Sand Castle King

We went down to the beach today to soak up some rays and play. When we got there I got the van stuck in the sand. I was able to get it out and move to more compacted ground. Not long after we got out, another car got stuck in the sand and they had to dig it out.
The wind was fierce today and thought it tried to blow us away, we endured for a couple hours. The girls helped cousin Nathan and his friend Jace build a huge sand castle compound. Nathan is the sand castle king!


It has been fun hanging out with Auntie and the boys at the beach house the past couple of days. We are kind of sad we have to go home tomorrow.

Tooth Fairy Visit

K was so excited to find a half dollar from the tooth fairy under her pillow the night after her tooth was lost.

A Tearful Tooth Loss

K came home from Bahmah's with a loose tooth. I was excited to see it but kind of grossed out. She has been wiggling it a lot the past few days; I was the same way when I was a kid.
This evening while eating peas from our garden, she lost her tooth. Unfortunately, she lost it. She either swallowed it or dropped it through the cracks in our deck. She and I were both very upset about it. I was upset because it was her first tooth and I was so looking forward to documenting it. She was upset because she had nothing to leave for the tooth fairy.
After looking on the deck, the table, and in her pea left on her plate, M got his tools and pulled up a board off the deck. We both took turns looking under the deck with a flashlight. We didn't see it, but there is a lot of pea gravel under the deck so it could blend in easily.

M screwed the board back down and K decided to write a note to the tooth fairy about her tooth. Hopefully her next tooth will be able to go under her pillow.

Belated Birthday Bliss

We celebrated my birthday on Sunday since I had been gone all week. M made me a very tasty cinnamon roll cake and some chocolate ice cream. We invited our friends, the Johnston's over to share it with us.
M and the girls got me some pretty earrings and a matching necklace. I can't wait to wear them together. My mom-in-law gave me a card with some spending money. I will be using it to buy some new jeans.

My beautiful girls and me.

I was dreading turning thirty-five, only because I filled out a survey recently and saw that I am now in a new bracket for age groups. It was kind of depressing to see the 35-44 check box. But at least I am at the lower end of the bracket and I look pretty good for my age, if I do say so myself;)

Kountry Kim's

While I was away at Girls Camp, our girls went up to Bahmah's house for a few days. They had a wonderful time as always.

They picked lots of berries and cherries.

They rode the ATV.

The made darling daisy crowns.

They rode Bahmah's horse, Spud.

They went to a friends house and pet the goats.

K made breakfast one morning all by herself. She made scrambled eggs and cut up some fruit. She is always learning great things at Bahmah's. I would think she was too young to do it, but obviously she is very capable. Guess I need to use her more in the kitchen duties:)


They had a great time but L was very happy to see daddy when he came to get them. I think it was harder on her than usual since she has been very whiny and clingy since her return home. Guess she wasn't ready for such a long stay away from mom. They both really enjoyed their time at Kountry Kim's though. Thanks for taking them for the week, Mel!

Good Works Pirates

I spent this last week in a tent at Camp Alpine surrounded by at least 75 young women and 25 or more leaders. It was our annual Girls Camp week and I was excited to be a leader with my friend and YW's counselor, Kristan. We had seven beautiful and amazing girls in our unit. This years motto was Seek Him and pirate themed so our unit's name was The Good Works Pirates.

Kristan and I showed up on Monday to set up our tent and decorate our camp site. We had a treasure chest, rope net, treasure map, banners, signs and other items to spiff up our site. Our tent was set back in the trees with a babbling brook right behind it. Our tent looks quite small but it was HUGE! We had a large queen size mattress in the back and ten feet by 12 feet in the front for all our food and belongings.

Here is our assignment board and list of activities
for the day along with our drinking water and dish water.

Our picnic table with map and tents around.

The first day we went to the confidence course which was a lot of fun. We worked together as a team to accomplish different activities. Climbing up a wooden wall, walking across a rope bridge with our eyes closed, trustingly falling into the arms of our comm rads, holding hands while crossing stumps without falling, and other exercises. It was a lot of fun.


Here some of our girls were trying to start a fire. I say trying because we were unsuccessful at fire starting until the third day at camp. The wood and pine cones were so damp we just couldn't get it going. We even made up a jingle about it to the song We Didn't Start the Fire by Billy Joel.
I celebrated my birthday while at camp. My roomie gave me some body butter and lip gloss. Some of the leaders brought me a cake and sang to me. Our YCL's made a birthday card which they all signed for me. It was really sweet; I had a great birthday!
On Thursday we went on a nature hike and learned about poison plants and edible plants. We had the longest hike at 5 miles. It was a lot of fun and very interesting. Here is a picture of all the second years, our YCL's, the leaders, and our nature guide.
Sitting around the campfire that we FINALLY started on Thursday night. We roasted marshmallows and star-burst. I had never roasted star-burst before, but it was pretty good. All liquidy on the inside and caramelized on the outside. We also had Reese's Peanut Butter Cup s'mores. They were SO tasty!

We had a wonderful time at camp. Besides all the fun, we became certified in lots of survival areas like: using knives, cloud identification, fire starting, emergency first aid, etc. We had amazing Devotionals each night, crafts, archery and swimming during the day. We even had a polar dip, which I did NOT participate in but Kristan did. There were so many great things each day and night I can't really pick one I loved. I was sad to go back into the world at the end of the week but excited to see my family and have some flushing toilets once again. Not to mention being warm at night. It rained the first couple days we were there and got so cold at night. But we got through it and I look forward to going again next year.

Tour of Autzen Stadium

Let me start off by saying that we are not duck fans in this family. But don't despair, we aren't football fans in general. If I had to pick a college team, it would be the Mizzou Tigers since I grew up in Missouri; M could care less about any team.
But when I heard a group from church was going to take the kids on a tour, I thought we should go along. I mean, we do live here and it is a huge obsession with Eugenians. It's part of the culture and would be fun for the kids to see in person.
I was amazed at how cool it was. Here is the eternal flame outside the stadium. The three pillars represent the past, present, and future players. Before every game the team walks beneath the flame and touches each pillar for good luck.
Here is their indoor field. It was awesome! It is exactly the same as the real field but they are able to adjust the conditions inside to those they will be playing in. They can make it super hot for when they are playing in Arizona. They can push air in through tubes making a wind up to 20 miles per hour to prepare the kickers for such weather. There are even speakers that simulate the noise of the crowd on game day to prepare the newbies.

One of their billboards with the air ducts above.

The kids loved running around on the turf.

A picture of most of the kids on the indoor training field.

Right outside the stadium.
The kids running down the tunnel onto the field.

Look at them running to the end zone.

Another picture of the kids up in the stands.

The tour guide said that Phil Knight has a bathroom right near section 31
and under the toilet seat there is a Nike swoosh with the words
Just Do It!. We all thought that was quite amusing.

Weekend Camping Trip

We took the kids to Loon Lake for camping this weekend along with four other families, a total of ten adults and fifteen kids 9 and under. We had a fabulous time playing, swimming, hiking, and hanging out together.
We showed up about noon on Friday and went to our group campsite which was HUGE! We fed the kids lunch and then went to work setting up the tents. All the husbands but mine had to work and showed up around dinner time along with the last family. M set up our tent and bed while the rest of us worked on the other tents. When it was all said and done, there were 7 tents and one mosquito tent set up. One of the tents was a mammoth of a tent and took us a while to figure out, but we got 'er done.

Here are most of the tents set up. This shows about 1/3 of our site.

In the late afternoon we headed down to the "beach" to play in the water. It wasn't very big or very nice looking but the kids had some fun splashing in the water. None of us brought a camera so no pictures of the yucky beach.
After playing for an hour or so, we headed back to camp for dinner. M was in charge of getting the fires started. We had one fire pit and one grill going for cooking hot dogs and foil dinners. The kids had a blast cooking dogs over the fire.

My fireman:)

Don't they look cute?

Enjoying the tasty dinner they made.

After dinner we made s'mores which are a camping must. Kristan said she makes her s'mores with reeses peanut butter cups, so I tried it and it was very tasty! I definitely will have to remember that one for girls camp next week.
After eating dessert the kids ran around playing while the parents ate their dinners. Then we got the kids ready for bed and put them down. We got the girls new sleeping bags for this trip and they really liked them. I was surprised that the girls went down as easily as they did. It went a lot better than it usually does at home and they slept like logs. I on the other hand, couldn't get much sleep the first night and I was freezing all night.
On Saturday we made a communal breakfast and then went for a hike to Loon Lake Falls. It was an easy hike but we were so glad we did it. The falls are near a beautiful, spacious swimming beach and it was only $5 per car to get in to the park to do both.
The kids enjoyed going to see the falls. It made our family miss all those weekends last year when we hiked to falls. I think we will be doing that again in the weeks to come.

Below the falls.

On the rocks right by the falls.

After the hike we headed back to our campsite for lunch and then changed into our swimsuits. We drove back to the park and headed to an area on the sand and claimed it as our own. We stayed at the beach for about four hours playing and swimming. M and I have two blow up rafts we have had since we were first married. This was the second time out of their box and they were fun to play with. All the parents took turns taking their kids out in the water. I think we will be taking our kids on a floating trip soon. They really enjoyed sitting with us on the boat.

Burying J in the sand.

Hanging out in the shade.
All the adults got burned but none of the kids did.
Guess we did a better job lathering the sunscreen on them.

K doing a great job swimming around in the deep lake.

L playing with a water gun.

We all agreed we had a wonderful time and it wouldn't have been nearly as fun if we had done it by ourselves. There is just something about having friends around that makes camping more fun and easier to do. The girls are already asking when we can do this again. Definitely a weekend worth repeating.