A Decade of Micah!

Happy Birthday Micah!!

It is time to paaaaarrrrtay!

He wanted something small, with his two best buds.

 Slip and slide, burgers and cake. 

 After playing out in the back for a good hour, the boys came in a opened presents. After presents, it was time to eat. Burgers and hot dogs were on the menu along with mac and cheese.

 Cake time. 

A fun birthday with this great kid.

Happy Birthday Micah!!!

YW's Camp @ Camp Lo Mia

 Kara just came back from attending her first YW's camp this year. In AZ, the church has property up in Flagstaff where all the YW go for YW camp. I was supposed to go as the Camp Nurse, but couldn't and Leigh was supposed to go as the 4th Year YCL, but was unable to because of Show Choir. So Kara ventured up there all by herself . . . . . . well sort of. She was with the rest of the YW.

 Camp Lo Mia has a lot of cool things. Kara said she had a lot of fun!!

 I was told by several sources that Kara was awesome at Archery ----in fact, they all called her Katniss.

Taking time out for a spiritual moment.

The whole experience was great. I'm hoping that next year, I can join the girls.

Happy 10th Birthday Micah!

This is our Micah. It was 10 years ago in Flagstaff Medical Center on a rainy day that I gave birth to this cute boy. He's our AZ baby. Today is his birthday. Most of our celebration is going to take place on Saturday, but we decided to take Micah out for a birthday breakfast.

It's hard being one of the youngest of 5 kids, but Micah holds his own. He's super smart, a great big brother to Jace, awesome swimmer, a good friend, sensitive to those that need help, great at Cub Scouts (he's currently working on his WEBELOS badge), and a wonderful son.

We LOVE you 

and 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICAH!!

Swordfish at Sunrise

Another swim meet this evening. This time we are at Sunrise Pool in Peoria.

Her swim time is usually not until after the sun goes down, thank goodness. It was only 102 degrees today. LOL! The last swim meet it was 118!

 The first event was the 100 m Individual Medley. Kara had been doing well in this event at practice.

 She started out strong, being a close 2nd in the butterfly. She stayed right with her competitor for 1st in the backstroke. Kara says that breast stroke is not her favorite. This is where she slowed a little. The last leg of the race was freestyle and she was tired. It is a long grueling race. She held on strong and placed 4th!!

Kara's second event was backstroke. She did well and placed 3rd.

Her last and final event was the 50 m butterfly. Before she went off to the starting block, she turned to me and said, "I'm gonna be first." I could see that she was determined. She got to the starting block and started. She was in the lead right from the beginning. During the last 25 m, you could see the girl in second coming up close behind her. It was so close, I actually thought that the other girl had placed 1st and Kara 2nd. 

Then they announced the rankings. "1ST PLACE - LANE 7!!" That was Kara!!! She did awesome!! She was excited and proud of herself. You could tell by her speed walk back to us to show us her ribbon.

CONGRATULATIONS KARA!!!

One more meet, possible two. Next week is the qualifying meet for the championships. If she makes it in the top 8 times for whichever event she swims, she swims in the championships. We'll keep you posted.

Summer Day at the Phoenix Children's Museum

Taking the kids to the Phoenix Children's Museum had been on my list of things to do with the kids this summer. We met up with some friends from my work and explored the museum.

This place is pretty cool. The kids had never been here before, except for Jace. He has actually been here three times.  

 Everything here is for the kids to play.

 The art room is pretty cool. Every time we come here, the rocket is a different color. Today I guess is pink.

The last thing we usually do is the giant tree house. It's three stories high. I did go through it with Jace. Let me just say they are spaces that are not meant for adult-size. LOL! It was a fun day with the kids. Glad we could cross this off our summer bucket list.

Celebrating the 4th in the High Country

We decided to not only get out of the house, but get out of town to celebrate the 4th of July. We headed up north where we planned to go on a hike. This time of year, it is much more pleasant to go hiking up in the northern part of AZ.

Our original plan was a hike up in Oak Creek Canyon. On the way, we drove through Sedona. Love this place and all its landscape. Sedona is a fun town filled with cool stuff.

We drove through the canyon and found the hike we wanted to do. Unfortunately, many people had the same idea and there wasn't any parking. We went to plan B, which we made up as we went. We drove through the rest of canyon up to the lookout out point to view the whole of Oak Creek Canyon.

So prepare for photo overload. The views here are awesome!

Again, that's the road we drove on that goes through the canyon.

Me and my girls.

I wished we had asked someone there to take our picture. It would have been perfect to have Randy in the picture, instead of taking it.

Kara being silly.

We were looking at the different native American jewelry that was being sold there.

After Oak Creek, we continued on to Flagstaff for lunch. We stopped at Chick-fil-a. They had someone there making balloon things. So the kids stood patiently in line for 30 minutes to get these awesome balloon creations.

After lunch, we decided to head to SnowBowl to try out some hiking over there. It was nice and cool.

In the winter time, this very spot is where people go skiing. See the lifts?! I think they give people rides during the off season. 

Can you tell the kids are game for this hike?!

We lost half our gang as we were going into the forest. So the boys and I headed back to round them up. 

Those clouds were the reason we lost half our gang. Just as we were heading into the forest, we heard very loud thunder. 

 We convinced them that it would be alright. So the rest of them reluctantly came along. 

Because of the high altitude, some of the kids had headaches. Poor things. But those that did have headaches were troopers and just kept hiking. 

It was still a little gloomy. The clouds were rolling in.  

We decided to head back after hiking in there for 30 minutes. We found out that to get to the end of the trail would take 2.5 hours. 

 We stopped for a picture before the end of our hike. We took this picture with my phone camera, which is why it isn't very clear, but I had to post it because I love this shot. It was a fun day. I love doing things with my family. 

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!!!