We started off our month with celebrating the 4th of July. We watched the parade in Hidden Springs and then went to a dinner at the Ball's. The big kids went to Simplot Hill to watch the city fireworks.
The next weekend we drove to Ashton for a Smith Family Reunion. It was wonderful to see so many of our extended family. Aunt Nip did a demonstration on dutch oven cooking.
The big kids and Nathan went on a rafting trip down the Snake River. We ate lots of yummy food and did lots of visiting. My favorite part of the reunion was when Nathan's dad, uncle and several aunts acted out one of their ancestors. The Smith's have such a rich heritage and it's always good to be reminded of where we've come from!
(I know, very sad that these are the only two pictures we took of the WHOLE weekend!)
Angie, Alexa and Sophie came thru on their way home from Utah. We spent one day at Roaring Springs together. We had so much fun!!! Bummer that Alexa and Spencer were off on a ride when we took the picture.
Later in the month we had another Smith Family Reunion, but this one was just Nathan's parents, siblings and their Japanese Exchange student, Tom and his family. (Yes, they came from Fukuoko, Japan just for our family reunion!)
The reunion was in Garden Valley and since we were such a large group we stayed in a lodge and a cabin.
It was absolutely fabulous!! We had SO much fun with our family. First, we got familiar with our surroundings. There was a pond where we could canoe.
There was the Payette Middle Fork river close by.
And we did a scavenger hunt looking for lots of outdoor things.
We did a lot of fun activities. We signed backpacks for everyone.
We made survival bracelets.
The girls made necklaces while the boys did something called Critter Club.
We had all of the grandkids paint their hands on pillowcases.
We had a Japanese evening where Tom and Emi and their kids taught us a Japanese Folk dance, wrote our names in Kanji and shared gifts and food from Japan with us.
We went whitewater rafting.
We went horseback riding.
Nathan put together a carnival and boy howdy was it ever FUN!!!
Here he is explaining how it all works. Everyone got a "passport" with all eight games listed. You could play the games as many times as you wanted. You got tickets each time you played and you could "buy" things with your tickets. He made bags for all of the kids to put all their great stuff that they won!
We had the YUMMIEST food! Everyone was in charge of different meals and I will just say that we have the BEST cooks in our family!!
We made s'mores almost every night!
The cousins had SO much fun just being together! Thank you SO much Grandma and Grandpa for a WONDERFUL week with our family!
We loved getting to know Tom and his family better and hope they can come to every reunion!
We ended our month with Andrew earning his Bear in cub scouts.
And the kids had a swim meet in Weiser. They did GREAT and brought home their best ribbons of the year!
Whew! What a month!!
