Glacier - St. Mary's Falls

We took a hike to St. Mary's Falls.  It has another set of water falls just about a mile further, but the boys were certainly not up for that.  We had a great time, and I have too many pictures to put captions under.  Great scenery, first huckleberry picking experience for the boys, and a hike to remember for sure.

Glacier - Lake McDonald



We pulled over for a quick visit to Lake McDonald -- just to skip some rocks and stretch our legs.  Then we got a bit more wet, and a bit more wet, and pretty soon we were diving off logs and soaking wet. But this was the highlight of my day at Glacier, 2014.

Look at that crystal clear water and those gorgeous rocks. 

I asked Josh to move because it looked like that log was going through his head.  He said "It really hurts..." and made this silly face.  My little class clown.

We took several pictures of the boys together, but all were not quite right.  Only the silly brother shots turned out.

If you meld these two pictures of gramma with her boys, you'll get a good one. One smiling boy at a time is all we get.

A stack of heads. 

Not bad...we rarely take shots with adults in them, so I'll totally take this as a win. :)

Luke had so much fun throwing rocks in.  He would throw big round rocks and say "made it skip. not a skipping rock, but I made it skip."

Josh asked if he could get the bottoms of his shorts wet, I said sure.  The next thing I know, he's doing this.

He found a huge rock that he wanted to bring to shore.  It involved getting 3/4 of his body wet.  I said, you're wet enough, just go swimming. And so he did. 

We swam out to the same log that was trying to go through Josh's ear, and he dove right off.  Kind of a belly flop, but still points for jumping off a moving log.  Sheesh. I tried, and it was hard to stand! I did a kind of falling dive that, thank God, there are no photos of.

Luke wasn't going to be showed up, so he kept finding better skipping rocks out deeper.  Soon they were wearing the back up clothes that I put in the car at the beginning of summer.

Grampa and Gramma's House

The boys have spent a lot of time in this cute little pool. The crocodile's mouth squirts and the volcano is constantly erupting.  So fun.

It's just about Josh's size...

Josh got a new tackle box, and to organize it he chose the dining room table.  To sit on. 

We have had ice cream every day. Luke is in chocolate-face heaven.

 

Luke loves their big big big cereal bowls.

They have extremely good slip and slide moves.

Luke did a whole break-dancing sequence and then got up and yelled "You call that Nothin??!?!??!"  I can't make this stuff up.

He's so smiley

He was so happy --- he made it to the end of the slide before the football hit him. (Josh was throwing it, obviously)

Grampa found and fixed up this darling little picnic table.  The boys ate their nightly Dairy Queen here.  Josh is so funny -- he calls his banana split a Splitter, so when I ask him what he wants, he says "just a splitter" or "my usual, the splitter."

This picture cracks me up.  The neighbors, who live behind a 6' wooden fence, were calling to the boys.  How old are you, etc, and then all conversation stopped and the asked "why is your trampoline so small." The boys didn't have a great answer, so this is them thinking of one.

Tuesday Water Fun

Tuesday we went to Woodlank Park Pool which has a diving board and a lazy river, plus two waterslides. Josh passed the swim test (woo hoo!) and got to go everywhere. He did some fantastic dives, ha ha ha, and we had a great time. Soon it was time for a snack and a break (see Luke's pouty face). 

Tuesday evening we went to Bitterroot Lake to John's friend's lake lot.  Heavenly.  The boys kayaked around a bit, but were very cautious and stayed super close together and really close to shore. 

They jumped off the dock -- this jump was part of the competition jumps where the person with the most style wins. Luke was all about a big jump.

Josh's style jump was ultra-casual and he just stepped off the dock.  Straight as an arrow. He lost.

Pine Grove Pond

Monday afternoon we took the boys to the Pine Grove Pond, where it is stocked with huge trout (that we have only heard of, never caught).  They got to kayak around and fish...but it was too hot to stay for long.

We came back in the evening and gave it a try. I was really proud of them -- they were fishing self-sufficiently and kayaking all around by themselves.  It was a cool mom-of-boys moment.

As we were leaving, I was loading the kayaks and Luke needed some help with a knot.  Grampa to the rescue.  He's so patient with my boys...

John John's House

Uncle John has a side-by-side Razor type toy that the boys really like.  Well, Josh likes.  Luke is NOT sure about it, and only rode in it for about a minute.  Josh loves it.

Josh saw all this land and his bike, and decided to practice standing starts for BMX.  He started here, in possibly the rockiest and most dangerous portion of John's 4 acres.

Then he decided to go over to a grassy hill, where the landings might be a bit more forgiving.  He was being ultra stubborn, though, and wouldn't move the pieces of wood that he was using as blocks.  His amazingly sweet brother brought one board over alone, and then couldn't carry this big one by himself.  John, sweet caring uncle John, helped.  Thank goodness. I added this picture to the post not to tell this story, but to show how sweet an uncle and a nephew can be together. 

 

Kali Bound

The boys and I took a road trip to Kalispell for a week.  Here is the family trickster ready to roll.

The family trickster, ready to roll with 3 bikes, 2 kayaks and about 15 swimming suits.

Sometime between Galen and Deer Lodge, the boys decided that it was safer to be in bike helmets in the car.  They said Galen sounds like a dangerous place.  (Didn't the State Mental Hospital used to be in Galen? Maybe the kids have good instincts.)

This is movie face.  I saw a lot of this on our 6 hours in the car.