24 September 2017

Gibson and Brandan finished making this sword.  It's made of wood so it won't cut, but it's sturdy enough to hurt someone.

 Abe's piano teacher asked him to make a piano abacus by stringing beads on strings.  He uses the abacus to keep track of his practicing.

 Helen has been working on a personal progress goal help others feel of worth.  She challenged the rest of our family to join her and made this sign to remind us to encourage each other.

 Brandan and Abe joined the other young men and their dads for a backpacking overnighter.  We've had some rain earlier in the week which meant snow in the mountains.  Abe slept in his hammock and stayed warm with his sleeping bag and air mattress for insulation.

 They hiked to a nearby lake in the morning.  The forest was beautiful.  You can tell from the clothing in the photo that we're not ready mentally for winter to come.  It will be months before we get this much snow in the valley.

 Here's a photo of the hikers headed back home.

We went to Abe's soccer game Saturday afternoon.  We love watching Abe play.  He only came out of the game long enough to get his leg patched up after skidding across the artificial turf.  Another parent told him, "You're a fighter!"

The secretary from Sofi's mission sent us this photo from a zone conference.  You can see Sofi in the middle.  Her companion is next to her in the striped dress.

17 September 2017

Brandan and Gibson finished chopping down our mimosa tree this week.  Gibson couldn't resist standing on the stump and quoting Dr. Seuss.  "I am the Lorax.  I speak for the trees."

Abe is playing soccer on the high school team this year.  All of his games have been out of town so far and we haven't traveled to see him play.  The next two photos were taken by his coach.  Abe's jersey number is 6.  Camden is number 25.

On Thursday, a large black and white dog joined the game.  It chased the ball (and sometimes caught it), tripped players and created all kinds of mischief.  The referees tried to remove the dog from the field, but soon gave up and decided the dog was part of the playing conditions, kind of like playing in the rain or on lousy turf or having the sun in your eyes.  The refs didn't anticipate the dog would assist Camden on a goal for Abe's team, ending the game in a 1-1 tie. 

 After spending Saturday morning at our stake's day of service, Brandan took Abe, Helen and Gibson golfing.  Abe just got a set of golf clubs at a garage sale and was eager to try them out.

This was Helen's first time golfing.  She loved it and can't wait to go again.

 It was also Gib's first time.  He had some good hits.

Here they are waiting for another group to play through.  After several hours of a clean up project in the morning, running through a park for an hour at the picnic afterwards and then playing nine holes of golf, our kids were very, very tired at bedtime.

We're busy with school and fall activities now, but here is our tribute to our summer.  We made a poster with some of our favorite memories.

10 September 2017

Tuesday was the first day of school for Gibson, Abe and Helen.

Gibson is in 5th grade.  He's looking forward to learning more about robotics and woodworking.  His class is starting out with a special unit on forest fires which is appropriate since we went most of the week with unhealthy/hazardous air quality thanks to the many forest fires in our area.

Helen is in 7th grade.  Helen loves her new math class and is not looking forward to PE.  Luckily for her, the gym ceiling fell down just before school started and the air quality is too poor to go outside so PE is postponed.

 Abe jumped right into his freshman year of high school.  His favorite classes are English and History, but he likes all of his classes.  He played in his first high school soccer game on Saturday.  It was supposed to be a home game, but they ended up driving three hours away to play out of the smoke.

 A man in our ward named Jeff is a talented bird taxidermist.  He has a license that allows him to acquire rare birds after they die from disease or old age.  None of the birds were hunted.  He works with zoos and museums.  Our ward's youth went to his studio this week to see some of his work.

 He has a wide variety of birds on display.  Gib's favorite was a penguin with very soft neck feathers. Jeff didn't taxidermy the elk.  It was a gift from someone else.

 Here's a close up of one bird that shows the bird's beautiful markings and symmetry.  The bird flashes its feathers like this to a female, who sees the markings in ultraviolet and is looking for symmetry of the circles and lines.  The patterns on the feathers were amazing; they looked like they were laser printed.  Zoom in to see them more closely.

 Here's Gib with an eagle owl.

 Our airport has a room that is a replica of the oval office.  Brandan had meetings at the airport this week and posed for a photo behind a copy of the Resolute desk.

Helen and Gibson joined Adele and Samuel to play A Child's Prayer in sacrament meeting today.  The kids played twice, once in Adele and Samuel's ward and once in ours.  Playing with 4 kids might be twice as hard as a duet, but the kids sounded great!

We planted an artichoke in our garden this year to see what it looked like as it grew.  We're not planning on eating it.  It's a very cool plant with huge purple flowers.

3 September 2017

Abe had a busy week.  On Monday he got his braces off.  His orthodontist gave him a big cup full of the kinds of candy he was supposed to avoid while he had braces.

 On Tuesday he picked up his new glasses from the optometrist's office.  Our optometrist said that when he started his practice 10 years ago, kids would cry if they had to get glasses.  Now they cry when they don't need to get them. 

 On Wednesday Abe had his board of review, the last step before he can receive his Eagle award.  Here he is in his uniform with the bag of visual aids he used for his presentation.

 Here's a photo of Abe leading the pledge of allegiance at the board of review.  Abe passed his board and all his paperwork will be sent to the boy scout headquarters for processing.  Unfortunately, the headquarters are in Houston, Texas. Hurricane Harvey will probably slow his paperwork down and it could be awhile before Abe receives his Eagle advancement.

 Back in May we looked at our calendar to pick a weekend or two to go camping.  It turned out we had exactly one unscheduled weekend: September 1-2.  We made reservations to camp at Castle Crags state park in northern California.  Helen, Gibson and Abe all slept in their hammocks on Friday night.

At home, a ring of forest fires surrounding our town have made the air quality very unhealthy.  The air at Castle Crags was hazy, but much better than home.  The haze blocked the views Castle Crags is famous for, including views of Mount Shasta.  We hiked Root Creek Trail, instead.  Our trail crossed the Pacific Crest Trail.

 Saturday was hot, but tall trees shaded the trail.

 We also took the River Trail down to the Sacramento River.  This suspension bridge crosses the river.

 The river was very cold, but Abe swam in it anyway.

 Here's a photo of Abe jumping into the river.  The rest of us waded, skipped rocks and enjoyed the cooler temperatures by the river.

 Before we left, we tried to find a geocache.  Gibson needed to go geocaching for his Arrow of Light award and with the geocaching app, we could see there were several geocaches nearby.  The GPS will get you close to the geocache and then you have to hunt for the location.  Abe found this one: a small envelope made out of camouflaged duct tape.  Abe, Helen and Gibson signed their names to the slip of paper inside before putting it back for the next person to find.