Today I spent the day kid-less.  A friend and I swapped kids and today was my day to play.
I did some shopping and then met a friend who wants to learn how to play tennis.  I was giving her some tips.  There was a lady teaching some kids on nearby courts and we started talking with her. Turns out she is the high school coach in the next town over.  I told her I would love some tennis partners and she promised she could hook me up.  (I think she even mentioned that one group was looking for a singles player for their league matches next weekend!)  I would love to get back into it on a consistent basis.

After tennis I had lunch with friends and then had to drive up the canyon for a 'work' meeting.  I was not home much, like I had originally planned, but it was a beautiful day to be out.

The last week or so my left shoulder has been giving me problems.  It was getting progressively worse - to the point that I was not using it.  I figured it was time to get back to my weekly chiropractic visits (have not been since before our road trip).  He checked it out and said something about the AC joint and maybe a pinched nerve?  Anyway, he did his stuff and I have probably 90% range of motion back!  It just amazes the body and how people that know what they are doing can manipulate things back to normal.  I am glad I went because I found out he will be out of town next week, so I could not have seen him next Tuesday.  And since I was not using my shoulder much, it was starting to freeze up on me and he said that can take a year to fully recover from.

This weekend B is going on his first weekend trip without mom or dad.  The cub scouts are camping!  I think he is really excited.  He was most excited about the climbing wall and the general store.  I can only imagine what he will spend his money on.  As long as he leaves himself enough money to have lunch on the drive back.  Hopefully he will change clothes (the last camp out with dad, he wore the same thing all weekend long).  With him being gone, JR is thinking about taking the other 2 camping - that would mean 24 hours home alone in my own house.  I could maybe finish a project or two without little hands disturbing my piles!

This Sunday is the last Sunday our church is meeting.  Will be very different but the boys are excited to try some of their friends' churches.

We recently went to a local pond....

The boys had a lot of fun.  We took one of the high school youth group boys!  After playing, they talked 17 year old Gabe into coming back to our house to play!  He also had dinner with us and I don't think I have ever seen my boys eat so much food - they were trying to keep up with Gabe and show him how much they can eat!

Off to bed!

Seems things are getting a little out of hand at our house. I am not tolerating all of the 'stuff'. Why is it so hard to teach responsibility to kids? We have a playhouse out back that is strictly for Legos, at least in the summer time. Yet, I repeatedly, day after day, find Legos all over the house. I finally had a brilliant idea. Every time I find a Lego, it goes into my Christmas bin. Then they get wrapped up and given at Christmas. It saves me money and it will be like a new toy to them. What gets me, is now when the boys find Legos in the house, they bring it to me and tell me to put it in the Christmas bucket!!!!

I find their clothes and socks all over the house. I told them that when I find their clothes around the house, I will put them in a bin that will get emptied every couple of weeks. If they run out of shorts and shirts, they will just have to wear pants and long sleeve shirts in the middle of summer. (The bucket has not gotten too full, but I imagine come school time, they will not want to be wearing the same clothes day after day after day.)

They proceeded recently to tell me that the reason they are not responsible with their stuff and put it away, is because I never taught them. Well, I have now started laundry parties. Every time I do laundry, which is only 2 times a week, I dump all the clean clothes out on the floor and they find their stuff, fold it and put it all away. The first time we did it they decided that a party was suppose to be fun, so they started throwing the clothes.

The clothes throwing party lasted 15 minutes and then they got to work folding and putting everything away!

When I ask them to clean now, they always ask if things have to be clean my way or their way...like that requires any thought :-)

We have a few bird feeders in our back yard and have enjoyed watching the birds. We would have 10-15 at a time, all lined up on the fence waiting for their turn to eat. I decided that I could not afford to fill the bird feeder every day, sometimes twice a day. So, now our seed is put out more sparingly, but the birds still come around. Here is the feeder we like the best because it gives us the closest view...birds on the window.

The boys have gotten into setting up a small ramp out front (they wanted to make sure these pictures made the blog).

I hope before summer ends that JR can get a more permanent one built for them, so they don't have to keep hauling wood and bricks.

JB went back to the ENT for his ear. We finally got the go ahead to swim without the ear band. The doctor recommended we get another hearing test to make sure the ear drum is doing what it is suppose to be doing (he did not seem too sure that it would be doing the 'right' thing). We will have to wait another 2 months or so to get it checked out. Sure hope that it healed correctly, as far as how sound passes to/through the ear drum.

B went back to the ortho. We are in a holding pattern until some of his teeth drop down more. Sounds like the ortho is leaning towards putting a full set of braces up top - if we go that route, I sure hope it is a part of the phase we have already paid for.

Off to do some reading before time to turn out the lights.

The lazy days of summer. Other than therapies, we are sticking pretty close to home...at least I am.

Last weekend JR took B camping for 2 nights with the scouts. (Hope to get pictures downloaded from his phone at some point!). Amazing how much quieter it is with one gone. The other two and I just hung around!

One evening this week JR came home a little early and took J and JB fishing.
Here is the catch from the evening.

I was told J caught the short one and JB the long one. They were quite excited. I had to laugh because JB did not want to touch the fish and would scream if J held it too close to him.

The other day we hit the bike trail again.
Saw this spot of flowers - I love the colors.

B took this photo...I love big brother helping little brother!

Thought this was a cool picture that B also took.

)
I was messing around with manual mode on my camera.  Think I am finally starting to figure out some of the settings.  (I also found out that both of my neighbors have a photography (side) business and she is willing to help me learn my camera

Jbird loves doing what are called bunny hops (where you jump on the scooter and get 'air').  I love his
hair in the picture.  It appears he caught air, although hard to tell.

Two hilarious things I heard Jbird say recently....
He was eating some cottage cheese and trying to get JB to try it. He said it was like tiny marshmallows covered in cheese. Then the boys were talking about all of our trips out to Ohio in recent years and Jbird was recollecting the trip where he met Disney Channel!

Today the boys and I sat down and played a full board game of Sorry - start to finish! I think it is a first. Just love that they are getting old enough to compete with me!

Another quiet weekend in store! Just have a couple of hours of cards and a few hours of work. I really enjoy no schedule!

A quiet week. We have gotten back into the therapy flow with JB. All 3 of his speech therapists commented on how well he is doing and appears to have not missed a beat with our long trip. The occupational therapist was amazed at how well he is doing. (We have been working on some things). So great big high fives to the little man - who is just a few weeks away from turning 4!

B and JR are camping this weekend. It was a family camp out with scouts, but I am wiped out, so just sent the 2 of them. Sure am glad, with how hot it is here! They are going to private property that is suppose to have some great fly fishing on it!

We are soon on the hunt for a new church. After 8 great years, our church is shutting their doors on Aug 4th. It was a very difficult decision for leadership, but one that probably needed to happen. Will be interesting to see where God leads us next (not looking forward to the search).

Since before our trip, I have not been sleeping well. The other night for some reason I was chilled, so grabbed the electric blanket. I slept better that night than I have for a long time. I have slept with the electric blanket all week and woken up very rested. I know it sounds crazy, but for me, I am back to two blankets and an electric blanket at night - during the summer! We do sleep with the window open and the fan blowing, plus we have a middle unit so it never gets too hot inside.

B is getting at a place where I am wanting to provide opportunity for him to explore some of his interests. There are several things he enjoys (and I think could excel in if given some exposure/guidance) and now I am on the hunt for the local opportunities - once he narrows things down. The things currently on the list - cooking, drawing, photography and guitar or drums. He is also considering basketball in the winter. (Both boys want to play soccer again in the fall!)

I am hitting the afternoon lull....time to get up and get moving!

JB is a mad man on his bike. I decided we needed to get him riding on something other than the street (until he can learn to steer straight). So, we recently headed out to a walking/biking path. It was probably just over a mile each way. JB rocked it - he was the only one that did not get off at one part and walk his bike. Then we headed over to the little BMX track. Bless his little heart. He tried hard....but he fell

and fell

and fell

and fell (I got blamed for this one because I 'pushed' him into the grass)

and fell some more

He would struggle going up because he could not get enough speed.

He was successful at times though....

The best part, as we left, he was still riding - so obviously not defeated too much.

As we got back to the car, we did have one really scary moment. The kind of moment that could have ended in an ambulance ride to the ER...The kind of moment, that as a parent am thankful for those near misses. JB was riding his bike on the sidewalk next to the car. There are some posts stuck in the ground with heavy chains strung between them to give the parking lot a perimeter. He was not really paying attention and rode right into the chain. It caught him by the neck and he fell off his bike backwards. Fortunately, he was going just fast enough to keep himself upright (not very fast). The chain caught him right across the neck. Other than a little 'road rash' he is fine! (Reminded me of a guy in my sister's high school class who caught a thin wire while on a 4 wheeler...he pulled through but it was a long haul.)

Look at him go....

NO TRAINING WHEELS!!! I thought Jbird was good losing the training wheels the day before his 4th birthday, but JB lost them about 6 weeks prior. I also find it odd because he has weaker core muscles - he sure over compensates somewhere with his balance. I don't get it but no reason to question why some things are easier than others for him - I will just keep cheering from the sidelines!

Our trip home

I have decided on our road trips that I do better leaving mid way through the day then getting up and leaving early in the morning. So, we pulled out on Wed 3rd. My sister and our visiting cousin Laura took the kids that morning and wore them out while I packed and took a nap. Just before we loaded up in the car, we had one last blast of fun...a silly string fight!

Here are all the cousins, minus Kristine who was at work. I mentioned our cousin Laura came to visit...she flew up with her daughter Izzy from Houston.

We did not get as far as we had hoped, so stopped close to the Illinios/Iowa border. Turned out the little town we stopped in was having their fireworks show that night and we were just in time. They started as we pulled up and we had a unhindered view! There were even some other kids in the parking lot who shared their sparklers with the boys.

The next day seems like we spent most of the day in Iowa. Never take a lesser known road through Iowa. I missed a turn coming out of Cedar Rapids (not sure if I was distracted with construction or the chaos in the car) but I think it cost us over an hour. It was a beautiful drive. With recent flooding, the locals could not even tell me for sure how to get across to I-35. So we meandered and eventually found our way. (I for some reason did not have a map in the car and have not yet gotten into the smart phone stuff). We stopped at a park outside of Sioux Falls, SD to meet with some friends for an hour and then continued further west - destination unknown.

As I started getting tired, we stopped in the middle of nowhere South Dakota. I had to laugh...
Outside the door was a folding chair and a plastic coffee container, holding ashes. Then inside, there is a note on the mirror that says: "Attention hunters. No mud, paw or footprints on carpet. No dogs on the bed! Do not leave dogs alone in rooms unless in a kennel. No cleaning birds in tubs, sinks or anywhere in the rooms." Then on the room fridge it says "Please don't put pheasants in the fridge or freezer." Guess this place is a hunters paradise. The lady who owns this place cooks a hot breakfast every morning and then has it out in crock pots. She even asked me what I thought my boys would like. We ended up with english muffin sandwiches and cinnamon rolls.

Next stop on the 5th was Mount Rushmore. Man, have things grown up around there. Granted, I have only been there one other time and it was probably 20 years ago. I was not prepared for all the growth, commercialism, tourist type feel of the place. (I was even surprised how huge Mitchell, SD was - the home to the Corn Palace. There is now a Cabela's there and that town is thriving.)

The boys were really impressed with Mount Rushmore. I was not feeling good so we did not walk around and explore too much, but we did see the museum, watched the 14 minute film and the boys loved running around the amphitheatre. They wanted to go on a couple of the trails, but I told them we would come back another time (it is only about 6 hours).

Here is the first picture we took - I was overwhelmed with the people and busyness.  I was not sure  what kind of pictures we would get later, so took this one.

We walked down and found the amphitheatre.  The boys loved running up and down the steps.  I kind of wished there had been a choir group of some sort that would have started singing. Would love to hear the acoustics.

I quizzed B before we got there as to who was on the mountain.  He got them right - I always forget Thomas Jefferson.

I had to basically lay on the ground to get this shot...but love that they are just below the faces.

We saw this goat on our way out and was laughing at all the comments about how mangy he looked.  He was not afraid of people!

I would love to see it at night time. Am considering a trip in the fall when the crowds die down. There are so many other things to do. They have a high ropes course, zip line and alpine slide that the boys really wanted to do. However, they were not being very obedient at the time, so we passed. Plus it would have made it hard because they were not all big enough and me being the only adult I could not be in 2 places at once.

I wanted the stop to be educational too, so we looked up some facts about Mount Rushmore.
The heads are 60 feet tall, nose is 20 feet long, eyes are 11 feet across and mouth is 18 feet wide. It cost just under $990,000 to build and took 17 years - start to finish. Washington was chosen because he represents the struggle for independence, Jefferson because he represents the idea of government by the people, Lincoln because he represents equality and permanent union of the states and Roosevelt for the role of US in world affairs. It took 400 workers and no one died during the building of it. Borglum had become so good using dynamite, that most (90%) of the rock was precisely blasted and only inches had to be chiseled by hand. Jefferson was originally on Washington's right but after 18 months, it was not working so they blasted him off and put him on Washington's left. One last thing that I did not know was....

"Some people, including the U.S. Supreme Court, think the U.S. stole the Black Hills.

In 1868, long before the carving began, the U.S. government promised in a treaty to let the native Sioux Nation tribes keep the Black Hills, including the Rushmore area. But in 1874, gold was found in those hills (and confirmed by Lt. Col. George Custer). After that the U.S. government and prospectors grabbed the land back and forced the Lakota elsewhere.

On July 23, 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court found that land grab was unconstitutional and ordered federal compensation of more than $105 million to the Sioux to settle the case -- but Indian leaders said no, they'd rather have the Black Hills. Writing in 2007, Oglala Lakota Sioux journalist Tim Giago estimated that the unclaimed federal payment, counting interest, had grown to more than $757 million." (taken from LA Times article)

Definitely a trip we will be making again!

We arrived home that night around 9pm.

July 4th

Happy July 4th. So thankful to live in a country where we still experience lots of freedoms!
When this posts, we will be somewhere in the plains of the Dakotas - heading back home.
A few last pictures from our trip.  (Look how tired JB is...here is hoping that they sleep half the first day away in the car!)

We made a trip to Lake Erie. We actually went the day before and road bikes. But when we got there, the wind and rain started, so I rode home and got the van. It has been a long time since I have gone on a bike ride in the rain. The first picture was them playing in the water, waiting for waves.  The next few are the boys wanting to be buried in the sand.

Dirty, dirty boys!

This just looks creepy....nothing but a head.

Our last hurrah, we went to a minor league baseball game and the boys got their picture taken with the mascot.  The boys were more interested in running around and getting concessions - no surprise.  They did enjoy hanging.  There were some near misses on the ball field and we saw a lady get hit by a missed throw from short stop to first base.  We think she was hit in the shoulder but she did not stay at the game for long.  The home team ended up winning 11-0!

Lord willing, the next post will come from our home state!

Swimming

Here are a few pictures from a recent pool outing.

I have been having JB swim just a foot or so to the side of the pool.  He is starting to get how kicking your feet can keep your face about the water.

Jbird loves to jump from the side and try to catch something.  I liked both of these...not sure where the water frisbee is in the first picture, but you can see it in the second picture.

B has been spending a lot of time going off the diving boards.  He actually tried a flip and over rotated and did a belly flop.  The dive is more difficult.  He strikes the pose and then at the last second instead of falling hands first, he jumps off.  I guess it is totally unnatural to fall head first.

I actually went off the diving board a few times.  It obviously has been a while since I went off a board, cause when I hit the water I took on lots of water.  My sister reminded me after the fact that I use to hold my nose when I went off the board - a fact that you should not forget!  I came up sputtering.  I also went down the speed slide.  I came up from under the water to my kids booing me!  Seems like it take some finesse to hold your feet up just high enough when you hit the water to hydroplane and then splash everyone on the other side of the pool.

Our trip is quickly winding down.  Will be hitting the road on Wednesday!