1/3/17 Last Day of Christmas Break

Today was the last day of Christmas break for the Entz kids. We asked the kids what they wanted to do on the last day and they said they wanted to spend time with the cousins. We decided that it would be a good day to go to the Pequeno Park and try out our rollerskates.

Peter tried out his new tricycle. He is going to need some more practice before he's got the whole peddling thing down.

TJ is still pretty new on his pair of skates. We had fun practicing together though.

Bradley, Lauren and Bradley's friend Jacob were able to join us at the park. In the background you can see Heidi helping Rebecca practice with her skates.

Once everyone had a chance to warm up we played a fun game of skating hockey using the aerobe frisbee as a puck. David was surprisingly agile skating around on his razor scooter. In the end I think that everyone had a good time and no one got hurt in spite of a couple of falls.

1/2/16 Little Roller Coaster

This morning David wanted to put together one of his Christmas presents. The process of building it was a bit of a roller coaster. At first David felt overwhelmed at the complexity of the project. He got Heidi involved and things got exciting as the project took shape. Then they hit a snag as they realized that some of the pieces of the second hand set were missing. Happily David has similar pieces in his other sets and they were able to engineer workarounds for the missing parts. In the end David had a project he was excited to show the whole family. The motor raises the car to the top of the track and then gravity takes it through a series of twists and turns until the process repeats. The kids had a bunch of fun watching it over and over.

David also took a moment today to try out his new tent he got from his Uncle Chris. It's a nice one that I think will suit him well.

For Family Home Evening we put together a fun gingerbread train kit that the Freeman family sent to us for Christmas. The kids had fun and I think we managed to get more candies on the train than Peter ate so that's a win.

Here is a look at the finished train.

1/1/17 A New Year Begins

Today our church time moved to 12:30 PM. Surprisingly it may have been tougher to get ready on time for 12:30 then it was to be ready for 9:00 AM church. Happily, with some effort, we all made it. There was some adjusting as we get used to the late schedule, for instance putting things away instead of getting things out. Still, that same sweet spirit is there. In Sunday school we learned about faith, hope and charity. In priesthood we learned about fatherhood.
In the afternoon Heidi and I worked on our usual weekly planning.
This evening Rebecca had a raspy voice. We made a homemade cough syrup recipe that included some lemons that were kindly given to us by our neighbor David, a couple of doors down. Hopefully she feels better in the morning.

12/31/16 Farewell to Reynolds and 2016

This morning, sadly, it was time to say goodbye to the Reynolds family. We've really enjoyed getting to hang out with them for this brief time. After hugs and photos it was time to wave goodbye. Heidi did a touch up job on the plumbing issue from the other day. Then it was time for Papa and me to take the motorhome back to storage. Rebecca and David decided to come along with me. They were big helpers at putting the tire covers back on the motorhome wheels.

This evening we rang in the new year with the Roche family. Peter was only happy as long as he had a copious supply of food.

We played multiple board games including this oversized Jenga game. We also played a game called "Ticket to Ride" that was about trains across the United States.

Sarah and Lauren had fun tracing each other's outlines with these oversized blocks. In the end we called it just a few minutes short of midnight. Our kids (and the grown ups) were pretty tired. I think that most of us were still awake as the new year came in just as we were getting tucked into our own beds.

12/30/16 Costco and Camp Fire

This morning we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and go out and throw the frisbee around a little bit. Things were going great in this big field until the sprinklers came on. The kids wanted to run through the sprinklers but Heidi quickly reminded them that it was still winter time.

Here's a shot of buddies Joseph and Peter before it was time to go.

We had better luck at this field with the sprinklers.

Then we noticed that one of our neighbor's chickens had escaped and was hiding out in the neighborhood pool area.

After an hour of unsuccessfully trying to catch this chicken it was time to get ready to go to lunch.

We met up with the Reynolds clan as well as Gram and Papa at Costco.

After lunch we all headed over to Mariposa park. In this shot we have Carson, Macy, TJ, Rebecca and Sarah playing on the chrysalis toy.

Eric and Amanda even got in on the fun.

Carson enjoyed this spinning contraption.

Macy enjoyed playing on this playground spider.

This evening the Reynolds family came over to our house and roasted Smore's with us in the backyard. There was a little bit of rain but the campfire provided plenty of warmth. This shot shows a brief spike in the flames as we burned a piece of our, now retired, Christmas tree. Today was a fun and busy day. I especially enjoyed getting to visit with Eric and learning some more about what he does for his work.

12/29/16 Quiet Thursday

This morning Heidi went into the boys room to check on Joseph. At first she didn't see him until she peaked under this blanket and saw his hand.
It was a relatively quiet day at our house. Heidi and I used the time to catch up on some things with work. In the evening Heidi and I purchased a computer for our database guy to use at the office. We also used one of our gift cards from Christmas and bought dinner at Dairy Queen. It was fun to go on a simple date with my sweetheart.

12/28/16 Temple Lights with the Reynolds

This morning I have a work meeting so Heidi and the Reynolds and Gram and Papa got together without me.

Carson had a new flying toy that he wanted to try out. It called for flying indoors so they all went over to the church to fly in the cultural hall.

This evening we went to the temple to check out the Christmas lights and nativity scenes. Here's a picture of Rebecca and TJ looking at one of the displays.

Here is Sarah enjoying some of the nativities from around the world.

Peter and Joseph enjoyed the pretty lights all around the temple.

I was surprised to see Becca B had come along for the ride with the Reynolds. She did a surprisingly good job of walking without complaining. Usually walking is a tough one for her.

The kids enjoyed the interactive displays.

Here's a nice shot that Heidi took of Carson, Rebecca, Sara, and David.
I was pleased that this time no one got lost. That was a big relief for me.