Spring Break 2021

Thankfully, both Salmon School District and West Jefferson School District had the same spring break this year, and we were all off of school the last week of March together. Sadly, though, we didn't have any major family plans. Instead, we basically worked a lot (the boys helped Josh at the golf course), and we also got a lot of projects done around the house. 

I look forward to the first flowers blooming every spring!
The crocus plants opened up during Spring Break this year.

One of the first projects I tackled was purchasing and installing (with Josh's help) two new exterior light fixtures on the backside of our house. The previous lights were terrible and hardly illuminated anything. For years, I've thought about having an electrician come to install more lights on the back of our home, and even talked with our cousin electrician about it once. But I thought of an easier, cheaper solution to just purchase better light fixtures instead. They're so much better and brighter! And they have motion sensors, too, which is helpful to save power. 

Kanyon and I cleaned out the closets and drawers in his room. The seasonal clothing event in our house usually takes place twice a year (spring and fall). It was a long ordeal when the boys were little, and  would take a couple of half-days to complete the process: the boys and I would sort through all the hand-me-down clothes in the grow boxes, box up the clothes from their drawers and closets that were too small, and donate the clothes that were smaller than the youngest boy. Now that the youngest boy is in high school, the process is SO much quicker than it was when all the boys were little! It only took us less than two hours altogether! The twins have been the same size for a few years, so they don't do this process any more, and I only have to go through one size of grow boxes that are bigger than Kanyon. We just go through all of his clothes, then go through the grow box to determine what to keep and what to give away, and bag up everything in the donate pile. This spring, we got rid of one bag of trash, and had three big bags for donation! It always feels good to clean stuff out of the house! 

 

The boys also helped me prune the two apple trees, which is an annual spring break event. We worked on it for several hours one afternoon, pruning the new growth and picking up/hauling off the cut branches. I love the way the trees look after they're freshly pruned! 

I also pruned the raspberry plants in the garden that same day. It's not my favorite job, but I'm the only one who does it every spring. I always get so scratched and torn up by the plants!

Before

After

One of the projects I really wanted to do this spring was remove the old netting and chicken wire that surrounded our garden and replace it. The fencing material has been falling apart and wasn't deer-proof any more. It's been bothering me for a few years, and I decided this was the year I was going to tackle that project. I saved up to buy new netwire to wrap around our garden posts, but knew I'd need Josh's help to put it on. We decided that if we were going to take down the fencing, it would be the perfect time to remove the peach trees from inside the garden. They haven't produced for a few years now, and they block sections of the garden from receiving the water from the sprinkler. I pulled all the old fencing material off myself, threw away what was un-salvageable, and gave away a large roll of chicken wire. Josh brought home his small Kubota from work, and dug up the two trees and removed them from the garden while the area was accessible. We had planned on putting the new wire up during spring break, too, but it didn't happen due to weather and our schedules. 

The upper end of the garden had old netting that was falling down.

And since he had brought home the Kubota, he decided to tackle another project that's been needing to be done for a few years. One portion of the ditch that runs along the edge of our property hadn't been cleaned out in a few years, and there were some small rock slides and some downed trees that needed to be cleaned out of it. Josh took the Kubota down the ditch, and worked for several hours to clean it all out. It looked SO much better!!

This is the view looking back towards our 
house and our "Triple S" corner by the ditch.

Our Spring Break wasn't ALL work, though! I wanted to make sure we had some fun times, too!! One evening, we made our own Miniature Golf Obstacle Course inside the house. The 5 of us played one round, re-did the obstacles, and played a second round. It was so much fun! I absolutely loved being at home and doing something creative and sporty with my boys!

Amanda and Ryan came to Salmon to visit over Spring Break, and they came over one night to play games with us. We played my new favorite game "Codenames". I love playing games with Amanda and Ryan!

And my favorite part of spring break was going on an overnighter trip with Josh to Haven Hot Springs. Neither of us had been there before, but I'd heard good things about it. It was close enough to not be gone for longer than an overnighter, and a place that we could go relax. We both loved it! It's located near Lowman, so about a 2.5 hour drive from Salmon. It was their off-season, so they didn't have any food available in their lodge (which I didn't realize before we left), but thankfully the pizza place a quarter of a mile down the highway was open, so we ate dinner there. It was such a laid-back place. They only had a few items on their menu, which was fine. We ordered, and played battleship while we waited for dinner to cook. I was elated because I totally CREAMED Josh!!!  Our dinner of their handmade pizza was super delicious! We headed back to our hotel after that. I had reserved the big hot pool to ourselves at Haven for an hour that evening, and the two of us soaked just as the sun was setting. It was SO peaceful! We watched as a herd of elk moved in closer to us on the hill surrounding us until the sky grew completely dark. I loved every moment of it! Our room also had its own soaking pool out our back door which we soaked in the next morning before we left. We'll definitely be back again!

Meanwhile, Ammon was having more fun than all of us! He joined Gabbie's family in Seattle for a fun Spring Break trip. He hadn't been there since the 8th grade music trip we went on with the school, and this time, he got to see so much more!