Sweet 16 and new kittens

Kayla celebrated her 16th birthday on Friday by getting her driver’s license (shhh, she cut class to take the test) and then having a “girls night” of pizza and music with 4 of her girlfriends. Saturday we hosted a big BBQ bash for her friends and family that included a bon fire, a cake fight, and a few people getting thrown into the lake. All in good fun of course!

It was a strange experience to see her drive off on her own for the first time. It was both worrisome and liberating at the same time. I will miss our car conversations when I’m trekking her around, but will value the extra time I’m not spending on the road.

Kayla’s MRI on her knee came back A-okay, which is great news. She is doing better with her physical therapy and managed to play 17 games (!) of VB at last weekend’s tournament and started in all games last week. Her team is 2-1 so far in league and doing really well...we have hopes they will make it to the state tournament again this year.

I finally “gave in” to McKenna’s pleas and we adopted two kittens today. Because of course you cannot just adopt one – each needs a playmate! They are really cute – McKenna’s is a light calico girl named Quinn and Kayla’s is a gray Maine Coon named Owen – pictures attached. Owen is going to be a big boy – somewhere around 18 pounds they say. They both hiss at Rowdie who just looks at them like “what the heck is your problem?” – but hopefully they will grow to like him. Either that, or they will live downstairs since Rowdie owns the rest of the house!

TGIFDOS

Thank God It’s the First Day of School!

It’s 1:00pm and I am secretly enjoying my quiet time after the girls left for school at noon today. Noon, you ask? Yep, the “upperclassmen” at the middle school and high school start late on the first day so the “Sixlettes” (6th graders) and Freshmen have the school to themselves in the morning. Per tradition, I took our annual “front-of-the-door” photos of the girls so we can track their growth and changes year-to-year. Hmmm, I should dig out all those annual photos to compare them...I’ll add that to my “list.”

What list? That’s the list of all the things I want to do before my sabbatical ends in (gulp!) 26 days. Time is going at warp speed since we got back from vacation - I feel like I’ve just finished a two week “race” only to have another one starting! The last two weeks of summer are always busy and this year included volleyball and soccer practices, haircuts & a perm, last minute clothes and school supply shopping, doctor & dental appointments, school orientations & class schedule pick ups, end-of-

summer parties & potlucks, Sweet 16 party planning, a written driving test (she passed!), a memorial, and countless “Mom, can you (take me/pick me up) (to/from) (fill in the blank)?!?!” And now, unfortunately Kayla is having trouble with her knee again, so we’re squeezing in another MRI and physical therapy twice a week too.

Fortunately Labor Day Weekend was unscheduled for the most part and I put the finishing touches on two “almost done” photo albums and started a third. And my gardens are looking pretty darn spiffy now that I’ve “rearranged this,” “moved that,” weeded, given the bushes haircuts and FINALLY managed to grow some beautiful dahlias without the bugs taking them over (one of my sabbatical goals).

Okay, break over, now I’m off again – to order Kayla’s birthday cake, pick up books for McKenna at the library, and then cheer Kayla’s team on at the high school volleyball jamboree. Let the next race begin!

Changing Gears

Our Lake Curlew vacation was a fun time – for the most part we had great weather for water sports, although it was a little windy the last couple of days. The bass fishing was great and our friends’ new “party barge” made it even more fun to take 8-9 people fishing in the early hours of the morning. We had close to 60 people at our annual fish fry pot luck on Wednesday night – it was a very large group of friends and family this year.

After six weeks of various excursions & travels we are back together at home and getting into the “back-to-school” routine that comes with the last two weeks of summer vacation. Philip goes back to work tomorrow (sigh!), volleyball & soccer practices start this week, and both girls pick up their school schedules this week and next. We are all happy to be home and I’m ready to take on some of my photo and scrap booking projects in between shuttling the kids around.

New York! New York!

The girls & I had an amazing 3 ½ days in New York City with my aunt, Tammy. We arrived to hot, humid weather Saturday afternoon and visited Grand Central Station, walked & shopped the stores along 5th Avenue and had a hot dog in Central Park. We ate dinner in Times Square and then bravely figured out the NYC subway system to get us back to our hotel.

Sunday we took the subway to the financial district and took the Staten Island Ferry round trip to view the Statue of Liberty and the skyline of Manhattan. From there we enjoyed the street performers in Battery Park, gazed at the history and beauty of Trinity Church and cemetery, viewed the construction at the World Trade Center site, and spent a little time in the Century 21 discount department store.

Sunday afternoon we were awed by the performance of “The Lion King” – truly a highlight of the trip. Afterward we enjoyed dinner at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, did a quick tour of Rockefeller Center area and the NBC studios and then crashed at the hotel to watch reruns on TV and recuperate!

Monday we took the subway to Canal Street in Chinatown and exposed Tammy and the girls to their first “back room” shopping experiences for knock-off and fake brand name purses and other bargain merchandise. What a kick! We stopped in at the Text 100 office for a quick visit and then once again crashed at the hotel at the end of the day.
Tuesday McKenna wanted to sleep in so Tammy, Kayla & I ventured off to Rockefeller Center, visited a few more shops along 5th Avenue, and walked through Greenwich Village and SOHO. By that time our feet were “barking” and we were all officially “shopped out.” After an early dinner, we took in a movie in Times Square before the 8pm performance of “Grease” on broadway.

We had quite the experience flying out Wednesday morning – we woke up to a tremendous thunder storm which dumped over 3 inches of rain in an hour in Manhattan and a tornado touched down in Brooklyn! We were soaked getting to the airport, but were luckily only 45 minutes late getting into Seattle.

We had two days to “regroup & repack” for our week of relaxation at Lake Curlew in Eastern Washington. Philip arrived there on Monday after traveling 1400 miles in two days from Colorado. He says the fishing is great and all of us are more than ready to have the four of us (& Rowdie!) back together again as a family on Saturday.

Birthday at Water World

Wednesday I drove 3 ½ hours back to Castle Rock to meet back up with the girls at my aunt’s along with my grandparents who drove in from Wichita on Monday. While I was gone, Kayla helped McKenna with her school shopping at the Outlet Mall – another successful shopping trip. They also enjoyed riding horses with Tammy.

Thursday, Aug 2 was my birthday and we celebrated the day at the local water park, Water World (http://www.waterworldcolorado.com/pages/newindex.html). The last time we were there the girls were 4 & 7 and McKenna was not very adventurous. This time I had a hard time keeping up with them! We had great weather and fairly short lines making for a great day of water fun with the family.

Today (Friday) we are hanging out at the house, playing my grandparents favorite game, Skip Bo, and getting packed up for our flight to New York City Sat morning. Tammy is coming with the girls & I for 3 ½ days in the city – should be an adventure! Grandma and I spent several hours today sorting through family genealogy information, old photos and dates and we got a lot of information pulled together going as far back as my great great great maternal grandparents. I also have a lot of homework to put all the data into something that makes sense before she & Grandpa go to Arkansas for the family reunion in September. They’ll be able to fill in information gaps from the extended family since many of them still live in the Arkansas area where much of our family is from. Grandma has also taken photos of gravestones in the family cemeteries in Cord, Arkansas to capture additional dates and names. It’s a fun scavenger hunt!

Salida, Colorado

Imagine 350 different Jeeps and all the associated motor homes, campers and tents all in one big country field with a giant red & white “big top” tent at the center and you’ll be picturing what it looks like at the All 4 Fun 4x4 event in Salida. The event started Saturday with people from all around the US. We met great people from Tennessee, Minnesota, Florida, New Mexico, California and many other areas. It’s an eclectic mix of extremes between true rednecks and company executives – many here with their families to enjoy the sport of four wheeling in the mountains.

Each day during the event, the drivers sign up for one of 20 different trails with about 20 Jeeps per run. Each trail is rated – green (easy), blue (medium), black (hard) and double black (extreme – you’ll have body damage to your rig).

The first day we chose a blue (medium) trail taking us through St. Elmo & across Tincup Pass to the small remote town of Tincup. The trail itself was rather easy, but the scenery was beautiful and it was a good “warm up” for me since I haven’t done much four wheeling with Philip before.

We decided on a more challenging run for day two and went with a black (hard) level run called the Chinaman Loop. What a kick! We were in major rock crawling most of the day – in some cases climbing through sections with boulders bigger than the Jeep – better known as “obstacles”. I was amazed at the areas we made it through and loved the landscape and taking pictures of the mountain flowers along the way.

Tuesday we went with another black level run up to Grizzly Lake. This time there was one major obstacle at the beginning of the trail that took two hours to get 11 Jeeps up & over -- after that it was a rocky, but scenic tour up to the lake where we enjoyed lunch. Again, we met some great people on all three trails and truly enjoyed the beauty of the Colorado mountains. And it wasn’t half bad having some time just with Philip either!

Castle Rock, Colorado

I’ve had limited Internet access this past week, so I’ll make a couple posts today on our adventures in Colorado. We arrived Wed evening the 25th, staying with my Aunt Tammy, Uncle Tim, Jason & Zachary. They live in a beautiful custom home area in Castle Rock (Escavera) and we’ve enjoyed walks on the walking trail around the community and also climbed “the rock” in town.

Kayla & I did our best to boost the local economy in Castle Rock our first two days here – specifically the Outlet Mall shops where we made a significant dent in Kayla’s back-to-school shopping and my Visa card! In addition to shopping, Tammy, Kayla & I took a tour of a local castle (http://www.cherokeeranch.org/history.htm) on Thursday, perused the Antique shops, and enjoyed watching Jason play in a basketball tournament in Colorado Springs. Kayla had her eye out for “tall hot guys” - she & cousin Jason are the same age and get along really well. We think Jason finally has Kayla beat in the height department – coming in at a little over 6 feet.

Sat the 28th we headed to the scenic Royal Gorge Park (http://www.royalgorgebridge.com/ParkInformation.aspx) where we met Philip & McKenna who had spent two weeks Jeeping in Whitehall, Montana and Ouray, Colorado and had just traveled in Salida, CO (about an hour from the Gorge) to set up camp for the All 4 Fun Jeep Jamboree (http://www.mhjc.org/all4fun.htm). After a few hours in the park enjoying the views, I followed Philip in my rental car back to Salida while McKenna headed back to Tammy & Tim’s.