February 2022

Snowy Landscapes:

On February 2, I drove down to Terreton to have a dominoes game night with my friends at Val's house. There was a MASSIVE herd of elk between Nicholia Ranch and Kaufman Creek. It always wows me when I see such a large herd of wild animals, especially when I'm not expecting to!

all the dark brown dots in the distant white fields are elk

a close up of just one portion of the area where the elk were

A week later, Josh took a Jeep ride in the afternoon up Perreau Creek, and stopped at the top of Lover's Lookout for some beautiful winter shots of the surrounding mountains and valleys covered in snow. 

Josh drove 2 ski buses in February: one with junior high students, and one with the high school P.E. class. Jonah and Micah both went skiing on the high school ski days, and Josh saw them only a few times when he was up on the mountain with them. He's so grateful for opportunities to go skiing--for free--when he takes the ski bus with the school! 

Winter Olympics:

It was weird having the Winter Olympics so close to the Summer Olympics that just occurred last summer in July! The Summer Games were delayed a year due to COVID, so instead of happening in 2020 and 2022, the back-to-back Olympics occurred in 2021 and 2022! The games were held in Beijing, China, and there were still lots of restrictions in place, so a lot of the arenas and venues were void of fans, which was a sad sight. In addition to that, there was some political unrest with China and Russia and the rest of the world, and a lot of countries had less athletes participating as a result--especially from the Ukraine who was experiencing a lot of duress from Russia at that time (before Russia started a war with them).  I've always loved watching the Olympics--I think it stems from my childhood when we would all watch it together (one of the few things we would watch altogether as a family). We spent a lot of time watching this year's games as a family as much as possible, too! We liked the snowboard races, skiing races, and skating races in particular this time around. 

One of my favorite moments at the Opening Ceremony...

...the dancers had these long poles and worked in total synchronization
to make different images and actions to go along with the scenes
projected onto the floor with their large digital projection system. 

For the first time ever, each country had TWO flag bearers:
a male and a female, carrying the flag at the Opening Ceremonies.
These countries had my favorite uniforms/costumes of the night. 

These countries had my LEAST favorite outfits.

Watching the Olympics together after Kanyon's birthday dinner.

The fireworks at the Closing Ceremony were incredible!

What a spectacular finale!

Dress-Up Days:

Leadore had a "Spirit Week" in February to show their support of the high school girls basketball team going to the State Playoffs. I love dress-up days at school, and I always try to go over the top so the kids can feel comfortable dressing differently, too. One of the days was "Gender Bender". I wore Josh's motorcycle shirt, a hat, and a mustache all day! That mustache made my face itch all day, but I was committed and kept it on until after 4:00! 

Kanyon has a unique dressing style--he wears shorts all year now, regardless of the season or the temperature. He likes to coordinate the color of his shorts with his shirt and long socks, too. He's put together some pretty cool outfits as a result! 

I love numbers and dates. For example, I like finding patterns in number sequences, I like when numbers on the odometer make a pattern, and I like when dates have number repetitions. Ammon turned 11 on 1-11-11, which was so memorable! I took pixie sticks to his 5th grade class at 11:11am, and gave them each two sticks, so when they held them up (one in each hand), it looked like the number 11! I wanted to likewise celebrate 2-22-22 at school, with different "two" activities all day, including having a class-wide dress-up day. The cool thing about 2-22-22 was it was on a TUESDAY, which we deemed was "TWOS-day"!! I wore a tutu, put my hair in two piggie tails, and ordered a special t-shirt for the occasion. It was a fun day! We did things centered around 2 in math, reading, art, and spelling. Also, I want to note that when I first starting planning for this day, I didn't realize it would be the same day as Parent-Teacher Conferences! I wore my piggy tails and tutu all during those conferences, too!!!

My hair is so short and fine, so my piggy
tails are tiny!

Hot Tub/Hot Springs:

Josh and I both love having a hot tub...it is so soothing on our aging, aching bodies! We take advantage of it in all seasons, but it is especially comforting during the winter months. We use it as a pick-me-up in the morning or a way to relax and rejuvenate at night. Unknowingly, Josh and I each took a solo morning soak on different days in February, and took nearly identical photos of the experience, which I find hilarious!!

Josh's morning soak...complete with a Frappuccino.

Kala's morning soak...complete with a Chai Tea.

Josh and I had a mini-getaway for Valentine's Day. We got a hotel in Rexburg on Saturday the 12th, and crossed another hot springs off my Idaho Hot Springs Hit List. We drove east of Rexburg that afternoon to Green Canyon, a commercial springs with an indoor pool and hot tub. It was SUPER busy, which neither of us expected. We soaked in the hot tub first, and then swam in the deep end of the warm pool. There were several families there, some for birthday celebrations, and there was a lifeguard training going on, and a scuba diving group lesson, too. We didn't stay for very long--only about 30 minutes total. It was probably our least favorite hot springs so far--it was noisy, outdated, and the facilities weren't super clean. We drove around the area to see where John Vermaas' fatal ATV accident had happened several years before, then we drove back to Rexburg, got dinner at Costa Vida, and relaxed in our hotel that night and the following morning, just watching Olympics on TV, reading, and sleeping in. It was a pretty laid back overnight trip: just the way we like it now! 

Overlooking the indoor pool

The indoor hot tub is in an adjacent room to the warm pool.
There's a small cold plunge in the corner of the same room, too. 

Superbowl:

We wanted the boys to invite their friends to have a Superbowl party at our house this year, just like we did last year, but not as many could come so we also invited the Hobbs family to join us. David doesn't like the Superbowl, but he was a good sport and they came, but he mostly sat in the other room and didn't watch a lot of it. The Rams and the Bengals were the two teams who made it to the finals. Interestingly enough, the Rams got to play in their home stadium this year, just like the Buccaneers got to play in their home stadium for the Superbowl last year! I thought that was so interesting. Josh and I weren't invested in either of the teams, but we were both really excited for the Superbowl Halftime Show, and it didn't disappoint. We especially enjoyed the performances of Snoop Dogg and Eminem. There were 5 performers (also including Dr. Dre, Mary J. Blige, & Kendrick Lamar with 50 Cent), and they performed on a long house-like stage, where each performer had their own room, and then they congregated to the roof together at the end. We had our traditional betting contest: whoever guessed the correct winning team with the closest score won a glass jar full of gold chocolate. Dallin Hobbs won, but for the first time ever, he wasn't present to win it. We've never had guests leave before the Superbowl was finished! They left about a half hour before it ended, so we made the executive decision to give the chocolate prize to Avery who won a close 2nd place, and I gave Dallin a different, but similar, prize later as a consolation. 

As we were watching the game, I noticed the boys were sitting by people similarly dressed to them. It looked like multiple sets of twins in our living room! 

Look-alikes Jonah & Erik with blue jeans, gray sweatshirts,
and long curly hair!

Look-alikes Avery and Kanyon with black clothes and constant
stares at their phones!

Look-alikes Tyler & Aidan with jeans, XC hoodies, and hats.

Nobody dressed liked Micah, and for once
the twin was a singleton!

Avery with the winning prize for the closest bet

This was the official betting sheet.
The Rams beat the Bengals 23-20.
Dallin had a difference of 4; Avery's guess was 5 off.

Camping:

Josh and I used his new 5th wheel to go camping overnight once in February when the weather was fairly nice. Since he didn't end up moving to Wyoming, he didn't need it to live in anymore, and we thought it would be best if we tried it out at least once before we sold it so we would know more about it, how it worked, and be able to answer questions about it. We camped at Deer Gulch and soaked in the nearby Cronk's Canyon Hot Springs (our favorite local, natural spot) while we were there. Although the sun was shining, it was pretty cold out, so we opted not to make a fire outside. Instead, we warmed up in the trailer, cooked dinner inside, and played games and read. It was a nice 5th wheel, but neither one of us liked the bed: we both prefer a stiff bed for our backs, and both of our backs hurt the next day after sleeping on it that one night! It was unusual for us to go camping in February--we usually start camping season in March--but we knew our spring schedule was going to get busy pretty quickly, so we were glad it worked out for us to go earlier than usual. We listed the trailer for sale in March, and it sold pretty quickly, so this was the only time we ever used it!

Cronk's Canyon Hot Springs can only fit about 4 people. It's 
wedged in between the river and the highway.

Ammon Spotlight:

The fraternity that Ammon joined as a freshman at U of I spotlighted all their graduating seniors online in February. He enjoyed being in this house throughout his college career, and was grateful for the brotherhood of its members. During his sophomore year, he served as their Vice President, which was an elected position, and it was apparent early on that he was very well-known and well-liked at AKL, so it was a great fit for him!

Missionaries:

The sister missionaries had been coming to our house since December to teach our friend Avery. During those 3 months, we'd gotten to know and had been taught by 3 different partnerships of sisters. Sister missionaries have served in the Salmon area for 5 years, but at the end of February, the sisters informed us that they were on their last transfer and would be returning home from their missions and that the area would become an Elders area once again. We were surprised by their announcement, but were so grateful to have had the opportunity to spend so much time with them in our home eating together and discussing gospel principles together. 

The last 2 weeks they came to our house, the sisters played a 
gospel principle jeopardy game with us that Sister Decker made.

Sister Mercer is using a leg roller as a pretend microphone
for the final jeopardy game (we'd gotten out the leg roller because
Avery's legs were sore after track practice). 

This was Sister Mercer's and Sister Decker's final visit to our
home before they completed their missions at the end of February.
Sadly, the twins weren't able to join us the last 2 visits
due to helping at the high school's play practice.