Henry's Lake

Nathan had a phone call from one of the potato plant men saying his company owns an 8 bedroom cabin in Henry's Lake, are we interested in using it for a weekend. How long did that stay churning in my head? We went this weekend and basically LOVED it!
This is the back side of the cabin facing the Lake. It is big and beautiful (the lake is too). That is my sister Janie up on the deck. Her little family came and I am so glad they did!
The dock is right out the back door, this is Savannah looking at the camera and Janie's little 2 year old McKay and Janie fishing off the dock.

Janie was on the dock and the boys were out on the paddle boat when Paul (Jane's Husband) yelled out "My line has a fish on it!", so Jane and I had to do the work (she has a license, I did not) of reeling this 22 inch brown trout bad boy in without the mens' help, (except for the kind words from the paddle boat), Jane reeled and I netted. I was shaking like a leaf and Jane was squealing with delight. She won the takers of first fish caught. Sorry Paul.
(For those who do not know yet, there are two sisters expecting, you guess who)!


This video was taken before the above picture, but I had to point out a few things. Paul and Nathan are in front (first time attempting the paddle boat), Corbin and McKay are somewhere and Tanner and Savannah are on back. Tanner loves it, Savannah is very very unsure of this whole experience and wants off. Her little wave tells it all.
Obviously I turned the camera off when I was needed to reel in the big fish!


Corbin holding up one of the fish.


Tanner holding up the giant for the day, a 24 inch brown trout. He reeled it in and did the work on it. It was cleaned and cooked and tasted to eat, then thrown away so fast. Nathan and Paul said it tasted like 'moss'. So, I guess big brown trout are nasty.

Tanner has a major wish in life and that is to live and survive in the jungle. He takes an arm out and shows his shoulder sort of like the 'junglemen?', so he disappeared for awhile and was near the willows and made himself a hat/crown with willows and a walking stick. He came running into the cabin just a banging his chest like a real jungle man. He made one for Savannah too, but she did not take it to that extent, I believe she took it to the hat/crown is a princess crown and the walking stick is a wand.
The two little 2 year olds had so much fun pushing their Tonka trucks and playing trains, it was neat to see this two little people interact and carry on.
Thanks for going Jane Bird and Paul. Fun was defnitely had by all!

Savannah

I have been a little behind. Corbin's birthday was back in June and Savannah's in August. So, I wanted to post some pictures of her. She is the sunshine in our home always singing and humming about her day. She is a nurturing little mother and takes good care of her brothers and daddy.
Savannah entered Kindergarten and I am not too excited about it, but they must grow up, I guess.


Savannah will always be a princess.
The pictures have no order. I do not have her baby pictures up on the computer they are saved on a disk. So, we will get to look at her from about age 3-5.


Happy Halloween 2007


Savannah and Tanner in 2007

Youth Temple Celebration

We have been so incredibly busy with the temple and all the Open House stuff as well as the many many hours put into the Youth Temple Celebration. It all came down to this weekend.
Friday I left at 4:30 to go to the Fairgrounds for a run through then dress rehearsal. I had to call Nathan to have him come home early from work because Corbs was running a high fever. So, he got here just in time. I took off. Later, to find out Corbs was really quite sick with sore throat, fever and throw-ups. (lucky for me I was gone right?).
The dress rehearsal was in front of a crowd and it gave me goose bumps. There are 14 Stakes and in all about 3000+/- youth. Pretty amazing to watch that many youth working together and forming patterns through song and dance.


A very small portion of kids, our stake is the solid colors of orange, blue, green, red and yellow.

On Saturday our day began early and finished late. The sun was pretty cooperative but still quite warm. Many many kids got fried crispy. We did the performance three times, the last for the Prophet, Pres. Eyering, Elder Cook and Costa as well as local dignitaries. Our prophet spoke to the Youth and blessed them. He singled out the Yellow T-shirt girls and told them in Printing Yellow meant something to do with the beginning and life begins there or something very cool. Obviously I memorized it well. The kids loved it! He was very realaxed and cracked jokes then he was taken by golf cart to the stands to watch.
The Youth took the performance to a higher level for the Prophet. It was fascinating to be a part of. The tears flowed. The Youth are wonderful kids and I feel so blessed to have experienced this with them.

This is the final song "Carry On". Our stake is the yellow flags on the right.

Thses girls danced throughout the performace, they had to try out for this. Two girls are from our ward. The one 2nd to Right performed a lift and it was right in front of the prophet. She said the prophet looked right at her with a gaze of WOW! It brought tears to her eyes as well as mine.

Portion of the choir




This is a video (from my camera-poor quality), of our opening number. I am not sure if this is allowed to be displayed. But, it is amazing.

Today, Nathan and I participated in the Temple Dedication at the Stake Center. Pres. Monson was at the Temple conducting. Again, he was so down to earth and cracked many jokes.
The temple opens for work on Tuesday. What a whirlwind of acitvity!

The Great Flood

Who would have thought there would be a great flood in our dessert land of Twin Falls? Well, when someone (not pointing fingers at any kids who live on our street, promise!) leaves the water tap on that is connected to our house, between our basement windows, a flood happens.

Nathan had a trip to Florida from Sunday morning to Wednesday late. I left Saturday with the kiddies and went to my parents for the Carnival and Parade, returned Wednesday afternoon.
The 'incident' happened sometime in there.
We returned home and Tanner was in charge of putting the videos away from the car.
"mom, something is wrong"
(complaining to myself, what is it, I am trying to get stuff put away!)
"Mom, something is really wrong, my feet are wet".
GREAT SCOTT BATMAN!
I drop the backpack and run down the stairs. This is what I saw

I could have added some fish and had myself an aquarium. Only problem is the water was literally flowing over the window sill and down the wall onto the floor

The outcome: A MASSIVE GIANT MESS!
We will pay for the insurance deductible and the Restoration Company will tear down sheet rock, tear out the insulation, carpet pad, baseboards and then redo all those including painting the entire living room walls to match it perfectly with what I have done already.
The water seeped into our food storage room, luckily it only affected the plastic buckets! Big time Whew! (but the vinyl flooring has to be replaced) It seeped into my craft room. Oh the fun!
I certainly hope the little person enjoyed that drink of water!!

Oh, the trip for us and Nathan's trip was enjoyable, but not so much now.
Thank you to the awesome incredible neighbors I have that I called in my state of panic and they were here so fast!

our lesson learned:
Put a lock and key on all tap spigots.

Family Rebellion

Our yearly sibling reunion (rebellion) was in Ashton, Id. We rented a cabin. Man, it is beautiful up there! I continually expressed this to Nathan as well as "I want to move here!". He said perhaps he could get a job driving a tractor in the fields. So beautiful and peaceful and very small town feel.
We pulled into the cabin and got out and no sooner did Tanner find a snake. He was so excited!



After he tossed that one like a discus in track and field, we came upon a dead one on the road, after that I found the slither path of another one. I was beginning to feel a pattern coming on here. I stayed out of the brush.
We had a lot of fun visiting and telling stories about when my parents ventured to the Logan Temple leaving us under the care of my oldest brother (8children). The stories that are told makes my mom wonder and my brother want to hide. We could see in our little town, when they rounded the corner a block a way, we could get the toys/clutter (furniture, ropes, blood-ketchup, butter knives) put away and be sitting so innocently on the couch welcoming them home. What a wonderful group of kids! (yeh right!).
We also had a memory object night where each sibling brought an object from childhood and the rest of us had to guess what it represented.




We "hiked" to Cave Falls and later Mesa Falls. Beautiful!


I love the look of this picture. "How is your crop going this year?" or "see that rock down there, how do you suppose we get it from up here?" Corbin and his cousin McKay (6 weeks apart) were actually checking out a dog. They kept saying "doggy! Bark, bark" and 'nice doggy!"



Picture of the grandkids and some adult helpers. I think our numbers are up to 40 total from my parents!
There are four different sets of grandkids that have three the same age. My three kids make up three of the groups. I thought I would add the pictures. (We could not get the three two year olds to hold still, they were all in melt down stage at that point).





Tanner (youngest), Ty then Kayla


Kajsia, Savannah (2nd to oldest) and Sienna
We stopped in St. Anthony and played in the Snake River where they have some of it "buoyed?" off for kids with a pvc type water tube and a diving board into the river. Yes, I joined in and yes, it was cold, but fun! I strutted my stuff with a front flip off the diving board. Now that is cool. Right?

On our way home we finally made the stop at Register State Park and checked out the pioneer names on the rocks. It was actually pretty cool. I am glad we did.



We have had a ton of company with my family's rebellion and the temple open house. We love it!
My sister from Portland to and from, sister from Seattle to and from, my parents and Aunt and Uncle from Preston, and my brother and his fam. from Logan up here for work. It has been really fun and busy! We have been dubbed "The Thomsen Bed and Breakfast". We will take it, come on up and stay!

memory tag

Memories Tag
Memory Tag1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.This tag can be for anyone in our family.

Stanley Camping Trip

Our neighbors invited us to go hit the road and put up a tent. We quickly agreed. However, it takes SO much gear to go camping and TIME!
We packed the entire house and then some and took off Thursday evening. We camped up in the Stanley, Idaho area. It was absolutely gorgeous. (same area as Girls Camp).
We went with MJ and Clay.
Friday we went to Stanley Lake for the day and dipped our toes in the ice water. The scenery was amzing, however the other visitors were soaking up the booze and we finally decided we had it. But, we loved it there!


This is the other visitors, but, I had to get a picture of the mountains!







Check close, Tanner's body language says "IT'S COLD!"
Corbie and his red juice all over

We ate lunch our neighbor made the table with two small sawhorses and a board. It was perfect.



On the way to the Lake the chairs went for a ride up and out of the truck and crashed to the ground. Luckily, they all survived and are still sit-able.



The next day we went fishing to the local fish hatchery. Later Tanner exclaimed "Dad, you really know how to pick a good fishin hole!" They each caught two. Tanner was pretty pumped, it was sort of a rite of boyhood for him. He was excited to get back to camp to clean, gut and cook the fish.

Tanner is pretty pumped! Savannah is holding it because she was asked to.
Corbs did not have so much fun.

Tanner and Nathan cleaning the fish Savannah watching and learning

I have not put in much about Corbs or the campsite. I will add more later, hopefully it will not put you in suspenseful waiting!