Monthly Goals

I have started 'monthly goals' to start seeing some acomplishment in my life. (not that the kids aren't enough!) Or to see if I can stick with/to something. Anyway. The goal for July was to write in my journal every day. I had read back through past entries and decided that I was a pretty good 3-4 times a year writer. But this is goal making, so I committed myself to every day. And I did it! Yea! 31 entries. I don't think I'm going to continue the daily writing thing, because a few, maybe 8, of those entries were three liners. I think weekly or twice a week will work pretty well and still enable me to keep up with whats been happening. Now it's August. My goal for August is to post a new blog post every Tuesday and Friday. I think I can commit to this. Plus there will be school starting and camping and maybe a visit to T.O. to see some chickens and a very special Moki dog (and Helen and Al), parades, and maybe squash pancakes, so I will have no shortage of activities to share. You with me? I don't know if it all will be current stuff or if once a week is "current affairs" and the other time is a "blast from the past" (three years). We'll see. A quick recap of the summer so far: The ring of fire and watching venus move across the sun was great fun. I bought some sun safe glasses for viewing and overall it was pretty cool. The kids didn't understand really what the point was.

Swimmming lessons since June for B and K. K is proving quite adept. She enjoys learning the different strokes and is a star when it comes to floating on her back. B is getting lots of practice as well. B is doing pretty okay. His backstroke is good, his front crawl leaves some to be desired, but he happily gets in the pool everyday and practices holding his breath underwater in the tub. We've had rain, rain, and more rain. All July loooong. It's always humid and the kids are always sticky and no one wants to play outside. I don't remember it being like this before. Usually we get a day or two and it's such a blessed relief you wish it could be rainy more. Not so this year. I am ready for it to STOP raining. We live in a desert, c'mon. Last week we had 3 days where there was no rain and no cloud cover. It was 107, but it felt suprisingly cool after all that humidity. Summer school ended the end of June, summer preschool ended the 18th of July. She thought she had to do summer preschool because of her horrible showing at her preschool graduation in May. Maybe that will be a "blast from the past" post. We've had lots of squash from our garden and across the street at the community garden. We finally have some red tomatoes. Rachels peach tree also gave us quite a few small peaches, an all of this rain (if it stops soon so they don't get moldy) will give us a nice crop of pomegranates. I'd like to make pomegranate jelly, we'll see. 2nd grade starts August 15th, Kindergarten starts August 22nd. This is just a nice bonus post for August so I can round it out to an even 10 posts this month. After I download my camera, there will be more pictures. Okay. See you tomorrow!

Gym Rat

I have joined a gym. Anytime Fitness to be exact. Rachel wanted to end her membership because she is planning on moving soon and decided she'll just run through the streets for exersize. Also, when I went to the dentist and had my blood pressure taken it was a little on the high side. 130/89. A fluke? Well it was almost exactly the same 6 months ago when I was there last. So, since I DO NOT want diabetes, and since I already have the genes for heart disease, here I go.

I went in today to talk with a personal trainer. But I didn't go alone. Oh no. Mom asked if she could go along and I thought 'yeah, good, mom's going to start exersizing again. Sure, this'll be nice.' I gave her 5 minutes to get ready. When the five minutes were up, and she was still wearing the same clothes she had on earlier, I though 'oh great we're going to be late.' But then she grabbed the camcorder and said 'oh you don't mind if I record this for our fitness blog do you?' um, what fitness blog. Oh, the one we're going to create! uh, fine whatever.

So, longer story shorter, I felt like I was seven and going to my first day of school. Especially when DAD dropped by as well. Ha! I may never go to the gym again. Except I am supposed to do 30 minutes before I meet with the trainer again tomorrow. And the workout he created just for me? I may not die of heart disease. I don't even think I'll make it through the first go around. But enough of that defeatist thinking. The kids first day of school coming up!

Camping at Honeycomb Rocks

Surprise Surprise!! A post! Take that Bekah. Anyway. Rachel wanted to go camping at Fossil Mountain for her birthday, but I was opposed to sitting in the heat for days on end with only the water we brought in. She compromised and instead we went to Enterprise Resevoir. There is a new(ish) campground there - Honeycomb Rocks, and we had a lot of fun. Except for when Kayla fell off of said rocks and ended up scraped, bruised, and bleeding. Whoops!

We went up Thursday afternoon and came back Saturday afternoon. Just a fun-filled couple of days! This area of the Dixie National Forest was a huge wildlife viewing area. We saw mule deer (with huge bat-ears), a grey fox, teeny tiny frogs the size of a quarter, many, many cottontail bunnies, fish, bees, wasps, cows, a 5 foot long corn snake, squirrels, chipmunks - even a Forest Ranger on a horse! I'm sure there was more, mom kept track.




Oh, and Mater...


although I'm not sure if he qualifies as wildlife.

Mom, Rach and the kids had fun fishing, Dad came up and spent the nights, and I enjoyed riding the back roads and eventually ending up in Nevada on the top of a mountain with a great view of the gorge. Our campsite was pretty great. Rachel and I only drove around the campground 4 times checking out each site. But it was worth it - close enough to the compost potties for Mom (and the kids), a short walk to the resevoir, and afternoon shade. Sure it was no Yosemite, but it was still enjoyable. we also had a huge bright moon to act as a night light. Mygoodness, you could practically read underneath it. We also saw a couple of spectacular meteors from the Persied (sp?) shower.





There was also a fun, fun 'cave', okay tunnel, running underneath the road and Rachel Brayden and Kayla were a little afraid to go in. Okay so was I. I just kept thinking of spiders touching me and some poisonous bug stabbing me. There were swallow nests near the mouth and Rachel said 'you go first and see if you get pecked'. HA! But the only swallows that were left were the dead and decomposed babies on the ground. Sad. Add that to the list of wildlife. But I ventured in with Brayden and the Rachel and Kayla followed. It was still a little creepy.


All in all a good camping experience and one that we wouldn't mind repeating. Although I'd choose Yosemite again if I could. I love Yosemite, I would live there if I could. Ahhh. Anyway. Here's to you, Dixie National Forest!

Two posts, made and gone...

Yes, this will be my third time writing a post today. Perhaps this one will actually make it to the blog instead of somehow being mysteriously deleted. Want to know what I was writing about? Our Easter egg hunts, then the Royal Wedding. Well it looks like the wedding one might stick because the picture is still here. So, here was my favorite hat, or rather the one that stood out the most for me. NOT the blue boat looking one, the other one. A big flower on top with a purple feather brim. So pretty. Will it come up on ebay do you think? Or should I just figure out a way to make one myself?

Yes, I was up at 2a to watch all of the hullabaloo. And I enjoyed it. I am an anthropological historian after all. Anyway, Kayla watched some of it with Nona this morning, and when Brayden came home from school we watched a few bits and peices on youtube so he could see the prince and princess. He was a little disapointed that they didn't kiss at the church, but when I was bringing the kiss on the balcony up to show him, he rushed across the street for the planting peanuts primary activity in the garden. Okay, fine. Well here goes, lets hope this works.

the beginning

I know it's been, what, almost 2 years already? But here it is, the family blog to keep you all up to date on whats been, what is, and what will be going on with us. That's pretty optimistic for this blog, so have no expectations and be pleasantly suprised!