Summer Fun

Sheesh, I can't believe that it is July 7th already. The summer is flying by. The kids will be back in school before we know it, which I often think throughout the day as Hannah and Justin are having one of their numerous arguments, wouldn't be such a bad thing. But I really am not ready for summer to be over. We don't have any big summer plans--no epic road trips or trips to far off destinations planned--but we have had lots of summer fun. The weather has been quite warm lately, although we have cooled off the past few days to a very pleasant upper 60's/lower 70's. We did buy a new slightly larger kiddie pool. On one 90 degree day last week, we filled it up and without even giving it a chance to warm up at all, the kids dove in. Owen, especially, was ready to go, but after being in there awhile, he would get so cold that his lips were blue, but he would not want to get out. As soon as he did get out and get dry and warmed up, he would jump right back in.

After hearing that my dear friend, Annaliese, does a Camp Fun for a week with her kids, Hannah and Justin were insistent that we had our own Camp Fun, which included family movie nights and a backyard campout. Dale set up the big tent and Hannah and Justin moved a great deal of their bedrooms out there and slept out there all on their own for 2 nights. Either Dale or I slept on the couch just in case there were any middle of the night emergencies like large bugs. I can't believe they stayed out there on their own. I don't even think I ever managed to stay the whole night out in a tent with my siblings. There was usually a spider or something that would force me inside. Camp Fun the way Annaliese did it would also include crafts and things, but this mom was not that organized. Hannah and Justin seemed satisfied with the movie nights and campouts. Maybe next year, I'll actually try to put together something a little more organized and maybe even invite the cousins over. Maybe I can arrange something with my sisters where we trade off days. Are you reading this, Marcie and Sara?

We also have made a trip to the zoo, which made Owen very happy. He asks almost every day if we are going to the zoo. At the end of summer, the new lion exhibit will be open, so that will be very exciting to see.

Of course, the highlight of summer so far has been the 4th of July. During the day, we all went to see the new Pixar movie, "Up." I highly recommend it. It even kept Owen sitting pretty still in his seat the whole time. Later on, we went to Grandma Judi's like we have for quite a few years now. There weren't as many of us. Only Aunt Sara, Uncle Gary and Katelyn and Ashley were there for a while. The kids all went in Grandma's hot tub, which she had turned down so the kids could use it as a pool. I don't know what they like better on the 4th--the fireworks or Grandma's hot tub. Even better is watching all the fireworks from the hot tub like Hannah and Justin did. They can hardly stand to wait until it is dark enough to light fireworks. We did quite a few of them before it was dark like smoke bombs. The kids loved those things this year. Owen, however, was not excited in the least about the fireworks. He could not stand anything with even a slightly loud pop. He just freaked out and insisted we go home. He also was not happy that the helicopter fireworks that he so proudly chose at the fireworks stand were going to be blown up. He was very angry when we brought them home from the stand, and he could not bring them inside to play with them like all his other toys. We did manage to get him calmed down inside, and he would watch the pretties from the window. Grandma Judi stayed with him most of the night watching from inside. We quickly blew up our $75 worth of fireworks and then moved to the back deck to watch everyone else blow up way more than we spent. We also saw the show that Washougal put on and Corbett across the river. It really is the ideal location.

This is what happens when you light 3 smoke bombs at once.

Frightened on the Fourth!

My standard sparkler photos

Next up for the summer is a 2 night trip to the Oregon Coast to Newport this weekend. We are going to stay in our favorite place there, the Hallmark Inn, which is right on the water and go to the aquarium.

Hannah's Hip Hop Showcase and other events

Well, last weekend was Hannah's hip hop dance showcase after her first year with Groove Nation Dance. She loved it, and I believe she will be continuing with it for quite awhile. Her only complaint was that she was only in one dance (some kids were in 4 or 5) and that she didn't get to dance at the evening show where some of the competetive teams and professional groups danced. It was an awesome show. The finale dance was a huge production with tons of competitive teams and instructors, and it was a huge hip hop praise to Christ. It was amazing. I have uploaded a video I took during Hannah's rehearsal. She is in the blue shirt on the end dancing next to her friend, Maya, who was in the white shirt. Keep watching until the end where you can see Hannah do her famous freestyle splits move.

Here's the whole crew

Here's Hannah busting out her moves during intermission of the evening show.

Meanwhile, Justin started doing karate last month. He has done well. A couple weeks ago they had a board breaking event where he broke four boards. He had previously broke one to get his white belt. Here is a photo of him breaking his board. Hannah also broke a board, as well as their friends Ian and Gabby that went with them.

Hannah and I will be leaving momentarily for Girl Scout camp in Yamhill, OR for the weekend. It will be the troop leader, myself and 6 girls. I'll let you know how it goes, when I return.

Happy Birthday Grandma!!!!

Happy Birthday to Grandma Sharon!!!!!

It's Been Awhile

Wow, it's been a really long time since I've blogged. A lot has gone on since my last post, and I've had pictures and things I've wanted to share, but I just could not get myself motivated to actually get on here and post. I love my computer and all the things I can do on it, but sometimes, I think that it sucks the life out of me, and after I get on and get caught up on all the scrapbooking message boards I'm involved in and do whatever else, I need to do, I just don't want to get on here and start typing, especially since I know it will take me awhile to say what I want to say. I won't even try to get caught up with everything that's gone on since my last post.

I do want to share some photos that I took over Memorial Day weekend. We had a very nice weekend. The weather was great--it has been sunny and warm for well over a week now--today it was in the upper 80's. The kids had Friday and Monday off, and Dale took them off as well. Friday we drove up the Columbia River Gorge to Bonneville Dam on the WA side where we went inside the dam and to the fish viewing room. Then we went to the OR side and went to the fish hatchery, which was very cool. There were ponds full of huge rainbow trout, and a pond with a viewing window that had very large sturgeon, including Herman, the 10 foot long, 70 year old sturgeon. Owen, especially loved all the fish.

The lovely "Hanford green" Columbia River water

The kids and Dale watching the numerous rainbow trout

Owen watching Herman the Sturgeon

Saturday was spent doing some things around the house. Dale did a little yardwork, while I started to tile our kitchen backsplash, which has been left undone for almost 2 years since finishing our kitchen remodel. I actually didn't end up doing much since I called a friend of ours who did tile for years to ask a few questions and if I could borrow his tile saw. He ended up coming over and pretty much doing the whole job. That's the way to do home improvement projects. I still have to grout the tile, though, which is the messy part. I'll post pics when I get it all done.

Monday we took another road trip up to Mt. St. Helens. Apparently, Dale has never been up there despite living here 13 years. I guess I just assumed we've gone up there. It was a gorgeous day, and we drove up to the Johnson Ridge Visitors' Center. Despite the eruption of Mt. St. Helens being a huge part of my history, the kids weren't too interested in all they could learn at the visitors' center, but we hiked around a little and tried to impart as much knowledge as we could to them. It is amazing to see where the side of the entire mountain blew out and the effect it had on the area. Things have grown and recovered tremendously there in 29 years (the anniversary was May 18th), but there are still areas where all the mudslides occurred that remind me of the surface of the moon.

Reflected in the window of the Visitors' Center

Trying to get these kids to pose all together for a picture is like pulling teeth.

Yeah for the sun!!!

Well, it's been a long time posting. Since my last post, we had Dale's birthday and Easter both on the same weekend. It was, of course, a good weekend. Unfortunately, the weather for the weekend wasn't good, so there weren't any outdoor egg hunts, but the kids had fun dying eggs and then finding ones filled with candy and their baskets and gifts on Easter morning before going to church to celebrate Jesus rising from the dead. He is risen indeed. After church, we went to Grandpa Mike's and Grandma Carol's for dinner. Of course the kids had an egg hunt there and got yet more candy, but the highlight of the day was seeing Grandpa and Grandma's new baby chicks. Grandpa Mike is building a chicken coop apparently and raising chickens. The kids also inform me he is going to get cows and a pony for the kids to ride. That should be fun. Hannah declared she really wanted some baby chicks, but my response was that those cute baby chicks grow into not so cute chickens that we have nowhere to keep.

The kids with their dyed eggs.

In their Easter best after church

The baby chicks

Fast forward a week and the weather has greatly improved. This weekend was sunny and warm and today was absolutely gorgeous and very warm. I actually took the boys to the zoo after picking up Justin from school. They had a great time, especially Owen, who had a great time right up until we left. The whole way home, he was very angry that we weren't still at the zoo. While a lot of animals were very lazy in the sun, we did have great fun watching the polars bears splashing around with a ball right on the other side of the glass, the sea lions which are always entertaining, the river otter, the sun bears and the cheetah. Later in the day, the kids had their first fling in the sprinkler. That is another thing that Owen was very upset when it ended. We also had our first cookout of the year. I hope this is just the first of many such days to come for the spring and summer.

One last thing I want to share with you. I've actually been doing an online crop over at the My Sketch World forum and one of the challenges is to make a card using word art that you can do on http://www.wordle.net/. This site is so awesome. You can go to it and create your own wordart by typing in any text or series of words you want and it will create a piece of wordart using those words. You can even choose different color combos, layouts and fonts. Here is one I made using the text from my last blog post on our Spring Break trip to the coast.







You need to click on it to see it larger. Anyway, just something cool.

Adieu Spring Break and Hello Spring!

Well, today was the first day back to school after Spring Break. The kids were not happy to have to get up and go back to school, although it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Usually Hannah gives me more grief about going back after any kind of time off. Of course, the spring weather came upon us just as the kids had to head back to school. It was downright warm today with more to come tomorrow. If we're not careful, we just might come down with Spring Fever. The cherry trees have finally bloomed full on, and they are gorgeous right now.

Our Spring Break this year wasn't typical. For the entire week, we were actually in the process of having our hardwood floors refinished. We actually avoided the process altogether at the beginning of the week by getting away for a few days. We went to Cannon Beach along the Oregon coast. I was worried that we were going to have horrible weather because the forecast just showed rain the whole time we were going to be there, but we were pleasantly surprised with gorgeous weather the two main days we were there. There was lots of sun and no rain until the morning when we were packing to check out. It was windy and cold, but at least we were able to be outside, walking along the beach, playing in the sand and if you're Hannah and Justin, even playing in the water despite the freezing cold temperatures. I don't know how they do that but they had fun. It was a nice relaxing getaway. Here are just a few of the many photos I took.

Picture perfect in front of Haystack Rock

Okay, so Justin insisted on bringing the goggles thinking he was going to need them in the water.

Owen decided that he needed to wear them at the tidepools. We got a lot of looks and comments. Of course everyone thought he was great.

Discovering the tidepools around Haystack Rock at low tide.

Hannah working on her sandcastle compound.

Justin got buried up to his waist.

And our crazy kids running in the FREEEEZING cold waves.

We got home Tuesday and hoped that our floor would be almost done, but due to a few delays, there were still 3 days before it was completely done. When we first walked in the house, the stain was on, and I was not very happy with it and almost freaked out. It was not what I had envisioned. It was just so different and took a little getting used to. He assured me that it would look a lot different once the two finish coats were on. I trusted him. For the two days that the finish was being applied, we had to be out of the house for most of the day. We did a lot of visiting of family and friends, which was fun, but after you're there for 5 hours or so, it gets to be a little much, and I just wanted to see the floor. Now, that it is done, I can tell you that the floor looks amazing. All the wear and tear from the 18+ years on the old nasty floor and the damage we added when we remodeled the kitchen have been erased, and the now all there is is a smooth gorgeous finish. All we have to do now is put up the tile backsplash and our kitchen remodel that started 2 years ago will be totally complete. Our next major project will be getting all that mauve tile out of our master bath---Ugh!!!

I Saw...

and it was AWESOME!!!! Yesterday I went and saw Wicked with Annaliese and Heidi, someone I met through Annaliese. I really didn't know much about this musical, but I have just known for a long time that I REALLY wanted to see it, so when tickets went on sale last fall, I did not stop bugging Annaliese until we had tickets. Then the problem is the long wait before you actually get to go see it. Well, it was worth the wait. I haven't seen an incredible amount of Broadway shows, but I have seen a few very good ones like The Lion King and Mamma Mia--even High School Musical was incredibly entertaining, but Wicked was, in the words of some annoying Bostonian portrayed on Saturday Night Live, "wicked awesome!" The set was AHHHMazing and the acting and singing were just incredible. At first, I was bummed because the understudy was playing Glinda the Good Witch, and somehow I felt cheated--like I wasn't going to get the best I could get. But if she was the understudy, then I couldn't imagine how good the main person playing the role is. Actually I did YouTube and watched the main gal, and I actually preferred the gal we had. It is an amazing story, which gives a whole new meaning to The Wizard of Oz. I will never watch that movie the same again. If you get the chance to see this show, I HIGHLY recommend it. In fact, I am thinking about making Dale go see it with me again when it goes to Seattle in September. I worry about seeing things a second time though, because can it live up to my high expectations a second time around? We'll see what happens.