Sunriver 2014, Part II

When Drew and Annie and Oden and the Swansons left for Longview, we had to find something to do without them.  It was strikingly hot, so water play seemed to be the obvious choice.

It was not long before Papa Scott was drawn in…and it really was hard to tell who the biggest kid was in this excitement.

I looked on from the outskirts with Colleen, and I kept thinking, "This is only going to end in tears…"  :)

The day after this, Papa Scott woke to some extreme back pain.  The video above we decided had to be the culprit.

We also did some biking...

Both kids did really well on tagalongs!  We just found one at a garage sale this summer and the house we rented had another, so both big kids were able to go for a few longer rides.

Joshy loved this turtle in the Village.  He wanted me to take a picture of it for his buddy, Kai, who loves turtles.

And then there was this cute baby in the sink, er, bath tub.  :)  I really could just eat him up.

Sunriver, Part 1

The day finally arrived on July 12--off to Sunriver!  We left unsure of how the day in the car would go, but our kids did an amazing job!  We stopped in the Tri Cities to have breakfast with Julz, stopped in Biggs for a potty break, and then made it all the way to Redmond!  Granted, we let the kids watch 3 movies and feed Micah bottles on the go, but HEY! We were all sane.  We celebrated by getting ColdStone ice cream before getting Costco and FM groceries.  This trip was WAY better than the young Joshua years...

Our house for the week was amazing.  Overlooking the golf course, with deck and yards and rooms for everyone.  We did laps around the kitchen.  Locking the doors at night took endurance.  And how sweet to have us all under one roof!  Then, to top it all off, on the first full day there we had a hail storm.  To the Lochhead men, this seemed to be God smiling down on us.  :)  Their eyes light up when the clouds roll in with all of their possibilities.

Somewhere in the Bin of Magic that Mom brought, Joshy found his Monster's University puzzle and preceded to put it together throughout the week.

 Happier than a unicorn eating cake on a rainbow!  That about sums it up!

Scott and Colleen made their delicious salmon for us…we never go hungry during this week!

 Micah, looking for sister fleas.  Maybe he was hungry.  :)

We had a quick loop that went over by the North Pool and back around that the kids could do on their own bikes.  We had to stop on every bench to just "drink it in." And take selfies.

And at age EIGHT MONTHS, Micah finally got to experience the swimming pool!  He'd been to the YMCA countless times over the past eight moons, endured two weeks of swim lessons for his siblings, and even helped mom fill the kiddie pool in the back yard a time or two.  But his parents never seemed to have enough energy to put his little rollies into a swim diaper.  Until now.

He seemed pretty neutral about the whole endeavor.  I think he didn't want his parents to feel badly for waiting so long to see if he was waterproof.

Mikey likes it!  ...I think?

Oden feeding Baby Micah.  It won't be long until Oden'll get one of these at his house--one that never goes home!  I think he's ready for the adventure of a little brother.

This little turkey looked pea-sized in our giant bed.  This thing could hold 8 geese and 4 hound-dogs and the piggy we stole from the shed...

 What a cute little piggy!!!  I'd steal him too.

Oden and Annie made smoothies each morning.  And ate with cars within reach.  :)

On the Tuesday of our week together, we got the sad news that Slick's brother-in-law, Dog, had a stroke and was on life support.  He'd been through a lot and was looking like he'd recovered, so we were all quite shocked and saddened with this news.  Slick and Twinkles rushed to Longview to see him, and Drew and Annie were a few hours behind.  They were able to be there when Dog died later that day and were able to be with family.  This was quite sobering on our week of vacation, and we were so sad with the Swanson family.  They all decided to come back to Sunriver on Wednesday night and we were glad to have them back.

Baby Food, Appointments, Garage Cleaning, and Treasure Hunting

The things we had time for during the summer!

I finally took time to make some baby food for Micah Man.  This is squash, but I've had lots of fun making pears and apple/prunes and carrot/zucchini/apple and my personal favorite, lentil delight.  And apparently I'd been STARVING the poor child--he likes to eat real food!  :)

I was going to put a picture of my dermatologist-burned-off sun-spot here, but it was too disgusting.  :)  I finally went to have my cheek looked at and all was well, but she offered to burn off a sunspot that had grown with each pregnancy.  I went for it, and the next day it was blistered up something fierce!  Really gross.  But here it's in the blog, without the visual, in case I ever want to know when I took care of that.  :)

 We went to see How to Train a Dragon II!  It was a fun treat for a weekday afternoon!

And this picture reminds me that we cleaned and organized the garage!  That means that bins of clothes were gone through and trips were taken to Goodwill and Other Mothers.  This boy was over the MOON when he found The Prospector IN THE FREE BIN at O Mother's!  Josh didn't have him in his Toy Story Guys collection yet, so this was an amazing find!  :)  (Later in Sunriver we found Mr. Pricklepants in the 40-cent bin! It was a good summer for finding treasure!)

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Back in the beginning of July we had to say "See you in a month!" to those Van Pickles, who were leaving for their month in Juneau.  We took pizza to them the night before they left so that we could get in one more night of fun.  (And then we were able to snag Kai for a few hours the next day before they left!)  This picture had to happen when we noticed that they dressed alike.  They're working on the "twins" bit.  :)

A Gracie Riddle

Question:

Answer:

"I guess I do!" (At least she ended with an exclamation point--it makes the "guess" stronger.)

The Fourth at the Farm

We got back from Cousin Campin' in time to shower and head down to Clarkston to see the fireworks with G'ma and Papa.  We park at Brady's parents' house and George and Connie are sitting in their front yard with their whole family to watch the fireworks that are being set off in the streets.  Joshy was fascinated and a little scared all at the same time.

 When it came time to walk to the grandstands, Gracie decided to stay with Megan and Abby and Papa in the Morrow's front yard.  The rest of us headed into the stadium to hear the music that went along with the show.

 A great show again this year.  Micah slept through the whole thing.

 And July 5th was JAM DAY!!!

 Oh, my, did we make jam.  All day!

And in the end, we had to put some berries back in the freezer.  Our resources outweighed our energy stores!

Taking a break!

 The kids found this frog that they had to take pics of. :)

Nice photography, Megan!

And the next day we got to swim at George and Connie's pool.  I think it was couple degrees away from being classified as an inferno in Lewiston.  I burnt my toes on concrete.  You have to be tough stuff to live in that valley.  And you have to live in the pool.  Maybe that wouldn't be half bad!

Cousin Campin' 2014

We went straight from Priest to Bernie and Marie's outside of Fernwood to be part of Cousin Campin' 2014.  We'd only been once before, without kids, so we were due for more fun.  :)  We got there really late at night--10pm?--and all of my cousins helped us set up our camp trailer for the night.  We were all pooped!  I remember waking to gun shots the next morning.  Ground squirrel target practice began at dawn.  :)

After a big breakfast by Marie, I decided I'd better jump on the dam making.  They'd really built it up by telling me that I was the last one to build any--and that was YEARS ago!  So I laced up the tennies and…eeeeek!…braced myself for the cold water.

After five minutes the numbness saves you.  I was happy to have Erin and Tanya join me.  Josh and Grace never lasted past the five numbing minutes.  :)

 Nick.  :)

This year's project was to rebuild the vehicle bridge at the end of the pasture.  They did a nice job!

What a great pic by Marie!  Bernie was cracking me up on his dozer.  He was having a great time moving dirt and then decides that he "hates thorn bushes" and takes down a giant tree-sized bush in three pushes.

We ended up only staying one night near the beginning of the festivities.  We went from here to the farm to watch fireworks with G'ma Joan and Papa Greg.  But it was a great 24 hours of campin'.  More next year!

FOUR dams built in a day.  Very numb feet.