Keller Family Blog

Troy and Bros fishing in Argentina

2012-01-22T21:21:00.000-08:00

Troy and three of his brothers headed to Argentina a couple weeks ago to do some fly fishing in the Patagonia's. Troy served his mission in Argentina a million years ago and has always wanted to roam the Patagonia area ever since. He finally got his chance.

First stop was Buenos Aires. Troy will have to edit this to get all of the places correct. Tatiana and her fiance are in Buenos Aires and they stopped at the hotel to say hi. We love Tati. Tatiana and her sister Debi stayed with us for a couple months in 2005? We loved having them and are so excited to hear that she is getting married!

Brett joined the gang and troy took them to see one of my favorite places in BA, the cemetery. It's almost like it's own little city. I was glad to see that there weren't many cats around. When we went there were like 20 cats at these gates. Eva Peron is buried here.

Eva Peron's tomb. Always lots of people there.

Some of the mausoleums had broken windows and it was interesting to poke one's head in and see the statutes and little seats to sit in while visiting your dead ancestors.

One of the many feral cats we saw. They seemed quite used to visitors.

Inside a mausoleum

Brett and Klint in front of a hobbit hole-style grave.

Kim doing a little tango in the streets! This area is like the artist community, Troy fill in the name please, Boca district? Yes, it is Boca. The street is the famous caminito. We walked up and down once and had our fill. Entertaining, but a seedy, touristy crowd.

At the lodge in the Ande's Mountains/Patagonia. Troy will have to fill in the rest! We were on the banks of the Futaleufu river, a gigantic (snake river size) trout stream.

Brett and Klint started the week off with a 100 yard dash to see who was fastest. There may have been a time when Klint was quickest of us, but Brett took him this day.

Outside the lodge, getting rigged up for fishing.

First day on the Futaleufu. This is one of our guides, Martin. He was a crack-up, with his Argentine cynicism, he had a quip for almost every moment. He said he liked us because he could use all his jokes. I think he tends to guide a lot of older couples. This bank you see us fishing off of was one we returned to several times because the fish would patrol its edges here looking for wind-blown bugs. But as soon as they saw you, they would dart low and stop feeding. So it was a lot of fun "hunting" them with our flies. My problem: once they took the little dry we'd cast, they shot off like rockets, and I broke off several. Brett with his lighter touch had better success.

Brett's first big one--21 inches.

My first bow. 18 inch fish, which was the standard size on the Futaleufu. None of the fish are stocked--all wild. Mostly rainbows with some browns here and there.

A nice bow the guide held for me.

Day 2. This is outside the Los Alerces National Park where we floated down the Rivadavia river.

Cool trees at the mouth of the river.

I forget the name of the lake that the Rivadavia river begins at.

Crystal clear water.

More cool trees along the bank of the Rivadavia.

On this day, Kim and I were with the other guide, Guillermo. Geesh (as he went by for short) really knew his fishing but his english wasn't as good as Martin's. His most common phrases were "It's good" or "It's no good" (meaning, it's not good), which he used constantly. Also, we grew to enjoy his frequent guttural "mmmph" sound which he would utter either to show he was pleased with something we did or that he was disappointed. Yes, sometimes we weren't sure which he meant. Not a man of many words, Geesh.

One of only 3 fish we caught on the Rivadavia. Klint (who does not fly fish) caught the other two! I had two fish on at different points, but one went straight under a branch and broke me off and the other one threw the fly on a series of jumps. Can't say it wasn't exciting. Despite the fact that the fish were very picky on this river, it was a lot of fun because of the scenic beauty, and the clarity of the water allowing us to see fish in the water all over the place. Much like the Green River in Utah. Klint and Brett liked it so much that they went back on Friday, though unfortunately got skunked.

These are the pretty trees at the "Kiss my ___" hole, named for some supposed incident when one fisherman won a bet over the other for hooking a fish in a challenging spot. Gotta love names inspired by fishing stories.

The lake at the end of the Rivadavia. The river is essentially a 5 mile link between two very large and very beautiful mountain lakes in the National Park.

Geesh working hard to get us to shore.

Day three, we went back to the bank where we "hunt" the fish. This is one of my rainbows. Martin was kind enough to drop down the ten foot enbankment and unhook it for me. The convenience of having a guide.

Klint during a slow stretch.

One of only two browns I caught. A 21 incher that fought like a demon for about 15 minutes.

A better picture of the same fish.

Nice bow.

Asado time! We ate grilled ribs and blood sausage, I think it was Wednesday night. The lodge had a separate building just for asado, which is the Argentine style of bar-b-que.

Me with our chef, Herman. He was hilarious. He came from a family of theatrical types, one of his sisters was a TV actress. He was quite theatrical himself. A great cook too.

The other folks here are all Argentines also staying at the lodge. The first one on the left is Fabian, one of the partners who owns the lodge. Next is his friend, Gustavo, then Gustavo's wife (forget her name). Fabian's wife is next to Kim and got cut out of the picture. Their kids (boy and a girl from each family) are on the right. They all go to the same private school where English is a primary focus, and they each spoke English quite well.

Hard to see, but the little dark specs in the pasture are ostriches (or the American version of them). Much smaller than the African version, but still big enough to knock a twelve year old over and they ran like the wind.

This is a snapshot of the grounds at a ranch we went to on day 4 to fish a spring creek there called Arroyo Pescado (Fishing Stream in english). Legend has it that Butch Cassidy was once the owner here 100+ years ago.

Pretty flamingos in the pond.

Big bow caught in the spring creek. It was slow going at first as we tried nymphing for them in the relatively shallow, clear water, without much success. When we switched to a small dry, things heated up. Brett caught a bunch.

Probably the longest fish I caught on the trip. Didn't measure him, but I suspect 22 inches. However, he was old and thin, so it didn't feel like much of a conquest.

Lunch at a bridge at the spring creek.

Brett caught a nice fish here by standing above the tree in the picture and floating his fly down to where he couldn't see, but we on the bridge could see it clearly and when the trout came up and took it we all yelled at him to set the hook. A lot of fun.

We ended the spring creek day trying to fish this pond-like branch of the stream. There was a lot of algae and not much action.

A gravestone that we thought might have been Butch Cassidy's! But, upon closer inspection, it wasn't.

Kim had never let his beard grow out this long. He said he left it on goatee style for a couple days when he got back to Nampa, to the shock of many.

A nice big rainbow caught in a pool of floatsom that was one of our favorite spots. You literally park the boat in a slow eddy that flows round a pool of driftwood leaves and such and look for rises. Then quickly cast to them and hold your breath.

This was our picnic area on the last day of fishing. Klint and Brett had gone back to the Rivadavia, and Kim and I stayed on the Fualeufu. This spot was really neat because it was hidden up above some winding steps that took us up and on top of the tall bank. The gnats were bad at first, but Martin started a fire and smoked them out. Of course we smelled a little smoky the rest of the day too.

Random flower.

Not sure but this might have been my last fish of the trip.

Kim's nice take.

Guide pics of Troy in Argentina

2012-01-22T20:59:00.001-08:00

week in review

2012-01-20T13:19:00.000-08:00

Morgan played her viola in church on Sunday and did a marvelous job! We had even just picked up a larger viola and so our wonderful pianist worked with her for a couple hours the night before to make sure it was perfect!

the kids after sledding on Monday, drinking hot cocoa with friends.

Grant having nerve testing done on Tuesday, all the nerves responded - bit more painful than we thought it was going to be. (after a bit I bet Grant wished they would quit responding as he about jumped off the table a couple of times). I think Grant and I both kept laughing so neither of us would cry : ) So we are back to physical therapy to see if they can strengthen the muscles that aren't working/growing in his shoulder. Dr. Bell here we come, again...

Grant had his very first track meet down at BYU. He ran the 800 meter. Did average, but it was fun to head to provo. I have a friend down their building a home and so Ana and I were able to walk though it and make it back to see grant run.

Yep Grant drove the entire way in the families little blue car. he still needs 9 more hours of driving time before he can get his license in two months!

Took Ana, Victor and Ethan to the golf course to sled on Monday. No school and snow, what a good combo! Who knows it maybe some of the only snow we get this winter it's been so dry. We were suppose to get more yesterday, but it rained and it feels like spring is on it's way today.

Troy has been in Argentina fishing the past week and reports that he is sun burned and his casting arm is getting sore. Pulling in 18-21 in fish is a lot of work! We miss you!

Victor's 14th birthday

2012-01-13T20:49:00.000-08:00

We keep trying to get Victor to have a friend birthday party. Who wouldn't want to play laser tag, go to a movie or drive go carts? I guess it's good he feels safe enough and wants to hang out with us for his birthday. I just worry about how he doesn't like to socialize with neighbor kids. He went from teasing and bullying to being teased and bullied. What to do... The therapist says we can start pushing him to do things with friends now, they've made a time line of his Ukraine life and he's pretty comfortable with it. Still a lot of holes.

So we celebrated his birthday early with cake, ice cream and presents so that we could put Troy on a plane to Argentina to go fishing with his brothers for 10 days. Again, back to Vic. We sang, ate and he opened his great gifts. Did you guess I gave him movie tickets forcing him to invite a couple friends to go to a movie with him. One day he will thank me for it. Right?

We'll Happy 14th! We love you.

Nerf gun was the favorite gift, good picking Grant. Runner up between the BYU hoodie and the spy gear lasers. Oh and Morgan's rocket.

Jr. Jazz Game

2012-01-13T19:33:00.000-08:00

We took Ethan's Jr. Jazz team to a Jazz game last week! Yeah, the Jazz beat the Grizzlies. Great game even if we were up in the nose bleed section.

January

2012-01-13T19:30:00.000-08:00

Making monster cookies

I was in St. George and got a call from Troy to tell me that Tanya was cooking and somehow created 4 foot flames on the stove that burned the cabinets above the microwave. Amazing, who knew. Victor was making fun when I came home so we reminded him that last time he was cooking with Troy (making french fries) the paper towel roll caught on fire. I think Troy should be banned from the kitchen...

I forgot to get pictures of ringing in 2012! Ethan came back up for something and so I had him pop a couple more noise makers to get these exciting 2012 pictures! It's going to be an exciting year! I can feel it in the cold, cold air : )

December phone pictures

2012-01-13T19:18:00.000-08:00

brought in the Christmas Season with a Spanish Christmas party at the neighbors. Super great food and fun for everyone. Alma you are awesome!

Morgan and I went to the Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert. It was wonderful and we loved Jane Seymour's reading of Good King Wensessel (sp?)

Grant was having back problems so we checked it out and it was his hamstrings and now that we have fixed that we went back today (January) for his shoulder... yep more to come, muscles not holding his shoulder blade correctly. Fun fun with 6 kids someone is always at the dr.

I think we tried a panorama picture of the family room

this was Ethan's Christmas present, but she had a bone disease and we had to put her to sleep, sooo sooo sad. Ethan was tough and a good sport and is willing to wait until we move in May to get another chameleon.

friendly 7 year old tortoise, Rock, that we met at the exotic pet hospital. He was very cool and crawled right up on Ethan's shoes begging for a treat.

Family Party

2011-12-27T08:26:00.001-08:00

PA Cousins making trains

2011-12-27T08:25:00.001-08:00

Grant and Friends making trains

2011-12-27T08:24:00.000-08:00

Morgan's bag

2011-12-18T20:59:00.001-08:00

Morgan finished sewing one of Aunt Tiffany's bag patterns! It turned out sooo cute. Thanks for designing such a cute bag Tiff : )

trains and christmas parties

2011-12-18T19:30:00.000-08:00

A couple Sundays ago we went to my moms to decorate cookie trains. A tradition I have always done and enjoyed but felt a little overwhelmed with this year. So my wondermom just went ahead and put it all together. So nice and we loved delivering the trains. It's good for the kids to think of a family they want to take them to. And this year we had Angela (exchange student from Chile) come make them with us. She was darling and so creative with her train.

Last week we had the elementary Christmas concert - very fun and we have always been impressed with the songs and the program. (This year we were a little suprised that the 4th grades didn't know either of the songs they sang, but the 5th grade did a wonderful job).

At the work party this past week, Morgan and Ana were the only two who braved telling Santa what they wanted for Chirstmas. The motivation was a large candy cane. They boys all said they were too old to sit with Santa. Tanya came with but saw the food table and never made it all the way to Santa. Which is fine, it was much healthier than the giant candy cane!

more jr. jazz

2011-12-18T19:20:00.001-08:00

last week in review

2011-12-16T07:23:00.001-08:00

Morgan had her orchastra concert a couple Wednesdays ago. She looked great and played beautifully. She has grown up so much this year. She loves to wear jewelery and worries about her shoes, things she has never cared for. Victors band concert was last Thursday and it was an insane day and I didn't get a picture of him. Troy made it to the concert and said it was great. This picture is Victor making dinner last week for some extra credit in CTE.

This is our awesome Orchard Jr. Jazz basketball team. Troy ended up coaching Ethan's team this past fall. We were lucky enough to have another dad who was in town every week Troy was out of town to help coach! Or it would have been me and I don't know that would have been good for the boys. They were awesome and fun to play with.

Austin came for a visit with his dad last week and he just hung out with Percy and loved him. Too sweet. Below is Morgans science fair project, testing the PH level of liquids. Great fun, but glad it is done and turned in!

Tanya's 15th birthday

2011-12-06T23:03:00.001-08:00

Tanya turned 15! We gave her the book to start studying to get her learns permit. She doesn't seem as excited as she used to about driving. She would tell everyone she was saving her money for a car, but the past few months she avoids the topic... oh well, one day

everyone wants to play with and have a picture taken with my new very cool iphone. Ethan at tithing settlement - yes both pics.

Our cute carpool friends and cousin wanted to see the house on Friday so we had a little tour/field trip. It was a lot of fun, everyone was super excited.

With the 110 mph winds that ripped through Bountiful and Centerville last Thursday we had a tree down by our rental property - super lucky the house next door had a tree on it and across the street there was a tree this size on top of a car. The power was out all day so our kids in the school district got out of school for both days. The poor charter school kids had power.

Around and after Thanks Giving time

2011-12-06T22:14:00.001-08:00

Grandma had everything out the Sunday before Thanksgiving so that we could make Turkeys, the boys were at a preisthood fireside. Good times. This is our one traditional food that we have at thanksgiving, little candy turkeys that sit by our plates.

Even though this is the family car, yes we have invested in a very bright BYU blue vehicle for the families use, we all call it Grant's car (everyone except Troy). We picked it up the Saturday before thanksgiving and Grant was FINALLY excited to drive that he drove me too and from all of my errands that I had to do that day. It's nice he is finally interested in driving himself places! Soon he will be able to go it alone - don't fear there are a few more months before he turns in his learners permit.

Ahhh, we arrive at Thanks Giving pictures. Troy's sister and her family joined us for the festive holiday this year and we had a really great time with them. The turkey came out nicer than expected and we had enough food to feed all 11 children! Troy put on some oven mits and cook some very delicious polenta for us all - Troy does not cook and it turned out very yummy!

I just have to post this beautiful picture of the front of our home that we are building. The framers have been working on the front porch and I'm just thrilled with how well the shape has come out. So exciting.

The relatives had bigger and better things to do and left us Friday, so we invited some friends over to eat more food! A spread of odds and ends in the left over department.

Saturday we pulled out the trailer and some gloves and picked out a live Christmas tree. We haven't had one for a lot of years. The 10' beauty was only 39.99 at Smiths market place - I thought live trees were a lot more than that. The tree is beautiful and smells wonderful, it's really beginning to look like Christmas around our house.

Before Thanksgiving

2011-12-06T22:06:00.001-08:00

I can't believe I havent' blogged for an entire month! Where did the time go? So here is a flash back to before Thanks Giving... sometime in November.

preparations for thanksgiving...Our thankful chain.

Ethans Jr. Jazz team, thanks to me Troy ended up coaching. Thank heavens another dad, Dave, has been around every week Troy has been gone and has taken over the coaching. I don't know that I could have done it!

Snow, snow snow. Our first real dumping, enough to make snowball forts.

My new phone, love it - forgot to save my calendar so playing a bit of catch up on dr. appointments and guessing on hair appointments...

More Paradisos

2011-11-09T20:08:00.000-08:00

Even though we were not envious of all the snow the east coast received last week, Saturday we received our own dumping of snow.

We also had the great priviledge of meeting another memeber of the Paradiso family (the brother of Debbi & Tati Paradiso - our girls from Argentina). David, his wife Andrea and their 8 month son Santiago came up for Sunday dinner. What a beautiful little boy with a mellow, happy personality. Cousin Aly also joined us for dinner, we just love having Aly come hang out. She was so nice to play some piano with the kids and listen to all the kids. And she was the photographer for the Keller/Paradiso picture.

Trick or Treat

2011-11-05T13:01:00.000-07:00

Happy Halloween! Since Troy was out of town Morgan, being 12 & unsure if she was too old to trick or treat, was put in charge of taking Ethan and Ana. Her friend Hannah came over to help out and I think they had a good time. Last minute Morgan pulled off a cave woman costume and was thrilled to be able to use the trick or treating bag she had sewn.

Ethan, once again, opted to make up a Star Wars costume for the purchase of a new light saber. Thank you Grandma for sewing this awesome Jedi cape, I believe this is its 3rd year in use! Last year he was Darth Vadar. Ana following in Ethan's foot steps wanted to be a storm trooper. She and Ethan have recently watched a couple of the star wars movies - could you tell? Ana always says she wants to be a princess or a dancer, but when it comes down to it she follows the boys with ninjas and storm troopers...

Grant was going to have some friends over, but one of the boys families was making scones and invited the boys over to eat and they ended up staying all evening. A cute neighbor who is an exchange student from Chile invited Tanya over to help hand out candy with her. She has been super nice and great for Tanya. Tanya doesn't like to do things with the girls in YW or in the neighborhood, but she has gone with Angela when she has invited her to go shopping or to watch a movie. Angela has been such a blessing! Victor stayed home with me to help pass out candy and watch a movie - he's one that will go when invited, but it's pulling teeth to get him to call or invite someone over. So a little late in the evening he tried to call a friend, but he wasn't home. All in all I thought it was a great Halloween.

October 29th

2011-11-05T12:47:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday Grandma and Grandpa brought Grayce and Mason over to roast some marshmellows and make some smores, Tricia and Justin were stranded in Hawaii - poor people : ). The kids all had a great time. Ethan was at a halloween party and Tanya was helping with the ward trunk or treat.

Past week

2011-10-27T19:35:00.000-07:00

We had Grayce and Mason over yesterday, Grandma is babysitting them while their parents are in Hawaii. The kids decided to put on a mixed up fairy tale play and these were a few shots captured by grant.

The kids were out of school last Thursday and Friday for UEA. Troy took the majority of the kids, all but one, up to Idaho. Grant stayed home to work on some projects for school and practice basketball. I was on some antibiotics a few weeks ago and it killed off my bacteria and the result was the fungus I had in Ukraine returned! My mouth had been burning the last couple weeks, but last Wednesday it was the worst and I went into Instacare with the hope they could see my past records and give me my little funny pill (my dr. was out of town last week). I'm doing much better, but it took a good ten days for the burning to stop last time, so I'm hopefully half way there! But it was a nice, quiet weekend for the two of us. We were productive and pulled up the garden and stained the playhouse. Along with watching a movie, getting take out that we ate for two days, going on walks and hikes and I read an entire book (during those same hours Grant played online computer games). Grant also had a boys night and I was sent to the basement to watch a chick flick.

Troy sent a couple pictures on his phone of the kids at a pumpkin patch in Idaho, I haven't uploaded yet. They all had a great time too. They saw all their cousins up there, had some sleep overs and I heard the boys played video games for almost 24 hours! They stayed with Grandma and Grandpa, who I hear are adding a studio onto the house for Grandma to paint in - very exciting, went to a corn maze and watched the BYU game with cousins.

these are the plants they were planting over the pipeline that went in by our house this summer. from a distances they looked like tombstones! we had to go check it out.

family home evening

2011-10-19T15:05:00.000-07:00

Morgan made up a scripture chase game for family home evening Monday night. Grant felt a bit too old to play, but it was a lot of fun and everyone else looked up thier scriptures and colored in their Halloween picture. Good Job Morgan! So of course we had some ice cream afterward, still seems to be the favorite treat.

Spirit Run

2011-10-15T19:22:00.000-07:00

Last night Morgan and I attended a concert at the assembly hall in SLC.

Today the family ran our first 5K. We were supporting the Jr. High fundraiser. We had a great time and the kids did really well. I even crossed the finish line, just under 40 min. Ethan and Ana ran the 1K around the field, but I think Ethan could maybe run the 5K next year. Grant came in first for our family around 20 min, Tanya came in first place for the girls - 22 min something, Victor was at 24 min, Morgan walked with a friend for part of the race and I came in first in the 40 year old catagory. Yipee!

We came home to find a bird in our house, cute little thinkg.

more canning

2011-10-15T19:08:00.000-07:00

We have loved having apples and tomatoes and we have made tons of soup, chilli sauce and apple sauce, but I"m so done with the canning. I know we'll love it come December!

BYU Football game

2011-10-15T19:02:00.000-07:00

Last Friday Troy and I went out on a date, we tend to go out on Fridays, but it's been a long time since Troy made a dinner reservation and asked me out. We went to the Melting Pot, I love fondu.

Saturday we took all the kids and joined a few other Keller families at the BYU vs San Jose State football game. It was fun to sit by cousins and cheer on the cougars, especially at a wimming game!

Cross Country

2011-10-07T17:48:00.000-07:00

Wednesday Grant ran in the district cross country meet. It was pouring freezing cold rain! Grant did well, not his best time but placed 23rd which was one of his best. Woods Cross took the first five places so they will be heading to state in two weeks.

The making of the apple sauce. I think Grandma Tingey was smiling down on me or laughing that I haven't gone out and bought an attachment to my kitchen aid! This is her old contraption that I borrow from my mom every fall to make tomato soup and chilli sauce : ) So yummy.

Thursday Tanya ran in the charter schools district cross country meet. The past four races she has come in first running about 2 miles in 15 min. (15 min 11 sec, fastest time) Yesterday she came in second but ran the 2 miles in 13 min 42 sec! She ran her heart out to keep up with the girl in front of her, I think if she had a bit more competition she would be a lot faster. There just aren't that many kids on the charter school teams. In fact our team usually can't qualify because they don't have enough girls run, but they still race, which has been good for Tanya - keeps her moving. We keep telling Tanya she needs to go to the neighborhood high school next year and she would probably run faster, but it's pretty big and scary so she really wants to stay at the charter school.

At both kids races I would tell the kids to cheer and Ethan would yell FASTER, Can't you go any FASTER!? or You need to pass that kid, run a lot FASTER! He was hilarious to listen to. Grant finished and told him he needed to run 3.1 miles.
Awesome job to everyone!

Picking Apples

2011-10-07T17:34:00.000-07:00

Tuesday we went to my Aunt Connies and picked 4 bushels of apples and some pears. Needless to say yesterday and today I have made some batches of apples sauce - it has helped keep the kitchen warm and smelling super yummy on these cold rainy days!

General Conference Weekend

2011-10-02T13:34:00.000-07:00

Uncle Brett and cousin Calvin came out this weekend (Brett's teaching a class at BYU on Monday). So Aly came up from BYU to watch conference with us. The kids have had a wonderful time having Calvin here to play with. The boys attended the Priesthood Session last night at the Conference Center in SLC. I took the girls swimming at Grandmas house while they were gone. We then had our usual banana splits after the boys got home. Mmmm.

past week

2011-10-02T13:30:00.000-07:00

I went with Ana and Ethan, Thursday, to Farmington Bay. What a fun field trip. We had wonderful teachers who taught about the birds and the land and then we took a little bus ride out to see some of the wild life. I think everyone had a wonderful time.

Later that night Ethan received a red bead at Pack Meeting and got to show of the arrow head her carved out of soap. Morgan cooked in her solar oven that she made in CTE this week. It makes very yummy, melty smores.

More Cross Country

2011-09-27T19:59:00.000-07:00

3rd week of sept

2011-09-22T21:31:00.000-07:00

We had Aly and Marcie over Sunday and Aly made this beautiful white texas sheet cake... mmmm we are going to have to try the recipe.

Grant's meet in Bountiful.

pine cone fight during the race

Tanya's track meet this week, she came in first both meets! Pics from Troy.

Lunch at Ukrainian Restaurant

2011-09-17T19:56:00.000-07:00

Today we decided to take the kids to a Ukrainian restaurant in SLC called Luybachka. We had meat and cabbage filled bread, good, salty but good. Borscht and Perogies with potato and ones with meat. We had some rice and meat rolled in cabbage leaves, and cheese in crepes with chocolate syrup on them. The kids had to wander around the little store, touching all the candy. The man who was cooking was from Romania. It was a fun afternoon, especially when Troy will make clay creatures for the kids to play with (last photo). Now to pay attention to the BYU vs UofU football game!

Hanging out with Angela

2011-09-17T19:41:00.000-07:00

Our neighbors have a 16 year old exchange student staying with them from Chile. We had Angela over to hang out with Morgan and Tanya yesterday. They made cookies and Angela taught Morgan how to embroider. Victor got in on the action and cross stitched a Y for the game today! Morgan also spelled mom and framed it for me, so sweet.

Constitution Day

2011-09-17T19:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Constituion Day at school. The kids made American flags with tissue paper, here are some of our crazy pictures.

This week

2011-09-15T12:42:00.000-07:00

So I got a crepe pan this week and we decided to make crepes, Ana and Victor are super excited! We found a Russian Blini recipe to try to... made with sour cream. Ana put it on every type of crepe we made!

Troy's new styling glasses for night driving.

Anas injured, but ok foot. Ethan shoot a nerf dart under the neighbors garage door as it was shutting so Ana stuck her foot under the door to try and stop it from shutting but instead it shut on her foot. She couldn't get it out, but it was good Ethan was there and was able to run around and have them reopen the door. The foot was a bit red, but nothing broken.

So yesterday the neighbors brought over flowers and a bag of candy to check on Ana. So that night while Ana and Ethan were eating her candy Ethan said that he would get his foot stuck in a garage door for a bag of candy. Which lead to other things that could happen so they could get their feet smashed. Then Ana told him that he needed to wear his crocks when he did it so that they would keep his toes from being broken! Other than the thought that they might both go get there feet smashed under another garage door, it was a funny converstion they were having.

weekend

2011-09-11T22:56:00.000-07:00

Troy took Ethan, Ana, Victor & Tanya fishing with him on Saturday. They went to some lakes up in the Uintas to hike around and fish. Grant had cross country, Morgan had no desire to fish and I set out to turn 50 tomatoes into chilli sauce. These are the pictures that Tanya and Ana took through out the day. Morgan and I went on a walk and did the shopping that we needed to do to make the chilli sauce. We watched Grayce and Mason part of the day and then finished the bottling while watching the LONG version of Pride and Prejudice - I had promised her we would after she read the book. We didn't make it through all 6 hours so maybe we can finish it on Saturday.

Grant Cross Country

2011-09-07T21:01:00.000-07:00

Grant getting ready to run cross country today at Highland HS, well at Sugarhouse Park.

Ethan ran up the hill to cheer Grant on and then rolled back down the hill.

Here comes Grant

This is our neighbor Alex, keeping up the pace and being WX's 5th runner in.

Ethan and I walked around the pond, looking for fish, but not seeing anything except geese and ducks.

Labor Day

2011-09-07T19:55:00.000-07:00

We went swimming with the Bronson family Monday night for Labor day/FHE. Between us both there was tons of food and tons of children that swam and swam and played. Great evening.

Friday, september 3rd & weekend

2011-09-07T12:55:00.000-07:00

Just the garden. Ana has been so excited that we have a pumpkin growing in the garden that we had to take some pictures. We've had a great year this year with peas and beans, then about 10 cucumbers, a couple zucchinis and tons of tomatoes coming on. We've used lots of Rosemary and chives, and some of the basil and parsley. It's been great.

Friday after school Morgan wanted to celebrate Jr. High by walking down to Nelson's from the school to get ice cream. These are the cute girls that accompanied her, they had a great time.

Sunday Morgan and Ana were actually being kind to one another and decided they could make brownies together so I had to capture the moment! Hopefully all of the playing mean tricks on each other phase is over, we moved Ana upstairs and they seem to be getting along a lot better.

Fishing Alaska

2011-09-01T22:18:00.000-07:00

Troy's parents go to Alaska to fish every September. We are the lucky recipients of a box of salmon every fall, very delicious for us. This year Troy decided to take the boys and go up and fish Alaska with his parents. They just returned this evening with a couple hundred pounds of fish! They had a wonderful time and here are some of their fishy pictures. Troy will have to write stories if there are stories to tell...

This is the ferry ride from Ketchican airport to the larger island. This was to have been the site of the famed "bridge to nowhere" as Ketchican is quite small and while it would have been quite useful to the few hundred residents there, probably not enough to justify the billion dollars.

I don't know. Don't remember this picture.

Downtown Ketchican

Ethan on the footpath over some water. Several streets of Ketchican are built over water, as the changes in tide are dramatic and the mountains come right down to the ocean, so there is not a lot of flat ground left over to build on.

Victor and Ethan spent a lot of time running around the docks finding starfish and trying to catch cod (which they did once on their own!). The dock guys would yell at them to put on life jackets. Why didn't I think of that?

Ethan trolling and waiting for a big one to hit!

Grandma trolling and waiting for a big one to hit!

The first day, Grant, Victor and Kim manned one of the boats and did well.

One of the few pictures including Grant, because after the first morning, Grant was in the boat with Grandma and Grandpa while I was in with Kim, Victor and Ethan.

This was our haul from just the morning of day 2. We had quite the efficient salmon-fishing team going and it shows from the tons of fish we brought in (more than most all the other boats going out). It helped that we had four rods in the water (most other boats had 2 or 3 people).

This was the "triple" we scored. Three fish on at the same time! We must have gotten into a school of them. It was a crazy 5 minutes trying to net them and keep them from tangling into each other as they rocketed back and forth and under the boats.

Ethan on the front of the boat. I made them wear life jackets if they went up there, so Victor rarely did.

Trolling with the downriggers. Those pretty islands in view were all over the place.

Not sure what to say about this picture. Kim was taking care of some business in the back of the boat and Ethan and Victor shielded their eyes so as to not see something that would scar them for life!

This is the picture of the bear cub we saw. Except that I was too slow and by the time the camera shot went, he had disappeared.

Ethan driving the boat. He loved it.

Biggest fish of day 3. Yes, that is blood, but fish blood. We had to wack them to keep them from flopping into everything on the boat, and sometimes the blood would fly!

Last day we went to see some sites. This and the next several pictures are of the local indian totem poles. Grant took pictures of each one for the report he has to do for school.

The whole Keller crew, including Kim, Grandma and Grandpa, Klint and Betsy and me and the boys.

Ketchican walkway again. I didn't realize I'd taken a very similar picture of Ethan the first day.

I tried to take a lot of pictures of the fish jumping up the crazy waterfalls so they could go spawn. This is the only shot where a fish turned out visible in the foto. See the tail as it is plunging back down.

catching up on homework so they can return to school bright and early in the morning!

Happy Birthday to Me

2011-08-28T22:15:00.000-07:00

Friday night Troy had invited a few friends over to my parents to give me a sort of surprise dinner. It was a lovely evening and Troy was just amazing in the set up and cooking of a variety of sliders! It was so sweet and I was so impressed that he did this for me, mostly that he took the time to plan it and execute it so well. And of course it was wonderful to sit and visit with friends. You are awesome babe and did a great job. Thanks for a great night!

Funny story: My mom had asked a neighbor to make a cake for the evening, some chocolate strawberry cake that is to die for and she forgot. So they ran to the store for this lovely white cake. Sunday she brought the forgotten cake over to my moms so we had it on my birthday and YES, mmmm it was so delicious! So glad she still made it!

Morgan made me this apron for my birthday, isn't it so darling?!?! She is doing so well on the sewing machine and it's so great to see her get so excited to make things for people.

The to die for cake :)

Of course a little drama over the birthday weekend... Ana sprayed water at Tanya while they were washing my Suburban and so Tanya hit her in the face and gave her a little shiner, it was about gone this morning, we put a little make up over it before church and you can hardly see it (under right eye in the picture, Ana's left eye).

Troy left this morning with the boys to go fishing in Alaska with his mom and dad this week (yes, crazy, they are missing the second week of school - I'm hoping we all survive). So I've been a bit stressed this week with back to school, mixed up classes and teachers, over scheduled appointments to pick things for the house - just too excited to have the kids back in school, scheduling lots of Dr. appointments and getting Troy and the boys off. I did have a little melt down this morning and yelled at everyone left home, while they were trying to make me my birthday breakfast! Really bad move on my part but it was related to some past birthday trauma after the kids were adopted, still bad move. So before 7:30am 3 of us were in tears and thank Heaven for Ana, she just gave me hugs and asked me if I could do her hair. It just snapped me out of it and got us back on track. So after multiple "I'm sorry" and explanations I think all is well, at least everyone went to bed happy and peace has been restored to the house :) Phew, one more year behind me!

first day of school - Monday Aug 22

2011-08-25T15:21:00.000-07:00

Troy made sliders for dinner Sunday night. We had a turkey burger slider with humus in a pita and a beef onion slider on little buns. Super yummy and super fun, especailly for me! Didn't have to cook anything, just had to help them find things every five minutes - still much better than cooking it all!

So funny to not see kids in uniforms! Victor and Morgan are heading off to 7th grade at South Davis, Ana and Ethan look so cute in their uniforms as they are staying at the charter school (they actually started last week). Tanya is staying at the Jr. high with the charter school, she left too early and didn't get a picture... I'll have to get that Monday. Grant is going to High School this year, can you believe how grown up my cute little baby boy is? He is thrilled he doesn't have to wear a uniform and was unusually willing to have his picture take this year. Tall, hairy, no braces and no uniform, he feels like he is ruling the world!

Morgan checked out her English book so that she could bring it home and read the stories in it! Must have loved her first day of school. Note: Monday and Tuesday were good days, Wednesday, yesterday a little rough. Morgan saw a neighbor being teased on the bus, so she went to sit by her (Morgan seems to be the underdog protector) and so the boy started calling Morgan names. She stayed tough till she got home and then she fell apart. Poor thing. She knew the boy, loves his family, and didn't think he would be mean to her and so it sort of caught her off guard. Victor's test scores finally were pulled from the charter school and they put him back a reading and English class so he was mad and upset, thinking I did it to him. So he came home and fell apart and cried. Tanya walked in while Victor was trying to explain to me the situation and she thought I had made him cry so she hid in her closet from me for a good hour. I had to run an errand and when I got home Ana was screaming (this crazy three year old scream that drives me crazy) at Morgan and Tanya, Grant was trying to sort out who touched who's stuff in who's room. I asked what happened and Tanya jumped back into the closet so I sent Ana upstairs and made Morgan pick up the basement. Oh thank goodness for those hours that they are at school! Otherwise I might have been yelling yesterday!

First day of school and swimming

2011-08-23T22:54:00.000-07:00

Ethan, Ana and Tanya started school last Tuesday, August 17th. Thursday Morgan and Victor had Back to School night for the Jr. High, we stopped at Orange Leaf as a reward for meeting every single one of their teachers! Mmmm. Friday we celebrated by swimming with friends and after they left we had a great time swimming with cousins. Great way to end the summer.

Last swim day w cousins

2011-08-23T22:43:00.000-07:00

August 12 we swam one last time with the cousins before they headed back to PA. Fun summer days!

playing with friends and making smores in the microwave.

Morgan's 12th birthday

2011-08-23T22:36:00.000-07:00

We bought a bag of limes for the kids to make limade... it was great entertainment for a couple hours. They are definately harder to squeeze than lemons!

Morgans been waiting for three months to turn 12 so that she could get her ears peirced. She took a few good friends from school (the charter school, because she isn't going to go there this year) with her to Clairs to get her ears peirced. After that we got ice cream and then went to see the Smurf movie. It hasd a little more potty humor than the girls were expecting, but over all it was a great birthday party. Her birthday was in July, but we had too many things going on and so we celebrated on August 11th!

Friday Tanya headed up to hang out with Lena and Sara. She said she had a great time.

Morgan finishing up Volley ball camp!

Second picking from the garden, end of the beans and peas. Yummy.

swimming with cousins - august 8

2011-08-20T19:11:00.000-07:00

Last day of swimming with the cousins before they headed back to PA. Everyone loves to wear Ana's yellow flippers, Mason wore them all day. The pool was up to 94 degrees so we ran the hose in the pool for a bit to cool it down and Ana became the pit stop. She kept saying who needs some oil. Very cute of her.

Keller Family Reunion - first weekend in August

2011-08-17T13:16:00.000-07:00

Do you think they look ready for the 5 hour car ride? Sure glad I wasn't a pioneer, living in a cabin this size with all these kids... We arrived at the Family Reunion House in good shape, stopped at Tiffs to say Hi and deliver a washing machine. The kids loved the bunk room. 14 bunk beds and enough blocks to build many forts.

The first night Ana and Ethan got the floor in our room, one behind the door and one in front. Ana took a few pictures of the garage at the house. It has been converted into a track of sorts.

The next day we headed off to the sand dunes to ride ATV's and paddle around the lake. The lake was perfect for little kids, I think the deepest spot we found was 3 feet deep. Although there were leeches in the lake, but after a bit the kids started catching them and playing with them.

That night we had the family talent show. If I can find where the video went to ours I'll post it... it's somewhere on my computer, but new camera and so it uploaded to a different place...

all 30 grandkids with grandma and grandpa

Cute Charlie finally warmed up to me and we crashed tons of dominos.

We stopped to feed some crazy big fish on our way to Yellowstone on Saturday.

Could Troy be shrinking? Then we realized with everyone standing there, the dirt was a good 4 inches less than the beginning mark on the post. We stopped at Mesa falls, really beautiful and amazing!

Pulled into the Yellowstone Park Visitor Center to get some times on the guisers in the park and for Troy to pick up a fishing lisence. It's changed so much since I was a kid, all the paths are boardwalks now - I guess that is better than someone wandering off into a hot pot. It was still just as amazing as I remembered as a kid. Half the kids thought it was cool and half thought it was hot looking at hot water on a really hot day! Oh, well they can all check it off of their list that they saw Old Faithful!

We found a table to have lunch. Half of us hoping not to see a bear and half of us a little disappointed we didn't see a bear.

Another stop to feed more fish. I didn't get any pictures, but we did stop for a couple hours for Troy to fish before we left the park. This at the head of a river in Island Park. Troy remembered there being a lot more fish than what we saw, but Ethan loved it. He found a handful of grasshoppers to throw in for the fish to eat.

Aug 4th - Donut Falls

2011-08-17T12:45:00.000-07:00

I keep uploading pics backwards with the new upload, it can't be so hard right! We went hiking with good friends to Donut Falls this summer. It was a pretty easy hike. Pretty area and it was fairly shady, so it was a nice hike on a summer day. Maybe it's that most of the trails right by us do have trees or the ones that do are really steep. So Laura has been taller than Grant his whole life (I can't believe I watched Laura as a baby!) until this past year, he finally caught up to her and has a few inches on her now!

Girls trip to St. George

2011-08-10T23:07:00.000-07:00

Sunday July 31, Morgan attended her first Beehive Class! And her cousins made her this super cute birthday card! What a lucky/blessed girl.

We then packed up the Suburban and headed down to St. George, all the nieces were off to see The Little Mermaid at Tuacan (an outdoor theater). It was a wonderful show and so perfect at the theater, all the characters were on heelies zooming around in the water. Very fun, I wanted to say very cool, but it was very hot even at 9 pm with the sun down!

We toured Brigham Youngs winter home and here Morgan was pretending to eat a pomegranate, too bad they weren't ripe yet. But we did get to pick and eat some figs. Olivia especially loved them and we had to pick up some more at Costco.

St. George Temple, it's just so beautiful.

We couldn't resist the water park by grandma's house... cooled us right off.

We returned on Tuesday and Suzie had taken my boys to play up at her home, super kind of her. I went up to fetch them and they were catching grasshoppers and dragon flies.

Wednesday all the cousins came over to play out our house for a bit and the girls made up a detective story/play they put on.

We made a stop up at our lot and were able to see the pump truck pouring the cement for our footings. Yep, we've decided to build a house with seven (I know we are crazy, but yes, seven) bed rooms. We've decided to separate all of the children and give them their own little box/room to be responsible for. And, just in case I need them to sit in their room for a bit there will be no one to tease or poke and there won't be anyone elses things to break, destroy or fill with bugs and dirt. We are all still learning about personal space and kindness! yes, including me.