Hope Valley Camping/Birthday Trip (Happy Birthday Danny)

Last weekend we went camping to one of Danny's (and my) favorite places for his birthday weekend. We took Colette along to experience the crazyness of camping with the Houseful of Blessings. The kids fished, played in and on the lake, we ate lots of good food, and we celebrated Danny's birthday. It was a really nice, relaxing weekend, and I'm so glad we got to go. It was the only chance Danny got to go with us this summer, as he has been so busy with summer school and working. Rebecca was the only one to catch 2 fish. She was dedicated and got out there at 6:30 in the morning. When she caught her fish, she came back and work us up (around 7 am) with "I caught it, now what do I do?" and it was dangling from her pole. We were too lazy to get up yet so had her put the fish on the pole in a bucket. (She said it was too wiggly to get it off herself). Funny girl.

I'm just gonna post the pictures in random order, cause I'm lazy like that.

To the Beach

Summer is flying by soooo fast and we have been so busy. We had swimming lessons for Jackson, VBS, Nick and Cara and even Samantha have been working lots, and I have been painting the inside of the house, plus lots more that I can't even think of right now.

We went to Bodega Bay a couple of weeks ago and had a wonderful relaxing time.
We played on the beach.

We flew kites.

We explored Fort Ross.

We went tide pooling.

We hiked through some redwoods.

Some of us climbed trees.
It was a great time to recharge our batteries and spend some time as a family.

And that is about all the time I can spare right now for blogging. Summer is almost over and there is still so much to do......
:-)

Happy Birthday to Samantha

Sunday, Grandma and Grandpa, Omi, and Uncle Scott and Aunt Lynn came up to help us celebrate Miss Samantha's 14th birthday. Ralph barbecued hamburgers and hot dogs, and we had the famous Buster Bar Ice Cream Cake.

Then, Monday, Samantha's real birthday, we had a little outing. First, we had to take Jackson to swimming lessons. I think it's pretty neat that Samantha didn't mind having her little tagalong best buddy on her birthday shopping trip. She could have waited til when swimming lessons were over to go by ourselves, and maybe most girls would have, but Samantha is not most girls. So, first the dreaded torture of swimming lessons for Jackson, then off to shopping and lunch. We went to Denny's and I was teasing Samantha that I would ask them to sing Happy Birthday to her (a fate worse than death to Sam), and Jackson really did ask the waitress "Will you say Happy Birthday to Sam?", and she did say it (but not sing it luckily for Samantha), and brought her a free ice cream sundae, which she shared with Jackson, with Jackson gobbling as fast as possible in order to get the most ice cream.....that boy. I bought Samantha a cute outfit and some sunglasses, and she bought a scrapbook and scrapbooking supplies, and some water toys/floaty things with her birthday money. For dinner, Colette came over and Rebecca made a chocolate cake for dessert. I think Samantha had 2 pretty good birthday days. :-)

2 Quotes

First the Jackson Quote:

"When I'm a dad, I'm gonna commit suicide."
~slight pause~
"What does that even mean?"
(This is probably funnier in person, but it totally cracked me up).



This quote is for me. I wanted to remember it:

“I have seen children from every type of home schooling and have never seen a success from an unhappy and unloving home…and never a failure from a relaxed and happy house running over with love."
John Mark Reynolds

A Jackson Quote

Cara's home, summer's here, and, we're busy. One day I will do a real post, but for now, here is a little Jackson quote from today:

"I love God best of all, but I really love Otter Pops too."

He really does too. :-)