Randomness

I felt like I needed a spot to remember all the little, random things that don't fit any of the bigger posts.

This one is just funny.  I know, I know, this is considered bad family time, but they were actually all interacting with each other about what was on their screens.  I promise.

Christopher and I went racing for a date!

Loved this Valentine I found on my bed!

Jasmine's preschool went on a field trip to see the Fire Station.  Arson, the dog, was a real sweetie.

Tyler LOVED the class pet lizard this year.  He talked about her all the time.  His teacher was actually amazing as using that for motivation.  Do your math, and then you can draw a picture of the lizard.  Read this story, and then you can hold the lizard on your shoulder.

Mr. Josh was most excited to show me the Valentine that Tyler wrote for Mr. Lizard.  Tyler was sure that the Lizard loved "his" card, too.

Kaitlyn had her final piano recital, and then asked us to quit taking piano.  Since Christopher and I both begged our parents to quit lessons and only took a year each, we felt like we would be hypocrites if we refused.  I'm hoping to find ways for her to keep her skills, without feeling bogged down by lessons.

And speaking of endings, Tyler received his Arrow of Light and finished Cub Scouts. He loved Cubs, but he loves 11 year old scouts just as much.

St. Patrick's Day!  Tyler loves green, and hence loves St. Patrick's day.

This is a silly picture, but a funny memory.  We spent an entire day cleaning out our garage together for the first time. I had done surface cleans many times, but couldn't do much without him telling me what tools were broken or not needed and what they even did.  So we cleaned it all out and made a pile on our lawn to give away to neighbors.

And then we came home from Moab a week later to find out our basement had flooded while we were gone.  We piled everything out of the basement into the garage, and now my garage is a mess.  Again.  It was clean for like 3 days that we were home.  And it still has an old oven in the middle, so I haven't parked in there since we started the kitchen reno.

Jasmine loved her music class this year!  She loved learning all the little songs and instruments.

A trailer upgrade!  We loved a lot of things about the older trailer.  We loved the 4 bunks, and we loved how light it was to pull.  But the dinette wobbled so much that we never used it.  Eating outside is fine, but if the weather didn't cooperate, the kids were eating cereal on the floor (because they were not allowed on a bed, and the dinette would have spilled it everywhere).  This new one is a little heavier, but it still has the 4 bunks.  And the slide out in the back is our bed, which makes enough room for a dinette and couch.

Move up day!  John Hancock has a Move Up Day where the students go to their classroom for the next year for an hour or two to meet their next teacher and get excited before they head home for the summer.  That meant that Jasmine got to go to Kindergarten for one morning. As you can tell from the picture, she felt rather big and important about that.

We found time to have a cabin trip or two!  Just quick ones.  And thank heavens, because the lawn and propane needed some attention.

The creek has been dry for a few years, which made us wonder if someone had diverted it upstream.  But after snow that came up to the second story windows this year, the huge snowpack has come down in full force.  I love the roaring creek!

The school year wrapped up with the usual performances.  Kaitlyn had her spring gymnastics show.

She fell off of the beam a few times, but did a really excellent job on the bars.  I was really impressed with how much she improved there.

And then her teacher had a forgetful moment and awarded her the best beam routine, and a different girl (who did great on the beam) the best bar routing award.  We weren't sure how to tell her, so we just mentally knew she did best at bar.

She has learned quite a few new songs this year, and I was the most impressed by how much poise and posture she had at her concert.  I'm so glad she liked learning the violin.

Jasmine performed in a Harry Potter themed dance show.  Her class were Professor Umbridge, and they held little stuffed kittens to dance with.

They were supposed to walk around the DA (the good guys) with menacing faces and wag their fingers at them (as the bad guys), but this was so funny that they all were usually grinning from ear to ear as they waved their fingers.

And finally, we watched Kaitlyn's class in the school dance show.  They danced to a song from Moana.

After all of the time I was spending keeping Jasmine busy while watching a performance of some kind, having one in the park that our dog could come to was a huge relief.  Much more fun.  And her class did a great job.  Her teacher is really so much fun, and I know Kaitlyn is going to miss her.

My Mom's birthday

Last November, my dad told me that they had lunch with some friends that day.  One of them told a story about how her children all flew into town and surprised her at lunch for he birthday the year before, and he told me that my mom's eyes lit up.  "I think that is something that she would really, really appreciate," he said.

So I started emailing my brothers. I told them that I would tell mom that I was coming to visit her for Mother's Day that year, since she often has come to visit me instead.  Knowing about my trip would keep her in town, and she would know to prepare for guests.  Whoever could fly in was welcome to join us. I was nervous that some of them wouldn't be able to come, but in the end, they all booked flights.

I was worried that I would make her suspect something, but we pulled it off!

She thought we were just going to her favorite restaurant (which truly is amazing) to have dinner with the two brothers that live in town.  And she was floored when she saw that three of my brothers had flown in and were sitting there, like nothing was different.

And then shenanigans ensued.  I was supposed to help mom decorate cookies for church that Sunday, so my brothers pitched in to help.  They looked . . . different than she anticipated, but she had a lovely story behind them as we handed them out, at least.

The next morning someone noticed a tree that had dead branches, and before I knew it, everyone was outside and doing yard work.

And that quickly evolved to kicking balls over the house.  Mom was worried, but I told her that, unlike when they were kids, they all were now adults with salaries that could pay for any windows that they broke.

 I was amazed by how much fun it was to have just the siblings together for a while.  For that day, we weren't spouses and parents of our own anymore, but back to the original family in some way.  It was really neat.

Part of the email chain was arranging to have a black forest cake for the family BBQ, since that is her favorite.  Those who lived in that area knew that Fragapane bakery is the best place to go, so they talked about who would go and order a Fragapane cake.  My older brother replied that he had no idea what a "Fragapane" cake is, but  . . . go for it.

This was the part that brought me back to childhood.  That's what my brothers DO if nothing is going on.  Break out the cornhole game, or start playing some form of hot potato with a volleyball someone found.  Always movement and competition.  And goofiness.  For no reason, the main goal of the hot potato game was to knock over Kevin's gatorade when he least suspected it.

And when cornhole evolved to cornhole over the house, Dan ended up on the roof to pick up any that didn't quite make it.

It really was a wonderful trip!  As a bonus, I got a week with no kids to just relax in my old hometown and visit with my parents.  I even took a trip overnight to go and see two friends from high school. I had such a great week!

Moab

Spring break was a perfect time to head to Moab.  The weather was still cool enough to spend the days hiking and exploring.  I was worried that we wouldn't snag a camping spot this time.  The place we go is "first come, first claim", and we circled around a little bit before taking a "tent" sized spot we barely fit into.  But it worked!

And it was perfect weather for a kite.

Our newest trailer upgrade involved a cheap projector on a tripod.  Christopher added enough solar panels that he could power a movie projector at night, and so we gathered around the fire for a movie night.  But our favorite part was our guests!  Christopher nudged me part way through Minions to point out a little headlamp that had stopped along the road to the bathrooms to watch our movie.  He was probably 2 or 3 years old.  A bigger brother joined him a few minutes later, and eventually a Dad came to collect them.  He told us that they were on a "no screen" week, so our movie was a true siren call for them.

Later, we turned around to see a whole group of young teenagers that had skipped any casual pretense and set up all of their camping chairs to form a back row.  We loved it!

Of course, Moab is always a lot of hiking in the parks for our family.
We hiked the trail to Landscape Arch, with a pause at Pine Tree Arch along the way.

Might be time for a haircut. Or at least a hairdo!

We hadn't hiked up there since the kids were tiny.

We hiked just a little bit beyond the arch this time.  The trail is more difficult as it continues on, but had some great views.

And that is the last view we have of the Junior Ranger vest.  I was so happy when I snagged that (usually $30) vest at the thrift store for $3.  But Jasmine took it off not long after this picture and we didn't realize it until we were a mile away.

Instead of freezing in the RV park pool like we had other years, we took our crew to the indoor, city pool. That was a huge upgrade, and it was still cheaper than staying at the old park!

She figured out selfies.  Look out!

We even talked Tyler into going off the high dive!  He did get pretty scared once he got up there (rightfully), but eventually took a jump off.  He is so much braver than me.

We went into Canyonlands to explore on another day.  I hadn't been in that park before.  "The Island in the Sky" seemed like an odd name until we drove along the plateau and hiked to the edge of the rim.

It really felt like we were in an Island in the Sky.

I don't know if that video will work on here or not, but it is the only way to do that place justice.  We hiked out on this 8 foot wide rock that literally had 1000 foot dropoff on 3 sides.  I had to check on a map later.  It was terrifying.

This arch is famous for sunrise pictures of the sun peeking through it, but what surprised us is how large it is on the side of that cliff.  If you could see the other side, it is actually huge.

I think the part of the trip our kids liked the most, however, was something I spotted in a local newspaper.  Backyard magic show!

It was in the backyard of a restaurant in town, and there were hay bales for kids to sit on and colorful folding chairs for adults.  We have never been to a magic show before, so we aren't expects by any stretch, but we were really, really impressed with this guy.  We have no idea how he did most of it.

There were only 4 or 5 families there, so each of our kids got to go up and participate in an act.  They talked about it for weeks.  Kaitlyn was very analytical, determined to figure out each trick, and especially the one she saw up close.

Tyler was 100% convinced by everything this guy did.  When he "poked a hole" in Tyler's shirt and then fixed it, he was jumping up and down in shock.  He inspected his shirt over and over all night.

And when the magician told Tyler to think very hard about his card that he picked, Tyler thought as hard as he could.  On tiptoes.

He even read Christopher's mind, and hid money inside of lemons that I was holding for him.

He played the clam game with kids, rearranging the order and then seeing which coloring book hid the surprise, which was hilarious.  Jasmine loved when he disguised the kids to make it harder to "recognize" them.  So many giggles.

And of course, we did our annual bike trip to get a banana split.

We need to find a longer trail, since the kids have nearly mastered this one, and we'll have to get more banana splits.  The kids are so big now that the entire thing was gone in 5 minutes.