I'm going to Boise!. . . .Where's a map?

The time has come for me to get caught up on the blog.  Last week we traveled to Boise for a family reunion.  Adam's sister Kirsti lives in the Boise area and hosted the 4 day 4 night reunion at her house.  Adam is one of 10 children and while only 6 siblings and their families plus Adam's parents were in attendance it meant that 33 people were staying at Kirsti's house.  That is a LOT of house guests.  Fortunately she has a large home and an indoor pool so we were all very comfortably situated.  The indoor pool was definitely a hit with the kids.  They swam morning, noon and night.  With the exception of our time at the 4th of July parade Korinne didn't wear anything but her swimming clothes the entire time we were there. 

Turns out Britton, Jenna and Korinne are part fish.

Jameson got in the pool a few times.  This was his first real swimming experience and he liked it.

It helped that he got a lot of attention from his older cousins.

While there we went to the Middleton, Idaho 4th of July parade.  It was quite the experience. Some of the floats confused me but there was a lot of water being thrown around and the kids managed to get quite a bit of candy.

Jameson slept until the fire engines moved through.

The night of July 3rd Kirsti said that her neighbor had invited them to a "Pyro-tecnic show" at dark at his home.  She is new to the area and had no idea what to expect so we decided to check it out.  She lives out on a country lane that has about 12 homes all spread out.  Upon arrival at the neighbors I saw everything set up quickly realized it wasn't just going to be a few sparklers, it looked like something a city would have set up for a big show.  You know the guy in Murray who spends thousands and thousands of dollars and an entire year programming Christmas lights to music each year just for the heck of it?  Well, that is how Kirsti's neighbor feels about fireworks. It is clearly his passion.  A crowd was gathering and I learned that this guy had obtained a special permit, had taken classes and was specially trained in fireworks and even had the fire dept on hand.  All of the fields around the site had sprinklers on them all day and there were fire extinguishers in select locations around the property.  It was all planned out and the sole purpose in doing all of this was to give his neighbors a good firework show.  Mission accomplished! When the music started he set to work and it was a huge private firework show.  It was just like going to fireworks at a city park. The funniest part was when a police car showed up on the lane and told him over his blow horn to "stop lighting fireworks immediately" which was totally ignored.  The guy just kept lighting away.  Apparently the officer hadn't gotten the memo that he had a special permit and was clearly frustrated that he was being ignored. Eventually the show was paused, the guy ran up to exchange a few words with the cop and then the officer turned off his flashing lights and drove away.  At the end of the show we all walked back to Kirsti's house.  No traffic, no packing up the car in a rush to beat the crowd, etc.  It was awesome.

On the last day of the reunion Kirsti's husband Topher got the boat out and the kids were able to ride on a tube.

Korinne fell off the tube and had a nice little swim in the lake.

It was a great reunion and the kids had a lot of fun with their cousins.  Here is Jameson with Grampa and his closest cousin in age, Dallan.  They are only 6 weeks apart.

As we got in the car Jenna said, "We really need to visit here more often."  Yeah, an indoor pool has that affect on kids. :-)