Pack Meeting

We had pack meeting last night. It was held at a local park that has a splash pad so the kids could play in the water. Before the meeting began, the leader had a water balloon tossing game for the kids to play. Ethan and Brennon did well but Courtney and Jamie (one of her favorite babysitters, and Brennon's older sister) didn't do so well because Courtney kept jumping back from the balloon instead of catching it.

Thanks to Ethan's love of swimming and a wonderful swimming teacher, he completed the requirements for the Cub Scout swimming belt loop and pin. We had pack meeting last night and he got his pin and belt loop and ... a beach ball for being so "on the ball" with his requirements.

Then the kids ate Popsicle and played in the water at the splash pad. They were also given some bubbles and spent quite a bit of time trying to hit us with bubbles because the wind was blowing.

It was fun and now Ethan is motivated to work on more of his requirements. Yeah!!

Happy Pioneery Day!

Happy Pioneer Day everyone!! We woke up bright and early, I finished decorating the kids bikes (they want them decorated but don't have the patience to do it...like I do!!), loaded the bikes into the van, drove to Tuacahn to pick up our Bountiful Basket (if you haven't done it, you are missing out! www.bountifulbaskets.org , then drove down to the center of Ivins for a pancake breakfast sponsored by the Fire Department. It was actually a pretty good breakfast.

Then the kids and Bryan got ready to ride in the parade. Our ward's entry was the "Stroller Brigade" and the dads were supposed to push their kids in strollers while the older kids rode bikes. They all were supposed to wear red shirts and blue shorts. It worked out pretty well but there weren't a whole lot of kids who showed up. But they had fun. I sat in the shade and watched just in case a child (Courtney) bailed before the end of the parade. But they all rode great. The weather actually cooperated and it was overcast and not too hot.

Biking to line up:

Passing by:




When the parade was over, we drove home to clean the house. We then went swimming and it wasn't crowded at all. Now we are going to run to my parent's house for a BBQ this evening. Fun day!!

Air Conditioning!

Well, after a week of having sketchy A/C, we think it may now be fixed. I hope I'm not jinxing it with this entry, but we'll see. Last Thursday evening at 6 p.m. it started working but nothing was cooling down. By about 11 p.m. it was cooling again. The next morning I called a company who said that we were low on freon and had a leak. They put more in and went away. Friday afternoon at about 2 p.m. it started getting hot and took hours before it began cooling again. Saturday the company came back out and told me that it was again low on freon and we had a huge leak. "We can fix it for $5,000." Okay right! So we spent the weekend watching the thermostat go up and down and finally spent Saturday night at my parent's house with A/C. Monday a guy came who couldn't figure out what was going on but told us we should probably just get a new unit. Tuesday morning Bryan called our builder who called the company who put in our A/C to come out. They told us it was too charged with freon and took some out and it began working again. Wednesday it quit again and the company came back out to tell us that they had no idea what was going on so we didn't have A/C. Thursday they came out, took the entire thing apart, couldn't find anything, but put it back together with some more space in the filter for air to flow and it's working. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

It goes out each July so we are used to it but we hope it will make it through next year!

Swimming Lessons

Yesterday was the last day of swimming lessons for Ethan and Courtney. Both are pretty sad because they love to swim and it's been the highlight of the past two weeks. I told Ethan that he could join a swim team that would practice 4 days a week and he said, "What?!?! Two days without swimming?!?!" He's a little fish and Courtney is trying her hardest to catch up to him. They both passed their levels with flying colors (it was even the first time in the class for Ethan).

Last month Ethan took the Advanced Class and Courtney took the Beginner class. This month Courtney repeated the Beginner and was a pro at it. She doubled the amount of time she could stay under water and even got her American Crawl stroke looking better. She is really feeling comfortable in the water, which is good and bad. Sometimes she forgets that she isn't really a mermaid!

Ethan moved to the Swimmer class (it was supposed to be Advanced but she switched it based on the abilities of the kids who signed up) which is a life guarding basics class. Ethan's class didn't work on strokes as much as they worked on how to life guard. He loved it. He was the youngest in his class but wasn't a bit behind.

Here are some photos:

Going to Lunch

One of Courtney's best friends had a birthday at the beginning of the month while we were in Colorado. They didn't have a party for her because it is a crazy time of year and Courtney felt a little sad for her friend. So I asked her what she wanted to do. Her answer shows that she wants to be a little older than she really is..."Let's take her out to a nice lunch." So we did.

The kids had earned some coupons for free kids meals at a new restaurant in town (actually, it probably isn't so new, but it was a new to us) called Iggy's Sports Grill. It was a best place ever and the kids loved it!! In the middle of the restaurant there is a jumbo-tron like in a basketball arena. It was playing the British Open and so Ethan was entranced. They had a great kids meal with a huge ice cream sundae at the end. And the prices weren't bad at all. Courtney loved being able to make her friend happy.

Ethan and his sundae:

Lia and Courtney:

Baseball in the Park

After the train museum, lunch, and chores around the house, we decided to go to the park. Grandpa went with us and it was a lot of fun. Grandpa brought a bigger bat and we grabbed a bigger lefty glove for Ethan to use and he did great! He really hit the ball! One time he even almost took out Bryan. Bryan pitched one to him, Ethan hit it like a shot...right back at Bryan's head. I heard the crack of the bat hitting the ball, saw it fly back to Bryan, saw Bryan put up his mitt and then hit the ground. I was so afraid we were going to have to call the ambulance but Bryan got up laughing and congratulated Ethan for a hard hit. Ethan was pretty nervous that he was going to be in trouble for killing his dad, but when he saw that Bryan was fine, he felt a lot better.

Ethan is left handed and throws that way but he prefers to bat right handed. Bryan kept trying to get him to try it lefty but he would only try a few balls (hitting them pretty well) before he would slyly slip to the other side. Grandpa told him to keep trying to do it left handed so he could be a switch hitter, but we'll see.

Courtney even got in on the action and his some balls. She is determined to play little league next year with a pink glove, but we'll have to see.

Train Museum

It's a tradition for us to go to the Denver Train Museum when we come to visit. The kids love it. They love going through all the trains and seeing the models in the basement of the station. This year we went on a Saturday and they had train rides, so we got to go on that too. It was pretty fun. They even had a small Thomas the Train going around the outside model train set so Ethan had a picture with him.