I have a LOT to catch up one! Basically I have to write about all of our summer 2025 adventures so far, and it's basically August (July 28 to be exact.) I will try to keep it to only the highlights or else I will be here all day!
Caleb's 17th birthday
Caleb turned 17 on June 6! Caleb always feels like the forgotten middle child, but in truth, he kind of chooses to spend most of his time with his friends. I asked him what he would want to do for. his birthday and if he would like to go to Utah with me like Gabe did for his birthday when he turned 16, and he was like, "Ummm... I'd rather just have the cash." (eye roll) So on his birthday, he went fishing with his first group of friends, which was Lexi, Bree, and Brantley. Then we took him out to dinner at Red 8 for sushi with Grandma and Grandpa Rhodes, and then he went and bought Legos and had a Lego building night with Benson, Cole, and Noah, and we had an ice cream cake. The next day was Saturday, and he went fishing again, this time with Benson and Cole and Josh. So, I'd say he still had a fun birthday weekend!
KODA!
On Friday, June 13th, we welcomed a new member to our family... a Bernese Mountain Dog that we named Koda! (After much debate about names) The story behind this, is that my friend, Claire, has a brother and sister in law that breed these type of puppies. They had a litter born on April 20th, and she started sharing their posts about these puppies that would be ready for new homes in June. I kept seeing them and was like, "Oh my gosh, this one is so cute!" (At the time, his name was Ledger) So I kept commenting on Claire's posts and being like, kind of jokingly, "Oh my gosh, Buy me Ledger right now! I love him!" (Did I actually think she would buy him for me? No.) I even sent Gabe a message though that was kind of joking and I sent a picture of the dog from Instagram and was like, "We might have this dog when you get home." (Little did I know, it turned out to be subtle foreshadowing.)
So a few weeks go by and I wasn't really thinking much about it because obviously we have Zeus, who has never gotten along with other dogs, so I just figured there was so way we could get a second dog. But then on Friday, June 13, Josh had just gotten home from "work" at about 5:00, and he comes upstairs to Caleb's room and says hi, and then the doorbell rings! He's like, "Can you get that? I have to poop." Sure, I think. It's probably Amazon or Morgan bringing us eggs or something. So I go downstairs and swing open the door, and there is a box with no lid on it and a PUPPY inside! I was like, "There's a PUPPY!! What?!" And it was so cute, by my first thought was instantly, "What did Josh do??? We can't have a puppy with Zeus! Is he insane?!" But Claire was around the corner filming me with her phone and they had set it all up to surprise me for me "birthday" which wasn't for another month!
So, now it's been about six weeks since we got him, and I can honestly say it's been nothing short of a miracle how good Zeus has been with him. We watched them really close for the first couple of days and didn't leave them alone together, but within three days, it was like we pretty much knew Zeus wasn't going to eat him (hopefully). Now they are like brothers and Koda follows Zeus around and tries to bite his legs and neck, and Zeus just tolerates him and shoves him off. Every now and then Zeus will growl at him in warning like, "You're annoying me..." but no actual bites or anything! The other day, a dog actually ran outside from the townhouses and was beelining towards Koda while Josh was walking Zeus and Koda (both on leashes) and Zeus like grabbed this dog by the neck and started shaking it! Josh went and talked to the owner and he was like, "Yeah, sorry my dog is dumb, he needs to learn..." so it was fine, but at least Zeus was protecting Koda! So, that's the new dog! He's already grown so much! He was 10 pounds when we got him, and now he's over 25!
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Father's Day
On June 15th, it was Father's Day and we maaaay have gone golfing together as a family. Here is a picture of Josh with Caleb and Avery! I think the dog was also kind of his present!
Avery and Briella time
I thought it would be fitting to make a note of how much time Avery has been spending with friend this summer, especially Briella! I often call her my "second daughter" because she's with us so much. One day, we went to the Idaho Falls zoo and went and got the Benson Boone "Moonbeam" cookie from Crumbl. It was a fun day, so here are some pictures!
Avery Braces
I also can't remember if I wrote about this yet, but Avery got her braces at the end of May! She was annoyed at first because she had to have a space maintainer and it made all this extra room in her mouth, so then she got a gap in between her two front teeth! But I already think that's starting to go away now after about a month. You can kind of see it though in the zoo pictures and the Wisconsin pictures because she had only had the braces on for about a month.
July 4th / Wisconsin Trip for Avery and Mom
About a month or two ago, I was trying to decide if I would go to Wisconsin this summer at all. As I was looking at flights, I actually found some decently priced ones that went from Idaho Falls to Madison on July 2 - July 9th, so I was able to book me and Avery for a total of about $200! (I used sky miles and a flight voucher I had from my Delta credit card.) So, Caleb stayed home because he had football and work at the golf course, and Josh was working a big 12-hour shift on the Fourth of July for the Melaleauca fireworks, so they stayed home.
It was actually really fun just being me and Avery! We did a lot of shopping, watched the fireworks at Lakeside Park, chatted with Gabe on P-day with Jasmine and all of us, went to the inflatable waterpark with Brayden and the Schmidts were all there too, and we went to Mt. Olympus one day! We also celebrated my and Avery's birthdays (Avery is 13!!) and went out to dinner with Grandma Dahlke. It was a fun trip, but only a little awkward because honesty, sharing space with Jesse is not fun. It always feels like kind of an inconvenience that we are there. I have plans for us to go there at Christmas time, and I'm a little worried about it just because they really don't have room. They have two bathrooms and Jesse uses one all the time as "his"bathroom and my mom uses the master as hers. He also uses one of the bedrooms down the hall as his bedroom (they don't share... which is a little weird to me.) So it's like, they really only have on spare bedroom. I think at Christmas, we might only stay there three nights and then head to Wisconsin Dells. Anyways, here are some pictures!
My 41st Birthday
I went to find some pictures of my birthday and there are none on my phone (typical mom life - no pics) so maybe Josh took a couple on his phone, but basically I went out to late night apps with Lauren, Ashley Pendleton, and Claire the night before my birthday. On Friday, my actual birthday, we went to lunch at Cafe Rio and then floated Warm Sough with the Summers fam. Gabe called and we chatted as we were getting the tubes filled up. Cody and Gabe talked in Spanish for a few minutes and Cody said afterward, "His Spanish is real good." Gabe said later, "Cody's Spanish was struggling," lol And I think Gabe now has this fear that he's going to lose his Spanish abilities when he is home from his mission for a few years, so he keeps saying now he wants to marry a Spanish speaking lady and only speak Spanish in their home. But anyways, for my birthday Josh and Caleb went around and had all the special people in my life sign this little notebook for me. It was really nice. I also got the dog... lol so I guess that was my present too.
Avery's Girls Camp
I convinced Avery (after much persuading) to go to girls camp this summer. She was very hesitant because last summer was so bad, but this time she had more fun. She hung out a lot with Nora and Olivia and Clara. They went up to Ashton and stayed three nights at Rock Creek camp (in cabins, with electricity) and flushing toilets. She did say the power went out the first day when it started raining, but it came on the next day. She got a little annoyed with Abbie Wooley and this girl Evelyn, but I told her having weird girls at church camp was all just a part of the normal church camp experience (I know it was for me!)
Avery's 13th Birthday
For the next 9 months, I can officially say that ALL of my children are teenagers! It's a pretty crazy thing though because one is moved out and living across the world, and the other is just barely getting to be in braces. So much happens during your teen years and so many big life changes! Avery wanted to go to Gravity Factory with just Briella during the afternoon, so she did that and then later on we went to dinner at the Mandarin and then she had Briella and Espyn over for ice cream cake. I really feel like Avery has gone through a lot of mood swings this year. The last year was a doozy, but I think she's turned a corner and is starting to get happier and easier to be around. Last year, she started her first period about a month before she turned 12, and it was like we suddenly were on this roller coaster of emotions with her, but most of the time she was just angry at the world. Luckily, that seems to be getting better. I even went shopping Utah this weekend with her and we had a lot of fun! (More about that in a couple more paragraphs.)
Delta Lake Hike
My coworkers, Nicole Stucki and Melissa Clark, and I have gone out to lunch a couple times this summer, and one day last week, Nicole texted and said, "We are going to hike to Delta Lake on Tuesday. Want to come?" I really hesitated because I had heard that hike was not for the weak, so I was really like, "Is this even going to be fun?" Like, I'm all for scenic hikes that are mid-level easy and you can just talk and walk the whole time. But I was worried this one was going to be pretty hard.... and I was right. Even the night before, I was like, "Do I even go on this?" but I told Josh that if I didn't go, I knew I would have major FOMO when they posted pictures about it, so I decided to just go. It was 4 miles in and 4 miles out, which doesn't sound bad, but it was basically uphill the whole way in and it just got harder and harder. At one point, we were basically crawling over giant boulders up the mountain! Afterward, we went to TJ Maxx and then out to dinner, which is more my speed. I'm glad I did it, but I probably won't ever do it again!
Utah Trip with Avery / Meeting the Spain Moms!
For the past year, I have been chatting with this group of moms on Facebook about our Spain missionaries! We have always said, "We need to plan a time to meet up," and this last weekend, we actually made it happen! I drove down to Utah with Avery for some back-to-school shopping. We left on Friday at about 10am, drove down to Ikea first, then checked into our hotel in Lehu right next to the outlet mall, then went to TJ Maxx, Home Goods, and Ross. Then we went to Zupas and took it back to our hotel and ate in our room and watched TV and spent the night. It was really fun. The next morning, we checked out of the hotel and went and met Michelle (Sam's mom) and Casie (Jack's mom) at Kneaders. We chatted and ate and were there from about 11:30-1:30. Then me and Avery shopped at the outlets and some other places, and then we headed home by about 5:00 and got back to Rexburg at about 9:00. It was a really fun girls weekend and Avery got a lot of clothes for school!
Caleb's Football, Golf, and more
I haven't said much about Caleb yet in this post, but he's been busy with working at the golf course, practicing for football, and having Lego party nights and air soft fight nights with his friends. He's also been out fishing with Josh a couple times with various groups (his friends, our new neighbor, Mitch...) and so here are just some more pictures of random stuff!
