Author: lilydarais

Decorating for Fall and Halloween

In the morning I took Basil on a long walk and then followed through on my Halloween decoration promises and took the kids to Target and Trader Joe’s for pumpkins and some yard decor. We got a posable skeleton, a skeleton pig, and some skeletons that are popping out of the ground. The kids loved posing them in the yard, and they also loved picking pumpkins for our front porch and front steps.

After all the decorating I picked up my mom for dinner. Everyone enjoyed seeing her.

After I dropped my mom back at her place, the kids and I walked all around the neighborhood as the sun set. We looked at everyone’s Halloween decorations and counted the Vote No Prop 2 signs. Every sign made us all squeal with delight, and we also saw some fun decorations.

Here is Ammon improvising beautiful songs on the piano

Abe leaves for Asia

In the morning the kids all said goodbye to their amazing dad before I took him to the airport.

Basil wanted to say goodbye too. I think he’s been glummer in Abe’s absence.

I drove Abe to the airport and we chatted the whole way there. I don’t even remember about what but every minute with Abe is fun. It was hard to say goodbye, but I am genuinely excited for him to have a new adventure in Asia! Hopefully 2 weeks will fly by.

While we were gone Lydia face painted Ammon and Clarissa.

The kids spent the entire day outside making mud pies, painting pictures, and coloring. I went swimming and tidied inside.

Lydia’s Halloween costume came!!

Day 1 at the Tetons

I am so grateful that Lily encouraged us to stop at a cabin an hour outside of the Tetons instead of getting in at 1:00 to set up camp. I’m not always thinking clearly when I’m trying to save a buck. Because we all got rest, we were able to have such a fun day today. We were to String Lake by mid-day and we had a wonderful picnic together right next to the lake. Lily had made the most amazing Panini sandwiches and the balsamic vinegar in them really made them pop!

Then we all enjoyed String Lake together. Honestly, I was afraid of the temperature of the lake, so to confront my fear, I just jumped right in really quickly. It was cold, but actually very refreshing and it got better over time….until it stopped getting better and then I started shivering and left. But before I left, Lily joined me and we both had fun swimming in the lake. Lily especially got some good laps in swimming to and from rocks.

The kids had fun playing on the beach.

At one point it got a little windy, and a toppled tree that was hanging over our heads (stuck on another tree) started to creak. We got freaked out (especially Clarissa) and decided to wrap up our time at String Lake. No trees falling on us to today, thank you!

In the car, Clarissa showed off her fishlips.

Then we all went on a short (I think about 2.4 miles) hike to Heron lake.

We loved looking at this beaver dam which seamed to be a true beaver mansion. The water was really low, which was a theme throughout our Teton’s trip (Jackson lake was at 33%) so we actually saw a dam higher up on the shore too (which we assumed was built when the water was higher). If you look closely in the picture below, you can also see the dam higher up on the shore.

We said, “Hey Bear!” multiple times to help stay safe.

Ammon and Clarissa LOVED looking at the beautiful and massive mushrooms all around. We also found a friend on the trail who taught us about mushrooms. She thought these were edible, but that they were older, as in past their prime for eating.

It was very tough getting Clarissa to walk, but things turned around when I encouraged her to tell me all about a Halloween party she was planning in her imagination. She talked all about it as we walked.

After hiking Heron lake came my favorite part of the day, and a highlight for the entire year for me. I got to cook Lily and Mary’s tin foil dinners on the fire, and then we had the MOST delicious family meal together. I LOVE seasoned roasted vegetables. The weather was perfect, and it was so wonderful to be together. Then we all had banana boats, and they were the yummiest ones I’ve ever had. They were cooked perfectly. Then after everyone went to bed, I sat by the fire and pondered and wrote a poem. I was feeling very inspired with thoughts and felt so grateful for every moment of life (which is what my poem was about). What an incredible gift life is!

play dates

Clarissa and Ammon played nicely all day long.

I spent the day cleaning both my house and a friend’s while Abe worked from early morning until midnight. He also went on a bike ride in the morning.

In the afternoon Amy and her kids came over, and Emerson stayed late for extra fun with the older girls. I helped Mary with her concerto in the evening and was so impressed by how much she retained after such a long time away from the piano. Ammon’s friend Kasey also came over to play for a while.

After I put the little kids down the older girls enjoyed some fireworks outside. The weather was beautiful, and I think we all enjoyed being home!

Clarissa’s birthday

On Thursday Clarissa turned 5!

We had waffles for breakfast, went to Color Me Mine, went to Claire’s to pick out her gifts, ate dinner at the Olive Garden, came home for presents, piñata and ice cream cake, and all around had a very fun day. Nana joined us for dinner and Tom and Suzanne joined us for the party afterward.

https://youtube.com/shorts/w84cQIDhniY?feature=share

Also, Abe had allergy testing done and found out he is very allergic to grass. Those big welts are all grass. Littler welts include weeds and mold.

Clarissa lights up our lives every single day. She is eye-poppingly precocious, silly, fun and charming. I love it when she uses the word, “indeed!” She also says, “What the heck!!” to our continual amusement. When she really loves something (for example, a hat on the rack), she declares it her “one true love.” She adores unicorns, fireworks, rollercoasters, playing with her siblings, sugar, screens, pools, baths, rivers, fountains (water in every form, really), drawing, coloring, crafting, dolls, and all types of pretend. She does not like hiking, long walks, being cold, being hungry, being sleepy, and not being heard. She says, “uuuuugh!” when she is frustrated, laughs and squeals when happy, and cries when corrected. She is the cutest.

We all love you so much, Clarissa! Happy birthday!!!!

play date with Mangelsons

The kids loved getting to know the Mangelsons at church camp and at our giant get together before we left for Europe. They also talked about Lily, Sophie and Grant a lot during our time in Europe. Brittany and I arranged a play date for the day after we got back, and so I spent most of the morning before that just trying to sort through the laundry and get the house kind of in shape for a chaos-free play date. Everyone had a great time!

The only picture we have of the day is of Ammon drinking a smoothie Lydia and Mary made.

Also, we were all very tired this day. Everyone woke up before 4am, and Abe really felt the jet lag at work. But he powered through!

Lower Manhattan, 9/11 Museum, and flight home

On Sunday we Ubered over to lower Manhattan and started off at the charging bull in the financial district.

  • Tourists rub this enlarged appendage for good luck in the stock market.

Then we visited Trinity Church and found the Hamiltons’ grave sites!

Then we walked over to the National Museum of the American Indian.

  • the beautiful rotunda
  • Clarissa found all sorts of displays that matched the cards on her treasure hunt
  • Abe fell in love with the work of Oscar Howe. I loved what I saw but rushed through the exhibit trying to keep up with Ammon.

After the museum we headed over to Battery Park.

  • We got a kick out of how similar the carousel in Battery Park is to the CoC temple in Missouri!
  • I told the kids we have ancestors who came over in the potato famine.
  • Magical carousel.

The kids really liked the carousel, especially Ammon and Clarissa:

Then we headed over the 9/11 memorials. We saw the fountains, the Oculus, and ate lunch at Oculus. We had dessert at Eataly.

  • Lydia remembered reading a book about this heroic fireman who kept a bandana in his pocket.
  • The Oculus.
  • Eataly.

Then we headed over to the 9/11 museum.

We spent hours in this museum and could have used at least another. The exhibits are incredibly well done.

Then we headed to our hotel to grab our bags. It was windy waiting for the airport shuttle so the kids huddled together.

Then it was time to fly home! Tom and Suzanne went out of their way to park our car in a spot very close to the airport exit. Since it was almost midnight when we arrived, we were very grateful for the shorter walk.

This was one of our favorite trips of all time. What a great day to conclude it!

Last day in Paris and flight to NYC

On our last day in Paris we checked out of our hotel, the Hotel Saint-Germain. We walked to the Museum of Natural History and ate one last breakfast at a boulangerie with some outdoor seating en route.

We arrived at the Jardin des Plants, one of the strong settings in one of my favorite novels, All the Light We Cannot See. This was a trip loosely based around the book because in St. Malo we were constantly talking about that novel too. But it was so fun to walk through the Jardin des Plants and arrive at the hall of mineralogy! That is a major part of the novel, and Mary said it was her favorite place of the entire trip.

Our kids playing in the jardin des plantes

Then we toured the onsite enormous greenhouse:

Afterward we walked to the Seine, stopped at a playground, and then bought gifts for friends at the bookseller stalls along the river.

We were decision-fatigued from all of the restaurant choices and made a bad choice for lunch. But it was nice to get out of the heat, and the kids tried their first escargot. Mary refused.

After we got one last ice cream.

Then we caught a taxi to the airport. In the car, people did created dances inspired by different (often every-day) activities:

When we arrived we realized we had left the laptop bag at the hotel! Luckily we were early enough that Abe had time to go back, grab the bag, and come back in time to get the flight. Some angel attendant helped me get everyone and everything else checked in the meantime.

The kids were exhausted when we landed in New York. The whole airtrain-to-shuttle-to-hotel route was way too much to ask on top of their initial level of fatigue, but they made it through (with Ammon and Clarissa sobbing almost the whole time).

They slept through the entire night and so did almost all of the rest of us. That was amazing because it was our first night back in the States!

On Friday we got in our car and drove from Basel to Paris. We loved that there were no signs on the French highways except for the artistic posters announcing each town, but in that visually decluttered environment it was hard for us to figure out where to pull off for food. We ended up making a long detour that seemed to take us to the middle of nowhere but dropped us off across the highway from a fast food and gas center. Abe and Mary walked across the bridge and picked up some food for us, and then we continued on to the airport to return our rental car.

After dropping off our car we taxied to Paris to our hotel, which I had booked in a more central location than last time. We dropped off our stuff and headed out to the Luxembourg Gardens which were relatively close.

  • It was really hot so we got the kids ice cream and water.
  • At the gardens.
  • The kids spent an hour playing with boats.
  • Lydia’s boat kept getting stuck in the middle of the fountain.

Here are a bunch of videos about the mini-sailboat fun everyone had:

Lydia’s boat got stuck a couple of times….

https://youtube.com/shorts/mVliHy_0nPs

Afterward the kids played in a playground and I eavesdropped on the Italian tourists behind me. One of the reasons I love Europe is because I get to practice different languages at the same time. I would love, love, love to spend enough time there to finally get fluent in at least one of them someday.

Then we walked to dinner. We ate crepes just as good as the ones in Brittany, although I think St. Malo restaurants have better ambience. At least they are more shady and less crowded than Paris (and I happened to sweat a lot less there).

  • Veggie crepe.

Then we walked home and went to bed. Our hotel could only put three people in a room at a time so we split up for the night.