Apache Tears

Slow Saturday morning

breaking out the Christmas presents

Elijah and Ethan worked on this kit from GG&Pops.

The girls worked with Iris' science kit.

After a mall visit, studying, and Claire's soccer game, we went for an afternoon hike with lots of cousins.

At the end of the hike was a cave where the kids mined for Apache Tears.

The legend is that in a confrontation with the "white man," 50 Apache were killed. 

The remaining 25 Apache rode their horses off a cliff instead of being killed. 

Their tears are embedded in the mountain and anyone who has one will never have to cry again.

See that cavern in the top of the last picture? 

David climbed up there and struck a pose.

One of the kids remarked, "Uncle David took his shirt off."

One of the adults said, "Of course he did."

It just makes sense,

especially in front of "Smoke Dope" graffiti.

Some people hitched a ride to the parking lot.

Our van is getting a new engine so the logical car replacement is a mustang. 

These boys were happy to ride in it together.

PS. Today was the first time in a long time that we sang in church. 

We sung into our masks, but singing was still good.
 

Weekend update

The focus of the weekend has been car issues, but we were able to fit in a few other things:

Skate Country with the cousins and a few minions

Extended family dinner for Clayton's priesthood ordination

Iris hugged Elle 17 times for her 17th birthday. Elle was not completely appreciative.

The big news this week is that Iris is transferring schools. Online wasn't working and it's time to restore her academic confidence. She's been brushing up on her Spanish since the school is Spanish-immersion: the same school Sybil is attending.

MLK weekend

For MLK weekend we went to Vegas to house hunt and check out David's new 'hood. 

At David's office, he had the bright idea to do a wheely-chair competition.

 He went first and knocked over a computer. 

Nobody went second.

Drove to the temple as we listened to a youth fireside from our Arizona stake.

On Monday morning we hiked red rock.

Sybil wouldn't climb up on the ridge. She said she would die if she did.

Notice Elijah doing push ups. We have made a family goal to do daily pushups. On January 1, we did 1, and we add one every day. It looks like we will make it through January, which is more than I can say for our goal to stop eating junk food. 

Can you spot Sybil doing her pushups at a safe altitude?

Elijah is playing on the high school soccer team. The season was canceled, due to covid, but then reinstated the next week. All players must wear masks and only 2 fans (must be adults) per player are allowed to spectate at home games only. I was in between gymnastics drop off and pick up, so I took this picture over the gate. Just call me Covid Rebel.

Claire stayed in Vegas this week with David since her school is still online. 

This is us conferencing calling last night as we sang happy birthday to the dog. 

I can tell she has been seriously studious the whole time when I find pics like this on my cloud:

Covid dilemma: I have bought enough masks to outfit the NFL, and yet none of my kids can ever seem to find one. Judging from the number of discarded masks I see littering sidewalks and streets, I have a feeling that I’m not the only one in this predicament. Yesterday, I saw yet another discarded mask. I picked it up, brought it home, and washed it thoroughly. Unfortunately I didn’t realize that logically, I’m the only one who could wear it. I was planning on slipping it into the kids’ stash, but it’s not pediatric size, and it has black sequins—it almost looks like a neglige, which made me rethink my brilliant idea (especially since it has a little brownish discoloration on the inside). Nevertheless, I congratulated myself on wearing it to pick Sybil up from school. And then I immediately asked myself whether this was worthy of accolades. That didn't stop me from picking up other one on my run this morning. 

Hawaii 7: Snorkling

Ok, this is the last Hawaii post (I think). Gotta get it out before the kids and I head to Vegas to be with David for the weekend.

Just a few side notes first.

A week ago we got an email from Iris' school. Online school isn't sitting well with her. They invited her to come to school. There are only about 20 kids (from all of the grades combined) at school with her, mostly kids of essential workers. They do online school at school= nonsensical. I thought about taking a "first day" picture since she was going back to school. I failed. She enjoys going into school and takes a bottle full of eggnog every morning. 

As far as we know, Elijah goes back to high school next week, but the Covid rates aren't abating and Claire will be online for the foreseeable future, which is why she will stay in Vegas with David next week. I feel like a Covid virgin these days, dancing at a rave with a host of rowdy Covid virus strains, waiting for an inevitable violation. The vaccine was rushed out, but systematic distribution was under-planned and the appointment website is forever crashed. 

It's the little altered details of life that jolts the pandemic into reality: not being able to hug my sister, not being allowed to enter the orthodontist office with my child, watching movies and being shocked that the characters are all bare-faced, a neighbor dropping by to give me Porfirio's misplaced dog-tags and tossing them to me from 8 feet away instead of handing them to me. 

Ok, now on to happy thoughts of beautiful Hawaii:

On our penultimate day, we went to a beach with waves big enough for boogie boarding.

We left the beach early.

Why?

To get more shave ice.

To say I was annoyed by David's obsession would be an understatement.

The kids didn't support my sentiment.

Elijah informed me, "Mom, you can't say he's addicted to shave ice, 

that's like saying he's addicted to being a good person."

Although I didn't order any shave ice in Hawaii (bc I'm a bitter person), I sampled, 

and the best by far was at a little asian place in a tiny store in Oahu.

The owner appreciated all 2 words David knew of Cantonese.

The texture of the ice coupled with mochi= mouth watering.

After the shave ice, we went snorkeling and took a boat that had a glass bottom.

I enjoyed snorkeling until I started to get sea sick.

On the left you can see a sea turtle (by the person's white head). 

I think the snorkelers in the water are all Udalls.

Hunt, Claire, Max, and Elijah did snuba-ing = scuba + snorkeling.

It's kinda like tethered scuba diving.

Sliding off the boat

These little black fish are known as the piranhas of Hawaii. 

People threw them hamburger and they swarmed. 

Speaking of hamburger...Claire accidentally ate meat for the first time in years on the boat. 

She ordered a veggie burger and there was a mix up.

She didn't hate it, but wasn't converted.

Snorkeling class.

 Livy asked if she could still snorkel even if she was missing her 2 front teeth. 

And Sybil asked innumerable questions about peeing in the ocean.

The morning of our departure we enjoyed the beach one last time.

Hawaii sent us off with a goodbye rainbow.

It was spectacularly bright.

For lunch, we set the older kids loose in downtown while 

the adults and little girls went to the amazing Star Noodle.

After another shave ice (of course), we headed to Haleakala National Park, altitude 10,023 feet, where we got great views and a taste of winter weather.

The sun set as we headed down. Marguerite had mentioned that GrammaRuth's favorite part of her Hawaiian visit was biking down this mountain, so in her honor, we listened to one of her favorite songs on the way down: God Bless the USA by Lee Greenwood.

Tram to the airport