Idaho Trip

On July 20th, we headed North for a much needed trip to Idaho to visit my folks. We hadn't been since the end of October!!! On the way, we stopped at Chelsea's in Odgen to drop off boxes for their upcoming move, pick up some clothes my dad left a few weeks ago, and finally meet Amber. 

After a very slow construction area near Arimo, and getting stuck behind a train in Idaho Falls, we finally made it to my parents' house. Michael enjoyed jumping on the tramp and having over an acre of yard to run in. I enjoyed raiding my mom's garden for some fresh green beans! Yum!

On Saturday, Michael helped his grandma and grandpa water flowers,

 And after a delicious brunch, we headed into town to check out Ririe Days. They had vendors, live music, a bounce house, a car show, and drag racing. Here's Michael and Brian watching the races.

 That night, we all went to Mountain River Ranch, my second home during high school. I started baby-sitting Mike and Julie's, the managers, kids, Lauren and Maddy, during the shows. Then, after turning 16, I told Julie that I wanted a real job, so she offered me a position as a "fluffer" during their winter shows (host/waitress/song-leader/busser/dishwasher/ whatever they needed done person). The next summer, I auditioned for the show. Long story short, I was in the cast three summers, and I'd help out in the winter shows when I came home for Christmas break. This  was the first show that I'd taken Brian--and Michael--to. It was long overdue.

Here's Michael with two of the girls from the cast.

 Waiting for wagons after the Shoot-out. My grandparents decided that they wanted to come too.

 Taking advantage of the new photo-op board.

 Brian and I with Cherry and Tony Last, the camp hosts for the RV Park and old friends. They are this fun couple from England. Tony used to flirt shamelessly with me, and Cherry would just roll her eyes at him. He's quite the character, and it was so good to see them both again!

 Our wagon ride:

 A shot by the horses. They are so big!

 Julie hooked us up with some awesome seats right at the front. Thanks to Michael, our group won the singing contest, and we got to eat first. How I missed this food!!! I would have taken a picture, but it was too good! And for dessert, huckleberry ice cream!

 The show was great! So much has changed since I was there. Mike and Julie got divorced shortly after I got home from my mission, and Julie has since remarried. I was worried about how it would be without Mike, but I was pleased to see that although things have changed, it is still the wonderful, fun place that I remember.  And it was so nice to see my dear friend Julie again. She even sang a solo this year, something that I've never seen her do! And she was awesome!

 By the end of the night, Michael was so tired that he cuddled right up to Julie. She loved it! I'm so glad she likes our little boy.

 Brian had a great time, so it looks like we may be making the Ranch part of our Idaho trip tradition.

On Sunday, I took my boys on a walk to the Snake River. How I love that river! There is something so soothing and rejuvenating about being home!

After our walk, we went to meet our Pig, well our half a pig. That's right. We own half of this pig, and this fall, it will come and dwell in our freezer. We own the left side, and Chelsea owns the right side. So, here's our half:

 Okay, truth be told, it could be any of these other ones. The point is, we have half a pig, and we're looking forward to eating it this fall.

After another fabulous breakfast/brunch, we went to church, had dinner, and then headed back to Utah. It was so nice spending one-on-one time with my parents, watching my dad spoil Michael some more, and see so many of the people that I love. I wish that we could have stayed an extra day. Thanks for a great weekend, Mom and Dad!

I Hired a Maid

Yup, that’s right. We now have a maid. His name is Michael. I must have left the door to our room open because next thing I know, Michael comes out with the vacuum (yes, we keep the vacuum in our closet for this very reason) and says he needs to clean up a spot on the rug. So, I told him he needed to pick up his toys first and put them away. He picked them up—and put them on the hearth. 

So, I helped him vacuum the rug. Then, he vacuumed the rest of the rooms. Makes me think I should give him an allowance or something. He put all his toys in his room up on his bed so that he could vacuum, 

and thank goodness he asked for help with the “dangerous” part (the outlets).  I figure a two-year-old maid is better than what we’ve got going right now.  

After vacuuming, he helped me sweep and mop our hardwood/laminate floors. 

Yesterday, we went to DI to see if we could find a few large, inexpensive rugs to put downstairs since Chelsea, Thomas, and the kids and coming to live with us at the end of this week while they look for a house. I found two decent sized rugs, and as you can imagine, they are quite nasty! I told Michael that we needed to clean up the basement and vacuum those rugs. So, from the minute we got back from DI, he was after me to go down and clean! I barely talked him into lunch and a nap first! When he got up, we swept and started vacuuming the rugs. And, first thing this morning, guess what he's been begging to do? Yup. "Mommy, we need to go downstairs and vacuum!"

Lara in Town

July 12-18, Lara and Julia came for a visit. They hopped houses, starting with the parents, then us for one night, and then Lea. We were so excited that she wanted to stay at our house! They were the first planned Saville guests from out of town. Michael loves his new little cousin. 

We can't wait to see you two again in a week and a half!

Evil Mike

The week that my dad came and stayed with us, our sweet Michael, the apple of his Grandpa's eye, went MIA, and in his place came Evil Mike.

Evil Mike threw fits like crazy, did the opposite of what he was asked, and was an all-around pill!! We were so frustrated, especially that Evil Mike showed up while Grandpa was visiting.

Thankfully, Evil Mike's stay was short-lived, and for the most part, our sweet Michael has returned to our house. Here's hoping Evil Mike stays away!! (Yeah right, huh?)

Fourth of July Week

Thanks to a huge push and release at work, Brian got the whole week off for the Fourth of July. Woo hoo! Here's what we did with it:

Since my parents came down for Heather's blessing on the 30th, and Chelsea was getting induced on the 3rd, my mom decided to just stay in Utah, so she came and stayed with us Saturday and Sunday nights, and left Monday afternoon to go to Ogden and be with Chelsea. It was so nice having her here. On Monday, we decided to head to Orem to check out Colonial Days at the Provo Freedom Festival. They put on a musical show called "Cries of Freedom" that we saw. I told Brian it would last 30 minutes, one hour tops. Well, it was more like one and a half hours. It was good though, and a nice reminder of how much we are blessed in this country and what a miracle it is that this country was even started in the first place. Michael really enjoyed it and paid attention through the whole thing, despite its length:

 After the show, we were pretty hot and tired, so we did a quick walk-through of the Colonial Village and Michael got to try on some armor:

 I got put in the stalks:

 And so did Michael:

 Then, we went home, and Michael and my mom played with Michael's new bubble gun, compliments of my parents:

 We loved having her. Thanks for coming and staying with us, Mom!

On Tuesday, July 3, Chelsea had her baby Amber via somewhat emergency C-section. Amber weighed in over 10 lbs! Congrats to Chelsea and Thomas and their family! My dad also came to stay with us late Tuesday night after working, taking the Salt Lake Shuttle to Ogden, seeing his new grand-daughter, and then driving the rest of the way to my house. He had the rest of the week off and didn't want to be left out of all the excitement.

On Wednesday, July 4, I turned 27. Woo hoo, right? Brian got me a large-aperture lens for my camera and Michael got me a UV filter. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling too good, so I didn't really get to experiment with my lens, but we did use it for all of our pictures the rest of the day. Here's a shot I took of Michael and Monkey right after I hooked it into the camera, as well as a few others:

 My dad watched Michael for us so that Brian could take me out to dinner. We had Texas Roadhouse. Yum! Then, we came back and had strawberry cheesecake and lit a few mild, ground fireworks.

 

 My dad only stayed out with us for a little bit. We must have been boring.

 Michael loved the pop-its. It was so fun watching him with them.

 And Brian was our chief lighter. We didn't wait for it to get dark due to our two-year-old.

 Hooray for sparklers!

On Friday, Chelsea came home from the hospital, so we headed up to Ogden to take her kids swimming and give her a quiet house to recover in. Unfortunately, Amber had been in the NICU for this and that, and wasn't able to come home with her. Mom, Dad, Cal, Heather, Matthew, Sarah, Michael, Brian, and I swam all afternoon at a pool in Ogden, grabbed some chicken and salad on the way home, ate, and then loaded Chelsea's kids into cars and drove back to our house (Cal stayed in  Odgen, but the rest of the pool party came to our house). It was a fun trip to Ogden, but I didn't take a single picture, even though I brought my camera, and I didn't get to meet my new niece :(

My parents left late the next morning with Chelsea's kids. Amber got to come home that day. They visited for a bit with Chelsea and Thomas, and then headed back to Idaho.

We had a great week, and we were sad to have Brian go back to work on the 9th.

Heather's Baptism

On June 30, my oldest niece, Heather, was baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by her dad, Thomas. We were happily able to attend this important day.

 After being baptized and changing into dry clothes, Heather was confirmed by my dad.

I can hardly believe that my little Heather is 8! It seems like just yesterday I heard the news of her birth and got to hold her for the first time.

After her baptism, we had a celebration, of course. It was good spending time with family.

 Two of the best men in the world, Grandpa and Cal

Cousins Michael and Sarah. Notice that Sarah's dress matches Heather's.

Chelsea made it through the day, and started breathing a little better. Her biggest worry was that she'd go into labor in the middle of Heather's day. She didn't, but more on that later.

Joe

"The rain is Tess, the fire Joe"

"Mariah", Paint Your Wagon

When I lived in Florida and Alabama, I saw a lot of hurricane evacuation route signs. During hurricane season, we had to keep our gas tanks above half a tank, and we were allowed to watch the weather. I marveled that so many people would choose to live in a place with such a huge natural threat every year. I decided that no place is completely immune to Mother Nature, and this summer has certainly proved it.

On Thursday, June 21, Michael and I headed to Wal*Mart to pick up some things. As I was leaving our neighborhood, I was stunned to see a huge billow of smoke coming off of the mountain just northwest of us. We watched it as we drove, observed the huge red flames from the Wal*Mart parking lot (Michael telling me that when smoke goes up, he goes down, and if he catches on fire, he needs to stop, drop, and roll), and nervously kept an eye on it while we drove the rest of the way home. Honestly, I didn't think too much of it; it was pretty far from us.

Then, on Friday, June 22,  in an attempt to distract Michael from his fit over my turning off Curious George, I said, "Hey Michael, let's go check on that fire we saw yesterday." Eagerly, he headed to grab his sandals and go with me. He thinks that fires and firetrucks are cool. I grabbed my camera, buckled us both in the car, and started backing out of my driveway. I was alarmed to find that I didn't have to leave my driveway to see the fire; I could see it from my from there! We drove over to the Israel Canyon Access Road to see if we could get a good feel for what was going on. The road was closed, but a ton of my neighbors were gathered to see the progress of the fire:

 I started getting phone calls and texts from friends at this point. My friend Kim offered her apartment if we got evacuated. I was touched to find out that so many were thinking about us. I drove around for a little more, headed into Lehi, picked up Danny, and drove through a subdivision two subdivisions north of us to see how close the flames were. We saw a plane drop fire retardant right in front of our car, and I was shocked to see that the flames were SUPER close to the homes there, probably only 50-100 yards, and it was all dry weeds in the middle. I was told that neighborhood was getting evacuated, and I started to get really worried. These people were in my stake!

We went home, and I unloaded both boys. I went to the bathroom, and then I heard the doorbell ring. I FREAKED out, thinking it was the fire people telling us to leave. It was the UPS man. We ate lunch, and I turned on the news, something I rarely do, especially when Michael is up. They closed the main road comind down to my subdivision. After lunch, I laid the boys down for a nap. I decided that I should at least start packing a bag with clothes, just in case, but by 2:00, I had decided that we were probably going to be okay.  I grabbed the camera, snapped a few pictures to post on Facebook:

 (These were taken from my driveway)

 

 And while they were uploading, I saw her, a woman with a fire-type emblem on her shirt holding a roll of caution tape and walking up my sidewalk. She told me that we were being evacuated. I asked if we HAD to go. "Yes, it's mandatory. If one of these houses catch, they're all going to go."
"How much time do I have?" I asked
"Not much. Grab the the things that are important to you and your kids, and leave as soon as you can."
"Okay thank you." I watched as she wrapped the caution tape around the post on my porch.

 I called Brian and started crying. "They're making us leave," I told him. He asked if I wanted him to come home and help me, to which I responded, "There's no point. There's not enough time, and the road is closed. We'll be fine." I posted the evacuation news on Facebook and turned off the computer. I finished packing my suitcase and started looking around for what we needed to take. I unplugged our two computers with the pictures on them and loaded them in the car. Then, I got a box and loaded it with all our journals and photo albums, birth certificates, title to the car, and our mortgage papers.  My guiding principle was to grab everything that could not be replaced. It was surprising how little that was. As I filled the boxes, I prayed that the Lord would save our house. I took some deep breaths, loaded the car, and then I woke both boys from their naps. I didn't want them to be scared, so I cheerfully told them that we were headed to Lea's house. I pointed out the fire as we drove away, and snapped a few more pictures:

I even pulled over to the side of the road to get a picture of all that smoke:

We left our house at 2:30. 

We decided to stay with Lea since she was the closest (distance wise) family member. We wanted to be close to our home. Amazingly, her yard smelled more like smoke than ours did. When I got to Lea's, Brian was there. We spent the rest of the evening nervously waiting for news. We are very grateful for Lea and Shayne for taking in three refugees!

We stayed the night. About 4 a.m., I got up to use the rest room, and I decided to check my phone. My neighbor, Winnie, who did not get evacuated, had texted that she had just driven up to check on our house and that we were probably in the clear (the text had been sent around midnight). Breathing a sigh of relief, and a quick prayer of gratitude, I went back to sleep. 

(I didn't take this photo, FYI)

The next morning, we decided to go check on our house. The evacuations hadn't been lifted, but we knew that one of the entrances wasn't blocked, so we headed out, taking Michael and Danny with us. It was comforting and incredibly amazing to not see much smoke coming from that mountain! Here's that same spot one more time: 

Even though we couldn't see flames on our side, the fire-fighters were still hard at work:

 

 Here's our black mountain:

These pictures are hard to see, but they still make me cry. We drove up to where the houses end and the dry, dry fields began, and we saw firetrucks posted between those hoses and the fields, ready in the event those flames came too close, protecting our homes. And even though the flames and smoke were mostly gone from view, they were still there, keeping silent vigil. I wish that I could have taken a better picture.

 With a heart full of gratitude, we headed back to Lea's, a little jealous of Danny in the back:

 We spent a few more hours at Lea's, and then decided to go home. I can't even express how grateful I was--and still am!--to be in my house again. I laughingly hugged the walls. It seems a little false to say that we almost lost everything since the things that really mattered were never in danger, but there are just so many things in our home--including the house--that matter so much to us, and we were so grateful that we didn't have to start over!

We only had sacrament on Sunday, but it was wonderful to gather together again. We all felt this special bond to our neighbors. Our hearts were tender, and full of gratitude that we were all spared the tragedy of losing our homes. One neighbor said, "My husband asked if I wanted to stay home since I'm so tired from all the packing and unpacking, but I said, 'No! I have to go and thank the Lord!'" I couldn't agree more!

The fire, officially named "The Dump Fire" started June 21 by target shooters. The dry, dry grasses and winds combined for disaster. Authorities estimate that 5,507 acres burned. On Friday, after we were evacuated, we heard that the fire was 0% contained. The wind never stops blowing out here, and with all the dry foliage, it is a MIRACLE that no homes were burned. By Monday, June 25, authorities reported that the fire was 100% contained.

 We've seen and read some of the coverage from the other fires that were in our state, as well as the monster one in Colorado, and we marvel that not one home was lost here, and let me tell you, it got REALLY close. They may have been slightly overly cautious, but really only slightly. I am so grateful for all the men and women who fought this fire.

 (I didn't take these pictures; they were posted online by neighbors)

We made banners for them. They posted flags around the command station in Neptune Park.  Some made cookies and cards. But, it just some how isn't enough. Thank you to all the crews who worked our fire, to all those who came from out of state, to all those who slept on the pavement, to all those who sustained injuries as a result. We owe you SO much. Thank you for being an instrument for the Lord to work a miracle.