We filled the days leading up to and through Christmas with lots of little activities to celebrate the season with family and friends.  Gma ...

Leading into the holidays, we had a few small adventures of note.  We took some time to organize and pack things up on Monday and Tuesday fo...

With the end of the semester, Mike got to travel back down to Springville for the holidays. Landon still has another week of school, but we'...

Back at the new normal. Monday morning after dropping off his rental car and getting a ride back to his apartment, Mike caught the fawns and...

We had a happy Thanksgiving week with all of us together for a few days.  Hallie's Starbucks customer Kenyon gave our family some frozen fis...

Mid-November features photos of felines, flakes, and frolicking fauna.  Halloween sort of passed Mike by this year. Hallie thought he might ...

As fall continues moving along, we continue riding the wave. Kai Puppy is always such a love. Hallie took him back to Brittany's late in the...

We are facing new challenges as the month moves along. But we get by with a little help from our friends.  Monday dawned relatively warm and...

In brief, the week involved sleeping domesticated animals, surprising semi-wild animals, Halloween, and paper cutting.  Here are three sleep...

We have a new adult in the family.  Hallie went to Rockwell Ice Cream and found this new restaurant nearby. Mike would have devoured some Ne...

This week Mike had the chance to go back to Springville for a few days to celebrate Landon's birthday.  Mike woke up to snow on Monday morni...

Back to a relative return to routine.  Hallie had the opportunity to work at a different Starbucks this week. Fun change of scenery. On Frid...

We were grateful to come together as a family this week to celebrate Grandma Owens' life.  Emily framed this photo of Granny and Papa that, ...

Mike spent time in California making funeral preparations with family, and Hallie held things together in Springville.  Mom Owens was always...

This last week didn't go exactly as planned. On Monday, Hallie was able to work a shift at Starbucks when a fellow barista called in sick....

We had an eventful week between Eliza getting into a new program, Landon attending HoCo, and the parents (Hallie especially) just trying to ...

🔥** We Will Not Cave ** 🔥 Authoritarians are counting on our silence. On our fear. On our surrender. But we’re here to say: we will not cave — and neither should the institutions that claim to serve ...

Mike got to stay with us a couple more days before heading back north, Landon got his drivers license (you've been warned), and the kids wit...

Mike came down for the weekend to visit everyone and get some more items to make his time in Missoula feel just a bit less Spartan (not that...

It can cool down any time now. Seriously. Another week has gone by. Mike had new employee orientation, and the College of Education and Univ...

Our first full week apart has passed, and we have managed.  Eliza ended up missing her first day of school in order to spend it at HMHI . Ha...

So begins the next chapter where Mike lives up north and the rest of us live down south (relatively).  On Monday morning, the parents awoke ...

This was Mike's last full week in Utah before his move to Missoula. Hallie's friend Laurie Ann runs the Open Class of the Utah County Fair. ...

Hallie and Eliza went to the rodeo, Mike took a flight to his hometown, Hallie got a tattoo, and Landon got out of doing something. In honor...

Summertime, and we're living easy.  We had a fair amount of Hallie hanging out with work friends even when she wasn't working, herself.  Eli...

Summer has brought with it unexpected changes. Some are welcome; some are not.  Through it all, "Happiness is a warm puppy," as the saying g...

We're halfway through 2025?! Already?! We had a fairly mellow Independence Day week by our standards. No travel; just running around town.  ...

Here we are, summer in full swing. This week, Eliza had the opportunity to help out at Leslie's.  Here us Mama Sally (the horse) and her bab...

Summer has come to Springville. Time for a name change. Speaking of change, we had a few this week.  Mike officially started as faculty at t...

We tried to get back into the swing of American life this week.  We've been fighting jet lag. Hallie says she did not sleep for over 24 hour...

Week two of our Japan trip has come and gone, and now we're heading home.  As mentioned last post, we have an album of photos that we will ...

We attempted to make a daily log of our Japan trip, but there was too much to cover while trying to enjoy our time out and about and recover...

School's out for summer, and we're off on another whirlwind adventure.  We spent the week winding out the school year and getting ready for ...

Hallie had a birthday. Hip, hooray!  Smith's has had some big wigs come in to clean house and take names. Mike likes this mischievous look o...

We're transitioning to the last days of the school year for some of us and a new term for others. Mike started a new term at PACE this week,...

We are beginning to see the signs of change as we move into May.  Kai loves his stuffed lion.   The kids decided to embellish Landon's drawi...

We did stuff. Mike had the week off from PACE, and everyone else had business as usual.  Hallie got complimented for making a drink at work,...

Happy Easter! We had many reasons to celebrate this week.  Monday was spent running errands, per usual. This was Mike's last week of the sem...

We had another eventful week with animal encounters, business travel, and birthday celebrations.  The deer came out to play while Eliza was ...

We had an eventful Spring Break week.  Eliza had a horseback riding lesson at BUH, and when Hallie was there, she saw some deer come up very...

Our first week of spring was pretty uneventful. We managed to get lots of photos of Eliza but none of Landon. He's a wily sort.  Eliza went ...

The coming of spring meant many things in our family this week, including St. Paddy's Day eats, early flowers in bloom, and a test run of th...

Nearly 8 million Americans work in industries targeted by the levies and the majority are Trump voters, a New York Times analysis shows

Here we are, another week gone by!  Hallie took Kai over to the groomer on Monday, and now he's all neat and trim.  He went with Mom to take...

Ten Myths About the U.S. Tax System - Freakonomics

Just WHEN IN THE HELL will our Democratic leaders understand the peril we are in?

Signs of spring include springing one hour forward. Grr. At least we have longer days and flowers.  Kai came back on Monday. He's always so ...

Over the past two years, everyday people have been showing up in support of Ukraine in both big demonstrations and small acts—including displaying the Ukrainian flag, publicly advocating for peace and...

Spring has come to town, but winter remains in the background. We had a week mostly bound up in new routines.  Eliza sewed a pillow at BUH a...

Getting the shingles vaccine booster felt kind of surreal. Lots of surreal events going on lately.  Eliza baked Valentine's Day sugar cookie...