Young Eagles

There have been many things that we miss being part of now that we have left DuPont. Naturally finding out about all the stuff our new home of Puyallup has to offer has been slow. Puyallup is so much bigger. The nice thing about living in a small town like Dupont is everyone always knows what's going on. Not so great if you are trying to keep family secrets but awesome if you want to be involved and have fun stuff to do.

Dave called me from work to tell me about this opportunity. The local airport here host Young Eagles once a year. Kids from 8 to 18 can go up one on one with a pilot for a 15 minute ride in a small plane. I knew it sounded too good to be true but it was worth a try so we signed the kids up.

Well, good news, it was better than we could have hoped for. First of all there were no strings attached. Not a single one. No one pushing you to donate money. No one making you feel guilty about anything. Just plain old community service by a bunch of guys that own planes. We didn't even have to pay for the gas.

All of the kids were divided into small group of 10 or so. Then the kids first went through a short safety course about flying. Then their guide took them to a plane and they learned about all the different parts of the plane and all about how planes can fly. After the short intro to flight they just waited for a pilot to come and get them. Emily and Chase didn't even have to fly together. They took each one up in their own plane.

Both kids were super excited about it. Emily's pilot did some tricks with her and Chase's pilot let him fly for a bit. Smiles were awfully big that afternoon. The little girls and Dad and I had fun touring the field and checking out all the different types of planes. The weather was perfect and we had lemonade and treats. It was awesome. Definitely a must do every year in Puyallup!

PS If you are wondering why Chase looks like a leper...he is VERY allergic to poison ivy!!!

Karie's Smile

This is Kate's smile. Straight lips totally closed. I think you can always see timidity in her eyes, but they are always happy. (if she's smiling...if she is in the throws of a tantrum which seem to happen increasingly often these days...well don't look at her eyes, they'll turn you to stone). I hate that she hides her teeth and is so straight lipped. I always try to coax her into showing me some teeth. But then her smile is so forced it is absolutely not genuine looking at all. So I have stopped asking her - for the most part. There are rare moments when I get a totally spontaneous absolutely happy open lipped smile out of Kate. But then I am usually enjoying the moment with her too much to capture it with the camera. So for the most part most of my pictures of Kate are sure to have this reserved smile. That's who she is, sweet and contemplative.

Sara's Smile

This is Sara's smile. Can't you see the mischief not only in her eyes but in the way she smiles?! She is 100% trouble and I think her little smile totally gives it away! She either smile with tight little lips biting her bottom lip and showing off those cute tiny teeth. Or she is taking it way over the top. I usually get this second smile if I ask her to smile. Her eyes open wide, she grins ear to ear, shows as many teeth as possible and then adds a bit of attitude. This is Sara!

Hiking in Idaho

I love Sallie! I love that she lives in Idaho. You have no idea how perfect it is that her home is the half way point from here to Utah. It makes traveling to Utah so much easier!And the best thing is that we love our days with the McArthurs. Sallie learned the art of hospitality from Dave's mom. Everyone was always welcome at Wilcox HQ. I always feel welcome even if I will be arriving at awful early morning hours! She makes us yummy meals, clears her schedule to spend time with us and usually has some totally great activity planned. She is even thoughtful enough to get us out and about to stretch our legs. Last year we really loved floating down the Boise river! This year we went on a small hike to see a waterfall.

The kids were really excited about the hike. I really do have a wild bunch of explorers. I think the best thing really was getting out of the car and running around. The waterfall was nice, but oh man was that water frigid. I don't know where it comes from but it was more than COLD!!! I bribed Emily and Chase $5 bucks each if they would swim out to the falls. They were both game. Poor Emily brave as she is only made it half way. She is a slower swimmer. I was about to jump in after her. The water was so cold she looked like she was having trouble breathing. Chase made it all the way out and then suffered there perched on a rock as he crapped from the cold unwilling to come back. Poor kids. I am such a mean Mom! Really the water was so cold I didn't even put my feet in because it hurt!!!

Here the kids are blazing their own path. It might be their very last time cutting their own trails. Chase ran into some kind of poisonous plant. I never saw any poison ivy or oak but it must have been there. If it is there he finds it. Several people have told us it doesn't grown in Western Washington. Well, Chase has found it. And now we know it was somewhere on this hike. We noticed it the next day! Now that we have experience though we started treating it right away. They sell stuff that neutralizes the oils and we washed EVERYTHING!

But the damage had already been done. This is Chase after two weeks of healing. Scary huh. It got so bad and swollen that the doctor put him on some heavy doses of steroids and antibiotic cream. So now we know...Chase is very allergic to the nasty stuff!!! Don't worry (I did) no scarring!

PS Another great thing about our trip was that Ray noticed I had an almost flat tire which we fixed on the way home. I would have been in whole heaps of trouble the next morning!

Kathy's Farm

Our Aunt Kathy has a farm E-I-E-I-O...

Well not really but my kids think it's hers and that it is wonderland. Kathy has a friend up the road who has a working farm. Every time we visit she brings us to the farm. We "adults" sit and talk while the kids play with their extended cousins and discover the wonders of farm life.

From collecting eggs, catching humming birds, feeding the horses, watching the pigs wallow, playing with gots, csnuggling with kittens, chasing baby geese, searching for snakes...you name it...Kathy's farm has it. And this year there were two brand new ponies on the farm. That was heaven.

It was so fun to watch the kids running in the fields with the horses and trying to steer clear of mommy horse's hooves!

We had a wonderful lunch and then sat back to relax in the shade while the kids played on. And as we sat we were groomed by the goose. How many farms have a shoe grooming goose? Not to many I tell ya!

All The Great Grandkids Minus Three

Flying Planes

It has been the summer of planes! Here we are flying again. Well not actually. We are flying planes. Or trying to fly a plane. Chase and Papo had the best luck. I think the girls just didn't have a strong enough arm to give it a good start. Papo bought us this remote control plane last year. But the weather wasn't right and then he was sick and so it isn't until almost a year later that we are flying!

It was a wonderful afternoon activity. I love that my Grandpa tries to find activities to spend quality time with the kids. He is the best!

The Apple Of Her Eye

We are in Utah again! School got out and we were on the road! In a mad dash to get to Utah before it gets hot and to get back to Washington before summer BLISS begins. After asking friends where we should go for some fun (we rarely explore much of Utah when we visit) I decided Park City was a must. It sounded like something the kids would love. I had hoped that there would be more places to sit and enjoy watching the kids than there were though. It is always such a hard balance to find places to satisfy my rambunctious kids and easy going enough (mostly meaning low activity) for Grandpa. I was so surprised Park City has such scant amount of seating! After looking around I came to the conclusion that the only place to sit was the chair lift. So Papo, Sara and I went on a long tram ride. (don't you love how Sara's pants are slowly slipping off her hiney!?!)

We did eventually find seats. From there Papo and I were able to watch the kids play on the trampolines, come down the alpine slides and dance and spin in the court yard.

After an hour or two we started to die. It was such a hot day, but we had to get our moneys worth. Papo treated everyone to ice cream and I treated everyone to a sunburn. Washington has spoiled me. I so rarely have to worry about sun like we did in California and should have here in Utah! By the time I thought to buy sunscreen it was too late. So much for taking good care of my Grandpa. We burnt up pretty good!

Today I was absolutely manipulated by my two year old. I took the kids to Old Navy so that I could by my three oldest a summer outfit to wear to Utah. Buying clothes for Sara was not at all in the plans! That little girl has more clothes than we have hangers.

I walked with the kids around the store for 15 minutes getting more an more frustrated by the minute!They were being such BLAH shoppers. No one was finding anything that screamed awesome to them. They were all having zero interest in any of the outfits I was selecting for them. I was about to lose my mind. The girls were solely interested in playing with the hula hoops and all Chase wanted to do was look for quarters on the ground to buy bouncy balls from their quarter machine.

Then there was Sara. She was all over the place. One minute she was a t a table oohing and awing over a shirt. Then she was pulling clothes of the racks and running to plead for them. She had accessories picked out and and was wearing half of the stuff she was finding. She was totally cracking me up! I had to take some pictures (unfortunately with my IPhone). We walked out of the store with nothing for the girls, a pair of shorts for Chase and a whole bag full of clothes (that we didn't need) for Sara. I would say my little two year old has definitely learned how to work the system!

I love my little passionate shopper!!!

Smile of The Day

My girlfriend just emailed me this video and I laughed so hard. It's awesome. Awesome enough to make me possibly consider becoming a Toyota girl and leaving Honda at the altar. No...not really....

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My Informercial Queen

Katie is a sucker for commercials! It cracks me up. A few months ago she came to me and told me that she saw something on TV that only cost $19 that would make my skin really soft and it had everything I needed. This cool scrubber, that nifty polisher etc... It was in response to me telling her I wish I had baby soft skin like her and Sara.

Every week there is some new toy that she wants. Mind you we watch very little commercials. Mostly the kids watch Nick Jr which is commercial free bless there hearts. But occasionally Chase is on one of the bigger kid cartoon channels and they get her. This week she is all about Pillow Pets. That is what she wants for her birthday. At Christmas it was Zhu Zhu pets. Who knows what it will be next week.

I wish I could remember the words that came out of her mouth a couple of days. It was another one of those, "Mom I saw the perfect thing for you" conversations. My mind is drawing a total blank now that I am trying to blog about it. But it was SOOOOO funny. I vaguely remember that it was about my feet. Humm...maybe she will remember.