Eighteen

Last month Lisa turned the big 1-8!

We got together with Grandma, Grandpa, and Jeff's family to do a joint celebration with Regan. Regan decided she wanted doughnuts, so Maria made these:

Yumiko made a strawberry triffle for Lisa. Both desserts were amazingly good.

Contemplating her wish...

For her birthday dinner we went to Texas Roadhouse, where Lisa tucked into a slab of ribs.

And enjoyed some ice cream for desert.

She got several presents, including some fun music...

...and a rock tumbler from our amazing home teacher.

Even Sunny joined in the festivities.

Congratulations, Lisa!

Bird's eye view

August 20-21 I went to Portland for a conference.  Though the plane didn't fly as far north as I was hoping it would, I got a few photos of Boise.

From this one you can see that it does actually make sense for Boise to be called the "City of Trees." At least compared to the foothills...

Here is Mom and Dad's neighborhood, with the gravel pits (now a park).

Here is our neighborhood.  Can you find our house?

Here it is!  (The resolution is really bad... the camera settings were wonky.  Darn...)

Two more from different angles.

Centennial High School.

Lowell Scott Middle School.

Some mountains near Portland.  Two of the Three Sisters, I think.

A forest fire.

On the way back to the airport I stopped by the Portland temple and took a few photos.

Out in the streets

On August 24 we went to an outdoor street fair in downtown Boise.  It was interesting. They had several blocks of the main streets blocked off, with a bunch of small booths set up.

There were a lot of interesting people walking around.

There were booths selling bread

and organic vegetables

and a variety of artwork, pottery, etc.

As you were wandering around, sometimes you'd also come across people playing music, like this.

Yes, that's Lisa and her quartet playing on the street corner.

They played for about four hours.

They had a really good spot, on the corner of 8th and Idaho, right at the center of the street fair.

A lot of people stopped to listen.

A fair number also put money in their tip jar. Lisa made more than if she'd taken an extra shift at her "day job."

Here's her friend Chelsey, who was playing the harp on the opposite corner of the intersection.

They had fun....

...and sounded great.

Way to go, kids!

In the cool, cool, cool of the evening

Monday, August 12, for our "home evening" activity we left home and went to listen to some jazz.

Mr. VP, my high school choir director, is not only one of the best directors ever, but also a fabulous guitarist.  He performs in a variety of settings, but probably his main vehicle is the Van Paepeghem Quartet.  His wife sings, and is one of the most amazing jazz vocalists around.  Their bassist and drummer are also a couple of the top jazz musicians in Idaho.

They were playing at the Sandbar, an outdoor restaurant at the Riverside Hotel.

We had dinner there while listening to them play.

After dinner we walked along the Greenbelt to a spot where they have the river dammed to make a flume for kayaking and surfing.

We watched the surfers and kayakers for a while...

...skipped some rocks...

...and enjoyed the scenery along the river.

It was a fun evening.

Starlight

On July 29, Lisa, Daniel, and I decided to try something new.  We drove up to Crouch to see a performance at the Starlight Mountain Theater.  It's run by a family in our ward.

It was a nice drive up.  We got there kind of early so we had time to look around a bit.

Daniel was really excited to be there.

Despite some initial reluctance, he had a good time, and enjoyed the show.  We say "Crazy For You," which I'd never seen before.  The songs were written by George and Ira Gershwin, and included a few famous songs like "I Got Rhythm" and "They Can't Take That Away From Me."

It was an interesting open-air theater, with a beautiful natural backdrop.

It wasn't a large theater, but it was pretty close to sold out. (Not when this photo was taken, but by the time the play started.)

We all had a good time.