Duncandoings

August 9, 2009
Dear Family,
The days of summer are still flying by, and we’ve been trying to pack in the fun! As soon as I felt halfway well, we took the family up to Idaho to visit G&G one last time this summer. We’d planned to see them on our way to Yellowstone, but when we moved our trip to August, we ruined that part, so we thought we’d fit in one more visit before their "at-home mission" ended—which was today! We went up Pioneer Day weekend since Brian had the Friday off, and had quite a blast, despite my sickness not being totally cured. Friday, we went to 9 mile(?) cave just a few miles away—in a field—totally disguised, unless you know where to look. Judging by the litter and graffiti, more people have found it since Brian had gone camping there, but it was so dark, we didn’t have to focus on that. We scrounged up 2 working flashlights, and walked through the almost ½ mile muddy cave—it was made from an airbubble in the lava of a volcano. Spencer was a bit worried for the first bit—it was pretty cold, obviously dark, and sometimes slippery in flipflops, but by the time we headed back, everyone thought it was definitely cool.
This is what it looked like on top of the cave--no sign of it!

going in...

making our way back out

After conquering it!

On Saturday, there were some neighbors throwing a neighborhood breakfast in their Garden of Eden yard—it was the most beautiful morning on these better than parklike grounds w/ pancakes, eggs, bacon, sausage, hashbrowns, tons of fruit, muffins, juice, and milk—SO pleasant and delicious! After that, we trekked over to Tautphaus Park for a trip to my favorite zoo in the world!! The admission is SO cheap—okay, not free like DC, but then, there were no ½ hour lines to see one panda either! $2.50 for kids over 3, and $5 for adults, --so I thought, well, it will be nice, but they may not have a wide variety of animals, etc., but at that price, it’ll be fine. We had taken Maddie when she was small, so I remembered it must’ve been affordable for us to splurge in our broke days, but I forgot how great the animals were too! Penguins (that we couldn’t even see at Hogle Zoo here in JANUARY!!), lions, tigers, zebras, red pandas, monkeys, peacocks, the works!! I was thrilled, and we could see most everything—only the tigers and otters were sleeping, and the grounds were beautiful and not crowded and shady and great!! I could write their ad if they need one, though I’d be afraid they’d realize then how much they could charge!! Anyway, it wore us all out, but we had a great time! We came home, packed up, visited w/ G&G Stewart on our way out of town, and got home around 9 that night. I thought I’d be in the clear by the next week, but progress is a little slow, so Brian, sweet man!-took the children (all, but Anne) to the Ward Campout up Morgan Canyon, joined in the potluck dinner, and made the most enviable breakfast the next morning w/ sausage, eggs, hashbrowns, and juice. They had rock-paper-scissor tournaments, told scary stories around the campfire, roasted marshmallows, and had bocce and other games the next morning. It took Emily half an hour to fill me in on all the details! I rented a movie w/ Anne, and did feel well enough Saturday to help clean out the van a bit, and even mow the lawn!! (what I’ve been dreaming of returning to these last weeks!). This week’s been even better, and we’re racing to use all the free coupons the kids got at the end of school. The original plan was to use one each Friday, but we’re down to squeezing in all we can these last few days. We went mini-golfing for FHE Monday night, to the dollar movie Tuesday morning, to the library and then free laser tag on Wednesday, I got the stomach flu on Thursday (dejavu!), and then Friday I took Maddie, and Brian took Brent to the newest Harry Potter movie. (Since it was PG, we told them if they read up to that book, we’d take them to see it in the theater). It was so fun!, and for the matinees, we nearly had the theater to ourselves! To even out the date-time, I took Emily and Spencer to Applebee’s on Saturday w/ a coupon Emily had earned, and they LOVED: "all the great service," " the comfy benches that are like eating on couches," "all the good food," "wonderful rootbeer," "playing the games in the kids menu," and "everything but leaving." We probably pushed our luck to go down to PG for a wedding reception last night, but it was fun to visit w/ a lot of Duncan family there. Anne cried through nursery today until I joined her the last half hour, but she’d been doing fairly well! (I’m sure the late night didn’t help)—and we were SO excited for her, and talked about it nonstop to her the weeks preceding. She’s finally trying out more sounds than "dada," does a pretty mean impression of the McDonald’s "ba Ba Ba Ba Ba" jingle, loves brushing her teeth, helping herself to half of our Sunday dinner "Celestial Cake," getting ready for prayers, talking on the phone—or anything that looks like a phone, and being "crazy" w/ her siblings. They all like to tell me in a surprised and almost worried tone, "Mom, Anne’s really crazy!" I don’t know where she learns it from?! We’re getting SO excited for our Yellowstone trip next week, then school starts the week after that, so life is zinging along! We had a sweet returned missionary speak today—a son of our Stake Pres., our favorite, named Brian Paul J , and I felt thrilled seeing all of their family gathered together, and thinking of our growing family that will be welcoming missionaries, etc. in NO time, and I’m overwhelmed w/ how full and blessed our little lives are! It is wonderful, and family is the best! Love, The Duncan’s