Reunion at Bear Lake

All 42 of us Eyres are here at Bear Lake.

The kids are in heaven playing with their cousins on the beach, building forts in the basement, playing pool, working on their numbers for the family talent show and working together. The adults are laughing and talking and cooking and playing games until late at night. We're eating lots of amazing food (Japanese curry, fish tacos, Cafe Rio-style salads, Thai food, Jonah's famous burgers...a different family is in charge of each meal - good thing I've been going running and doing long swims every day or I'd be seriously bulking up...). We're all a little short on sleep (so hard to go to bed when there's so much fun to be had - and so hard to sleep with thin walls and babies crying in the night and little kids getting up and having noisy fun at the crack of dawn). And there are huge piles of dishes and big fat messes to clean up all the time (but we've got a good system going now - each age group of grandkids is in charge of a different after-dinner clean-up job and there's a list of other housecleaning jobs they can choose in order to earn extra points - there's a big prize for each group that gets at least 100 points by the end of the reunion. I think the kids are having as much or more fun together as they work together as they have playing together...).

It's so fun to see all the interactions - big kids delighting in their baby cousins and feeding them and caring for them every chance they get, grown-ups discussing ideas and asking and giving advice, groups of mixed adults and kids laughing their heads off as they fly along on the tube behind the boat, everyone cheering for every good shot in the family tennis tournament and the ad-hoc beach volley ball games, parents jumping in to take care of each other's kids as needs arise.

There's nothing like being with these people in this place.

Here are some snapshots. I'll get some nicer shots from my siblings who have the fancy cameras and the photography talents when I get a chance. But for now, here's a bit of what we're experiencing via un-retouched phone pictures.

Tal and Anita are in charge of the reunion this year (every year, it's a different couple). Here they are announcing the details of the tennis tournament and the overall reunion agenda.

And here's everyone listening to Tal and Anita 

(the first day of the reunion was Eli's birthday - thus the banner)

My sisters and I took all the little girls for a walk one lovely morning.

And we found some lovely flowers and butterflies

After lots of fun tube rides in the lake, the hot tub sure feels good

The kids are doing pretty well keeping up on their reading time while they're here - and some groups of cousins are reading the same book together so they can have a book club discussion.

Liza and Hazel and Claire have been inseparable - they've made up the cutest dances and have worked SO hard on their points, doing every possible household job.

The twins and the three little boys close to their age have built countless waterways and structures using sand and water. It never gets old.

Isaac's become a fast favorite with all the babies. Here he is with Poem and Annina.

Here we are enjoying the famous Jonah Burgers - he mixes the ground beef with lots of magical spices, makes the patties, cooks them just right, then serves them topped with sliced beets and mangoes. 

Good stuff!

Storms roll in most afternoons - beautiful stuff.

When it started pouring, everyone decided to dance in the rain. I love spontaneous fun that comes when you find the beauty in something you weren't anticipating - like rain on your reunion. After the fun dance party, it cleared up and got sunny again. Perfect.



This evening, we went bird watching at the bird refuge down the road. We had a contest to see which group could get the most photos of different species of birds. It was beautiful.

Family Pioneer Trek at Martin's Cove

We're at Bear Lake now, enjoying a few days with most of my family members before the official Eyre reunion starts on Friday. So great to be with everyone, to see the kids having so much fun together, to meet a new niece, to have that uniquely wonderful feeling of relaxing togetherness that Bear Lake brings.


For a few days before we got here, we were at Martin's Cove in Wyoming doing a pioneer trek. Jared and I did one with the youth from our area in St George three years ago and had a great experience but thought it would be all the more meaningful if we could go with our own kids. So when our stake in Ogden announced that they were going to do a family pioneer trek this summer, we signed up for three days of wearing pioneer clothes while camping and pulling a handcart through the Wyoming wilderness while hearing faith-promoting pioneer stories and having some good old fashioned fun. And it turned out to be a truly wonderful family bonding and learning experience. 

Here we are near Devil's Gate (that break in the rocks in the background)

The kids thought this would have been a much more comfortable way to travel than pulling handcarts.
But only the richest could afford wagons so mostly wagons like these were used to haul provisions and
families hauled their personal possessions in handcarts.

The kids really loved the adventure of it all and the things we learned about pioneers really seemed to sink in and affect them. I looked over at Silas during a film about a little pioneer boy who lost his father in a terrible snow storm during the little orientation meeting when we first got there, and his eyes were glistening with tears. I asked Oliver at the end what he learned. He said "That it would be really hard to be a pioneer for three reasons. You get hardly any food and it's bad food. You walk a LOT. And you might die." Isaac insisted on pulling the handcart by himself for about a 1/2 a mile so he could see what it was like for the pioneer boys his age who had to do stuff like that. Ashton and Isaac both took great care of several very little kids to help out the kids' parents and it was great to see all the families really help each other in every way throughout the experience. Eliza delighted all the pioneer stories and games and was so helpful and cute about everything.

One of the really cool things about going on this trek to Martin's Cove was that Jared's great great great grandmother, Amy Orme, and great great grandfather, Samuel Washington Orme, along with his two sisters, Sarah Ann and Rebecca, were in the Martin handcart company that got caught in the early snows and endured unthinkable hunger and cold while waiting in Martin's Cove for rescue parties to save them. They walked about a hundred miles through 2-foot-deep snow with their handcarts, subsisting on rations of 4 oz of flour a day until they were finally rescued. There are so many heartbreaking but faith promoting stories and we felt proud that some of those stories belonged to one of our ancestors.

Here's a little story we know about the Ormes: As the storms got worse and the rations got smaller, men were dying right and left. As men were primarily responsible for pulling the handcarts and as men typically have a higher need for calories than women anyway, the 4 oz of flour for all adults that they whittled their way down to after weeks of semi-starvation was just not working out for the men. Samuel's mom and sisters saw the men dying and decided to do a very brave and very hard thing. They decided to insist that Samuel take part of their rations to supplement his own so he could keep his strength up and help them all make it through this ordeal. Likely due to their sacrifice, all four family members lived. Samuel went on to support his mother and sisters as a blacksmith all his life (their dad had died before the trek began). We found a great tribute written about Samuel by his son at the visitor's center. Samuel was as honest and faithful and hardworking as they come.

Here are the kids looking for their ancestors on the list of members of the Martin Handcart Company of 1856:



And here's what they found (the names in red are those that died - and there's sadly a whole lot of red on that board). Great great great grandmother Amy, great great aunts Sarah Ann and Rebecca, and great great grandfather Samuel (Washtington was his middle name because he was born on the 4th of July). Samuel's son was Silas who our Silas is named for.

When we first got there, we set up camp (feeling pretty darn grateful for the tents we've got instead of the canvas and sticks the pioneers had for tents - in the snow...)

Then we had had the beautiful experience of watching a couple little girls from our stake be baptized in the Sweetwater River.

We picked up our handcarts from here (and the twins made fast friends with this big dog who looks like a sheep and who has appointed himself the guardian of all pioneer treks according to the missionaries who help manage the treks- they wanted me to be sure to include a photo of Oscar the dog and this is the best I could get -he wasn't much for posing for photos).

Then we packed up our handcarts and headed out. The kids were really proud of the family flag they designed and made all by themselves. I was proud of myself for backing off and letting them do whatever they wanted. And it turned out great!

The kids loved puling the handcart and letting the adults act as the brakes in the back (they got going a little fast here and there...). They insisted on having the adults ride from time to time to make it harder and to imagine what it would have been like if they had to pull sick parents as so many pioneer children did.

We pushed and pulled our handcart all day and the kids were tough. After learning about their ancestors walking through snow and freezing and starving, there wasn't much room for complaints, I guess.

We all sat down in Martin's Cove to hear about the plight and strength of the brave pioneers in the Martin Company. If you want to read all about it, there's some good info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_handcart_pioneers

We rolled up our pants and hitched up our skirts to pull our handcart through the Sweetwater River that the pioneers had had to cross repeatedly in the ice and snow.

It was great to see all the kids on the trek loving the simple passtimes of long ago - climbing trees, playing tag, whittling, playing pioneer games, chewing on grass stalks, climbing rocks. It was very nice to put away all electronics and see how quickly the kids came up with great activities.

Silas and Oliver were a pretty good match for each other with the stick pull.

All the kids were enamored with these little string and wooden circle things you could get going - much better than a yo-yo...

Eliza and her friend Savannah had SO much fun together.

By the end, we were all pretty darn worn out from all the walking, the hot sun, and the late and not-so-comfy nights. Here's Silas during an evening of pioneer stories. Love how he's got a piece of grass in his mouth. Ashton got all the kids in camp going on sucking on the ends of grass...

On the final day of the trek, we had the chance to drive a few minutes up the road (a day's journey for pioneers) and see Independence Rock, a major landmark on the Oregon, Mormon, and California Trails. It's called the "registry of the desert" since pioneers all the way back to 1824 inscribed their names on this rock. It was fun to climb up on top for great views of the old trail and see 100's of names all over the rock. The goal of the pioneers was to make it to this rock by independence day - if they could do that, they'd most likely beat the storms and make it to their destinations safely. The Martin Handcart Company didn't make it to Independence rock until October. Combine their lateness with the very early onset of winter and things just weren't good.



This one says A.E. Moody, July 8th, 1853. Love the neat handwriting.

J.L. Holland 1862.

 On the left, hehind Isaac and his little friend Amelia you can see a bridge and traces of the old trail.

It was a landmark experience for our family. Experiencing a small token piece of what our ancestors experienced was so good for us all. We felt things we couldn't have felt any other way. We loved sharing this experience as a family. And we're all feeling so extra grateful now for the gospel our ancestors sacrificed so much for, for the good food we have, for our van, for air conditioning, for clean clothes and washing machines, for water bottles and sunscreen, for modern clothing, for comfortable beds, for health and strength.

We felt a lot of love for each other - and our van - as we pulled out of camp and headed to Bear Lake in a vastly speedier and more comfortable fashion than our ancestors traveled.

Favorite Journal Entries - and writing prompt ideas

One of my kids "must-do's" for each day this summer is writing in their summer journals. We have a list of writing prompts they can choose from (my list is below) or they can come up with their own topic if they want or just write about what is going on in their lives and in their heads. The kids love it when I sit by them and ask to read what they've been writing. I've learned a lot about how things look from their perspective and what's important to them by reading what they've written. 

I asked their permission to post an entry from each child's journal:

By Silas, age 7 - he's so excited for our upcoming Bear Lake reunion

I love what Oliver had to say about his twin, Silas. I love how he says Silas is
"helpful, loving, gentle and kind" and that "he wants to have fun witch is the best thing that
ever eggzisted in life and he nows how to have fun"

Eliza has written way more than anyone else - she's really into writing
and has captured some great stuff.
To me, our backyard needs tons of work and is a bit of an eyesore.
Glad to know it looks so great through her eyes.

Isaac loves his old and new bikes even more than I realized.
And I love how he spells neighbor - knabor.
And for the record, I'm a pretty decent mountain biker - I'm just not into the
crazy bumps and drop-offs that Jared and Isaac and Ashton love...

I love seeing that under that somewhat surly pre-teen, there's still the
very excited and fun-loving little boy we know and love.
Ashton was his dad's right-arm man designing and building that zipline (see it HERE).

I love that these journals are helping my kids capture important bits of their childhood and I love seeing them get better and better at sitting down and expressing themselves on paper every day. I don't bother them much about spelling or punctuation with their summer writing (as you can see from the examples above).Sometimes I'll point out a place where it's a bit hard for me to understand what they're trying to say because of messy handwriting or especially odd spelling or missing punctuation and they happily fix that. But mostly, I think it's great for them to just pour out their thoughts on paper and get excited about writing w/o the details of their writing being an issue.


Here are the writing prompts we have on a list for our kids to refer to (and my sister Shawni has some great ones for her kids as well - check them out in her post from today HERE) 

Writing Prompts

What is your favorite day you can remember? What were all the things that made it so great? Remember to use lots of adjectives (describing words)!

What is the worst day you can remember? What made it so bad? If you could go back, what could you do to make it a better day?

Describe your house. What rooms are in your house? What do you do in each room? What do you like about your house? What do you like about your backyard?

What is your bedroom like? What does it look like? What does it have in it? What do you like to do in there? What do you like best about your room? What would you like to change about your room?

Describe one member of your family. (Do every member of the family by the end of the summer!)

What is the favorite day you can remember? What were all the things that made it so great? Remember to use lots of adjectives (describing words)!

What are some great things about being a member of your family? What do you love to do with your family? How can you help your family be even better?

If you could have any super power, what would it be? Why would you choose that super power? What would you do with your super power? How would you stay humble even though you'd be so awesome?

Write about someone you feel sorry for. Is there anything you could do to help that person? Why or why not?

If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go? Why do you want to go there? How would you get there? What activities would you do there? What souvenirs would you want to bring back for your family and friends?

If you could have any pet in the world, what pet would you have? Why would you pick that pet? How would you take care of that pet? What issues might you have to resolve to make that pet work out OK?

Write everything you can remember about the grade and class you were in last year. Where did you sit in the classroom? Who did you sit by at lunch? Who did you play with at recess? What games did you play at recess? What were your favorite classroom activities? Why? What activities did you NOT like? Why? What was your teacher's name? What did you like about your teacher? What didn't you like about your teacher?

Who are your best friends? What do you like about each friend?

If you were the principal of your school, and your goal was to help every student be really successful and healthly and happy, what would you do to make your school better? What would you change about how the school looks and what materials are available in the school? What would you change about the things teachers teach and the way they teach them? What would you change about school lunch? What would you change about recess?

Imagine your perfect day. When would you wake up? What would you do? What would you eat? Where would you go? Who would you be with?

What are your talents and interests? What are you good at? What are you working on? What do you wish you were good at?

Write about someone you admire. Why do you think this person is great? What can they do that you'd like to do? What have they done that was a great example for others? How could you be more like this person?


What are some great things about being a member of your family? What do you love to do with your family? How can you help your family be even better?

(If you want all these prompts in a nice printable format as well as my list of 5-10 minute daily household tasks that the kids do and tons more ideas and printables to help make the rest of the summer wonderful, check this out: Summer Camp Kit)