My Kind of Mountain Men

It wasn’t just about some swift twists and turns, it was much more than that. Try 85 mph head-first, face-down drops, 263 feet butterflies-in-your-stomach plunges, huge spirals, sharp dives, and near vertical 61 degree dives! My rollercoaster buff of a husband loved it all, on his first trip ever to Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, California with three buddies of his for a quick turn around “guys trip”. Any massive steel structure that was totally wacky extreme is what they were magnetized to, over and over again. I call it insane, Jon calls it exhilarating. But nonetheless, he loved redeeming his birthday gift from the kids and I and has made it as clear as water, that he wants to return annually for some serious thrills. I think I can agree to that, I wish to say because of my love to see Jon happy, but deep down I think it’s a little more than that. Subconsciously I would gladly gift him with a guys’ trip to that theme park for the mere fact that I would NEVER have to do it with him. I so am not a rollercoaster enthusiast as he is.

The lack of vocal ability, bent up eye glasses from all the rides' impact yet thrill written all over his face when Jon arrived home safely was reward itself, hearing the stories and reenactments of his favorite rides; x2, Tatsu, and Goliath.

(Click on the name of Jon's favorite rides and you can see its total craziness on You Tube, that is...if you have a strong enough stomach.)

Green Trails...

Friendship is such a gift! Today Owen’s buddy Colton invited Owen and I on a double date after he earned a very special reward. Colton worked hard and Owen received the blessing too! Isn’t that special?! What boy wouldn’t want to ride in a green taxi around town? We sure know two boys that would! Our one way ride, 4.5 miles, may have cost $13 but it was unbelievably precious. Their smiles never left as Colton and Owen were able to reach their own window controllers. Pushing them up and down, waving at the people and cars they passed tickled me down to my funny bone! When we arrived at our planned destination, McDonalds, our driver was a good sport and posed for a few photos before the boys high tailed it inside to order Happy Meals and play in the Kid Zone. Riding in green style was an adventure of a lifetime! (Thank you Colton and April for including us!)

Happy Meal...Happy Boys!

A Sweet Date with Owen

Today is “closing” ceremonies of summer; I guess you can say because Owen officially begins preschool tomorrow. {sigh} So to savor every minute left with my “baby” at home full time, we headed into Scottsdale to play at our favorite park, Mc Cormick-Stillman Railroad, then off to a place my Grandma and Grandpa used to take me as a kid for special confectioner's treats, the famous Sugar Bowl. My four year old ‘Monkey’ and I enjoyed his first banana split, thinking it was funny to combine ice cream with his all time favorite snack, bananas. Both of us could have generated a bunch of electricity with the wattage of our smiles today. From start to finish it was a blast! The day passed as quickly as a rocket ship. If only I could have pushed the pause button!

Christmas in July...I Mean, August

What is it about time and how quickly it fleets from us? Our traditional “Christmas in July” was postponed one month later, to August. It’s a “good thing” that we set the “rules” and calendar for this mock holiday and don’t have pressure from stores, church, gift exchanges, holiday parties, and other outside commitments!

Today, the kids woke to Christmas music filling the air, our small tree up, and the smell of peppermint cocoa. You should have seen their mile-wide smiles. Merry Christmas! We began our day with a small devotional over breakfast of Christmas tree Belgium waffles then pulled names for our gift exchange.
After praising Him at church, with a name in one hand and $1.08 clung in the other, we each walked the isles of the local dollar store in search for the “perfect” gift for our loved one. It’s quite comical the things we can come find at that store. Upon arriving home, we had individual wrapping parties then proudly placed the gifts under the tree for the evening’s gift exchange.
(This silly eye glass/straw gift was to Jon from Baylee) (Baylee loves Root beer so I found Root beer Popsicle treats for her gift.) (Jon actually found a "keeper" for my gift. He gave me a poem on prayer!) (Nathan and Owen picked each others names! Nathan gave Owen a pirate set which he was ecstatic about and Owen gave Nathan a foam hammer.)
We took advantage of the hot outdoor temperatures and decided that it would be a great family fun adventure if we headed to Mesquite Groves pool in Chandler where high dives, twisty slides, a lazy river, water vortex, competitive lanes, an in-water play yard, and much more awaited us. I had looked forward to finding an excuse to explore this new pool.

Later, we had a traditional Christmas dinner, baked sugar cookies and decorated them, dipped strawberries, sang Christmas carols, watched Elf, and exchanged our gifts.

Fun times were throughout the day and night. We look forward to four months passing from now when we’ll be bundled up in much cooler temperatures, celebrating our Savior’s birth, once again.

More 4th of July Fun

Hiking and discovering some Hopi petroglyphs, cooking brats on the hibachi, and watching a spectacular show of fireworks in the sky above the Lyman Lake was precisely what we did with the rest of our holiday today! What a delightful time we had!

Chapter Three...Channel Islands Vacation...Sea-doo and Family Reunion

Can someone pinch me?! Today was simply fantastic in every way! It was better than I could have ever hoped or prayed for! It began with Cherie and Eric coming out to the beach house and Eric graciously taking Jon and I out of the Sea-doos for an adventure on the Pacific while Cherie watched the kids (and gave Baylee some artistic drawing and painting pointers)! Jon, Eric, and I ended up on a ride of a lifetime, about fifty miles round trip at speeds around 45 miles an hour. In the three or so hours we were out, we rode out to Anacapa Island (one of the eight Channel Islands of California and a National Park). ). Eric, our fearless, careful, attentive tour guide showed us all angles of the island as we rode around the entire thing. On the backside, the waters were like a river, so peaceful and calm. The island was breathtaking with its rock formations and birds flying in all directions. One day, I’d love to get out and walk the island to see the vegetation, lighthouse, wildlife, and more. During our round trip, while riding on the cool water, we saw plenty of seals and a few dolphins which truly was amazing (Jon’s thankful for no shark sightings!) Seeing the seals and dolphins in their natural habitat was breathtaking.

Oh and if you could have seen the three of us upon arriving back home! What a crackup it was to look in the mirror, salt crystals were all over our faces and hair and we definitely had a sun and wind glow appearance to us. There’s no guess work to it, we wouldn’t have won any modeling contests for an advertisement for a Sea-doo company.

(Here we are, off for an adventure of a lifetime, wrapped up to make sure we'd be warm enough!)

(Eric our leader)

Arriving back to the beach house later than expected, the house was full of family ready to celebrate my Aunt Evey and Cousin David’s birthdays. We made it as much of a reunion as possible but surely missed all those that were not able to come. Growing up I had my cousins around me all the time, they were my closest friends yet as an adult, I can’t remember the last time we were altogether for “good” reasons (verses funerals). Oh how I loved every single minute of my time with the family today. Mostly we just hung out and caught up as much as we could, but also the kayaks, electric boat, and hot tub were powered up! Oh Cherie and Eric, you were such generous, bighearted hosts! (My dad and Pat were even able to come for a short visit today which was really neat!)(Our birthday girl.)(...and birthday boy, Cousin David)

(Baylee and Cousin Phil)

(Baylee and Cousin Cherie)

(Owen and our playful, silly Cousin David)
(Our loving and super hosts...Eric and Cherie...bless your hearts for your graciousness!)