TALES from HUFFAKER HAVEN
Ha•ven[hey-vuhn] n.
Any place of shelter and safety.
Narratives, stories, tales and yarns of the Huffakers that call this haven, "Home."
And then there's that moment, when you start a blog post, you upload some of the photos, but you don't actually insert them in the post. And your computer runs an update during "off-peak" hours. And then all the uploaded photos get dumped.
Not that I don't love each season as it comes along, but there's a sense of freedom about summer that is especially nice. I've had Kenny Chesney's "Summertime" song running through my head almost daily lately:
Maybe you'll let it run in the background while you scroll through this post on June.
June specifically means that school's out! It means the relentless schedule finally lets up. Sleeping in can happen. Todd again hosted his Sunday School class for a pizza & movie party, and man -- those teenagers sure enjoy sleeping in, too!
If Excited-For-Summer were an Olympic event, these boys would have it NAILED.
Those kids love his pizza, because he cooks it out on the smoker. It gets a great crust on it, and the cheese & crust take on the smoke flavor really nicely. It's like having it cooked in a wood-fired pizza oven. SO good!!
For myself, I've turned down the "sleep-in" option this summer, and that's also been rewarding. As soon as Seminary let out, I started heading out each day for an early-morning walk, and documenting it with a daily Snapchat to my hubby & kids. You never know what you might see while you're out walking:
Pretty cool. Even though I was far from it, I could hear the propane burner firing in it.
That is definitely a bucket-list item!
Alyssa decided that Miss Emma needed a big hairbow for softball -- like all the big girls have. So when she packaged up & sent the personalized bow, she went a little crazy and sent a whole box of sunshine to go with it!
Emma was thrilled, to say the least!
(I think I need to kidnap those caramels. She'll never miss them!)
June also brought an early raspberry harvest, and Emma jumped right on that .....
(Pink gardening boots are the best!!)
Then she took the camera. Despite the headless Momma look .....
.... she got a good shot of the berry bushes:
... and some mud on her boots:
It was already hot, and even though we were out picking in the early evening, she slipped back inside (Um, what about those muddy boots??),
and fixed up a tray full of icy-cold water glasses for each of us to have.
My heart melts when my kids do stuff like that on their own!!
It was a good picking!
The next morning, Emma wanted to learn how to make raspberry jam.
When your kids ask for stuff like that --- like, teach me how to do useful things -- don't hesitate for a moment, -- DO IT!!
She participated in every part of jam-making.
(Blender, instead of just mashing the berries.)
Stirring, ladling ....
And lifting the hot jars out of the canner. Later, she labeled her jars, too. I think that merits an entry in the County Fair this fall!!
Softball continued...... now with the fashionable bow in her hair!!
But the weather wasn't always pretty. We came home from the game that day and had a bright double-rainbow out the back view:
Father's Day weekend was a lot of fun ..... Todd actually spent the week ahead of it smoking 12 pork shoulders!
Only 4 at a time fit on the smoker, so for three days straight, he drove the neighbors crazy with the smell of that deliciousness!! Mmmmmmm.
(That's a honey-raspberry rub on those, in case you're wondering!)
All that pulled pork went to a church picnic dinner at a nearby state park.
I think my stomach is growling, just thinking about it!!
Todd also got busy and made the BEST tire swing in the back yard:
I think some of the older kids are a bit jealous, because he we didn't put this up when they were young. Emma's sure enjoying it, though!!
Best part of Father's Day Weekend, was that these two came up for a long-deserved visit!!
We've sure missed Brandon and Cecilia and their TWO kiddos!! Wish we were a bit closer, but it makes the reunions all the sweeter!
Biased grandma here, but these two munchkins are SO adorable!!
Gathered the whole local family around for a barbecue on Father's Day .... more deliciousness, and the best company to share it with!
Those Hufaker "kids"!! Missing Kerry and Shelly, -- and you'd think they pre-planned to coordinate outfits, but not really!!
We also grabbed a four-generation Huffaker picture while we had the chance, too:
Later, we got the female version of it, too. Definitely an un-planned photo, as I'm wearing softball coaching stuff, and Giselle looks like she's in her jammies!
(Adding a couple more kiddos into this crazy shot:)
I love the sheer joy in Giselle's face:
Darius gives a stare-down to Uncle Wade:
One evening, while Brandon and Cecilia were here, we made some back yard s'mores:
And I discovered (after all these years) that I have NOT been doing s'mores right.
I've always thought that s'mores are kind of dry, and not very exciting. I didn't see the appeal. That night, I figured out what my problem was: my proportions were wrong!
Old recipe: 2 graham crackers 1 marshmallow, 1 square of regular Hershey bar.
No, no, no, no, no.n That's all wrong.
It should be:
New recipe: 2 graham crackers, TWO marshmallows, and 1 square of a mega-Hershey bar. (I'm not sure what they call that size..... like the 1-pound size bar)
Holy revelations!!
With the amounts of chocolate and marshmallow adjusted, suddenly this snack makes sense to me!! The graham cracker only needs to be there to hold it all together -- not to be the major component. The chocolate must [be adequate, no skimping here!] ---- not be cold, so it can properly begin melting when it meets the hot marshmallow. And the marshmallows go on each side of the chocolate, so there's never a cold side (refer to photo above!)
At last, I see the light!!
Maybe you already knew all that, but it was news to me!!
And, finally ..... there's this big guy:
I can't express enough how grateful I am for him, and for the immense amount of work, energy, and effort that he puts into our home, our yard, our family, our business ...... he is amazing!! I won the lottery when I made this catch, and I'm going to get mushy and say I love him so, SO much!!
For the last several days, that phrase just keeps going through my head. It's usually immediately followed by the self-admonition: "Get ON with it, Marilyn!!"
This blog post is going to end up being much more photos than words. Life has been busy, and whose isn't? We're no different than anyone else. I've had a couple of rambling-mind posts that I thought about putting up, but I'm going to move on with getting current first.
So without further adieu ---, I give you: May.
Miss Emma was ready for a photo session in the back yard, ...... but not so ready for there to be actual INSECTS out there with her, as well. Who knew, right?
We seriously have been trying to get her over her fear of buzzing things. Not sure if it's working. This is her look when she had a fly-by that she couldn't run from, because she was stuck up a tree. (Well, I guess that's ONE way to keep her out there!!)
At the beginning of May, Darcie returned from her freshman year at BYU (Provo) for about a week of visiting, before heading back down there for her summer job as a sports camp counselor. (Boy, things sure come full circle, don't they? She used to GO to softball camp at BYU -- read more HERE -- and now she's a counselor there for the campers!)
While she was here, it was time for the annual J.A.M. softball clinic, Emma's second year. They were short on counselors this year, so Darcie stepped up and volunteered to help. Makes it her 5th year as a helper.
Off they go!!
Also while she was here, the weather was nice enough to go out and make ice cream on the trampoline:
(I love the spirea blooming in the background! The peonies were kind of on their way out, though.)
(And, ....... she snagged the camera from me.)
..... so I got her back:
Todd and I wanted to surprise Darcie with some fun activity that would remind her that home is still a nice place to be. She's had a great time at college during her freshman year, and she's got even more upcoming adventures (more on that later), so we chose to do something that's both super-fun, and still is a reminder of her childhood.
So we planned a day, and took the girls four-wheeling!!
And then later, I found this photo of her when she was about 3 years old .....
If I'd know I had that picture, I'd have had her do a re-creation of it.
(We used to tell her that if she was holding on to the "insides" of the handlebars, then she was helping to steer it. Ha!!)
It was still pretty chilly up in the mountains, so we're dressed for it. Plus, four-wheeling usually means you end up getting a little muddy:
... or wet .....
(I try to tuck my feet up on the fenders to keep them dry when we cross streams.)
The real revelation came to Emma, though. The child actually had thought that "four-wheeling" meant that we take her for rides around the back yard. Yes, THAT'S how long it had been since we'd gone on a real ride.
We were all a little spattered. But, hey ----- what a view!!!
(In keeping with her adventurous photos from southern Utah -- she wanted this shot here.)
Man, oh man -- it sure was a ton of fun to get back on the machines again!!
We had ALL kinds of weather in one day -- sunshine, rain, snow, HAIL [that hurts!], --- and I think Darcie loved every second of it!!
Darcie wasn't around this year to help Todd out with coaching the Little League softball team. Emma moved up from T-ball to Farm League (coach-pitch). That put me in as assistant coach, and I ended up with very few photos. Maybe that's just as well?
(She would always tuck her softball pants down inside her socks! That's one way to do it, I guess!)
Also in May --- can you believe it's been a year? Alyssa and Andrew celebrated their first anniversary! Alyssa asked me to take some couple-photos for it, so we had a photo session down by the greenbelt.
We kept heading south from there, and had to pull over for the classic state border picture of Emma:
(And then she wanted to take a picture of me, too.)
We hadn't ever been down to visit Todd's sister, Shelly, in her new home, so this was the trip to do it! Actually, there was another reason for taking the trip at this particular time, but we sure soaked up all the family time we could while we were there!!
Love Shelly!!! She's got the greatest little family, and it was a blast to be there.
Alexus took Emma out for a spin in the 'Stang ---
(And we went to dinner in one of the coldest restaurants, ever. Seriously, we were wearing our coats in there!!)
Shelly & Andy had invited us down for Family Day at the mine where Andy works, and we jumped at the chance! It was so much fun to see!
So, in no particular order .........
They have some pretty BIG equipment out there:
Cool girls!
This photo is a little warped, because it's 3 pictures together. I wish I could set you on the edge there to look down into this thing, because it's HUGE. Like, really, really big!!!
So, I took my long lens, and zoomed all the way in on that last picture. If you were to look really, really closely at the upper right of that photo, you would see this:
Those teeny tiny, look-like-toy-trucks and grader and excavator ---- those are the big, humongous ones like the dump truck from that first photo!!
Unbelievable!!!!
And they drive those things until they can't drive them any longer. Here's one of the used tires:
The mine was really quite welcoming and had a bunch of displays and stations set up from all their different departments -- engineering, geology, safety, electrical, thermal imaging, processing, ..... I can't even remember them all. They handed out a bunch of candy and freebies (that's what's in those bags we're carrying), and fed us lunch, and drove us through their processing plant area, as well as to the top of the mine edge.
Emma loved it, too!
This is Emma on the thermal imaging camera -- she thought that was pretty cool, also:
More equipment. Wanna know how big that grader is?
It's THIS big!!!
It was really quite a memorable trip, and huge thanks go to Shelly and Andy for being amazing hosts! We had a blast!!!
