The younger kids day off

Our nephew is in Japan on his mission and we got this note from him the other week. It was sweet up until the end where he called me his crazy aunt hahahaha.

I like to see it a term of endearment. I'm sticking with that story. I think he IS onto me though as being crazy, I just can't believe he figured it out.

The younger three had a day off school so their teachers could write up report cards. It meant that I  could plan time with Natalie to go on a hike and let these kids run crazy. And that's just what we did.

I mean come on, how beautiful is this? Way better than being at school right?

These guys think so at least.

Natalie and I talked deep, like was always do and walked along the river while listening to our kids, laughing, talking, yelling, crying and playing. It was pretty perfect people.

Love these two.

Love their friendships.

We walked to this huge tree that they decided to cut down cause it's dying, which was super sad. But the kids played on it before they haul it away.


How cute is this girl right?



Here's Bryan happy before he fell off and hurt himself. He was ok, I think he got the wind knocked outt've him and was a little sad, which is totally understandable. I've had the wind knocked outt've me and it sucks.



In 'Uncle's' words from Hunt for the wilderpeople, this picture is 'magestical.

This tree was magestical as well.

Autumn is beautiful right?
What a wonderful day for us to spend some time outside. I loved it and am glad we could all go.

It was the start of a wonderful weekend. More to come about that in the next post.

One crazy weekend

So this weekend was very full with lots of things happening.
First we had Dru's brother and two friends, Puggs and Topher, come up to our place to help frame the workshop all weekend. Ryan and Topher came up early friday morning and were ready to work and worked all day and into the night Friday, Saturday and most of Sunday as well.
Puggs came up Friday night and left early Sunday morning to be home for his son's baptism interview.
We appreciated all their help and it was so amazing to see them work the whole weekend. Here are some videos of everything.


Pretty cool right?
Yuki thought the walls just came like that. When we told her that it was just bits of wood and they actually nailed all of that together her mind was blown and mine too to tell you the truth. What a bunch of rockstars thats for sure.
Their bodies were tired and I made sure they were well fed and looked after the best I could. They worked hard all day everyday.
It was nice once it was dark and they had called it a night, for them to come in and eat and talk and laugh a little bit with us.
So we had all of that going on the whole weekend.

Second it was Masaru's last mtb race and it was here in Boise up in Bogus basin. Dru wasn't able to be there for that race, obviously, because of being with his brother and mates, working on the shop, so it was up to me to do everything for that, which is fine.
Also Dru's mother came up to support Masaru in his last race and watch him as well.
So she came up on Friday and left on Saturday after his race.
Masaru was really happy that she came all that way to watch him race and it was super nice of her. She helped me with dinner Friday night, which was really nice as well since I was so busy prepping for not having a nervous breakdown because of this weekend.
Friday after school I took Masaru as well as a couple of his team mates, up to Bogus to do the pre-ride.
It's around 45 mins away and so I left the other kids at home with their father and told them to watch out for Grandma as she was going to be up.
We got up there round 4:30 so that they could go and check out the trail and know what they were in for for the race the next day.
I brought up my knitting and sat there and knitted and told them we had no time to muck around since I needed to get home as quick as I could and start prepping dinner for all of our guests.
The trail was short but had a brutal climb in it then switchbacks all the way down.
Masaru didn't say much about it. It was cool to watch as a spectator though, that's for sure.
We made it home and fed everyone and slept. Masaru's friend, Kaleb, stayed the night with us too so he could get a ride to the race the next morning. His Dad was out of town and so having me help out was great for his mother, which I was happy to do since I was going up anyway.

The next day we got up super early to make it up to bogus in time to help the team and cheer on our teammates who were racing early.
It was cold ALL DAY. I didn't and couldn't get warm. The sun was out the whole day though and it was pure blue skies, it was just cold.
I think Masaru was cold too and didn't realize how cold he was. He brought the wrong gloves to race with and so wore my ones that I had on so they were warm for his fingers. He said, after his warm up ride, that his fingers were sore they were so cold. So we got him warm.
He did great in his last race.
I forget where he got. I think maybe 14th? He boosted it at the end again and was amazing. I'm so proud of him.
Here's a video of me yelling at him hahahahaha

I thought he was coming 15th but he passed a few kids at the end and only came in 14th I think so I must've counted wrong, which is totally possible.







Shauna took the spot where they started and finished down the mt, but I climbed up the mountain and ran down through the switchbacks so I could keep yelling at him till the end.
Total rockstar. I love it when he races. It's so awesome.
Shauna then left and we walked her to her car and gave out hugs. It was great to have her with us.

Then once he'd finished we helped with the team and cheering others on, but to be quite honest I was really cold.
We saw some friends and I caught up with them and made sure out mates the Bigelow's were still coming to our house that night to stay the night. They were in a couple of blog posts before. They have 4 boys and a trailer. So they just needed a driveway to park in and I told them we'd do dinner. I put it in the crockpot before we left just to make things easier for all of us.
Then I took my knitting and sat inside the lodge because I was so cold. A friend sat with me with her kids and talked with me the whole time. It was nice company and I made my mate a knitted bracelet and let the sun shine on my body and be warm for a couple of hours.
I'd promised Masaru I'd stay till the end and now was regretting that promise.
Takeshi found the pump/jump track and spent around 3.5 hours up there riding. I'm glad he did that cause he wanted to ride the whole day. It was awesome they had that up there. So that kept him and Kaleb happy.
Masaru went back and forth between them and his other mates. He's such a social butterfly man.
Here's some video's of the pump/jump track.

Takeshi. Masaru.
We stayed once they started announcing the awards and they first thing they announced was the t-shirt competition that Masaru entered.
He got third and was up there getting clapped and cheered. He wanted to win but I think he was happy with third. He got some socks and then I finally convinced him to go home.
We beat the rush which I was super happy about that, plus it helped that Masaru couldn't stay warm either. I think he was finally over it and just wanted to be warm and go home.
So we got Takeshi and Kaleb from the jump park and packed up and headed home.

Once we got home we showered and got dinner ready for everyone and all of us hung out till late, laughing and catching up with old stories etc.
My kids were smashed and so I sent them to bed and they didn't even argue. I think they knew they were tired and wanted to be put to bed.

The next morning the Bigelow's left and Puggs left and I went to church with the kids while Dru worked.
Then eventually Ryan and Topher left as well and we said our thank you's and goodbye's.

It was a crazy but fun weekend and I got through it all in tact and happy.
I'm glad that Masaru had such a great last race and for the season and for his amazing growth and development in the sport.
I'm also grateful to Dru's brother and his mates, for their sacrifice, hardwork and mostly love through service, that they gave to our family when we needed it most.
We are blessed and humbled with the love we've been given.

This is India... blog entry by Dru

The Chairman of the Board is determined to build a potato processing plant in India. He's intrigued with India. For the last few years, the project leg work has been done by a single guy. Now, the project is picking up steam and looks like it will get approved as an official project.

Tim (my boss) and I handle all things international. Tim handles more of the compliance side of the house and handle the transactions--Tim is versed in both, which means I'm not completely on my own. After working in private practice, Tim spent 15 years at Caterpillar and three years at Intel as an in-house international lawyer. He's taken it upon himself to take me under his wing and mentor me into becoming an international lawyer myself.

Tim spent 4 years in Geneva with Cat, an experience that he said has been unrivaled. He said, you can't really be a good international lawyer without living abroad and really wading in.

Enough of that rabbit hole, back to India. Tim and I have successfully invited ourselves onto the project team to help ensure we build a quality facility for a fair price and that we don't engage in corrupt practices that are common place in India. No one is very thrilled about this Project, except our Chairman, and his man that's been trying to get this project off the ground for the last few years. Consequently no one seems to be making this any sort of a priority.

So, Tim and I are trying to steer this project in the right direction. Our Food Group VP of Supply Chain organized a trip to India to see the project site and meet with the engineering firm that we intend to hire to engineer, procure, and construct this facility. Potential train wreck. So, I successfully got myself invited along with Tim. But, part of our reasoning for going over was to interview local counsel, which we'll need to help guide us through the craziness of India.

Tim flew out Saturday to New Delhi to interview a law firm that our man insists we use. I flew out Sunday to Ahmedabad with the VP, Director of Procurement, and an entourage of engineers from our engineering department. We flew out at 2:40pm to Seattle (1.5), then Dubai (14), and arrived in Ahmedabad (3) at 3:00am Tuesday morning--over 20 hours of travel. Sounds terrible, but much more pleasant when you fly business class.

It's been nearly two decades since I've flown business class. Back then the seats were infinitely better than coach, but didn't lay flat--that was reserved for first class. Fast forward, and now business class seats lay flat, so sleeping is not an issue. I think I got a fairly solid straight 8 hours of sleep from Seattle to Dubai.


We got checked into our hotel at about 4:30am local time with a departure for the site at 10:30. Once we hit Dubai, I tried to stay awake so that I could go straight to bed once checked in at the hotel. Worked fairly well and was able to get about 5 hours of sleep. We stayed at a Novotel, which is a European hotel chain--nice place, similar to a Hyatt Place.



After breakfast at the hotel, we embarked on a journey to the project site. The site is out in the sticks, about an hour drive from Ahmedabad. A few interesting observations. Cattle are sacred, but water buffalo are not. Therefore, cattle roam free, including the middle of the road. No one seems to own them. Water Buffalo on the other hand are treated differently, so you'll see small heards being walked by someone.

Back at the hotel we had a cutting, or a french fry tasting. We had several different cuts made from several different varieties of spuds. It's quite amazing the difference in taste variety to variety.

Dinner was at BKs. Not because there aren't better places to eat, but because our man wanted us to try the "value added" specialty products that we intend to produce in the Indian market. These products are more like appetizers than french fries. Think deep fried mozzarella sticks. Very interesting and tasty. Although they like their spice, so some of the products were quite hot.

But wait, aren't cattle sacred in India? What in the world is BKs doing in a non-beef culture? Not to worry you can still get a whopper...it's just mutton and not beef. It wasn't that bad, but still prefer beef. They also have a veggie burger of sorts, but its different than what we'd see here in the states. It's more of a deep fried patty made from potatoes and other vegetables. We sampled one, and it was actually quite good.

The next morning we left the hotel at 5:15am to catch a 7:45am flight from Ahmedabad to Mumbai.

This is where things get crazy. Road rules appeared to be non-existent, a free for all. Yet, I never saw an accident and it seemed to somehow work. When I say free for all, I mean free for all. Lanes? We don't need lanes. Even when traffic was light, our drivers seemed to straddle the dotted lines for no apparent reason. But when traffic is heavy, which is pretty much Mumbai 24/7, it's cars, trucks, and tuk tuks battling it out for space.

I think the only way it works is that you're responsible for what's in front of you and everyone else is responsible for what's going on beside you. Shooting the gap has a whole new meaning in India.

We met up with Tim in Mumbai. The first day, Tim and I left the engineers to attend an interview, so we asked if they could call us a taxi. They said no, and politely told us we could find a taxi around the corner. So we set out on foot, wondering if we would fall through the sidewalk that appeared to have storm drains or sewers running below. No taxis in sight, so we improvised and jumped into a tuk tuk. What's a tuk tuk? Picture a rickshaw (remember that cart that Kramer pulled around during an episode) that's motorized with two wheels in the back and one in the front. the 5-10 minute ride back to the hotel cost us a whopping 50 cents USD.

Western hotels are a target for terrorist activity, so security at the hotel is, at least in appearance, more stringent that the airport. Pulling into the hotel via car required a brief stop to pop the hood, look underneath with mirrors, you know, make sure there weren't any bombs. Once cleared, the barricades dropped down to the pavement so you could drive through to the front door. Once out of the car, you had to send your bags through an x-ray and enter through a metal detector. I'm not sure this step in the process was really achieving anything more than the appearance of security.

The ITC Maratha was a nice hotel. Marble bathrooms, high ceilings, and really nice restaurants onsite--one of the best two restaurants in India--according to our man. One night we ate at said restaurant, a traditional-type place, so no silverware. Food was amazing. The lamb was superb.

One thing about India, good food.

The next day Tim and I took a taxi down south to interview a law firm that was recommended to us by one of our US outside counsel. The taxi driver had no idea where he was going. Thank goodness for google maps. I had to show him my phone several times. In the end, he dropped us off in the completely wrong place. After searching and searching, we finally had to ask for directions. Apparently we were 30 minutes walking distance to the offices we needed to go. Add insult to injury, we had already sent our driver off and told him to pick us up in the same spot in an hour.

We decided to hop in cab to make the meeting. Did I mention that Mumbai is very hot and sticky. Yeah. No AC in our newly acquired taxi. good times. We laughed and said we'll refer back to this experience as "remember that time we got lost in Mumbai..."

Alas, we arrived, fashionably late, but arrived. Our interviewees were kind enough to call our taxi driver and explain where to pick us up, so we didn't have to navigate back to the drop off point.

The last day, we travelled even farther south to the old part of Mumbai. Heavy British influence with some great architecture.

India is an interesting place because the poor are commingled with the rich. There is no good part and bad part of town. There could be a very nice property next door to a shanty. I never saw two nice properties side by side, but rather amalgamated among the slums.









Trash, everywhere? 20 million people in Mumbai in an area smaller than NY City. I don't know where they all live because unlike NY, I didn't see as many high rise buildings like you see in NY. Sure they had skyscrapers, but not packed in like NY. Lots of seemingly abandoned high rise apartments half constructed. Probably full of squatters now. Trash. Did I mention the trash?

Lots of micro businesses run out of shops the size of a shingle car garage. Collectively, I'm told, these businesses make up $50 million per year in revenue. And scooters, lots of scooters. Lots of people riding on said scooters--at one time. We even saw two men riding a scooter while carrying a ladder. But, the ladder wasn't running horizontal like carrying a surfboard. No, it was in between the two of them straight up in the air like a mast on a sailboat. This is India.

While Dru was in India

Yuki lost a tooth.

I don't know if the tooth fairy came or not. I guess she knows now.................

She also started basketball and figured she'd give that a go. She did great.
Dru missed her first game and only really made it to a couple of them which was disappointing to Yuki.
Dru's still trying to find work/dad/life/shop/husband/sleep balance, so we'll let it slide a little now before we decide to toss him to the wayside.

She scored almost every game but didn't get chosen for the Allstars team, which I think is a good thing.
I think it's good for her to learn she's not the best at everything. Although the girls they did pick I questioned slightly over Yuki, I brushed it all off though and still believe it's a good thing.
She had fun, learned lots and it was awesome watching her and her teammates play. They came a long way and did so well and by the end of the short season were pretty great.

While her and her friend weren't on court they'd make things out of coloured clay. Maybe to calm nerves? Or maybe because it's nice to create when sitting. I get it.



I made sure I got my social time by going for walks by the river and looking at the gorgeous views right by my house.

The leaves are so wonderful and the colours so amazing. It was nice to catch up with my mate Sarah and just be outside in this beauty.

I made sure I made it out with my mtb'ing mates as well so I could get that itch scratched.
After riding with Masaru's mtb team I've realized I suck and aren't much help if I don't get better and fitter on the bike. So I think I'll do some training over winter.

It was my mate, Jobecka's 38th birthday and so I got an idea to make this for her when my rotor got replaced.
I needed help with how to execute it though and my mate, Briana helped me to execute that plan. I suck at crafts and she is the queen, so she helped a ton with ideas and getting it finished. So I knitted her something, cause I can knit at least!!


But I think it turned out pretty good for me. My idea was a little different, BUT, I'm not complaining as it turned out pretty good I reckon.
I gave it to Jobecka at 5:30am before we worked out and I gave her a friendship bracelet as well from Peru. I cried while giving it to her and felt like an idiot but then she cried to me after her party so I think we're squared up.
She did a bingo party which was fun. I won nothing, but didn't care. It was good to be out with adult women.

I went on a half-day field trip with Takeshi's class to a historic home right by the school. It's called the Bown House and it was very interesting. I'm really glad I went.
Here's Takeshi at the 'school' getting instructions about how it would've been to be at school around that era.
The lady thought he was a girl, but whatever right!!



Here they are in the kitchen learning about what that would've been like back in the day.

Here they are dressed in the era clothing trying to look sad like the kids would've back then in pictures. They told them they had to have a straight face cause the camera's were different. Takeshi figured he'd just close his eyes and do a sad face.

Then here they are working on the Oregon trail and learning about what that was and how it the people did it.

So we still had fun while Dru was gone to India and I didn't really start missing him till the night before he was due home. I think that's my pattern.
It was nice when he came home and he brought me home some awesome pants which I love, and the kids t-shirts, which were the wrong size for Yuki and Takeshi, and so Emiko got 3 t-shirts hahahaha

I'm going to try to force him to blog about the trip. So wish me luck. It's pretty interesting. So hold tight and I'll see what I can do.

Masaru's 4th race - Jug Mountain McCall

We love McCall and Jug Mt and so we were pumped to go to this race this year. Our friends let us stay in their place so we decided to go up Thursday night and stay through till Sunday.
We got up there and had some dinner and hung out and relaxed then went to bed.
The next morning we decided to go and check out Bear Basin and have all the kids mtb there.
It was just wonderful.
That place is very family friendly and a WONDERFUL place for the whole family to mtb at all levels and to have fun together. It's beautiful and we had a blast there.
Emiko did amazing and I think will be a great mtb'er for sure.
She even had her first crash that we got through together.
Love it.

Here's the little pump track right when you get into the tracks at bear basin.
Here's Masaru trying out the skinny they had there. He did so good.
Doing some sweet jump off of a rock on the trail.
Masaru was trying to coach Takeshi to hit the rock better. It was cute.




Here we all are on this beautiful day together. It's a happy memory for me.

Look at Yuki's pose hahahaha
We then headed back to the house and Dru, Masaru and I went to Jug to help set up the tent and stake out a place for the team to go to then let Masaru do his pre-ride to prep for the race the next day.
We stayed there for a while helping out where we could and making sure everything was ok.
The race course seemed very hilly and Masaru said it was gonna be rough, but that's ok. I think he wasn't expecting much since the last race was rough on him.

We came home and had dinner and hung out together and watched TV and played games.
Later on that night the neighbours knocked on our door and said that we'd be toilet papered and it was suppose to be on their place not our place and that they'd clean it all up the next morning. We went outside and saw what had happened and saw this.

You should've seen the back as well. It was crazy and EVERYWHERE.
We just shut the door and went back inside and hoped the neighbours did their job well the next day hahahaha

The next day we headed out early to get to the set up to support the other kids.
Masaru's race is always between 10:30 and 12:30 because he's in middle school and they have the best times. Next year it'll be a different story cause he'll be a 9th grader or what they call a 'Freshman' and they'll do TWO laps AND either be VERY first racing or LAST racing. So it makes for a crazy day.
But we enjoyed this season for the middle times and the one lap races.

As always I staked out the best places to cheer Masaru on and make sure that I was there to 'yell' at him where he needed it most. Some trails are better than others. Jug was a pretty good one to get to your racer throughout almost the entire race.
Here's a video of his EPIC ending............what a champ right? I mean I can't even get enough of watching it. He BOOSTS it and it was incredible. He just has these turbo's at the end that the other kids simply don't have. It's amazing to me and I LOVE it.
Check it out:


Awesome right!!!
He got 13th in this race and it was amazing and built his confidence back up from the last race.
So, so fun.
We spent the rest of the day there, helping out and such and then helped to pack up and clean up the area and cheer on the other kids.
I always have a ton of fun there with them.
We then headed back and had a shower and got packed up because our friends, Heather and Dave, invited us to stay the night at their house for Saturday night. We figured it'd be fun so said yes. Dru and Dave's other friend, also called Dave, was going to come and stay the night as well in their trailer/caravan they travel in. So it was gonna be a party for sure.
So we got ourselves organized and all packed up and headed over there for the night.
We had hamburgers for dinner and hung out.

Here are most of us at dinner.
So there were 11 kids and 6 adults. Everyone had a friend and someone to play with so it was perfect.
We then watched 'Hunt for the wilderpeople' since Dave and Heather had never seen it. I never tire of watching that movie, can I tell you that!! They laughed and thought it was great, then we stayed up and talked for a while before heading to bed.
It was a really fun night together.
Our whole family slept in the same room. They have two beds in one room and so Dru and I had one and the boys had the other and the girls slept on the floor. It actually wasn't too bad.

In the morning we woke up to Dave making pancakes for us, and I was looking at Heather's meal plan for the week up on her fridge and it said 'Sunday Dave's birthday'. I looked at Dave and said "Today's your birthday?" He said it was. And HE was making US breakfast hahahahahaha
What a great guy.
We all had breakfast together and hung out while Dru and I (mostly Dru) packed up our sleeping gears and got out mtb gears on.
We hugged everyone and said our goodbyes and thanks and happy birthday's hahaha then headed to jug mt to ride before heading back to Boise.
The reason we were leaving so early is Dru had to get home by 1:30-2 to get ready and catch a plane to India for a week for work. But we wanted to hi Jug before we headed out. We REALLY wanted to hit Tamarack but couldn't squeeze it in in the timeframe which is a total bummer.
When we got to Jug Yuki said she wanted to ride, which was a huge surprise and so I ended up staying with Emiko while those guys rode.
We watched 'Hunt for the wilderpeople' while the others rode.
Here's a little fun footage of the little skills park.

Takeshi doing a skinny.
Some sweet jumps.


Fun, fun.
Yuki struggled up the hill but did great on the down, and the rest did great and Masaru and Dru even did two rounds of Berm and Ernie while Emiko and I hung out.
Then we headed back to Boise to get Dru to his plane.