Dress-up!!

Yes, even boys play dress-up. Right now we have Batman, Spiderman, and...

Jonah the Lion!!

CAMPING! Camping! And... camping.

We've gone on three camping trips this summer. I'm seriously tired of doing all the laundry that follows, but we've had some really great trips.

The first was with Brandon's cousin and family to Diamond Lake in southern Oregon. Right after the van died. The logistics of this camping trip were interesting. We ended up borrowing my dad's truck to go down. We squeezed the boys into the back of a Ford F-150 extended cab and drove for eight hours. It actually wasn't too bad. We'll call it bonding.

The lake was amazing. And the weather was fabulous. I even got a sunburn one day! This is my idea of camping. It got pretty chilly at night but as soon as the sun came up it was nice and toasty.

The main goal for Brandon this trip was fishing. And he did plenty of it! He'd go out every morning around 5:30 and bring in his limit around noon. Then we'd spend the afternoon together.

The boys got to go out, too. This is a pic of Sterling, Hyrum, Dylan (back of the boat) and Ty (in the front). We met these cousins last summer and Sterling and Dylan hit it off. They were the best buds and this summer they picked it right back up again.

Hyrum caught his first fish!! He was not interested in holding it, thank you very much.

Sterling went out with the guys one evening. He lasted about ten minutes and then was bored out of his gourd. But, once you're out there, you're out there so he had to tough it out. That was his last fishing trip in the boat.

He did, however, enjoy riding one of the bikes. We tried to bring ours but those were not high on the priority list and when the back of the truck was full, bikes were left out.

Jonah pretty much kicked it in here for much of the time. Well, he crawled around and got filthy dirty, too. Isn't this a great shot? Kate, who we were camping with, has a fancy camera and knows all the lighting tips. She should go pro.

She got this great shot of Hyrum, too.

And this is what you get after five days of camping and fun. Three boys sleeping in the back seat.

But, wait, there's more! Next we went on a trip to the ocean in Oregon for a family reunion. Tell me if this was a crazy decision. It was 90 degrees and sunny at home. It was misty and 55 degrees at the ocean. Total cloud cover. I wore two sweatshirts and a jacket to stay warm. I was happy to be sleeping in the back of the suburban for this trip. The boys got to sleep in Brandon's parents trailer with their cousins. They loved that.

It was a short trip, so not many pictures, but...

Sterling got buried.

And soaked. BRRR!

Hyrum got a great view of the ocean.

And cousin Molly got a piggyback ride! As for me, I huddled by whichever campfire I could find.

The last trip was another shorty. A quick weekend at the coast here in Washington, where, again, it was plenty toasty at home but cold and rainy 60 miles away on the ocean. Go figure.

But we did enjoy jumping waves. Sterling also became a pro at riding his bike sans training wheels here! He's awesome.

Hyrum showed his boy side. Slugs. He loved them. Picked them up. Found them new homes by our tent. One even came home in our tent, unbeknownst to me until I put it up to dry out. Nice.

Don't let the crazy man in the shorts fool you. The water is freezing!

See? I had on two sweatshirts.

Our kids could play in the sand all day. Good thing we needed to eat or we would have never convinced them to leave!!

Even Jonah loved it. It was hilarious watching him crawl around in the sand. He did this crazy crawl that I might have to get my hands on the video of.

Phew!! That was a lot of pictures! I enjoy camping but I am very happy to have no more camping trips on this year's calendar. Maybe if we were going somewhere warm and dry I might change my mind.... Oh, wait, I just remembered it took me two days to finish the laundry from this last trip. Next summer sounds great.

What a day!

Our bishop has an amazing little piece of land with a hand-built cabin on Lake Cushman up here. He and his wonderful wife were kind enough to let our Relief Society spend the day there yesterday. No kids, no husbands, just a bunch of girls sitting around chatting.

We got to the lake and found out we had to cross the lake in a boat to get their land on the other side. It was beautiful.

This was our view when the morning clouds blew off. Just the setting and the company would have made for a pretty exceptional day. I invited my mama along to spend the day with me.

I was on the planning committee for this day and thought I knew all that was going on. I was extremely surprised to see tubes on the dock!!

My mom was pretty excited, too. She raised me to be a water-loving girl and as soon as lunch was over we were the first at the dock for a ride.

We had a blast. Here we are enjoying a nice ride. I should have kept my legs down like my mom did. My knees kept knocking together and I have some nice bruises to show for it.

And here we are holding on for dear life!! We were proud to say we didn't get dumped and we had soooo much fun. Maybe next time Brandon suggests we find a boat I might not talk myself out of it...

So, there was this other tube there. It was a two-person that was a little more wild and no one would go on it with me! Not even the young, just-graduated ladies. There was one young woman there with her dad, who was driving a boat, and I asked her if she'd ride with me. It was an awesome ride. Like, seriously, hang-on-for-your-life, air-borne kind of ride. We had a blast. And we have matching bruises this morning to show our tubing credentials. Mine's from my knee hitting my cheek-bone as we were being thrown from the tube and her's is from banging her eye into my shoulder as we were being tossed around.

I haven't had that much fun in a long, long time. I love playing on the water.

In the running

So, I've been nominated for the Meanest Mom in the World. By my son, no less! Here's the story.

The other day Sterling asked for something and I told him no. He asked me why I always say no when he asks for something and I jokingly responded because I like being mean. He thought about that for a while, obviously, because yesterday we were at Costco having pizza and smoothies (something mean moms always feed their kids) when he asked me for something again. My response was no and so he followed up with, "Mom, why do you like being mean so much?"

Yes!! My ultimate goal as a mother has been reached!! I now feel secure in my parenting.

Funny automotive story, by Brandon

So, I'm not the brightest crayon in the box when it comes to automotive technology. That's because growing up, my dad, who is a car genius, did everything on the family cars. I could barely tell you the difference between a gas cap and dip stick.

So, as you could imagine, after just having taken the plunge with the new Suburban, when I started hearing a whining noise on Tuesday when I left work, I was experiencing some sort of nervous diarrhea!

Every time I accelerated, it would make the noise, but would stop upon deceleration or coasting. I didn't want to be stranded in Lacey, so I figured if I could hit the highway and be on cruise control, I might be fine. The noise was pretty bad until I got up to 60, and then 70 (when the limit changed). So bad that while I was on the phone with my good friend Ed, he could hear it on his end.

What did it sound like? Well, it was something in between a mule and the noise Jim Carrey makes on Dumb & Dumber ("Wanna hear the most annoying noise in the world?"). It sounded like it was coming through my speakers, though my radio was turned completely off. Truly, it was like aliens had overtaken my car.

Sure enough, while cruising, it was fine. I made it home. I was thankful for that.

On the internet, I was reading possible issues, by Googling things like "honda accord whining" and "honda whining acceleration." The number of responses I found were like the sands in the sea: cool air intake, transmission fluid, power steering fluid, wheel bearing, improperly tightened belts, water pump... the list goes on and on. But I didn't really trust any of it since all these guys are your typical "resident tech" types.

When my father-in-law came over, I asked him to take a ride with me and see what he thought. We drove all over and had a problem hearing anything. And since it's impossible to fix what you can't identify as the problem, I was getting a little frustrated. I was about to give up and head home and... **WHINE** There it was! And this time, it was while I was slowing down! So I stopped the car right in the middle of the 50 mph road, since nobody was behind me and it continued. My father-in-law was about to get out when about 300 yards behind me, a car started approaching, so I started again and hit a side road. Of course, nothing! We drove around a little more and when I was about to give up, it hit again, and luckily, it was in a small parking lot. It was loud. Lloyd thought it was coming from the back. He got out. He listened at the side of the car as he moved toward the back. He asked me to pop the trunk. I did. And the noise - STOPPED AGAIN!

Baffled, Lloyd got back in and asked if he was dreaming or if it really stopped right when he opened the trunk. And was it really coming from the back? I told him I thought it might be.

We got going again and finally heard it. We were on a 35 mph road with nobody behind me. I quickly slowed down, popping the trunk and the same time I was stopping. Lloyd, risking life and limb, jumped out when I was almost stopped, and ran to the back. He figured out the problem.

So, at this point, to explain the issue, I think it prudent to give some background. The Friday before all this went down, I was in charge of a church activity. It was a BBQ with games and fun stuff (including a wiffleball home run derby). I had this megaphone. Well, apparently, the megaphone button was turned on and it was in the back of my car. And I think when certain frequencies were reached by certain car components, maybe in conjunction with some of the different towers around, there was a high-pitched squealing that was emitted from this stupid electronic megaphone.

I was thankful it wasn't major car issues; embarrassed it was something so stupid; and glad I would have a funny story to tell.

It's tough...

being a baby.

Especially after a hard day of playing at the park.

Brothers.

So, you say you'd like to play in the mud with your big brother, huh? Be forewarned, you may not enjoy it as much as you think.

See what I mean?