Intertubes!

We've been talking about it all summer and we finally made it out on Grandma and Papa H's boat.  Unfortunately they were unable to join us.  We definitely missed their company.

The kids were super excited!  The first waves on the boat had the boy's hands up, ready to roll.

 The kids had to pick a number to go first.  Carson won and wanted Mommy to ride with him.   Carson was really excited, though once the intertube started moving he seemed kind of tense.  After a while he gained some confidence and seemed to enjoy himself a little more.  Kayda and Dillon were great with the flag and making sure Daddy knew if Carson wanted a change of pace.

 Kayda "won" the second turn and graciously invited Dillon to join her.

 You need to watch this sequence of events.  The were caught outside the wake when we hit another wake.  They look terrified!

 Then they got air.  Dillon's face cracks me up.  It looks like he is thinking "what have I gotten myself in to?"

 Coming back down is when you really have to worry about staying on the tube.

 They nailed it and you can tell Dillon had a good time.  Kayda must have too because she kept wanting to go back out. She just looks relieved that it's over.

 Carson decided to have Daddy ride with him this time.  I discovered I really don't like to drive the boat when I'm towing someone.  Especially Carson, he's still so little and scared easily.  That and I'm not very good at getting them back in the wake after I get them out of it.  I particularly missed the company of Papa H right about then.  He's much better at it than I am.

 She landed this "jump"!  The kids all called this the "Great Goliath" and she had immense pride that she made it through.

 We hooked up the second tube.  The yellow tube kept creeping on top of the red tube.  Every picture I have of it the kids look like they're greeting each other.

 Then they hit another wake.  Dillon went flying, then his tube went out of control and kind of knocked Kayda off.

 Bye kids!
 After that we switched their places.  I really wish I'd had my camera out because Kayda got knocked off the red tube, it went flying into the air, seemed to center itself and then dropped right on top of Dillon.  It just bounced off but it was a one in a million occurrence.

 We took a break to swim.  The kids had a fantastic time and, given the opportunity, probably would've happily played that way for quite some time.  As it was, we had a bit of a deadline to get to a dinner with the family.

 Carson has come a long way.  At Lake Chelan he was pretty reserved about jumping off the floating dock.  He was pretty excited to jump off the front of the boat though.

 Then it was time for all three of them.  Carson was finally ready to go on his own but Dillon was really not wanting to ride the red tube (which submerges easily so Carson couldn't ride it alone).  Carson decided it was fine for Dillon to ride with him.

 You could see that Kayda was starting to get tired of tubing.  So we pulled in that tube and let the boys keep going for a little while.

They rode in most of the way to the dock.  Then it was time to pack up and head to Uncle Pat and Aunt Sarah's house.  We had a barbecue as a send off for their eldest cousin Nathan, he's headed to college.  We were also celebrating Grandma H's birthday.  The night ended with Kayda and Ella having a sleep over at Grandma and Papa's house and Chase sleeping over at our house.  I think all the kids were able to have a great last school free night.

Last week of summer

We decided to cram a bunch of excitement into the last week before school! 

Thursday, Carson and Dillon got to go meet their teachers.   Dillon has the same one Kayda had last year (Yay!).  Kayda's teacher is a new hire and couldn't be there so she got to go see her room. 

 Carson didn't want a picture but these kiddos mostly cooperate!

Then Friday Daddy took the day off so we could go to Wild Waves. It was forecasted for a chance of thunderstorms.  It ended up raining the beginning of the day which meant we didn't have to wait for the water slides at all!   We went over to the rides,  back to the water and then rides again.  We were absolutely exhausted by the end but the kids had a blast.   Carson decided he LOVES when his "tummy tickles".  Which is kind of unfortunate when he needs an adult for most rides and Mommy and Daddy don't handle it well.  We sucked it up.   Just grin and bear it!

 He didn't want the "before" picture.

 Such good photo subjects!

 This is a terrifying picture of me HATING this ride but Carson has the BIGGEST grin!

 Sunday Daddy took the kids to go boating with Uncle Greg.   Mom's Grandma and Uncle Bob both passed away in the last week and a half and didn't much feel like socializing.   I'm glad Daddy and Uncle Greg could take them. Carson rode the tube once with Daddy but mostly just wanted to crawl around the boat. Dillon could've ridden the tube the whole day happily.   Kayda was pulled underwater with the tube and was nervous after that.  They all came home wanting to do it again.

After that they got to go celebrate Grandma H's birthday, which means cousins.   They love seeing them!

A couple activities

Alright, I haven't done well keeping this up to date so we'll take a little trip to early August.  

The month started out with Kayda's activity day.  It was lego themed and had some really fun activities.  A favorite was making derby cars that the girls got to race on the pinewood derby tracks!  

 Kayda won!  They also got to race speedorz, decorate lego cookies, build bridges etc.

 The last 45 minutes of the day was family time so the boys got to play too!


Another day we made our way over to a local creek.  People have made a dam so there is an area that gets a pretty good pool for the kids to play in.  They had a great time exploring, floating and swinging from the bridge rope swing.

Carson tried the rope swing too but he wouldn't let go until brother went out to help him!


Besides South Dakota and camping it's actually been a really hard summer to get the kids to actually DO anything.  They have just wanted to be home. They've spent some time in the pool and sandbox but they have wanted to be inside playing with legos more than anything.  It's been really frustrating actually.  Unfortunately for them I'm dragging them out a bunch this week before school starts in just over a week!

Other Summer Going-On's

 Meet Aladdin.  Aladdin is pastured with two dominate Mares, he is the low man on the totem pole.  Dillon met him and fell in LOVE.  He sat there with Aladdin the entire time Kayda, Carson, Katelyn and I were feeding the other horses and getting them water. 

 Kayda got to ride with Katelyn to experience a canter!  She loved it, though she didn't like being behind the saddle much!

 We went and spent an afternoon at a local creek.  It doesn't run too fast and isn't too deep so I brought the kids' tubes.  They got to experience a float for the first time! Kayda and Dillon did it multiple times.  Carson just went for a tiny little float.  Unfortunately I had baby Weston with us so I couldn't help them more to get them more comfortable with it.  They still had a great time though!

 Our recreation department put out a GIANT tarp and sprinklers for the kids last week.  We were able to get there before the crowd got too big.  It took Carson a little while to warm up to it but the kids all had a great time and saw many of their school friends there.