Tavita and Kalei's Big Adventure

This summer Tavita and Kalei went out on their own. They up and left us for a couple days and took a trip to Idaho. Ok, they weren't completely alone, Grandma and Grandpa took them up to go visit Auntie Janessa and Uncle Ben (Brayden chose to stay back for a birthday party). They may have only gone as far as Idaho but you woulda thought it was an adventure of a lifetime. They had a blast. I love looking at the pictures of the trip because they look like they were best friends through it all. While their relationship is improving, this summer, they couldn't stand to be within 20 feet of each other.
One would imagine Idaho to be nothing but a vast expanse of potato fields. If that is what you are imagining right now, you are absolutely RIGHT! However, they did find a few spots amongst the fields to have some fun.
Getting ready to go for a swim

Hanging out on the tractors. The majority of the pics that came back were of these two cuties and every kind of tractor you can imagine. I'll only present two of them at this time. They happen to be the same kind of tractor but trust me, there were A LOT!


Chowin some cotton candy

Playing with the cows

Jumping with Uncle Ben (I still love my kids wound up with an Uncle Ben, such a classic Uncle name)

Riding the carousel

Here are a few other random pictures I snagged.
Hanging out in their little fort they built

3 little monkeys jumping on a bed

I don't know if I mentioned this story before but its a classic. It's old, but had to be recorded. This past spring, my mom came in for a visit. We picked her up and stopped to play a little laser tag on the way home (a favorite past time for the boys).
My mom sat out with Kalei and I took the boys in. The guy (I'll be generous and put him at 22-23) running the show was proudly showing off how they added a smoke machine on your way in to make it seem more like a subway (The laser tag is supposed to take place on the streets of New York). We were about 2 min into the game when the fire alarm started going off. I gathered the boys and headed for the exit. We walked into a room FILLED with smoke and the poor employee running around yelling "It won't turn off, it won't turn off."
Apparently in the meantime, my mom and Kalei were downstairs when the alarm went off and a guy came running out of the kitchen yelling, "FIRE!!! Everyone out, everyone out." My mom and others who had family in playing Laser Tag were a bit worried since we hadn't come out and the rest of the building had been evacuated. It just took us a little longer because we couldn't see 6 inches in front of us while we were trying to get out.
We got outside and the parking lot started filling with fire trucks and police cars. they all went in, in full gear. It was a great show for the kids, way better than any game of laser tag. These nice men were kind enough to pose with the kids.

Needless to say, the next time we went back there was no more smoke machine.