The Grubers: SEPTEMBER 2018 - Garden Harvesting, Fires, Labor Day, and Double Paintballing!

We got to spend the weekend at Mike and Kate’s cabin up Spanish Fork Canyon. We love this special get away! We stopped for dinner at Bam Bams and picked up groceries from Walmart before heading up. We had a great time, but of course there is quite often some sort of mishap. This time it was Colson, he had diarrhea all that day and ended up throwing up that night. Jason was up with him in the basement throughout the night. Luckily, by the next day he was feeling better. We were able to ride the ATVs and float down the river. Colson surprisingly hated the river. He was terrified and cold. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing watching movies, eating treats, and sitting in the sauna. We were also pleased that Jonah did well, with his typical on and off fussiness.

the boys favorite spot

For Labor Day we were at Payson Lakes again with the Arbons. The boys were constantly going on canoe rides with family and they were loving it! Colson loved fishing with dad, they caught six fish! Jonah did well and seemed content.

Jason and I started watching Jack Ryan in the evenings through VidAngel.

Apparently Jason and I started a personal $50 fitness goal “reward program”. He was working out in the mornings with his ward friend, Chester, and I was trying to go three to four times a week. I think we did well going to the gym, but I have no memory or proof of any $50 rewards received.

We made salsa, a highlight of the season! Kim, Kyle, and Camry came over to enjoy some.

We were also pleased to see that our fruit trees were producing better fruit this year! Our apples on the tree on the far right were really good! The peaches were bigger than they have ever been. We were surprised we even had peaches, to be honest, because at the beginning of the year we had an insect in the tree that we had to kill and it seemed like there were no buds. We were pleasantly surprised to see some! The peaches were still on the firm side, but the flavor was way better than past years. Our pear tree was just chock-full of pears! We were really excited about that. They were really tasty! Unfortunately, however, our vegetable garden really suffered this year. We don’t know if it was the soil we got from the compost place, but we had a lot of rot-bottom on the tomatoes and not very many peppers grew. We did, however, have a ton of weeds in the garden. I wasn’t up on weeding them as well as I had been in the past.

preparing apple crisp

peach galette

We had a family night at the Larsen’s pool with our family, the Larsen’s, and the Paynes. We had a barbecue and swam in their pool. It was perfect weather and a lot of fun! It was Jonah’s first time in a swimming pool! He did great and just kicked the water like crazy!

We had a period of some crazy fires in Utah County! There was the Bald Mountain Fire and the Pole Creek Fire over Elkridge/Woodland Hills/Covered Bridge. These fires were all going on at the same time. We were really worried for the Pacada’s Cabin, because that is in the Covered Bridge area. They barely got by without a fire! The air was crazy smoky during this time.

I subbed a Bunco Night with my good, old friend Desi. It was fun to see her and others again!

I started listening to the podcast, Swindled, while at the gym or doing laundry or whatever. It is fascinating!

Since Charlie was beginning Spanish Immersion at school, Jason and I started using the Duolingo App to learn Spanish. It’s such a great app! (This goal, however, didn’t end up lasting long...but it was fun while it lasted.)

Jason had his Young Men’s Camp Out. This one they planned to do paintballing, but due to all of the fires down south, they could not do the paintballing up Hobble Creek Canyon as planned (at the typical Dead Dog Field we go to with my family). Jason was super grateful to my efforts as I desperately searched for alternatives for them so they didn’t have to cancel last minute (Literally this was the day of or the day before). I was able to find the Squaw Peak Playing Field and an open camping site at Nunn’s Park. The field ended up being really fun (more of a world war trench feel...I think they have closed down the area to paintballing in the past year due to complaints from nearby archers). Another perk was Nunn’s Park is SO close to the playing field. So that worked out really nicely. The downsides were that the field sees a lot more traffic and had greater potential of having other people join in on the game throughout the day. Everyone had a great time and was so glad they were still able to make it happen.

my research of Nunn's Park

While Jason was gone on his camp out, Amy came over Friday night and we hung out while the kids were in bed. We watched The Guernsey and Potato Peel Pie movie on Netflix. We loved it!

We had George and Nancy over one Sunday evening to enjoy some apple crisp, a perk of having lots and lots of apples growing on our trees!

Colson took a field trip to the Curiosity Museum with his preschool group. He went despite the fact that he had had really bad stomach pains and diarrhea that morning. I had had the same thing on Sunday night so I was pretty confident it would go away by the afternoon. I was grateful that I had experienced it so I could have sympathy for his pain!

We made our homemade grape jelly with the bounty of grapes that cascade down our fence from our neighbors yard. It is always a long, tedious process, but always worth it in the end.

We had a weenie roast up above Aspen Grove. We always enjoy doing this when we can. This time it was surprisingly cold, but still lots of fun.

spot the boys

Jason got to attend a special Stake Meeting with Elder Holland. While he was away at that, Amy and Tess came over and we went to the Holy Cow Boutique in Lindon.

In preparation for upcoming Arbon family pictures, we had an evening of shopping at Traverse Outlets. We then had dinner at Johnny Rockets. Everyone ended up really liking the food!

And then, of course, there were the Arbon family pictures taken at the Rock Quarry. Amy was our photographer and did an amazing job, as usual!

LOVE this!

some candids:

Charlie made a hilarious McDonald's Land game.

We had a big play group at our house for Charlie.

Then there was the Annual Arbon Paintballing Event! Hobble Creek was still closed because of the fires so we took what we learned from the YM Camp Out and camped at Nunn’s Park with cousins and played at Squaw Peak Field the next morning. We literally got the last camping spot on the grounds (that technically is not supposed to be used as a camp spot, but we were grateful for the exception). It also ended up being the final weekend the campground was open for the season! We really lucked out! Those who camped were Dan, Marc's family, Jason, and one of his Young Men, Richard. I took the boys to enjoy the fire, weenies, and s’mores, but went home to sleep. Bryan, Erin, Darnel, and Meeya also came to just hang out Friday night around the fire. George and Nancy came to watch the boys Saturday morning so I could join up with the paintballing at Squaw Peak. Others who joined that morning were my dad, Bryan, Richard and Kamilla, Wes, and Jared. We had the field to ourselves for a little bit before a group of six or seven Hispanic guys came, shortly followed by a huge group of 18 high school homecoming kids. We had a great time despite the unexpected visitors. We especially enjoyed wiping out and destroying the high school kids that first round. There were LOTS of welts and bruises! It was also really hot that day, but still so much fun!