Packing and a planting...

Today has been one of those days were the morning felt like I had all the time in the world. Then like a mack truck it hit me not only did I double book myself for this evening (oops) I have two days before I leave for 10 and I have packed nothing yep that's right nothing. First thing first I had to call my friends that we were having dinner with and A. Cancel B. Bring kiddos with me. Luckily B worked out. (I refused to give up watching the kiddos we had some planting plans). So to dinner we went. It was very fun and exciting and the kids did amazingly well. So we played and visited for a few hours. Then we did the planting. Planting what you ask? A geocache! That's right a geocache (www.geocaching.com)! The kids helped us find the most perfect spot. Well hidden under some... well that would ruin the surprise for someone who was attempting to find it. We creeped in buried it and creeped out. The name of the cache is Hatchets and Pointy Sticks. The name has deep personal meaning. Tomorrow I shall share the story so stay tuned.

Fathers Day in the Park

Our Church had a Father's Day picnic at Sunnyside park on Sunday. Abigail had fun playing on some of the toys. Most are still a little big for her but she attempted to have fun.

Coffee and Cropping Yay for ME!

My day has been so fun... not really sure what Josh and Abi did but I got up early (not exactly the fun part) and met my BFF for coffee and we attempted to hit some yard sales but didn't see anything good so we drove on. Then I came home and picked up my kit for Kit Club @ PaperPals (http://www.paper-pals.com/) our local scrapbook store. I love seeing what other ladies do with the same stuff that I was given. Most of the time I feel quite inadiquate to call myself a scrapbooker but I always get some amazing ideas. Then I had a short break and headed back to PaperPals to take a class on using a clear acrylic album. It was so much fun. Shawna had a demo she had done but left it open for us to make our own. I found this fun and yet challenging. Again back to the I feel inadequate around most other scrapbookers. I had to keep on asking Shawna for approval (thank you Shawna). Here is some pics of some of the pages of my book...

After the class I was expecting to go home grab a quick bite and go work on roofing project number 2. Sorry no pics I forgot to bring my camera. Hopefully I will get some from the home owner. Just as I was about to leave PP I got a call from Joel that said they were all done so I got to go home. With no roofing project I knew that I needed to go work on cleaning a house that I am working on for some friends so I muster up the strength and headed over. I entered the house making sure ppl knew I was coming in. There was a car parked outside but I figured it was just more ppl. working on the house (our friends are doing a MAJOR remodel) I came up stairs to find Nick and Sherri! What is the significance of that you might ask... Well about threeish years ago they moved away b/c Nick joined the Army. I didn't know they were in town so it was a very pleasant surprise. We chatted for awhile and then I went to go get the the cleaning I had come there to do however, another pleasant surprise, the cleaning supplies were nowhere to be found so I was able to come home and relax. Again YAY FOR ME! Hope everyone else has had as pleasant of a day as I have.

Roofing

As part of going to World Changers the youth Pastor (Joel) organizes pre-projects for us. Typically it is roofing since that is what is needed around our area most. It took us two days and we were done. Here are some pictures from Pre-project #1.

Memorial Day weekend fun...

We started the weekend Friday afternoon and headed to Yakima, WA apparently also known as the Palm Springs of WA. Ha Ha… Amanda my wonderful sis in law got us tickets to go see Josh Turner and Carrie Underwood in Concert. We had so much fun. However, the security was a bunch of jerks. I was so close to getting a really really good up close shot of Carrie on stage I was zoomed in the camera was focused and about to click to take the photo when some security guard grabbed my arm and told me I had move. GRRR! I asked if I could have two seconds to take the photo and he said no… at least four other people were standing around taking pictures. Here is some of the shots I did get… We hung around after the concert and got some pictures with the band but Carrie Underwood didn't come out of her bus.

Then we were off to White Salmon for the Powers Family Reunion @ Aunt Nancy and Uncle Lyle’s cabin. They set us up in their 5th wheel it was VERY nice. Thank you guys again. Abigail got to meet her Great Grandma W for the first time.
In great Abigail style she immediately wanted Grandma to take her from us.

Just before sundown I went for a run Saturday night and found myself lost. The road I took slowly started to narrow until it was just a walking path. However, I finally found a property that thankfully led back to the road I knew and I made it back to the cabin just before all the sunlight was gone. They sent Josh out to look for me b/c stupid me didn’t bring my phone so while I was lost I couldn’t call anyone for help! I did pick up a rock as my protection (as if that would stop much) but hey David killed Goliath with a stone so I thought I could have a chance. That night we listened to the styles of Lyle and a neighbor breaking it down for us.

Sunday brother Steve organized for some members of the fam to go white water rafting with All Adventure Rafting (http://www.alladventurerafting.com/) guides. Here are a few pictures that they took for us:

We had to split into 3 groups. The top left picture is all of us getting trained to work the river. The picture below that is a group picture of all of the family members that went down river. Brother Lonnie and his son Bailey went with a completely different crew and the lower left corner of the collage is them. Look closely at the picture in bottom middle you can just barley see the tip of Bailey’s helmet he got completely covered! Upper right is brother Steve with his son’s Logan and Dylan and some of their friends. The lower right corner is Josh, Dad, Edie, myself, Kelsey, and Nick. It was completely amazing experience. THANKS STEVE! Dad in law affectionately got the name chrome dome (notice the helmet) along the ride. We were all tired by the time we got done we were all hungry and wondering when we were going to eat. Then Edie came to our rescue and let us know that she had brought snacks (mom, of three boys she knew). The next morning we came back home. Good memories to add to the scrapbook that will get finished??

ARGH.......

We are heading out of town this weekend for a big family renunion and on Friday I am going with my sister-in-law to a Carry Underwood concert (so excited for that). So, of course with all the things still do I decided to lock my stuipd keys in the car thus keeping me at home unitl Josh got here with his set to let me in. Killing about 3.5 hours of things to do One of which was coffee with a friend that I had to cancel, very sad. It is almost like my body keeps foregetting to tell my brain or visa versa that I am too busy for that type of insert explicative here.
But all was not lost... I used that time so wisely to do some photo editing. To calm my angered spirit of course...

Frustrated beyond repair…

My daughter so cute so sweet until you set her in a bath tub then the evil emerges and I can’t get her to stay put. Let me see if I can set this scene for you. We walk into the kitchen (I don’t actually have a bathtub) and as soon as her pretty little feet hit the water she screams, wails, and looks at me with those big blue eyes that just yell “how could you mama” as I struggle to get soap on her hair as she attempts with much effort to stand up. Then of coarse I have to get the soap I just put in her hair out. I only have one hand so I take the wash cloth and run it through her hair until I don’t see anymore evidence of soap all the while water is going into her face so she is getting more upset and fighting all the more. Then it is a quick (mind you I said quick) wipe down and finally, it is time to get out. Again a reminder that she wants out of the bath very badly so I can’t take a hand off of her So, grab the towel with one hand holding it in my teeth in order to hopefully protect my clothes a little HA and of course so can have use both hands to pick her up. As soon as she is lifted folds her legs toward her chest and refuses to uncurl them until she is in my arms and away from the water. Of course by this time I am drenched for my efforts and must also dry off and change as well. You would think that after she is out it would be the end of the fight but no it continues as we move onto the forever hated clothes. By the end of it all I am frustrated and frazzled.
I used to think that wrestling my 60lb dog into a bath was hard but Chase has got nothing on Abigail. The clothes thing I get she has been that way for a long while. But the bath thing… it was like a switch was flipped and my once splashing happy baby that would play with her toys and be sad when bath time was over turned into… well I described it earlier. So if you seasoned parents have any advice that you would like to send this frazzled parent I would happily receive it.