nice to see how settled and happy they are, as well as getting a chance to visit.

Then we checked into our hotel and went to Red Robin for dinner.  It was a hit with everyone!  

I didn't get any pictures from Sunday(the battery problem), but it was mostly shopping and swimming.  We got some Krispy Kremes before we left Boise.  It was nice to get some real donuts, but they aren't as good as Dunkin'.

What a guy!

Yesterday was water day at Samuel's school.  I didn't get any pictures for two reasons.  One is that Esther was asleep when I dropped Samuel off.  The other is that our camera's main lens is broken.  It's been breaking for awhile, about 2 years, and now won't work at all.  So there are no pictures from the water day to show.  

During water day the kids are encouraged to bring squirt guns to play with.  I saw this a couple of years ago.  It doesn't turn out well because the older kids get self-important, take the younger kids guns, and just decide that they deserve them.  This happened to Samuel's friend, Alex.  So yesterday when I went to pick Samuel up his teacher stopped me to tell me she was very proud of Samuel.  When this happened to Alex he was too afraid to go up the 4th grader to get his gun back.  So Samuel went with him.  But that's not all!  Samuel went up to the 4th grader looked him in the eye and said "That's his gun."  Then he just stood there looking at him until the 4th grader gave Alex his gun back.  

What a kid!  He was so brave and stood up for what was right without getting violent or yelling or crying!  We must have done something right!  It just goes to show that the truth is a powerful thing, and saying the truth can affect change.  I am such a coward about saying the truth so often, I suppose I could learn a thing or two from Samuel!

Sick

We've all been sick for awhile now.  I have some wonderful pictures to put up, but somehow sleeping has been the priority for last bit.  I am happy to say that Esther now has long enough hair to put into pig tails.  VERY CUTE!