Bubble Gum Alley

Ok, so I'm no Martha Stewart. First, she would not be pictured in Bubble Gum Alley. I'm sure she would be on a cobblestone rue that is over a few hundred years old where every town blacksmith has constructed some type of art work instead of an alleyway where everyone has discarded their gum. Second, she would have remembered to pack everything. Not only remember but giving 5 tips on how to do it efficiently, thus our trip to SLO. So one day one of my offspring tells me they didn't pack any panties. Hmmm...quickly my mind went to how long that could last. Then another of my children says he doesn't have any socks. (We all know what that means when we wear shoes with no socks, P U). So after much consternation and debating about where and how far we had to go we decided to drive the 30 miles to buy some of these items at a more affordable cost instead of buying panties that say, "My parents went to Cambria and all they brought back for me were these panties," for $29.99. Just to add insult to injury, the same young lad that didn't have any socks also replied to my inquiry of his wearing a sweatshirt, that "no" he didn't have a T-shirt on underneath. We made the most of the unexpected trip and checked a few things out. We were able to purchase things at a very good price and they are also stocked up for this fall for school. As an organized media mogul would pen, "It's a good thing!"

Elephant Seals

We were blessed by a generous family offering their home by the coast for a few days. The first day we went to the elephant seals. It's not their peak time to be on the beach but there were enough to watch. They throw sand up on themselves, for what reason, I am unsure. The last time we saw them it was raining so we enjoyed this time a little better.

Kissing Camels

This rock structure is called "Kissing Camels." We saw this amongst many other beautiful rocks in Garden of the Gods. We were delayed getting into Denver last Friday due to mechanical problems. So that made our quick weekend that much quicker. We missed one of the family parties for my Uncle Gerrit and Aunt Mary's anniversary party at Glenn Eyrie. So we packed a lot of thing in on Saturday. We ate a very quick breakfast and drove to Garden of the Gods for a couple hours. After that we were able to see all the family at my aunt and uncle's 50th anniversary party. After that we visited the Air Force Academy and Focus on the Family. From there we got to eat with all the remaining cousins and their families and then a few of us got to play a friendly game of miniature golf. It was so good to see all my family from there again. It had been 20 years since I had seen some of them.

Here is the chapel at the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The smoke in the background is from the Waldo Canyon fire.

Shade

Summer's haven from the sweltering heat of the sun.

Amphibians

We brought our tent trailer to the dairy yesterday. It's always a fun time. We get to have coffee with Opa and experience rural life. I can tell though that my kids have not grown up on or near a dairy. At our arrival they were turning up their nose at the smell and asking if they were walking on cow poop (mud and rice hulls). First, let me just say that I can't believe they can be squeamish about it. Second, they don't know the difference between cow excrement and muddy rice hulls. Hmmmm, you may NOT be a redneck if. . . Anyway, after coffee time they got to catch some frogs. We brought 3 frogs home with us and put them in our abandoned fish aquarium. It is now an amphibian terrarium. Maybe living in the "city" produces rapid, resourceful thinking. Anyway, I think this frog is comforting the remaining frog, yes, I said remaining. The other has gladly escaped from our children's clutches. But not before consuming his fair share of baby crickets.

Family Jamboree

Our annual family trip to the coast was a nice, cool breeze in the midst of very hot temperatures at home. We enjoyed ice cream, swimming, and lots of family time. The annual golf outing ended up with Blake arriving and leaving with the family trophy. The yearly scavenger hunt for the kids was another success. The prize was a candy bar for all the participants. We had successful bike rides and yummy s'mores. What great memories!

Toothless

It's been a long time coming. Kenna has seen many classmates and younger, lose their teeth, one by one or two by two. She is finally starting to lose some. For the longest time she has only lost 2 teeth, up until this past week. The "tooth fairy" forgot to give her money, which is a shocker since she's been waiting so long for her to make her appearance. We were all happy to see the tooth fairy goes on vacation with us. She's just days away from losing another. She's going to get fitted for her second apparatus tomorrow at the orthodontist. Her first one wasn't working. I think it had more to do with her not remembering to wear her retainer which is suppose to work together alongside of her apparatus. I think the tooth fairy should dole out more money for the teeth because she's an extortionist in the name of dentistry.

K's birthday

It was Kenna's birthday. . . a month and-a-half ago but as long as we're not keeping track of how long it has taken me to post some things we are very glad we didn't celebrate her birthday late. We dared to have a slumber party, but only with 3 extra girls. With our family though, we still had 6 young girls running around. It was nice and laid back. I don't know if that has been used to describe slumber parties before but we had a good time.

Piano

Jacie finished her second year of piano lessons. This also marked a milestone for her piano teacher Sharon as well. After having baby number three she decided to end lessons permanently. We are sad to have to find someone else but glad she's making decisions that are best for her family. Fortunately for us, we go to church together and hang out occasionally so not all is lost in seeing her.

Challenge

I was telling the girls about the 90-day challenge the women of our church are doing to read the New Testament and asked them if they wanted to do it too. This is them listening to the Bible being read to them on my Ipod. I don't always like technology but here was one awesome way to use it. As Jamie Grace would sing, "God Girl."

Berries of Blue

We love summer! Especially when it isn't so "blazing hot," as our children like to say. We love picking our own food. We were able to pick blueberries the other day. That was a first for all of us. If we had to take a vote, I think 5 out of 6 prefer this over any other produce we've plucked from the earth. The 6th liked picking them she just doesn't prefer to eat them. What a servant-hearted girl to labor over something you don't even get to enjoy the bounty of.

Mini-me

Can anyone guess what she's doing? After the kids got their disposable cameras we went on a hike around our campground. The kids were all too eager to snap some pictures. I think they've seen me take a few. I like to capture different points of view and it's apparent that I'm not shy about getting in awkward positions to achieve a shot.

Legoland

We really enjoyed riding all the rides in Legoland. Carter was just over the required height which made things nice. The only limiting thing was fear. It took some convincing to get Jacie on the roller coaster. We told her we wouldn't have to go on another one if she didn't want to but she had to at least try one. I think she enjoyed it after all was said and done but if there was some heart monitor on her it would have spiked as soon as we said we were going on one and didn't stop until we got off. The only complaint we had of the park was the displays were a bit dirty. The grounds didn't seem to be kept up quite as well as we had expected. We had a great day though.

San Juan Capistrano

We visited the mission in San Juan Capistrano. I must say, it was very beautiful. It was nice because they handed out "phones" to all the kids so they got to punch in a code to hear about that part of the grounds. I was amazed at how big the mission was and of course how beautiful it was. We had heard that this is the "jewel" of all the missions in California.

Carlsbad

Is anyone a fan of Huell Howser? I can't remember the last time I watched him. Maybe when I was nursing. Anyway, he travels up and down California looking for "California's Gold." I remember seeing an episode on the flower fields of Carlsbad and thought that some day I would like to go see them in person and take some pictures. I think the only way to do that place justice is to rent an airplane or helicopter and take an aerial shot. We went camping in San Diego county. We planned on going to Legoland one of the days there. I knew that if we went to Legoland the first day they'd practically shun me at the thought of visiting flowers after that, so I scheduled this for the first day. We also got them recyclable cameras so they were pretty excited to visit the ranunculus. Personalities sure did come out upon receiving the cameras. Carter was practically done with his pictures before we left the campground. Avery and Kenna were a little more conservative about it but still ended up being done by the first day. Jacie had allotted 2 for the campground, 3 for this, 4 for the flower fields, etc... Although she showed the most promise, she did end up using them up quicker than what she planned but lasted longer than the rest.

April Fools

 I have enjoyed finding things to trick the kids with for April Fools Day.  I think last year I made candy bars look like breadsticks and green Airheads rolled into peas.  This year I had a few up my sleeve.  Kenna likes having a fried egg for breakfast sometimes so I made this for her.  It's yogurt and a half of a peach. 

Jacie has been into collecting seeds for her garden so I printed out this seed packet and put Cheerios inside it.  She read the label and still didn't realize it was a trick until she was going to divide her "seeds."

For lunch I made them Jello in cups with straws so it looked like punch.  After that the kids were scheming.  They tried mixing glue, lotion and some other stuff to make it pink.  I thought at one point, this could get kind of messy.

Cherry Cupcakes

 The kids, traditionally, get to pick their birthday cake.  This year Avery wanted cupcakes.  We had the Boersmas, Kostelyks, and the Olsens over for after-school snack.  After all the fun and running around we went to Red Robin for her birthday dinner.

Birthday Girl

 This is Avery on her birthday in her class.  We made butterfly crafts for her birthday since it also is the first day of spring.  She helped me the night before assemble the snack for her class, which also looked like a butterfly.

Pioneers

 Here's Jacie, her class, and a demonstration of what they might have felt after their journey.