Wyoming - Sept

My parents are officially moved out of their Morgan house and are living on the Walker Angus Ranch in Lyman, Wyoming. They have moved into my grandparents home, which they built when my dad was about 5 years old. It hasn't seen much remodeling since then (although I do remember when they got brand new blue carpet when I was young and we laid down on the carpet and wanted to sleep there because it was so soft!). It has needed a lot of work, and my parents are completely remodeling it. Not gutting it or anything, not even taking out any walls, but they are doing a full kitchen remdel, plus new flooring, new bathrooms, and updating basically everything (doors, windows, etc..). They've already painted all of the bedrooms and are prepping for new kitchen cabinets. We've been coming to help as much as possible and it's amazing how much I love this place and how my love for it has grown been more than before now that it it my parents home. I have been surprised at how quickly it went from being "my grandparents house" to just "home". 

There has been a LOT of work to do, but a lot of fun, too. I've been helping my parents, but my dad makes sure to take the kids out to do something fun at least once during our visit. I was working on a project inside the house while my dad was taking the kids out to ride the gocard.  I heard the back door open and my dad called for me. Lucy was screaming and my dad said "There's been an accident." My first thought was a broken bone or something terrible, but no, they had just ridden the gocart over a too-soft cowpie and cow poop had flipped up all over Lucy. It was everywhere. In her hair, on her face, on her clothes. This picture doesn't do it justice, not the cow-poop or how upset Lucy was. I got her cleaned up and now we all laugh about it often. 

One of our Wyoming days lined up with Austin's birthday, and we celebrated with my parents in Lyman. (Plus went out for Ice Cream at the local shop.) 

-I also have to share this funny story. Backstory: my parent's live outside of Lyman's city limits and so they don't have access to the city garbage services. Instead, they have a burn barrel in the backyard and when the garbage gets filled up they start it on fire and burn it down to ash. Austin, my fire-loving boy thinks this is the best thing ever and my dad has been waiting until the kids get there to start the burn barrel so that they can help start the fire. For whatever reason, the fire was a little hard to start on this particular time and so my dad put some fuel in a cup with the idea that they would start the fire with a small spark and as soon as it hit the cup it would start a big enough fire to burn. It was taking longer than expected and so all the kids and my dad leaned closer to see what was wrong when POOF a huge tower of flame exploded out. (I realize that this is really dangerous and could have ended really badly, but they weren't actually close enough to be hurt so so it's just a funny story.) They were all close enough that their eyebrows, eyelashes and hair were singed from the heat! They came in laughing and exhilarated, and even though I'm SO so grateful that no one got hurt, and even though we had some good lessons in fire safety, we love to laugh about this! 

I love my parents both very much. They are wonderful parents and amazing grandparents. They love me and they love my children and I couldn't be more grateful for their presence in our lives and for their example to us. My dad spoke in Stake Conference the weekend after they moved out of Morgan and I got most of the talk on film. I'm hoping to put it into a montage with some pictures of cows (ha), but it's such a treasure to have his words and testimony recorded for myself and my children.  

Also pictured above is an old wooden spinning top game that my dad found when cleaning out the house that he used when he was young. We ended up bringing it home to our house because they were going to throw it in the burn pile - but I guess my kids are as sentimental as I am and couldn't bear the thought. They loved when my dad pulled it out and taught them how to play. 

We are looking forward to lots more days (and lots and lots more work) here at the Red Brick Ranch House.