five men and a lady: 2011

During the kids Fall Break we were able to go camping for four days. It was WONDERFUL! The weather was great and so was the location. We enjoyed a day of canoeing and then just spent the next day relaxing and kayaking on a neighbor campers kayak. All the boys except Conner tried it out alone! Leah even tried out some swimming in the freezing cold water.

The boys love campfires as does their mommy!!

Leah can't get away from that darn metal chain! We tried a few times, but she would take off towards other camps, so this is the way it is!

Ok, so I really do start these weekends off, looking pretty decent, but by the end a little bit rougher!

Two of the boys slept in this little tent.

Canoeing... what a great time. The boys jumped in while canoeing, and boy was the water COLD, they didn't stay in long. It was pretty much an in and out excursion! :)

Lunch time on the other side of the lake. The weather was in the 90's in mid-October!!

Leah trying to dry herself off after a tromp in the water with another dog. Too funny!!

Bryce on the kayak by himself! He loved it!

The boys caught these big grass hoppers and insisted on carrying them around. Them carrying them around ended many a grass hoppers life! :( Eww!!

Sean and Conner each holding grass hoppers!

Sean Kayaking by himself. Amazing what these little guys can do when you let them!

Rummicube... lately a staple on our camping trips. So much fun!

What a messy campgrounds!! We really should talk to those boys about keeping a cleaner area! :) The boys each got 10 pictures on the camera of whatever they wanted, this is one!

Our view.

Our neighbors campground after they packed up. Great spot!!

Playing 500 with dad. This caused a few tears...

Cleaning up camp and getting ready to head out. :(

Our family.

Our campsite.

Hiking while on Fall Break

Bryce was beat by the time we got to the top of our hike! Cody is always a trooper!

The group of hikers who made it to the top, minus mommies!

Conner climbing around.

Pictures from our nature habitat!

The beautiful sunset from our back yard. Love this place!!

LOVE IT!!

There is always a unique bug or animal running around this place! It's so much fun to see all the little critters. This grass hopper was a really pretty bug! Conner tried to catch him and had no luck, it was quite noisy when it flew off and startled him, as did it startle me too!!

Leah looking cute, not loving the chain but since she jumps the fence it's a necessity until the invisible fence comes in.

And a lizard on the back fence too!

The Air Force Ball

Doug took me to the Air Force Ball this year. So we searched in my closet and found a dress I could recycle from Colleen's wedding and off Doug went to the dry cleaners with his mess dress from the Academy and my dress. And we were set!

It was a beautiful evening at a beautiful location, the only thing that would have made it better would have been knowing someone there! We knew very few people there and non of the people we sat with. Next year we probably won't go unless we have friends to go with! :)

At the end we did run into a friend from Korea of all places!! :)

Camping at Rose Canyon

We have been wanting to go camping since landing in the US of A and we finally got to go do just that a couple weeks ago. We packed up all out "gear" and newly acquired dog and off we went, just 45 minutes from our front door! The best part about this camping spot is there is a stocked trout lake there as well that the boys are able to fish while staying there! They all LOVE it!

Doug loves how this makes the fish look so big!! :)

After fishing we went on a hike up the mountain right behind our camping spot! It was such a great camping location. The boys are always on the lookout for little critters and this hike didn't disappoint! Conner found what I think was a horny toad. It was just a little guy but I am pretty sure he wanted to bring him home and keep him... Yeah, not so much what mommy wanted.

All those great fish that we caught... they had to be cleaned, and mommy doesn't touch that with a ten foot pool, so that's a Daddy job! Thankfully he doesn't mind.

Even I got in on the action of chopping up a dead tree into firewood. All that exercising paid off!

Our dog, being part grey hound, was FREEZING all weekend, and was not such a huge fan of camping. She's afraid of the dark and she also has no body fat, so she's had better times. Doug had sympathy on her and pulled out a sleeping bag for her to use so she wasn't so cold! So sweet! And too funny!!

Our tent was on a SEVERE slant ***ehem*** and the boys started off sleeping at the top of the tent and ended up in the morning all bunched up at the bottom. Gotta love slippery sleeping bags! Thankfully we slept on an air mattress so the slipping wasn't AS bad, but even we were scrunched down in the mornings.