May/June/July

I feel like the blog is fizzling out.  Different season of life, I guess.  Here's some of what we've been up to.  

We have a gray cat in the neighborhood that has been coming around to visit.  I've been putting food out for him, because I find it so amusing to watch Grumman's little walnut brain be blown by the idea of another cat out there.  I leave the door open a couple inches when he is here, and they "high five" each other through it.  

We made it through the end of the school year, and all the end of school year events.  Certificates were passed out.  Songs were sung.  Parents applauded.  

This was taken in the Kaiser waiting room.  I had some weird eye issue when we finally limped across the End of School finish line.  Thankfully, after 3 weeks of prescription drops, it cleared up with no lasting repercussions.  

Here's Jack with a 3D printed airplane.  He's a full fledged grown up with his own car, his own church, and his own opinions, lol.  He even took his first solo vacation recently, road tripping to Idaho to visit family.  

And here's Jack flying a plane.  Again.  Different plane.  

He loves flying, and will hopefully be taking lessons at some point.  

Speaking of flying, in June, I flew to Colorado to see Sam and meet Nan, his fiancé.  They took me to the Denver Zoo.  If you look closely, you can see the elephant is about to chomp down on an entire bunch of celery that the staff member tossed at him.  

We saw lots of neat animals.  Their cream colored raccoons are adorable, but they were hard to photograph.  I think one was named Cashew.  

It was wonderful to see my boy.  And Nan makes him happy, which makes me happy.  

They're getting married next summer.  

This is a terrible picture of their dog, Pip.  He kept crawling in my lap and making himself right at home.  

This is one of their kitties.  They also have a gray kitty, but I can't get the photo to upload.  

It was a quick trip, but I'm so glad I went.  I love that my kids are interesting grown ups with active lives of their own; it's just hard to have them in 4 time zones sometimes.  

I discovered my own mini travel hack on this trip.  I used binder clips to keep my charger cords untangled in transit.  When I turned off the light in my hotel room, I realized there was a gap in the curtains, letting in a flood of light.  I used one of the binder clips to fasten them shut.  

At some point, I will write a post (or a few) about the next trip I took this summer.  

Calaveras Big Trees

We visited a state park with several families from our church.  

This was most of us, before our hike.  

An obligatory, "we were here" photo.  I got in the habit of taking pictures of the kids when we went somewhere, just in case I needed to be able to describe what they were last seen wearing.  

We had a lovely 2ish mile hike/walk through the giant sequoias and other evergreens.  We saw some very Big Trees indeed at this pleasant recreation area.  

There were trees you could walk through.  

We spotted wild strawberry plants, tiny waterfalls in a flowing stream, and even some snow in the very shady spot where snow plows had piled drifts.  

The weather was warm enough to be comfortable in short sleeves.  

And at the end of it, there was a little gift shop and museum (tiny museum).  I took this picture of the separating arrow for Hannah, since she was hanging out with the teens and wasn't with me in the museum.  Hannah is fascinated by weapons, so I thought she would appreciate this.  

Since the park was a couple hours away from where we live, we listened to a book.  Hannah and I are reading/rereading the Susan May Warren books in order this year, so we were listening to her The Heat Is On.  Watching my long suffering husband as he was subjected to Christian romance was quite amusing.  

Spring Break Road Trip - part 1

I know, it's been months since I've blogged.  But we finally did something blog worthy.  We took a road trip up to Oregon for spring break.  My motivation was to see a Shakespeare play in Ashland.  But, of course, it turned into so much more.  

Fiona gets a little concerned when the suitcase comes out.  Jack was responsible for the animals while I was gone, so it's a valid worry.  

The drive up north was a bit rainy, and it was whooshing windy when we stopped in Weed.  

We went to the Wildlife Safari in Winston.  I got our tickets via Groupon.  This cheetah has an emotional support dog in the cage with it.  

We saw lots and lots of very cool animals, and the girls even got to ride a camel! 

After Winston, we stopped on the way back to Medford (where we stayed all week) to stretch our legs.  

We took a nice walk along the Rogue River, and I introduced the girls to miner's lettuce.  

You can take a girl out of the library, but you can't take a love of books out of the girl.  We stopped at 2 used bookstores, we pottied at 2 public libraries, and we visited at least 19 Little Free Libraries.  

We wandered around historic Jacksonville, but most things were closed, as hours are limited during the off season.  

But it was still very pretty.  Lots of daffodils and tulips.  

Deer roaming the streets in Ashland.  (We saw more of them by the science museum, but I didn't take a picture then.)

We walked around Lithia Park a bit.  It was chilly, but picturesque.  

We toured Harry & David.  

Many of the machines were not in use since most workers had the week off for spring break, but we did see some activity.

The tour guide made it sound like a great company to work for, and of course, after the tour comes the...

...gift shop!  I didn't buy a mug, but I did miss Grumman while I was gone.  We bought some dark chocolate truffles and a soup mix I'm looking forward to trying.  

So, it goes without saying that we visited a lot of public restrooms.  In fact, this morning when Eddie Murphy's Party All the Time was playing on the radio, I mentally changed the chorus to, "My kids want to potty all the time, potty all the time, potty all the tiiiiiiime..."  Anyway, I spotted a duck in one of the restaurant bathrooms we visited and it reminded me of cruising ducks, which made me smile.  

We had lunch with an old friend in Eagle Point, and afterwards we explored a bit of the historic sector.  

Another walk along a different stretch of river.  

Hannah and Katie loved the food.  Eating out all the time, picking what they wanted, was one of their favorite parts of vacation.  We had Panera, Cracker Barrel, Black Bear, pizza, a leftover night, and more.

My grandmother loved rocks.  My dad loves rocks.  I have a fondness for rocks.  Two of my children have expressed a love of rocks.  So we went to Crater Rock Museum.  Which was more impressive than I expected it to be.  

Some very big specimens.

Some scary specimens.

Hannah's favorites were the native bows & arrows, and the stone knives.

The train, fire engine, and planes are MADE OF ROCKS.

This fort, and the "painting" below, yup, MADE OF ROCKS.

And off in a back room, oh yeah, a couple dinosaurs.

I'll stop here because this is really photo heavy, but I have more to share!