July 26 & 27th

Monday we went to Forest Park in Everett.  I remember coming to this park as a child and enjoy bringing my children here as an adult.  The playground is in the same location as the one I played at as a child but has been totally updated. 

The old wading pool has been replaced by a spray pool that the kids enjoyed playing in. 

Here are the girls' new swim suit coverups.  They're made out of $5 Wal-Mart towels and elastic thread.  It took about 30 minutes to make each one.  I saw the tutorial here.  beach towel cover up tutorial

There's not much different about the petting zoo, it's still down a steep hill from the main park area. 

The bathrooms are still a long walk from the play area too.  It pays to plan ahead!

I'd gone over to the Wilmont's (a family from church) in the morning to let their dog out (we were doing the pet/plant thing for them while they were out of town) and my wallet had fallen out of my purse in the little van.  I grabbed my purse when I got everyone into the big van but didn't notice the wallet.  I'd planned to run a bunch of errands on the way home but with no money, and an almost empty gas tank, that wasn't going to happen.  I was worried how I was going to get my gas guzzling van full of children back home without running out of gas but decided there was nothing I could do about it and we might as well enjoy the day.  (I learned this trick from Dode.  Once we were driving to church when the fuel pump on the van conked out.  He decided we'd worry about it when church was over so we left the van where it died (very close to the building) and went in to enjoy the meeting.)  Thankfully, I found $60 stuffed in my camera bag from our road trip and that let me put gas in the tank and get three out of four errands done.

Tuesday I was one of the chaperones at Elizabeth's activity day camp. 

She loved having mom there with her.  She kept sneaking glances at me to smile and I was the recipient of lots of hugs.  She learned a song, planned a family home evening,

decorated a pillowcase,

and did some Zumba. 

The event finished with a lunch where Elizabeth really enjoyed the brownie bites (she had six) and the fruit kabobs.  

My new addiction!

My step-dad Greg knows I have a taste for good chocolate and spoils me by bringing/sending me dark chocolate bars.  My favorite chocolate company is Theo Chocolates, based out of Seattle.  Last week, he brought me a spicy dark chocolate bar.  I wasn't so sure about it, I'm pretty much a whimp when it comes to spicy things but since it was here, I gave it a try.  The 1st time I had a piece, I thought it was so-so.  But, the 2nd time I was hooked.  There's something about dark chocolate with the background heat of the chili peppers that makes my mouth say YUM!  I'm very good at savoring the chocolate he brings me and can usually make one bar last two weeks, breaking off tiny pieces I let melt in my mouth.  Not with this one.  It's taking all my self control to make this one last.  I never would have believed the combination of rich bitter dark chocolate would go so well with spicy but it totally works!  I'm scheming how to buy them by the case!

1st week of summer, Arlington style

Although we've done a lot of playing this summer with our big trip, it hasn't felt like summer until now.  When we got back, I had two weeks to get everything ready for cub scout day camp.  We finished up with day camp last week and now it feels like it's time to play.  I started by getting the calendar out and scheduling some fun.  I started with the Saturdays since that's when Dode can play too.  We're having a family party on August 7th and a party for our ward family two weeks later.  We've got a few family hikes scheduled and a trip to Sucia Island in the Puget Sound on the boat.  Next, I chose something fun to do each Thursday.  Woodland Park Zoo, 3-2-1 Bounce, Jetty Island, surfing and hopefully a trip to Oak Harbor to see the cousins.  That didn't feel like enough playing yet so every Wednesday evening is boating, rain or shine!  Lastly, it still didn't quite feel like a full schedule so Mondays are "park" days. We've got lots of fun parks within a 30 minute drive from home so we'll be making the rounds.  This Monday it's Forest Park in Everett where the girls can wear their new swim cover ups I made them after playing in the spray pool, pictures to follow!  I love to do fun things with the kids but find it's so easy to talk myself out of it due to low energy, errands, projects at home, etc.  When it's scheduled on the calendar, I'm much better at feeling "obligated" to play ( I know that sounds pathetic).  All that playing begins the week of July 25th, this week was for getting stuff done.

I hadn't done true grocery shopping since getting home from our trip and some of our staples were running low.  (We'd gone through six containers of peanut butter on the trip and had used up the rest since getting home.)  This week it was time to fill the cupboards.  I felt very frugal Tuesday as I did my bargain grocery shopping stacking coupons and hitting the jackpot of marked down meat, hit Rite Aid for the rebate items, stopped at the bread outlet, stopped at the fabric store to pick up some patterns on sale for 99 cents, then walked over to Value Village to look for some new church dresses for the girls ($3.99 each).  All that on the way to pick up newspapers in order to save gas by doing it in one trip.

Then, on Thursday Miriam had to get a filling at the dentist which she was dreading.  It made it a bit easier for her to handle because she went to spend the night at Millie's after the dentist.  Dode had made plans with Jacob to take him and his friends out boating after work so once he got home, he grabbed the boat and van and was off.  It's the first trip for the boat this season.  Dode managed to let everyone have a great time and get them all home safe and sound.

I ended up babysitting for Sheri as a last minute emergency.  We don't have any little ones left at home but Seth and Ellie didn't seem to mind drinking Aunt Stephanie's special milk concoction of fat free milk with a shot of whipping cream.  Seth is a fellow of few words and it's hard to know what he wants.  I figured out he really likes cantaloupe after he and William finished off an entire melon just the two of them.  I don't know that Ellie enjoyed her first sleep over.  She went to sleep just fine (after the to be expected fussing) but was up a few hours later wanting her mom.  She didn't know she was among the enemy until I turned on the light to offer her a cup of milk.  She looked at me, did not like what she saw, and started leaning into Dode who was holding her, until she turned and looked at him and saw another strange person.  Then the tears really began.  We couldn't give her what she wanted and she cried herself to sleep, heartbroken.  She woke up a few hours later to repeat the cycle.  But, morning came and with it the return of mom.  Neither Seth or Ellie were ready to leave.

Friday we had Elizabeth's 10th birthday party. 

It's over a month late due to our trip but worth the wait.  The girls decorated sparkly foam visors,

 beat up on a huge pinata,

and spent a lot of time splashing in the pool. 

We did a Hawaiian theme since that's what we had stored in the garage

Birthday parties are not among my favorite things and I used to limit the kids to one every other year.  When I saw with Jacob how quickly they outgrow wanting a party, I decided to throw caution to the wind and let them have yearly parties.  I have to force myself to schedule them and carry them out but it's a gold star feeling to have the party complete.

William enjoyed repurposing the pinata as a giant silly hat.

Saturday after our produce responsibilities were done, we went to Kyak Point to enjoy the nice weather.  The camera was left at home.  The park was really busy but Dode was kind enough to drop us off down at the beach and drive up the hill where the overflow parking is.  The kids enjoyed swimming in the Puget Sound and playing at the playground.  When everyone was played out, we headed back home for dinner and time in the pool.

Day Camp

wikipedia: Performance art is art in which the actions of an individual or a group at a particular place and in a particular time constitute the work. It can happen anywhere, at any time, or for any length of time.


I'm a creative person but not an artistic person.  Cub scout day camp is my chance to be a performance artist. This was my 9th camp (8th year) as program director.  (The 2nd year I did camp I ran two camps.)

I truly feel like an artist with day camp because I begin with the theme I'm assigned, dream up classes that go with the theme, add in fun extra elements, and finally get to see my vision become reality when camp starts.  I look around and see cubs at my stations, happily engaged with adults who are presenting fun information and I feel like a true artist.  It's also always amazing that it "works".  Then, four days later my artistic creation is nothing but memories and a few items the boys bring home with them.

This year's theme was "All American Sports".  I wasn't very excited about it to begin with because I don't follow any professional sports.  Offered free tickets to a sporting event, I politely decline while I think to myself, "they'd have to pay me a lot of money to go".  But, I applied my creative juices to the theme and it turned out to be a successful camp.  I can gauge how well the boys are enjoying the camp by how many boys we have spending time at headquarters in time out.  If it's a great class, they don't want to miss out and make sure to behave.  We didn't  have any time outs this year.  Hooray! 

We had 120 cubs with 60 adult and teen age volunteers.  It doesn't matter how many fun classes I plan, the favorite activities are always archery and bb guns.

We had some fun classes in the "sports" theme including playing with footballs, soccer balls, and baseball.  The cubs were able to earn 5 belt loops: archery, bb guns, map & compass, badminton, and kickball. 

They also completed 3 wood projects

did outdoor cooking....

learned about two of my favorite sports,

orienteering,

and geocaching.

I take photos of all the dens to send home with the boys and they always want to do a silly photo.

The boys can earn prizes through showing scout spirit.  I collect things all year from the free box at garage sales, giveaways at events, and anywhere else I can scrounge things the boys would want.  I pay the kids 25 cents for unopened Happy Meal toys.  This year, the prizes were dumped into two large inflatable sports coolers.  They spent a lot of time pawing through looking for the perfect prize.

Since it was a sports theme, and I'm the program director, I try to have a hat or costume that goes with the theme.  This year, I was the referee.  I blew the whistle to let them know it was time to go to a new class.

This photo was taken at 8:00 pm on Thursday night, after four days of running camp, taking down camp Thursday night, and unpacking everything at home.

To go with our sports theme, we handed out trophies to all the boys at our closing exercises.  The dens all came up and performed a short skit before being handed their certificate and trophy.  The boy's eyes were drawn to the trophies like magnets and they had a difficult time getting their focus on their skits.  I was watching carefully, worrying that we wouldn't have enough.  We ended up with four extra trophies.

Every year, when camp is over I lay in bed that night with Dode talking about what we could do better/different next year.  It usually involves extra work for him!  When I first started doing camp, our whole group events were held in the field with me in the front of the group yelling as loud as I could.  Then, we added a megaphone which helped but was still not a good solution since the sound was so narrowly projected.  To give the front where I stand more of a "stage", we added 12 core value flags in a semi circle. 

Our core value flags are the primary colored flags you see.  Each one has one of the 12 core values of cub scouting printed on it.  The white and yellow triangle flags are our national accreditation flags that we receive each year when our camp is inspected and meets BSA national standards.  We started flying those a few years ago.  We've accumulated quite a few!  Our new addition for this year was a sound system.  You can see a small round table under the red flag.  That has my PA system which is powered by a small generator we hid in a clump of trees.  Dode's speakers from the garage (formerly from the church building) were stuck up on poles and projected the sound nicely.  I used a wireless headset microphone which left me free to move around and engage in the kind of silliness that I do in front of the group like direct and sing action songs.  At first, I felt silly hearing my voice echoing off the trees but it helped so much.  The boys were quiet when they needed to be and we could actually hear the skits this year!  One of the dad volunteers who was a den leader teased me about my singing so I guess I'm a good example that you don't have to be THE best to get up and do something, you just have to do YOUR best.  I am the queen of PVC pipe, rebar and zip ties at day camp.  Poor Dode is stuck pounding all that rebar in. 

 I already know what I'm doing differently next year, I'm going to run a ribbon between each core value flag pole to keep the cubs back.  I had one walk right into the speaker on the pole and several tripping over speaker cords.  I'm also moving our gathering area closer to headquarters. You can see headquarters, it's the white canopy in the far distance, lined up with the flagpole of the red flag closest to the camera.   I ALWAYS forget something back at headquarters and am left sprinting back to get it with minutes to spare before I'm "on".  Three times a day I end up making the trip twice. 

I've been doing camp for so long that planning the program isn't terribly difficult so I keep trying to make it better by adding more to it.  Here are some things we've added over the years that I believe are unique to Camp McKinley.  We have a joke flag that we fly.  One of the teen helpers wears a jester hat and when the flag is flying, he receives jokes and hands out Laffy Taffy.  I have metal juice lids with a special label on them that another teen hides throughout the camp during the day.  Once found, the cub scouts bring them to headquarters for a prize.  We also have a daily riddle or puzzle relating to the theme that when the cub scout solves, they receive smarties candy.  To make our ceremonies more fun, I have a big fuzzy white wig and lab coat that one of the teenagers puts on to become "Salbert Finestein", the long lost nephew of Elbert Einstein. He shares deep thoughts with the boys like, "If you cut off your left arm, your right arm will be left".  I'm always on the lookout for more ways to make camp fun so if you have any suggestions, send them my way!

Our trip in review

So, I've had a few days to recuperate and it's time for a few statistics and a review of the trip.

Miles Traveled: 6,101
Gallons of gas used: 600 (can you say ouch!)
Ice cream cones/milkshakes eaten: approx. 92 (how embarrassing!)
Junior ranger badges earned:  37
Days of trip: 24
States:  14
National parks/monuments: 9
Kids: 6 
Tents: 4 (5 when my mom joined us) so fun to put up/take down almost every day!
Mom: 1
Grandma: 1/3 (one week of the trip) 
Emergency room visits: 0 hooray!

Would I do it again without Dode?  Yes, although I'd much rather have had him with me!  The long driving days got lonely with the kids plugged in to movies/books/headphones.  It's also nice to have the dad along when parenting issues come up.  Plus, he's my sweetie.  I missed him.  Would I do everything exactly the same?  No.  I'd plan another day in the Black Hills.  We didn't have time to do any bike riding or hiking or take advantage of any of the ranger programs in Custer State Park.  I'd bring coats/blankets and food if we were staying for the lighting at Mt. Rushmore.  I'd take the detour to see the homestead that inspired Laura Ingalls Wilder.  I'd skip the tour of the Minuteman Missile Command Center (even though those things really interest me) in favor of a hike in Badlands National Park.  I'd find something to do in Minnesota besides gassing up and getting new movies at Wal-Mart.  It killed me to drive by the Czech museum in Cedar Rapids and it surprises me how much it continues to rankle me.  My dad is half Czech which makes me 1/4 and my grandpa has relatives that live in Iowa.  I'm sure that museum has information about my ancestors.  And I would love to know more about how their culture and lives were affected when they came to the United States.  Next time, I'm stopping!  I'd also stop at the Strategic Air Command Museum in Omaha.  I'd spend more time with Sharon and Lynn.  I'd skip Pikes Peak Railroad (it was pretty but too long and expensive) and instead drive through Garden of the Gods and stop at the Focus on the Family visitor center and then be able to enjoy the drive along the river to our campground without being so tired.  I would have stayed closer to the Grand Canyon.  I would have biked the trails at Kodachrome State Park.  I would have planned more "down time" where we just enjoyed a day of swimming and relaxing without seeing anything special, maybe every 4-5 days.  There's a lot more in Southern Utah I want to see and my hope is to make it a trip of it's own in a few years.  I would just put my shoulder to the wheel and gone all the way to the Atlantic,  another 800 miles to the east.  Then I could have felt like I made a truly cross country trip.  So much more prestige you know!  One thing I fought the entire trip were the bikes we brought along.  They took up 3/4 of the trailer and had to be put in like a jigsaw puzzle to fit in.  It was a shove fest to get everything in and the doors closed.  The bikes got used maybe 20 minutes the entire trip.  I guess my bike riders are getting too old to enjoy riding around the campground and my little ones are still too little to begin.  Next time, I'll just bring my bike!  Plus, I'm sure there's some delicious ice cream shops we missed.

We managed to eat several traditional and/or officially legislated state foods- South Dakota: Kuchen, Minnesota: blueberries, Nebraska: Kool-Aid and Runza sandwiches, Utah: scones.  I would have liked to include: Indian Tacos at 4 Corners Monument, the Illinois state snack of popcorn (we made some in the microwave while we were there but that doesn't count). 

I've been asked what my favorite thing was on the trip.  I don't have a favorite but I have a top 5.  Here they are in no order of preference:

1.  Seeing the smile on Sharon's face when we pulled up.  It made all the miles there so worth it.
2.  Storybook Island- the playground in Rapid City that was fun and free.  A playground where I could enjoy too.  If I'm ever rich in more than children and blessings, I'm building one in Arlington.
3.  Mesa Verde National Park- I live on the west coast where nothing is more than 100 years old and most is much younger.  To stand on structures that were built 800 years ago is amazing.
4.  Taking the kids to the Nauvoo and Salt Lake Temples
5.  Little Bighorn Battlefield- I really felt the spirit of that tragic battlefield

There are also things I accomplished that I'm quite proud of like:
1.  surviving the trip!
2.  navigating my way through states I'd never been to before without getting lost
3.  getting camp set up/taken down and meals cooked/cleaned and still getting to bed on time
4.  being a cheerleader for 24 days, as in "who cares that it's (fill in the blank....raining, hot, buggy) aren't we having fun!"
5.  taking the trailer wherever I wanted, backing it up successfully
6.  dealing with dead batteries, collapsed tents in the middle of the night, stolen license plates, closed mountain passes 90 miles from home and overheating vans while keeping my cool
7.  keeping the little ones from getting sunburned, the bigger kids were on their own and it showed
8.  planning a trip that was a lot of fun for the children and still had things to appeal to me

Here's the kids favorites:
Isaac- Hoodoos in Southern Utah
Anastaya- watching grandma and grandpa perform in Rendezvous in Old Nauvoo
Elizabeth- Lost Island Water park
William- the playgrounds at the campgrounds
Miriam- swimming pools, playing Boma's itouch
Jacob-the Grand Canyon

Now that the trip is over, I'm going to be taking the rest of the summer off, just kidding.  I have day camp coming up in 11 days.  I'm the program director which basically means that anything and everything that happens at camp is my responsibility.  Our theme this year is sports and so far we have 120 cubs coming for four days.  Once day camp is over, then I can relax (stop laughing)!