Rough life

Its so rough when I get 12 days off from work, then work 3 days (2 of which were 12's) and have my regularly scheduled 4-day weekend! I hate it when that happens. Someone sure knows how to plan well!

We had a really nice weekend. I ran on Saturday morning, took the kids to the Farmers Market, a bike ride/walk on the loop trail, went to a dinner party Saturday night, church on Sunday, ran an errand for my Mom, golfed with My Honey and Bubba on Sunday afternoon and today I got a massage and a much-needed chiropractic adjustment after an unfortunate fall on the golf course.

I don't claim to be graceful, never have been, never will be. But I was especially un-graceful after hitting my ball to the high side of a hill, traipsing up to get it, knocking it down the hill and then taking a slider down the hill on my ass. Nice Rainey, very nice. It must have looked pretty funny Bubba was a giggling fool - not to mention me! I was cracking up at myself. But I was hurt, twisted my knee and wrenched my back. Luckily I had a massage scheduled for today and then I was able to get adjusted right afterward. Hopefully it will be feeling a bit better tonight.

My Honey played golf on Saturday morning too. Unfortunately he had a bad experience at the golf course, needless to say he's done playing there. His punch card is all done and so is he. They just don't treat their customers very well out there. Thankfully there are quite a few choices around here so we headed out to Three Lakes on Sunday. It was a little windy on the back 9, but we managed. Bubba throws his ball out, hits it, runs, hits it, runs and then tries to putt when we get to the greens. He only actually did this on about 6 holes, but it was enough to tucker him out!

Today he is at the YMCA day camp program again. Next week he has a day camp called "Knights, Castles and Kingdoms" it should be fun, and we will close the week by going to a Shakespeare play! While at the Farmers Marked on Saturday, the kids in the Short Shakespeare program were doing snippets from the play coming up next week "A Midsummer Nights Dream." I happen to know the director from my childhood when her daughter and I were friends and when I did the program and she invited us to be her guest at the play! Super cool, not only do we get to go to the play, it will be free! I would love it if one of my kids were interested, likely it will be Miss I, and did the program one summer. We shall see.

Nothing much planned for tomorrow, Emilee comes over, we're going for a walk with some of the girls from work, and then the rest of the week is work, work, work. It's my long week and I think I have a 12 hour shift, or two... I cant remember for sure. August is full of overtime already and it hasn't even started, plus, you never know who will call out sick or any of that stuff.

Home sweet home

Well, we are back. I tried to find pictures of the highlights of each day. Hope you enjoy them. Yes, the kids sleeping was the highlight of the first day! It was so cute because they were in the same room in "big kid" beds which Miss I thought was the icing on the cake!

We broke our travel into two days. The first day was all the way to Portland, the second day we set out for the Portland Zoo, which was pretty cool, and then to Lincoln City. The rental house was good, but had several small details which weren't taken care of that drove us nuts (for instance no washcloths in any of the bathrooms...)

We spent time on the beach, we went to the Newport Aquarium, a lighthouse, and of course the outlet mall.

Several of us went to Depoe Bay and did a charter-fishing-boat-thing. I have only fished a few times, like 3 from the shore of small lakes. I didn't particularly care for it, but I figured I would try deep-sea fishing, I would at least like the boat ride. Which I did, until me and the starboard rail became best friends. It was a foggy, foggy day and I spent a lot of time puking over the rail! I couldn't believe it. I love the water, love boating, never, never have been seasick before. Apparently the wide-open foggy spaces and 20-foot rollers and me don't get along. So, I will probably never go deep-sea fishing again. It was such a disappointment (the getting sick part). But we did get fresh crab out of the deal! And fresh fish too.

While we were letting the kids unwind after the aquarium in Newport the guys went to the Rogue Brewery next door. We met them at the door and My Honey was carrying a case of beer. My favorite beer, Dead Guy Ale! It was such an unexpected treat! Big ol' 20 ouncers too! We first tasted the beer at a restaurant here, but the next time we asked for it they weren't carrying it anymore so we were glad to come by it and bring some home.

My Honey and I celebrated our 16th anniversary while we were down there. We went golfing and then out to dinner with his siblings and their spouses. it was a lot of fun. The golf course was pretty nice, but COLD. In fact, the whole trip was COLD. We left 100 degree temps for 60 degrees in Oregon. Brrrr. It was a nice way to spend our anniversary.

All in all a good trip! I would definitely do it again, with the whole family, but maybe not to Oregon ... too cold this time of the year anyway. I am looking forward to going down in October though!

"Lost tooth"

Bubba is an official big kid. Here is his story (as told to me)

"I lost a tooth on Tuesday. It was a night that I was being babysat and my sister."
"My mom liked it that I lost a tooth. Dad was pretty proud."

Me: How did the tooth come out?
"The person that had the wiggly tooth pulled it out. It was Harry. And thats it. Well, it bled a little."

Pretty cute huh?

It was a pretty wiggly tooth, he had been playing with it for several days and I was ready to pull it. I asked him to come over to me so I could "feel" it (with the intention of pulling it) and he wiggled it right out of his mouth. He was so excited! He did a little happy dance. Then he freaked out that it might be bleeding. It would have made a great video but how do you know when something like that is going to happen? Kind of like Miss I helping My Honey discipline Bubba, but thats another story!

We were going to a baseball game so My Honey and I were pretty glad we were still home to see him lose it!

We are off on vacation tomorrow. I understand we will have internet connections so I will try to brag, I mean post, a few pictures. (Thats for you, Mom!)

The 4th and more

The 4th was fun. I worked hellacious hours all weekend, but we did take the kids to the annual show in town.

Bubba has been every year since he was about two and it was Miss I's first show. It has been tradition that I meet them at the park because I am usually working, but this year was different, I was off for the show! I just had to be to work at 5am the next day!

We arrived at the park with PLENTY of time to waste so we found the cotton candy vendor and sugared up the kids. Bubba kept asking every 2 minutes "how much longer?" and My Honey made a big production of getting his phone out of his pocket to check the time and making him do the simple math of figuring it out for himself. It was pretty cute.

Miss I had no idea what to expect. She was in her stroller all snuggled in a blanket, reclined back waiting when IT happened. The first fireworks. She shot up with her eyes, huge as plates, glued to the sky, her fingers went into her ears and she watched in awe. When the first few ended she said "NEN MAMA! NEN!" (Translation: again mom! again! and quickly!) And so it continued for the first bit, then she wanted to make sure everyone else was enjoying the show, so she went around to Bubba, Grandma, Grandpa, me and My Honey and sat with each of us. It was really sweet. Bubba did his usual plugged his ears and waited it out. Hes a good sport, but the loudness really gets to him.

On our way out of the park we saw a small brush fire across the river. Thankfully the fire department was able to get there in a few minutes and not much was destroyed. Why are people careless though? Just because there is a river nearby does not mean that water is easy to come by, especially in the dark. Oh well, hopefully someone saw something and the people who started the fire will get into trouble. Hard to say though.

The rest of the weekend was shot for me. I worked 5am-5pm on Saturday and Sunday so those were pretty much my days. My Honey took really good care of me, he had dinner started on both nights when I got home and worked on laundry and vacuumed and all kinds of stuff!

Today was busy, I took Bubba to Emilee's to play for the morning, Miss I and I went to pick raspberries (she has pink-eye so I didn't leave her with the other kids). Then she and I went to my moms house for lunch and her nap. While she napped I took Bubba to Super Cool Science Camp (SCSC) where he learned about the parts of a flower today and that leaves give off oxygen. They put leaves into a mason jar of water and watched them bubble. Pretty cool experiment. I guess they are keeping some kind of a log of their experiments so it will be fun to read that at the end of the week. They even got to do a painting of the parts of a flower today. It was everything he loves! While he was there and Miss I was at my moms I took a few hours to shop. I wanted to find a portable DVD player for the car. I had to look at 5 stores before I found one that had 2 screens. After that was Karate then pick up Miss I to see the doctor, then to Safeway for a quickee dinner and to get her prescription, then home to eat and now everyone is in bed, it sounds like they are even asleep!

Tomorrow is not nearly as busy, but still a lot going on. Emilee comes here in the morning, I am taking all 3 kids to a swim lesson, then we are meeting 2 gals from work for a walk in the park. Lunch, SCSC and a baseball game tomorrow night. I guess it will be busy. Then back to work on Wednesday for 3 days and then ..... VACATION! More time off, just what I need! Can't wait, it should be a fun one too!

Before & After

Amazing what you can do in two weeks!

Yes it was

The water park was a blast. I got fried though, AND I was wearing sunscreen. I think it might be expired or something. Bad news, my back is red, red red, and so are my upper thighs - you know the place where my shorts usually cover, toasted on the front and back! Oh well, we had a lot of fun.

They put in two new features at the water park; a lazy river ride where you just float along on an inner tube and a surf/body board thing. The lazy river was fun and the surf/body board thing looked fun too, but we didn't try it. Dani MADE me go down a water slide. Twice! Okay, it was so fun I went a second and a third time! Bubba is too short for the big water slides, but there is a whole section of little kid stuff so he didn't feel left out or anything.

Today is an Emilee Day. We left the house for a swim lesson this morning at 9 but it has been re-scheduled to next week so I brought the kids home, vacuumed the pool and let them swim here. Amazing how tolerable the water gets after 3 or 4 one hundred degree days!

Its a little cooler today, its actually refreshing to have an eighty degree day. Dani keeps saying "its freezing here" now that she is used to the 100's. Silly girl, she has to go back home where its overcast and 70 on a warm day! I told her she can stay longer if she wants to. I ain't kicking her out!

We went and had our toes done last night, then stopped for ice cream on the way home. It was fun. We came home giggling like school girls! My Honey thought we were cute. "It was cute to see you acting like sisters" is what he said. It was fun to be like sisters :) I will miss her when she goes. It is nice to have her around for the convenience but also for the 16-year old energy. Positive energy. Maybe having a little girl won't be so bad after all!