Light My Fire

So this was taped to the inside of my bedroom door when I woke up this morning. Funny, huh???

I was up and getting ready at 8am for our 8:30am hike. I got the kids up and moving, but Joe and Jim were already up. Jake? Nope. I woke him up, and played up the fact that Boxer REALLY wanted to come on this hike in the mountains. And he was moving SO slow. So I reminded him that the later we got to the mountains, the hotter it would be. That hurried him up. hehe.

We headed out, and dropped by to pick up Kari and Josephine and Leo. And off over Transmountain we headed! It was SO loud in the Suburban with the windows down that kids and the music and all, but it was fun. ha!
We decided to take the kids on the nature hike for the first trip. Because it's super short and easy. Don't wanna scare them off from hiking first time... And we saw one of the park volunteer guys there, and talked to us for quite a while about the wildlife and such. GREAT source of information.

Jake noticed this lizard, and snapped a picture of her for me. Gladys, the dude told us.

THis is a bird watching facility, not a hut, Leo informed us. hehe.

Boxer was SO ready to go!

It was a quick little hike, and everyone did a fabulous job. Jake asked to PLEASE not be included in the hiking plans for the future. ha! He didn't find it fun in the least. Josephine kept pointing out the beauty, and Jake would go "That's not beautiful, that's ugly" "This nature SUCKS" was my favorite Jacob quote of the day, though... ROFL!

When we got back to the trail head, we chatted with the nature dude for a while longer, then headed home. It was a GREAT first hike of the summer!

Kari had told me that her hubby was sick. He was in the field, and had been on IV's for a while. Poor guy. When we headed home, she got a text from his saying that he was in the hospital. I dropped her off at her house, and offered to keep her kids so she could go up and see him, but she said that her 15 year old step son would watch them. Poor Kari.

We spent an hour at home doing chores and cleaning up, because the house was trashed. SO super messy. I did Tom and Eme's chores, and Jake did his, and Joe and Jim did theirs, and it looked SO much better.

Then we got on our swim clothes, and got ready to go to the sprinkler park on Biggs. Because that's where we were picking up Tom and Eme at 1pm. Jake wanted to go to the Youth Center, and since it didn't close until 9pm, that worked well with my Cub Scout Day Camp schedule too.

See, I'm wearing my new wrap from Captain America!

I dropped Jake off at 12:05pm, and then we headed to Biggs Sprinkler Park. And we only had to wait about 5 minutes to get in. Not too bad. There was no seating left, so I sat down by the rock wall, and let the kids play. At 12:45pm they called a Pool Break (silly, for a sprinkler park, I know...), and we gathered up our stuff and headed to the Biggs park main office to see when the Purple Campers would be arriving. 1:30pm. OK, so back to the sprinkler park we went.

And we found Maggie and her family there! So Jim and Joe got to play with Little Jacob. SO much fun to find friends!

Here's me eating my apple. Oh yeah, and I"m doing well on my diet! I've lost 7 lbs so far!

We left to get the kids at around 1:20pm, and I just HAD to snap a few photos of these flowers. Aren't they pretty???





After waiting for about 15 minutes, the bus finally arrived, and tired but happy campers started to unload. Tom and Eme both looked like they'd had a WONDERFUL time. They grabbed their gear, said bye to their friends, and we loaded up the truck and headed home.
And the second we walked away from Biggs park, Eme and Tom started in on it. Bickering and carrying on. OMHeavens, I SO wanted to just ship them back off to camp!!! It was SO annoying.

We got home, and the kids unloaded their stuff, and we turned on a movie. I took a little nap because I was getting a headache. I took some meds, and laid down, and felt SO much better after!.

I got up at 4pm, and started to get ready. I'd put chicken drumsticks in the crock pot with BBQ earlier in the day, so I gave everyone some chicken, and made sure they were dressed appropriately, threw on some better clothes, did my make up, and I was good to go.

And it took forever to actually get out the door. Eme had gone to her friends house and wasn't back home when she was supposed to be, so I had to track her down. Joe needed water bottles. Leo spilled chicken on his pants. And on and on and on. We didn't leave post until around 5pm.

And then we hit rush hour traffic. Crap! It was slow going for a while, but it finally picked up. Here's me with my 64 oz flavored water! Yeah me!

We made is JUST in the nick of time. I sent Eme and Jim off to childcare, and Leo and Joe off to their Wolf's group, and I took my supplies into the gym. I had 2 11 year old Scouts who were my helpers, and we got it all set up.

First, we were teaching the Wolf's (8 yrs old) an Indian story, then they were using Indian drawings to tell a story. We had a TON of symbols and words hung up, and they picked and choosed and made up a story.

Bear hunt man. Man eat bear. Man build Tepee. Deer eat grass. Very simple, but they LOVED it. Each boy had a chance to come up and share his story. It was a good time.

The second group had a harder time with it. I don't know if they just weren't as creative as the first, or what. Boy in the first group were writing 3 and 4 stories, and the 2nd group some were still struggling with the first story.

The 3rd group were Bears (9 yr olds). They were supposed to make things to play 2 Native American INdian games, and know the rules and such. We made a game from the Bear book, where you make corn cob darts. It was pretty cool.

We punched holes in the end of the corn cobs (dried), and stuck 2 feathers in it. Then, you were supposed to hold 2 of the "darts" between your thumb and pointer finger, then one between your pointer finger and middle finger, and toss them both at the same time into a bucket or pot. It was funny watching the boys try it. hehe. Sometimes one would just stay in their hands, and they'd look at their fingers as if they'd betrayed them. ha!

During my last class (after it had JUST started), I got a call from Jake saying that there wasn't enough people at the Youth Center to keep it open, and they were closing it early. And if I could come and pick him up. Nope, sorry, hon. I was teaching a class 30 minutes away... So I told him to read the book he'd brought, and I'd come and pick him up as soon as day camp was over. Poor kid. At least he had his book. And at least it's not cold outside. hehe.

We finished up with the last class, had closing ceremony, and we were out of there. We made it to the youth center a few minutes before 9pm. I would have been doing well, had they not closed early. Sorry, Jake. I tried :)

We drove home, and Leo came with us. He was gonna spend the night, since we had to be back over there at 8:30am. Joe and Jim and Leo slept in a fort in the little boys' room, and Eme and Jake and Tom and I worked on the chores real fast. And Tom was falling apart. Crying at the drop of a hat. I think the boy needed more sleep. Finally, I sent him up to his room.

Eme went to bed too, and Jake is watching a Star Wars movie. It's now 10:36pm, and I'm gonna finish this up, and watch some of Season 2, 24. It's been a long week, and it's ALMOST over. hehe.

Gotta get up at 7am to be out the door by 7:45am to be to the West Side by 8:15am to teach another class at 8:30am-1pm. Then we'll head back home, chill for a few hours, and I have Scrapbooking class with the Hearts Apart program. I need to call and see if they have any openings in childcare. Otherwise, I'll just let Tom babysit. There's never a dull moment in my day, you know...

Oh yeah, I talked with Kari, and she said that her hubby has Diverticulitis. It's a stomach/intestinal swelling problem, I guess. Poor guy. He's home resting now. Prayers for him would be good. Poor Brian :(

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Great use of Orange, Sharon, my dear! LOVE this one :)