Why We Take Them Swimming

Doing this . . .

Produces this . . .

Silence is heaven to the ears after hours of screaming. It's the little things.

The Grand Canyon! WOW!

Jeff's Eagle Projet: CHECK

BEFORE AFTER DONE! (This was not staged! He really crashed at the end.) The glorious back hoe that saved DAYS worth of time, literally! Those roots were stubborn even for the back hoe. Thank you to Jason Stadelman for figuring that out and working it all day. LUNCH! Pulled pork and watermelon. This crowd was easy to please. Some of the 67 people who showed up to help Jeff out. 67!!! Wow! A few men showin' the boys how to build stairs. Turned out great! Broken foot? No problem, there was a job for everyone! One of six MASSIVE stumps that they pulled out. Those roots were as long as the plant was tall. They were planted in 1950 and they did not want to leave. We raked! We painted! We built! We burned--a lot! We put in a porch ceiling in seafoam green. We planted and spread. We roofed! We trimmed! We hauled! and hauled and hauled! We moved a lot of dirt! And we accomplished a whole lot in 6 hours! Thank you!!

Bend '12

Another variation of our trip to Bend was fun and different. We cut a night out due to basketball games (2 wins). We didn't tube this year, but hit the Woodburn outlet malls on the way down and went swimming . Ben went to class only one day this year. I took them all up to the mountain on Saturday. Sunny blue skies in Bend, but blizzard on the mountain???? It is only 15 minutes away??? The little ones and I played in the snow a bit, but then got cold and went back to the hot tub. The big kids and Ben had a great day of powder on the mountain. Hannah took a class again and loved it. Jeff has graduated to black diamonds with his father. They both did snow boarding this year. They were VERY sore the next day. Lots of crashes on the powder covered ice. I came and picked them up and we crashed at Outback for dinner. Fun times!! We hiked around the river for a bit Sunday and came on home through Sisters. Ben and I listened to a book on George Washington and made the trip go by quickly!! Lovin' the weekend getaways!

Detroit Lake VERY empty!!!! Does anyone know what's going on?

and yes he fell in . . . completely. Ruined another cell phone. I had just warned him to be careful and down he went. It was a 43 degrees outside. The water was wicked cold. And what did I do . . . I laughed and laughed and laughed. I'm still laughing. It was the highlight of the whole weekend. Teenagers think they know everything and can do anything. Ha, ha, ha!!!

He made it!!