road trip 'on the fly'

In the middle of the last week of August, I took the younger 3 boys on an unexpected trip to Boise. My friend Krissy moved there earlier this summer, but her kids' dad still lives in Salmon. Circumstances worked out that they were in Salmon with their dad for the week, and then it was their mom's turn to have them, but she was going to be bringing them back a few days later because they would be with their dad again for Labor Day weekend. So to save her a trip, I drove her kids to Boise for her. We love their family, and it was so fun for Jonah and Micah to spend some time with their friend Mason, whom they hadn't seen almost all summer. We left on Wednesday after lunch, and got to Boise that evening. We had to stop 6 times along the drive for potty breaks and to dump the puke bag frequently (Mason gets car sick, and driving along the winding river road was not good for him). I was so happy to see my friend again!!!

Krissy fed us dinner, then the kids all played together in the pool outside their apartment complex. It was so much hotter in Boise than Salmon, and the kids were happy to play and be cool at the same time. They were playing some kind of a game where one person gets out and starts saying colors, then when they say the right color, everyone starts swimming to the opposite side and the person jumps back in and tries to beat everyone else. It kept them busy for quite a while, and Krissy and I just sat in the chairs on the side relaxing as we watched them. 

Taylor was the only girl in the group--she was such a good sport. She played so good with the younger boys; Kanyon just adores her! She posed a few times for the camera, which cracked me up!

The boys have missed their best friend Mason. He is so goofy, playful, and so much fun to be around! Jonah appears to be the goofy one in this pic, though! Jonah would not settle in the water long enough to get a photo--this is the only decent one I got of him!

The swimming pool also has dumping buckets and shooting water fountains, which was fun for the boys to play in. Taylor kept trying to convince Krissy to take the ice bucket challenge using this water feature!

Micah was fascinated the most with the water fountains:

When it started getting cooler, we went inside. The boys spent the night in their sleeping bags in Krissy's living room, and I got to sleep in her bed with her. She and her kids all got up early the next morning, because her kids started their first day of school at their new schools. When they left, my boys got up and I fed them breakfast. Then we packed and cleaned up, and went school shopping. I hadn't gotten their school supplies or new clothes yet, so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity. Since most kids were in school, and it was a weekday morning, we got a lot of shopping done without the stores being busy or crowded. It was awesome! We got everything on our lists, and were all done in an hour and a half! 

We got on the freeway headed east, because Ammon was running in his first cross country meet of the season in Shelley that afternoon. As I was driving past Boise, I was thinking that since we got done shopping so quickly, we were going to arrive pretty early at the meet, and I didn't want the boys to get bored while waiting for his race, so I decided to spend more time in Boise. I took the last exit, and showed the boys where the BSU stadium was. And after that, I thought we should go to the Boise Zoo since it's in the same neighborhood, so I drove them there. The boys debated if they even wanted to go to the zoo, because they thought about going to a movie with our extra time instead. When we were looking at the entrance, we saw that the sign said Thursdays were Family Days, so the tickets are discounted, and that basically sealed the deal for me! I've taken all my boys there before, but they were younger, so none of them remembered it. 

In the interactive room we went in after we first entered, the boys tried on animal costumes:  

Kanyon the turtle

Micah the bat

Jonah the porcupine

It was a nice, warm day and we had fun wandering around looking at all the animal exhibits.

Jonah & Micah looking at prairie dogs through tunnel windows

Jonah & Kanyon pointing out the nearby prairie dogs

you're gonna hear me roar!

anteaters have such unique body shapes

zebra stripes intrigue me

I like all the little facts about specific animals that are placed by animal molds that kids can play in/on:

Micah the tortoise

Jonah on the gila monster

Kanyon with giant ears (I can't even remember what real animal has these!)

There's a petting zoo that has some hungry goats (and other animals) in it! We got some food and the boys fed the animals out of their hands. Kanyon thought the goat's tongues didn't feel good on his hand, but the other boys thought it kind of tickled the way they ate out of their palms. 

Zoo Boise is larger than I remember it being; they've added a few exhibits since the last time we were there a few years ago. I loved seeing the variation in animals!

giraffes are my favorite

we all loved the sloth bear! it was like a cross between a big
dog and a bear. he was super cute and likes seeing people!

monkeys and gorillas are so captivating!

One of the new parts they had this summer was a butterfly house. We walked into this gated area and butterflies were EVERYWHERE! We weren't supposed to touch them, but it was so funny when they landed on us! I've never seen so many different kinds and colors of butterflies. I was fascinated! The boys received an information page with photos and names of all the breeds of butterflies in it, and they tried to find each one. When one would land on one of us, they would look on their diagram and figure out which kind it was.  

this one has the Salmon Savages colors!

a group of butterflies eating oranges for lunch!

When we finally left the zoo, the boys were hungry for lunch. We stopped at Sonic and drove through their ginormous drive-thru line. I didn't realize until it was our time to order that they were having a special that day for 50 cent corn dogs! By the time we made it back to the freeway, it was 1:30. I was thinking Shelley was about 3 hours away, and Ammon's race was at 5:00, so I thought we'd get there with extra time still. But as we drove out of Boise, and I saw the first city/mileage sign, I panicked. It was 120 miles JUST to Twin Falls! I got out my Idaho road map, and found that Pocatello was another 120 miles past Twin Falls, and Shelley is 25 miles past that! I was freaking out that we wouldn't make it in time. Thankfully, the Idaho Interstate MPH was increased to 80 (I seriously had no idea!). I started doing math on my cell phone calculator to figure out the mileage vs. the time to see if it would work. I figured out if I drove 84 miles an hour, I would get there exactly on time. But I still had to make a pit stop somewhere along the way to get gas. So, I drove 85, stopped once for 10 minutes to get a few gallons, and we made it to Shelley at EXACTLY 5:00!!! I had been sweating and was so nervous for the previous hour of driving that I wouldn't see his whole race, but lucky for me, Ammon's race didn't start until 5:10, so I had enough time to see him before his race started! Whew! 

We watched him run his first high school race! I was so glad that we actually made it!

When his race was over, I took the younger 3 boys with me again. We went to Idaho Falls to do some grocery shopping, then we drove home. We got home around 10:00 that night, after driving over 750 miles in 2 days. It had been a lot of time spent in the car, but it was worth it to spend time with our friends, get our school shopping done, and watch Ammon run! It was a good last-minute road trip at the end of our summer!