Cleaning up Carnage trail

On the National Day of Service, Saturday, September 11th, 2021, we went to the Ballard Carnage Trail and did a huge cleanup with our community! Lots of people showed up, and there were big machines and several dumpsters and dump trailers for our use! And boy, did we use them! Most places would be dirt with a little bit of trash, but carnage trail looked like trash, with a little bit of dirt. There was so much garbage and junk everywhere!

Lani with her Stake Relief Society Presidency were delegated some responsibilities. One of those was to take pictures and post them online, so here's some of the photos from that day.

We spent 4 hours and were thankful for the gloves donated by Napa auto parts to protect our hands from the glass, barbs, and other sharp and sketchy objects. I'm pretty sure we were in a tetanus paradise.

On the Roosevelt East Stake's Facebook page there's more photos, and here's the info I shared there: 

9-11 Day of Service: Ballard Carnage Trail Project

We literally moved mountains (of trash) today!

Before we began, it basically looked like a landfill exploded. With machinery, trailers, dumpsters, gloves, rakes, and everyone’s help we hauled off numerous couches, mattresses, appliances, box springs, spoiled food storage, barrels, jugs, barbed wire, bullet shells, cans upon cans, glass upon glass, and junk upon junk!

Our project manager confirmed that we filled over 20,000 lbs. with the dump trailers and with the 3 large roll-offs we filled another 100,000 lbs. approximately. So about 120,000 lbs of garbage! Phew!

Thank you to the community for coming together to clean up today!

Bye-Byes & Birthdays

It was lots of fun being able to see Joe and his kids this summer, and byes should always be GOOD byes, so we decided to go to Lowes to do their ninja course and other fun things.  Actually, this doubled as Amara's birthday party since she really wanted to go there and it was almost her birthday.

Mom and I found the massage chairs!

After all the fun, we went out to eat at Golden Coral buffet.  It was a good summer and a good send off.  

Our family stayed a few more days at April's house to celebrate both Devon's and Amara's birthdays which are only 2 days apart.  In the meantime, I got to spend some quality time with my mom and sister and my family too.

temple date at Payson

workout date on floating yoga boards (P.S. Those are hard to balance on!)

disc golf date at Jolley's Ranch

Another workout date

Devon's Birthday

Devon started the day with opening gifts then it was off to Airborn Jumping Gym for some more fun!

Amara's Birthday

It was a Sunday, and we were at April's house and Amara was sick.  But that didn't stop her from having an amazing birthday!  April made it so special by decorating the basement!  She was sleeping in the room right next to the family room, so we had to be extra quiet, but when she woke up this is what she saw...

She got lots of gifts (that tends to happen when you're visiting family)

She loved the mini orchid I bought her.

and the little cotton candy machine

and the mini farkle game

Amara chose the cake out over FaceTime when April and I were grocery shopping.  It was an excellent choice- a tres leches with pink and white marshmallow Sponch cookies.

Then it rained like the dickens!  The kids just had to go out and walk in the gutter rivers.  Had they a boogie board they probably could've taken a ride down the street!

The rain didn't last long, but it was amazing while it lasted.  It was a beautiful gift from heaven, especially with the current drought conditions.

Lauret Campout

 

My dad scheduled our Lauret family campout at the old Scofield Scout camp.  Wavetronix, the company he works for, actually recently acquired the camp for their company retreats and for family reunions and such.  It's awesome.  It is in disrepair, but we were blessed to have access to clean, running water, some port-a-potties, and canoes!

We all took turns cooking at our makeshift outdoor kitchen w/ dad's and April's camp chefs and small tables.  Every meal was delicious and no one left hungry!  First was dad's chicken fajitas and quesadillas with black beans and rice; then Joe/Micah's French toast w/ eggs, sausage, Portuguese sausage, bacon, juice, and milk; then April's/my build-your-own sandwich bar with 3 bean salad, applesauce, watermelon, chips, fruit snacks, carrots and radishes & ranch; then dad's dutch oven chicken and rice w/ rolls and watermelon.

There were no fires allowed because of the drought and extreme dry conditions, but we still roasted marshmallows over the camp chef each night, and did "campfire" programs too!  

Our competition games were held in the old fort.  Those who wanted to, signed up to compete.  We played a "zip chip" mini frisbee game trying to hit the overturned garbage cans for points.  I did pretty bad at that, even though I thought I was going to do ok.  Haha!  There was a disc golf putting championship, which I think I did pretty average with.  Then there was the Kan Jam championships... April was on my team and we KILLED IT!  WE WON!  

We made it on the lake in the afternoon just as the wind started picking up.  All 3 of the pop-up gazebos we brought got crushed by a microburst.  The sand was nice, though.  The water was algae filled and freezing.  So cold, in fact, that we decided to do a polar bear plunge.  I even participated (my first ever).  Not gonna lie, that was gross,  I was having anxiety about the dirty microbes that went in my ears, but just for a minute.  Paddling the canoes proved to be very difficult in the wind as we kept getting pushed out further from shore.  We all had fun anyway!

Excerpt from my journal, July 9, 2021:

We did a family home evening as the sun was getting low.  Micah gave a lesson about being a child of God.  Then I led us in an activity playing snake oil skits.  I LOVED that!  Everyone's skits were GREAT!  Joe's group sold us on "Vomiting Babies," April's group did "Dance Belts," Micah's group did "Horse Grenades," and my group did "Poop Whistle."  Rexton couldn't get over how funny the poop whistle was. He was the one that "blew the whistle" and it shot poo at the thugs trying to harm us.  Funny to watch!

Disc Golf

Kan Jam

My dad giving the zip chip a good throw

The zip chip playing field in the middle of the fort

Lily tossing the zip chip. Amara, Owen and Devon fielding the throws.

Amara's turn

A look at the fort from the outside.