Brad's first campout

Brad is part of the 11-yr old scouts, and we decided to go on a campout up to Payson Lakes.  It is absolutely beautiful up in the mountains this time of year in which the fall colors are gorgeous, the temperatures are bearable during the day and just a little cooler at night.  On the drive up, Brad was pretty funny as he wanted to drive up with his friends up to the campgrounds instead of driving with "dad."  It's already happening! 

I had to get a good laugh with Brad.  We sent him and a couple of the other boys on a chore to get some firewood.  This 30' tree limb is what they came back with.  It was hilarious.  Most boys would come back with arm fulls of wood.  Not these boys.  They go for the gusto.  Brad's leading the pack, Mitchell (Brad's good friend) is in the middle, and Liam (our next door neighbor/friend) is in the back.  Little kids are so adventurous.  It is so funny to see what they come up with

We made hobo dinners.  It was so good as we added some cream of mushroom soup to the mix of hamburger, potatoes, carrots and other blends of spices.  Cooking the tin foil dinner over charcoal in the fire pit tasted soooo good.  These current leaders of the 11 year olds are so much better at cooking than I ever was or still am.  I was impressed with their cooking abilities.  I wish I had a touch of chef abilities in me, but my kids suffer every time I have to cook.  I remember the first time I went camping as an 11-yr old scout leader in which I cooked, or tried to cook, a breakfast of pancakes, eggs and sausage and hashbrowns.  I burnt everything to blacker than black over a super hot fire and my hashbrowns were horrible.  My "hashbrowns" were not actually hashbrowns.  Who would know that spaghetti noodles and hashbrowns look almost identical when raw.  Well, these "hashbrowns" never got crispy and I could not understand for the life of me why not.  Well, the boys that came with me a few years back, one of them being Ethan, cried because they had no food to eat, laughed at and with me for the horrendous cooking abilities and mocked my "hashbrowns."  I now know not to cook spaghetti noodles for hashbrowns 

It was good to spend some time with Brad!  Brad chipped right in setting up his tent, helped out with all the cooking, cleaning, and getting along with all the other boys

Brad tried to catch some fish but was unsuccessful.  It was relaxing though.  Where do my children get their love of fishing because it doesn't come from their dad.  I get so bored with it and don't have the patience.  I know some people love to fish, but it is just not one of my passions.  To this day, I still have never caught a fish.  I remember one time going with Nichole many years ago to a holding pond.  Everyone gets a fish at a holding pond, right?!  Well, not this outdoorsman.   I think Ethan was only like 5 and he even caught a fish.  I have fished up in Yellowstone on a river, fished a pond and the Potomac River when younger with my older brother Dale back in VA, fished Tibble Fork lake up American Fork Canyon with Ethan, fished up at Strawberry, maybe a few other lakes and lastly, here with Brad at Payson Lakes.  I just am horrible.  I am afraid, for as much as I love the outdoors, I am just not a true "outdoorsman."

Brad and Mitchell, the studs, got to walk around the lake.  I'd say it was about a two-mile hike around.  Brad, after having such a good time, slept the whole way home in the car.

The flock

Ethan dressed up for the Brigham City Temple dedication

Brad and his typical Sunday dress shirt.  He hates to wear a dress shirt

 

Jake always knows how to pose for a camera...notice the little shift to the side with the cheesy grin

 

Ava loves to hold her little "baby."  Eli hates wearing this sweatshirt...and it's not because of the team.  He can't fit his head into it

Ethan turns 16

 
For Ethan's birthday dinner, he requested chinese pot stickers, sticky legs, hash brown potato bake with bacon and cheese and top, steemed broccoli and rolls.  For dessert, Nichole made her famous 8-layer cake...chocolate cake, chocolate pudding, crushed candy bar, cool whip and then repeat the layers.  It's totally fat free!!

Ethan was so ecstatic to get his gift from Ava!  She was so cute and just wanted to be able to wrap up a gift and give him something, so she got him a little tiger...lol!

Ethan, after getting his best gift of the night, got a couple shirts and couple pair of jeans.  I guess clothes is pretty typical of teenagers and what they want.  One of the pair of jeans he ended up taking back to exchange for some music from itunes.  He loves his music.  In fact, he just also bought a music adapter for his ipod to use in the car with the car stereo.  It's funny, I remember being like him when I was his age and always thinking music was so important.  The other important thing for this young man is his driver's license.  He is dying to get it.  As part of his certification, he needs to get 40 hours of drive time in.  So, he and Nichole drove to St. George and back and left me with the rest.  I had Eli with me all day and soon realized it is so difficult to get anything done around the house while holding a little baby.  It was kind of frustrating not being able to accomplish my list of tasks I wanted to get done.  Since I couldn't do anything, I just loaded up Jake, Brad, Ava and Eli in the family wagon and went furniture shopping and to Chuck-a-Rama. 

Ogden Valley Triathlon

 



 

This last Saturday marked the last triathlon of the season for me.  I went to the Ogden Valley Triathlon.  Ogden Valley was the very first one I did a few years ago after Don had invited me to do it with him and Jill's dad.  So, I wanted to return to the first one I ever did to see if I had improved at all.  I can remember my first tri in which I showed up doing the rookie or first timer things like doing the swim in a jammer, doing the bike on a mountain bike and running in crappy street/cross training shoes.  I can recall that my time was just under 2 hours but the course was also shorter back then.  The first time I did it it was an 800 swim, 13 bike and 3.1 swim which is the average sprint distance.  This time, a few years later it was a 1000 meter swim, 16 mile bike and 4 mile run.  So, it was just a little more than the average sprint distance and a little longer than the first time I had done it. 

I love my new bike, but it is definitely time to get a new helmet!

This is pretty much right toward the end of the race.  I had just passed up the guy in the background of the picture.  His name was Brad.  He had been leading the whole race until I was able to overtake him in the last few hundred yards.

 

I did improve in comparison to the first time by a lot.  My overall time was 1 hour 44 minutes 16 seconds which was good enough for 39th overall.  The sweet news was that I came in 1st place for my age division of 40 - 45, in other words the old guys.  That's right, I placed first for the old guys in which there were 21 in my division.  I couldn't believe it especially because it felt like I didn't race good at all. I did the swim in 20:24, the bike in 47:43, and the run in 30:35 with the remainder of the time in transitions.  In triathlon, I am only 39 right now, but they place you in the age bracket that you will be in by Dec. 31.  And, since I will be 40 on 12/12/12, I am in the 40-45 age bracket. 

 

My first time ever standing on the blue medal stand was a pretty cool feeling.  And, for me to do it after returning to the very first one I ever did was especially meaningful.  The guy to my left, or the guy on the right in the photo, finished just 30 seconds after me. 

 

Jake's fish

Poor Jake!  After having dogs and a cat, we decided to try our luck with fish.  Well, one of the responsibilities for Jake is to take care of the fish by feeding it daily and cleaning its tank.  Our little man was performing his duties proudly just when the improbable happened.  The poor little fishy plopped out of the tank when Jake was draining the dirty water and went right down the drain.  Nichole told me that Jake was so distraught and upset that she had to take him back to the store and get him a new beta fish.  She consoled our little man by telling him that maybe, just maybe, "he made it back to some body of water after going through the plumbing pipes."  Wow, moms are great for making others feel good in desperate situations! 

Imperfect daddy

So, a couple miscues.  Maybe it's just bad parenting.  Poor little Eli fell off the bed and then I nearly dropped him.  As for the first incident, Nichole and I were in the bathroom getting ready for something, so we laid him in the middle of our king size bed.  A few minutes later we heard a thump and Nichole went scrambling back into the room to find our little boy face down on the ground.  That little bugger is learning to get around by jerking his body around.  How he got all the way to the edge of our bed was just not foreseen.  Luckily, he wasn't hurt but he sure let us know all about it!! 

  

 

As for the second incident, we were having family home evening and playing "Simon Says."  Well, it was Ava's turn to play Simon.  At one point she had us doing jumping jacks.  I soon found out it's probably not the smartest thing to try and do jumping jacks with a baby in one arm.  Eli went flying out of my left arm and had to catch him half way falling down to the ground.  It scared the bejeezies out of him!  And I gave him a good scratch across his cheek with my fingernail.  He was not happy about it!  After a little bit when he was back in the safe arms of his momma, he gave me the dirtiest little scowl as if to let me know he was not happy with me.  It is so funny to see the different personalities of each child. 

Ava's typical gift

This is the typical gift I get from little Miss Ava.  She likes to draw something on paper, go down to the pantry, and pull out a bag of oatmeal.  She's done it like 6 or 7 times now for me.  She is so funny!  The crazy thing is, why the oatmeal?

Eli's first solid food



Holy Cuteness!!  I love those big dazzling eyes.  Nichole gave him sweet potatoes for his first solid food meal while I was at work.  Every time I feed this boy, he gets so worked up in anticipation of the food coming to his mouth that his whole body tightens up and he starts to shake. 

 

 

The other night I went on a little date with Jake, Brad and Eli. We went to Macey's and got an ice cream cone...you know the cones for like 50 cents each. It's a deal you just can't pass up especially with the big herd we have now. Well, Jake tattled on me to Nichole and told her that I fed Eli a little bit of the ice cream cone. Yes, I admit that I did. He loved it! Was it the best thing for him? Maybe not, but it was just 2 little licks, okay maybe 2 gulping licks. Either way, he had more on his face than what actually went down the pipe.  It's tough when those little brown eyes are begging and notice every little bit of food passing him up going into someone else's mouth.

Ava's first day of preschool


 Ava was so excited to go to school for the very first time.  She gets to go every Tuesday and Wednesday for the next little while. I sure love these special kids

Julie Carlile is Ava's teacher, and Julie goes to our church so we see her there.  The first Sunday following preschool, Ava was so excited to go say hi to her teacher...Miss Julie!  Julie had just handed me her donation envelope with Ava running up to me at the same time.  Ava tried to get Julie's attention wanting so badly to say hi to her teacher, but Miss Julie did not see her.  So, Ava just looked back at me and grimaced with a cute little smirk as if to say, "next time."  She was cute about it.