Camp Cowabunga

Undoubtedly, the best part of 3rd grade is Camp Cowabunga. All of the 3rd grade classes head down to the park for a day of games, friends and fun. They set up "camp" for the day and have a blast. That day is today. Even as I post this, Spencer is playing games and making S'mores.

I walked down to the park with the little kids and joined him and his friends for lunch. I love how all of his friends greet me as I join them and they all think it's "cool" to have a mom eat with them. This is just the best group of kids. We all had lunch together and then played on the playground. Spencer loves to help McCall on the jungle gym and his friends join in. Did I say they are just the best group of boys?

When it got too hot, the boys all congregated on their blanket in the shade and we all just talked. For a minute, I forgot I was the mom and felt like I was part of the gang.

Spencer and his very best friend, Porter.

Scout Camp

Dave left for scout camp today leaving me a widow for the rest of the week. This is nothing new, I've done this before, but somehow this time seems worse...and it's just the first day! It seems that while he's at camp having fun, I'm the one earning all those merit badges. Here's the badges I've earned--

• Citizenship - For spending the past 2 days at the school for various talent shows and awards assemblies, all while keeping 3 little kids quiet
• Auto Mechanics - For the flat tire that had to be fixed
• Personal Management, Personal Finance, and Cooking - For getting all my errands done and managing to organize, buy and pack food for 15 hungry scouts/leaders for dinner all for under $20 (That's only $1.30/person and includes all the paper supplies!)
• Search & Rescue - (Not really a merit badge, but it should be.) For actually finding my lost 2 year old in a mass of 500 people at a track meet
• Climbing, Personal Fitness and Athletics - For hiking up & down the stairs at Spencer's track meet to get him to each event and take kids to the potty (many times!!)
• First Aid - For the smashed toenail on Davis thanks to the restroom door.
• Family Life - For continuing on with everything despite being alone and not wanting to
• Fishing - For retrieving a Gameboy out of the toilet AFTER it was used. Yuck!!

Needless to say, I miss Dave. Today was incredibly rough. I'm just hoping that tomorrow is a better day, because I really don't want any more merit badges. I'm not a very good widow and I really don't like it. Maybe because my married life is just too good. I think I need a little retail therapy to recover from today. Park City, here I come!!!

Bear Lake

Last weekend we took a little weekend trip to Bear Lake. I'd like to say it was just for fun, but it was really for Dave. He ran in the 1/2 marathon on Saturday. I felt really bad for him because during the time that he should have been training we had a Disneyland vacation, a trip to Vegas, baseball (lots of that), and to top it off, a terrible cold that turned in bronchitis. He ran anyway, but I don't think he'll be doing any more of that anytime soon. Unfortunately, our family schedule and our preferred lifestyle (aka staying up late) just don't blend very well with running every day.

We got up to Bear Lake Friday night, had dinner and went to our condo. But after an hour there we realized that the furnace didn't work and it was going to stay cold all night. After a few phone calls, we ended up moving to a different condo (with a working furnace) that ended up being much better anyway. We originally planned on only taking the 3 boys so the condo we rented wasn't very big. But when we ended up taking all 5 kids, it was cramped. The second one had 2 bedrooms and bigger beds and was MUCH nicer. After we moved condos, we both said we should have stayed longer and taken advantage of all the space.

Dave ran a good race, but we weren't able to be at different mile markers to cheer for him. We waited at the Finish line and the kids couldn't resist running to the finish with him. Tiara had been saying for days that she was going to run with Daddy on Saturday, and she did. Seth was upset that he didn't get a medal, too, since he crossed the finish line.

After the race, we took the kids to Minnetonka Cave. Neither one of us had ever gone there and we both wanted to, so we took the chance while we had it. The kids were great, climbing up and down all 888 stairs! I carried McCall most of the way, but finally had to give up and have Dave help at the end. I was so proud of the kids for hiking the whole way without one complaint. I'm such a lucky Mom!

Anti-viral Virus

I'm baaack! After 3 days of no computer, I feel a little more "connected". My computer has been giving me fits all week. I boot it up and it spontaneously reboots whenever it feels like it. Dave enlisted the help of an IT guy at work, but his 'miracle disk' didn't get very far. My lovely security, McAfee, claimed to have major threats and had shut everything down. No firewall, no privacy service, and worst of all, everytime I tried to do anything with the virus protection the computer locked up and shut down. After trying just about everything, buying an external drive to try to salvage anything we could, spending HOURS and HOURS transferring files the IT guy says, "You might want to try just uninstalling McAfee if that is the touchy program." Guess what? It worked! How a security program gets a bug is beyond me. But it's gone and McAfee is now reinstalled and appears to be working great. I have a ton to update and will try to get to it later tonight...

LM*O

I started out cleaning the kitchen today and turned on Studio 5 to listen to while I cleaned. Well, My kitchen still isn't clean thanks to them! They started talking about technology and then showed this YouTube video by Tim Hawkins...

Well, I wanted to see the whole thing so I turned on the computer and I've been laughing my you-know-what off ever since. This guy is hilarious! I've watched most of his videos and neglected my motherly duties. But it's been worth it. My eyes are watering and I'm about to pee my pants. I haven't laughed this hard in a while. Maybe it'll clean out my lungs?!

(You'll have to pause my music to listen to the video)

It Clicked!!

Finally!! We have been waiting for it to click with Spencer. He LOVES baseball, but has struggled with getting it all. It doesn't help to follow after 2 brothers that are really good. Thankfully, tonight was different. It was his last game of the season and he played better tonight than the whole rest of the year. He got his first hit and it was solid. Now, you have to understand PeeWee baseball in order to fully get it. This is the first year the kids get to pitch to each other and most of the time the pitching is less than desirable. The games are mostly watching kids get walked and than stealing their way around to home on all of the passed balls. So, he's had his share of times on base, just not any hits. But tonight was different. He was getting some decent pitches and once he fouled one off, we knew the hit was coming if the pitcher would give him a good pitch. SMACK!! Thanks to the Marlins pitcher for a beautiful one right in the zone. But to top it off, his coach let him pitch in the last inning. He was so excited because he's wanted to pitch all season. He walked his first batter and I thought he was going to do the same to the next one. But the strikes started coming and he struck out his first batter. Poor kid didn't know what to do. The ball sank down into the strike zone right at the end and he never saw it coming. Yeah for Spencer! It's too bad that the season is over because he's getting it. Now he can't wait for Fall Ball. Just when I thought we were taking a baseball break.

Self-Proclaimed Queen...

of bargain shopping, that is. Check out what I did today. All of this came to a grand total of $47.94 until I swiped my Albertson's card and handed the checker a fistful of coupons. You should have seen his face when he said "That will be $4.14?" That's a savings of 91%! Here's the breakdown:

Easy Mac free
Grey Poupon free
Ritz crackers $1.25 each
Wheat Thins free
Crystal Light 34 cents
Life cereal free
Pancake mix free
Saltines free
DiGiornio sandwiches 65 cents each

So, for less than a McDonald's lunch I walked away a happy mom with lots of money still in my wallet.