Reunioning!

Family reunion time! We started out with an awesome Bees baseball game in Salt Lake, where we finally saw Asher again (a couple of inches taller, we're pretty sure)

Unfortunately, early the next morning we broke a kid for the first time ever. Good on Sera for trying to smile--her arm was in so much pain.

 

While she was getting it set, everyone else was having a blast at the awesome lodge my sister Tenille and her family run up in Park City. My dad had a million tricks up his sleeve and kept everyone well-entertained, besides which we had the chance to enjoy delicious meals and some special family time--I didn't take nearly enough pictures!

 

Before long, Sera was back to her old self, sling and all. It's no easy feat navigating a beach with a plastic-bag wrapped, splinted arm, but Sera managed it with finesse.

 

We had a day or two of fun with just the siblings and their kids (including Don's daughter and their family) at my mom's fantastic Bear Lake cabin--it was pure bliss!

 

Including a great big un-birthday party for everyone!

 

Plenty of beach time with my fave siblings--Chels and I looking fab in our hats

 

And a few pictures of the whole bunch--paradise!

 

This pose is kind of becoming a thing for us--it really does take five of us to hold this (big) little brother of ours up!

 

Our girls totally bonded with Brandon and Jennifer's girls, who have spent the last few years traveling the globe--I can't say we're not a little jealous of all their amazing experiences from Costa Rica to Spain to Bali!

There were some good times on the boat--these two were fearless!

 

Asher came into his own as a waterskier and wakeboarder

 

And Addy showed off her "anything you can do, I can do better" complex

 

These two were happy as clams just bouncing around in the boat

 

Then everybody else arrived--my mom invited all her brothers and sisters and their families, plus one of her cousins that we've always been close with. It was so great to see some of my favorite cousins who I grew up with--Natalie and Nicole and Alyson, and Katie and Brad . . . love these people! And again, nowhere near enough photos.

 

I couldn't take a picture of this when this was packed with people, because I was down there with them! Talking the day away, playing volleyball, making sure people didn't drown--good times!

 

I'm sure everyone will thank me for posting this super-flattering photograph--like I said, I didn't get nearly enough of the good ones! The food was amazing, everyone pitched in.

Including this handsome guy--you can't imagine how many hot dogs a crowd like that can plow through!

 

These two are the power couple behind that crowd! I love this amazing Grandma and Grandpa Hooper, and the great example they have been to all of us throughout our lives. I spent much of the day talking to them, and it wasn't nearly enough. You can guess how old they are if you want, but chances are you'll need to add at least twenty years to your guess to come close.

 

And then, after all, I managed to get a few good pictures. Here are grandma and grandpa with many of their grandchildren, though we're missing Rebecca, Lee, Rachel, and Aaron (most of whom were there earlier, but left before we thought to take pictures)

 

And here's the whole mess of us! Love this gigantic family of ours!

 

Fireworks, Family, and Breaking a Kid

July started out with a bang--doesn't it always? Because Aaron had the awesome opportunity to prepare the San Diego Master Chorale for the Fourth of July Pops, he scored us the best seats in the house for the concert. The Embarcadero, where the San Diego Symphony summer performances are held, is flush against the ocean. You can't imagine a more perfect spot to enjoy an evening concert, while watching sailboats and yachts cruise by, often lingering to catch a few strains of music. The concert was just fantastic. Two Broadway soloists and a very talented young local girl joined the symphony as they played through patriotic standards from the stage and screen. The choir sounded amazing, and Bill Conti, the symphony director (who also wrote and recorded the music for the Rocky movies and Karate Kid among others; he also conducts the orchestra for the Academy Awards each year), complimented Aaron and the choir highly on their preparation. After the performance, fireworks lit up the sky from every direction. In addition to San Diego's fireworks immediately overhead, we could see fantastic shows going up from Coronado Island just across the bay, and Sea World, a little further up the shore. I have to admit that they may even have given my favorite Red White and Blue Ash fireworks shows in Cincinnati a run for their money.

We were sad to bid farewell to Asher for most of July, as he took his first solo flight out to Utah to spend a few weeks with his Papa earning money for scout camp. Our ward decided to participate in a particularly fantastic (and pricey) scout camp this year at Catalina Island. Although it sounded absolutely amazing, when Aaron and I looked at the dollar figures to attend, we pretty much decided that spending that much money on a great family vacation would be more valuable. Lucky for Asher, Papa wanted a say on that. There's really no better advocate for scouting than my dad, so he suggested having Asher come out to spend time with him and earn the money for the camp himself. Since a break from Asher's constant "hops" to touch the ceiling was at least somewhat welcome to us as well (Asher is one of those kids who completely gets what the song Happy refers to when it says "clap along if you feel like a room without a roof"), we sent him off and tried not to have too much fun without him. While he was working hard mowing lawns and pulling weeds and planting things, we carried on with summer goals, the library reading program, and visits to places we thought wouldn't make Asher too terribly jealous. Meanwhile, he managed to have a fair bit of fun amidst working so hard, attending an additional weekend scout camp in Logan, and coming back with a treasure trove of merit badges to show for it.

We did finally splurge on a family membership to the San Diego Zoo and Safari Park, both of which we have enjoyed visiting several times. Although I maintain that both Cincinnati and Fort Wayne have remarkable zoos (especially considering the price differential), I have to admit that San Diego knows how zoo. We all saw panda bears for the first time (except Aaron, who saw them on a school trip when he was young), and were awed by the tram safari at Safari Park, which feels like an actual trip to Kenya or something. We were also especially impressed by the fantastic gorilla exhibit and the Chinese acrobatic performers putting on a show near where we ate lunch. We look forward to visiting many more times before our membership expires--not until the end of next summer! We filled in with some visits to Sea World (which we found far less enjoyable packed with tourists in the summer), the beach (also crowded), Balboa Park, and Old Town, all to the tune of terrible traffic. Ultimately we formed the opinion that San Diego is one of those rare places that is less pleasurable in the summer than during the rest of the year--perhaps that will help us plan better in the future.

About halfway through the month, I got a bit of potentially exciting news. Sometime in the spring I signed up to take the FSOT, or Foreign Service Officer Test. It's the first step in qualifying to work for the State Department in US Embassies around the world. I took the test in June, and found out this month that I had passed. As a result, I had to complete a personal narrative form that will determine whether I continue to progress in the process. Although it's both a competitive and opaque process, both Aaron and I are quite excited about the possibility. It takes over a year to get through the whole process, so it will be quite a long time before we'll know much, but I'm hopeful that it could launch our lives in an entirely different direction for a while. Perhaps we have a tiny bit of karma on our side? During the World Cup games, sometime before the quarter-finals, Aaron and I were arguing about which countries would be most interesting to live in with our family. I told him that if Brazil won the World Cup, we would move to Brazil, but if Germany won, that would mean that a move to Germany was in our future. If you didn't see the game between the two, here's a short recap:

Yeah, it wasn't pretty. And, since Germany took home the World Cup, we apparently have an impending move to Europe in our future!

As we neared the end of July, we packed our bags and headed out to Utah for some family reunioning. Although I toyed around with last year's idea of visiting several national parks on either end of the family visits, after checking into reservations for the packed cabins and campgrounds involved, we decided that we could maximize our current location best by planning travel in the off-season. Only a family river-rafting trip up to Jackson Hole stayed on the schedule. On the trip out, we stopped off in Las Vegas at my new favorite Vegas hotel: Sam's Town. When Aaron told me the name, my hopes weren't high--it sounded like maybe a bit of a dive. It was not! It was by far the most family-friendly hotel we have visited there, and for $30/night! The inner court was done up like a wild mountainside with animatronic wildlife including bears, eagles, beavers and deer against an indoor waterfall. Glass elevators overlooking the scene carried us to our rooms, where we enjoyed a quiet night before waking up to a fantastic breakfast buffet that the kids went nuts for. After filling ourselves with Belgian waffles and French toast with strawberries and whipped cream, made-to-order omelets, and any number of other delicious items, we loaded up and made the rest of the trip to the tune of the family videos Aaron burned to DVD for us. We had some great laughs looking back on our years in Cincinnati and Canada. Good times!

We arrived in Salt Lake that evening and finally got to see our oldest kid again at the baseball game where we kicked off our family reunion. He grew even more while he was away! I shudder to say this, but it appears he has actually passed me up. His sisters and brother were thrilled to see him, and couldn't get enough of him as we watched the Salt Lake Bees battle it off against the Reno Aces. It was great to be together with all the cousins, aunts, and uncles, and my kids were in heaven babying my sisters' smaller kids. After a narrow victory by the Bees, we closed ranks and headed up to a lodge that my sister and her husband oversee in Park City. They hooked us up with rooms filled with bunks for all the kids to party in, while Aaron and I got a lovely room on a different floor. Bliss!

The next morning, our trip took a turn for the worse when the kids went outside to a playground to stay out of the way while we made breakfast. Sera apparently misunderstood the term "breakfast" altogether, and decided to go for a fast break of her radius, a couple of inches up from her wrist. That's the punny version of the story. The actual experience was considerably less enjoyable. As Chelsi and I were cooking up French toast in the kitchen, I thought I heard some banging from the door, which was on the other side of the building. When I went to open it, I could hear screaming outside. I was prepared to reprimand everyone for making so much noise when I looked down and saw Sera's arm hanging completely wrong. I added my scream to the throng and carried Sera in onto a couch--probably I shouldn't have moved her in retrospect, but the clan of kids around her wasn't really doing her any favors. Somebody got my dad into the room and he splinted it while Aaron called around to find out what our insurance would cover out of state and where we could take her. Without going into too much detail, after visits to three different clinics over two days, we had her set in a semi-permanent splint and out of pain, and we finished our trip that way. The biggest casualty of the injury was the much-anticipated white-water trip, which wouldn't have been nearly as much fun with a broken arm. We were sure grateful to everyone who kept our other kids entertained while we dealt with all the fallout. The kids all enjoyed some wonderful games together with Papa, and we all enjoyed one another's cooking and the beauty of nature at the lodge.

On Wednesday evening, we headed up to Bear Lake for a Hooper family reunion with my mom's family. Asher was more delighted than usual to be descended from a family of "Hoopers," given the potential basketball connotation. We were among the first to arrive, along with Don's daughter Jennifer and her family, who have spent the past few years traveling the world together. We enjoyed talking with she and her husband Brandon about their travels and adventures, schooling their kids in an international way, and immersing in other cultures. It was particularly informative given our own potential international aspirations. As a bonus, both Addy and Sera made fast friends with their two girls.

The following day, everyone else arrived and we got to divide our time up in the best ways possible--between waterskiing and wakeboarding, great company, and wonderful food. It was so fun to catch up with many of my cousins who I haven't seen in years, to meet their kids, to knock a volleyball back and forth across a net, to take to the water in a kayak, and to just enjoy the amazing blessing that a good family can be. On Saturday my grandparents showed up, and I especially enjoyed being able to spend time with them. I've done a bit of family history research over the past year, and my grandmother is a wellspring of genealogical knowledge. I grilled both her and my grandfather for information about their lives and what they remembered of their parents and grandparents. I felt a little selfish for monopolizing so much of their time, but everyone else was out playing on the lake, so I pretty much had free rein. One thing I have decided for sure is that I would like to age like my Grandma Hooper. She still has the same wonderful, amazing laugh that I have always known and loved, and she just doesn't seem to get a minute older from year to year.

We closed the trip with a journey back through baking Las Vegas where we stayed at a slightly less amazing hotel than on our trip out--I was woken in the middle of the night to somebody screaming loudly enough that it worried me into calling security, so that's always a lovely way to end a trip. We got home for a little bit of rest and preparation for a new school year, not to mention visits to the doctor to figure out how best to deal with Sera's broken arm. With all our saved money, I have Aaron pledged to a train trip at some unspecified point in the future, so that's floating around in the back of my mind--great fodder for daydreaming on these last dog-days of summer.

San Diego Summer

 

We were missing Asher through most of July--he was having the time of his life visiting his Papa in Utah! We managed to have a good time without him, though.

Addy, Emer, and Sera writing letters to soldiers before our concert and fireworks at the Embarcadero

 

Fireworks rings

 

Could there be a more picturesque spot for a concert and fireworks?

 

Aaron singing with the San Diego Master Chorale and Symphony under the baton of Bill Conti (Rocky composer)

 

Fireworks with my favorite fire cracker

 

Frank Baum's house on Coronado Island, where he wrote many of the Oz books

Super-cool stained glass window display of scenes from Oz at the Coronado Public Library

 

Sunset on Coronado Island

 

 

We loved visiting our friends the Snows for awesome swim days several times this summer.

 

As you can imagine, this water slide was the piece de resistance!

 

It was a great way to get to know some other families and kids in our ward better--many thanks to the Snows for their amazing hospitality!

 

Visiting the fantastic San Diego Wild Animal Park

 

And the amazing Wild Animal Park--let's just zoom in on the background there, shall we?

 

Real car, real lion. Yikes!

 

 

Love these hatchlings!

 

Another concert at the Embarcadero

 

This one was titled: My San Diego, My Story, and inspired a bunch of cool program ideas for Aaron

 

It would get ridiculous if I posted all our Sea World photos for the summer--love that joint!

 

June Boogie

Is there such a thing as too much fun? If there is, we must be approaching it. On weeks like this last one, during which the kids got to bed before 11 pm exactly once, I sometimes find myself craving the consistency of a regular schedule, even if practically every minute is filled with fun. At times, the indulgence can feel almost gluttonous. That said, we did have a great deal of fun this month, and I can't say I regret any of it. I doubt whether I have time or space to do anything besides catalogue it all.

At the end of May, my dad flew in from his annual sailing trip. The kids embraced him as they always do, and we spent his first afternoon here crossing the bridge to Coronado Island, where he was a wellspring of rather a lot of interesting information about the island itself and the famous hotel that stands on it. We only whetted our appetites for the place, however, and look forward to going back again--maybe next time we'll get to see some of the Wizard of Oz memorabilia, as the island was Frank Baum's home during much of the time he was writing the books. On Sunday we all attended Aaron's San Diego Children's Choir concert, in which Asher performed (with the peculiarly straight face he has adopted every time he is "forced" to sing), and in which the highlight was "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands," an arrangement by our friend Brett Stewart for his OCMCO choirs, but adapted by Aaron for his groups--the verse when the littlest kids came in singing "he's got the little tiny baby in his hands" was just adorable. The following Monday, we took the kids out of school and headed for Sea World, where we stayed until closing. We made sure to take my dad to our favorite Blue Horizons and Shamu shows, but were also excited to see that an octopus exhibit is set to open this summer, along with a show called Cirque de la Mer, which takes place in the actual ocean. We visited the beluga whales and rode on some favorite rides, including trying Shipwrecked! for the first time. The next day, we got to spend some time at the beach and then hit a taco shop for Taco Tuesday. We were sad to say goodbye on Wednesday, but really appreciate having the chance to have Papa come visit.

The following day was a big one for Asher--his 13th birthday! Although there is ample evidence to support it, nobody really tells you when you're holding your brand new baby in your arms that one day he will become a teenager. We're very encouraged, however, that he has really begun to show some of the responsibility and accountability of a young man now. It is wonderful to see the same determination and leadership abilities that have caused trouble here and there in the past mature into traits that will be of great benefit to him and to others in the future. Anyway, since some of the kids hadn't had a chance to pick out gifts for their brother yet, we told them the night before that we would take them to Walgreens in the morning before school. We left a little after 7 am and headed up toward the Walgreens a little to the north. It was a while before the kids started asking why it was taking us so long to get there, but since they were chatting and reading as we drove, they didn't notice so much. Of course, about the time we turned onto Disneyland Drive, they started to suspect something was up (all except Asher, who had figured it out when Aaron told him not to wear his proper school uniform, but who had managed to cooperate and keep mum about it--see what I mean about the benefits of maturity?). Rather than heading to Disneyland again, Aaron whipped out the tickets for California Adventure that he had gotten at a discount when purchasing our Disneyland tickets the week before. None of us had ever been to California Adventure, so it was truly exciting to get to try out some different yet still magical rides and shows. A big favorite for everyone was the Aladdin show, but other favorites were as follows: Asher--Radiator Springs Racers, Addy--Hollywood Tower of Terror, Emerson--California Screamin', and Sera--Toy Story Midway Mania. I loved the ambience of the park the most--walking through Cars land was especially fun, although if I had to pick a ride, it would probably be the Little Mermaid Under the Sea ride, and Aaron really liked the Radiator Springs Racers as well. Although it was less of a surprise than Disneyland had been, and though everyone was sincerely wiped out by the end of the day, it was a pretty great way to help Asher cross the bridge from childhood to young-adulthood. We waited until the next day for cake (German chocolate) and presents (Addy--basketball shoes, Emerson--sandals, or "sliders" as Asher calls them, Sera--a popsicle-making kit, and from his amazing and beloved parents--the full-size basketball hoop he has been dreaming of since we got here). Although Asher has always been the hardest of our kids to parent (boundaries are not really his thing), we've always know that his remarkable qualities of sensitivity and persistence would come to fruition one day, and it is wonderful to watch that begin to happen.

The next week was full of extra school activities as the kids wrapped up their school year. There was a promotion ceremony for Addy, pool parties and field days for everyone, and Sera got to present her Australian animal diorama to her class (her animal was a kangaroo). Somehow I managed to put together some end-of-year teacher gifts which paled dramatically in comparison to some of the things kids brought in--apparently end of year teacher gifts are kind of a big deal here. Ah well, I know we appreciated our kids' teachers, and I hope they know it too.

Following the last day of school, we embarked on a mad rush to fit all the fun local adventures we could into the limited time before Asher was set to leave for Utah--after hearing that we were waffling over whether to send him to the expensive Catalina Island scout camp our ward is planning for the summer, Papa insisted that he could help Asher earn the money himself over a few weeks this summer. Thus, we spent the first two weeks of summer break trying to squeeze everything in--something Asher clearly appreciated, judging by the strained expression he wore on his face the whole time.

We were able to go to a couple of summer movies, visit several museums at Balboa Park, hit the beach, take in a day at the Del Mar Fair, and attend a Pentatonix concert, a Padres game, and the long-awaited Piano Guys concert. Of the bunch, my personal favorite was the Piano Guys concert, and my least favorite was probably the Del Mar Fair. Though I did my best to keep my belly-aching to a minimum, state fairs sort of bewilder me. The Del Mar Fair is probably the biggest and noisiest I've ever been to. Although I enjoyed the art and photography and woodworking exhibits, I could have done without the pig-racing and monster trucks. I declined to join everyone else for the motocross exhibition, although even Sera said I missed out on that (watching people perform death-defying stunts on motorcycles--alas, I don't quite believe death can be defied every time, and I don't want to be watching when it isn't), but relented and came in for the monster truck bit--it only took one smashed bumper and the near miss of a crash before I determined that I'm not really cut out for that type of thing. The Balboa Park visits were quite lovely though, and even though Aaron got a bit resentful of my continuous narration at the Air and Space museum (doesn't everybody automatically think of the opening chapters of Narnia books when they see World War II aircraft carriers?), I think it's safe to say that I'm really more of a museum girl than a fair girl.

The concerts were the most fun. For the Piano Guys concert, a note to Steve Nelson, a good friend of mine from high school, landed us with VIP tickets and backstage passes! Before the show, we got together with some friends from the BYU music program who also live in town. We met up at Café Coyote, with Asher and Emerson and the two boys from one family at one end of the table, Addy and Sera and the two girls from the other family at the other end of the table, and all the parents in the middle. It really is wonderful to get together with friends from different periods of our lives and compare notes. One of the drawbacks of having moved so much is a lack of consistent friendships that carry through the years, though hopefully the multiplicity of friendships will outweigh it in the end. After a lovely evening in Old Town, one family split for a different performance, and we headed over to Humphreys on the Bay with the other.

The concert venue was lovely! Sailboats were drifting alongside to listen to the concert as well (the performers joked at first that they had the cheap seats, but then conceded that perhaps the purchase price for a yacht made them the expensive seats). It was so exciting to see a peer and friend enjoying such success! Steve Nelson and I were really quite good friends growing up--I probably had as many classes with him growing up as anyone else, given our common musical interests coupled with years of German classes, besides his house being only a few doors down from my best friend's. I remember Steve's videos always being the best in show for the annual Deutsch Video Fest that Herr Hardy held, and the fantastic videos he put together our senior year as a class officer were outtnding. It's interesting to see how he has married that skill with his exceptional musical skills to really delight and inspire people around the world. My hat is off in homage to such remarkable determination, stamina, and musical inventiveness.

We finished the month with a Padres baseball game, which was pretty fun to watch, and which featured players at an exceptional skill level. But quite honestly, when it comes to sports, I'm more of a small-town girl--I'd take a Fort Wayne Tin Caps game any day (better between-inning entertainment and better cheap seats). Luckily, the game ended with a spectacular fireworks blow-out to blast us into July, where maybe we'll manage to fit a couple of entirely empty days into the schedule!