Space cadet in training

Today I was overtaken  by a moment of craziness and decided to take the boys and one of their friends to the Museum of Flight in Seattle. I'm not a fan of long driving, but the hour and a half that it took to get there was well worth it!

We started at the gift shop (because the craziness hadn't worn off yet) and saw this great bib. I loved it enough to have Garrett snag a picture of Duncan in. I didn't love it enough to pay the $22 to make it my own.

(my great camera men were either too blurry or too close, but you can get the idea of how cute my little bobble head baby looked in the bib)

Through most of the museum I think I was so overwhelmed with the awesomeness that I forgot to take pictures of what we were doing. It was just that great of a museum! A momentary clearness in my thought processes came while we were waiting in a forever long line to walk through the last Air Force One plane that retired in 1990.

 This plane hosted Presidents Kennedy and Eisenhower and a number of dignitaries like Henry Kissinger.

 For as long as we stood in line, we walked through the plane fairly quickly. It wasn't all that impressive. The staff seating was like normal first class seating and their bathroom was just as crowded as a normal airplane bathroom. The presidential bathroom, however, was quite spacious for being on an airplane. It even has a stand up shower in it. The boys think it is great to be able to say that we've been in Air Force One. (Although technically, it is only Air Force One when the president is actually in it. Otherwise it is called SAM970 - Special Air Mission followed by the plane's tail number)

Sadly, this is the only picture I took of the inside of the museum. This is the entrance to the WWI level of the museum. It was so amazing! Planes from almost every country involved. Flight suits. Engines. Full size planes, scale model planes. Tons of hands on learning activities for the kids. A.m.a.z.i.n.g.

We only went through the WWI, WWII, Space Exploration (Boeing makes the NASA space shuttles as well as airplanes), Air Force One tour, Concord tour, and the B-17 tour and that took us almost three hours. We still had another half of the museum to go, but it was time for us to head home.

We will for sure be going to this museum again! It would have been worth the drive for just one of the World War portions of the museum. I can't wait to go again and take more time in each of those areas and to see the other parts we didn't even get to!

Gone

My little cadet is off.

I won't see her again until I go to pick her and her friends up on Friday.

I already miss her!

Worth Fighting For

Tomorrow morning I drop Teagan off for a week long girl's camp. This will be her second year going and she is so excited. I loved going when I was a teenager, and she seems to be following in my footsteps in her love of church Girl's Camp.

This year, their theme is Worth Fighting For. As in, learning what is worth fighting for. Family. Freedom. The Gospel. Their values and beliefs. Themselves. Her age group was assigned to be the air force and they are doing a whole military dog tags, camo backpacks, and morning drills type of fun. I'm excited to hear how the week went when she gets home next weekend!

In prep for her week away, we did our traditional corn row hair style. My mom used to do my hair this way when I was younger and I always loved it, and it has become one of Tig's favorite styles as well. Last year we did fun little beads on the bottom of all the tiny braids, but this year we made fatter braids and added a ribbon for each of the values that the young women learn about in church.

White = Faith

Blue = Divine Nature

Red = Individual Worth

Green = Knowledge

Orange = Choice and Accountability

Yellow = Good Works

Purple = Integrity

Gold = Virtue

 I loved the way they turned out! Not only are the functional to keep her hair tangle free and critter clear, but they are also pretty reminders of the values she stands for!

I'm not worried about her while she will be away from us, but I do worry about her little buddy. He is going to miss his Tiggy a lot.

As I was taking these pictures he said her name for the first time and she was so ecstatic about it! I wish I had caught her happy dance on video, it was that great. But here is a snapshot of what it looked like:

My summer job

I've had some really cool jobs in my life.

Jobs like working with the LPGA and being trusted with the Tiffany's crystal trophy.

 Working at the zoo and learning great facts such as that a Rhino pees backwards. (first hand experience on this one)

And I've even worked at the hospital and stood in on C-sections and ER surgeries.

I seem to be drawn to really interesting work experiences.

This summer I had another cool job.

I worked at Scholastic book sales. And because of past experience I had working at the Special Olympics, I got to look like this for a couple hours and get paid double...

Oh yeah. I was Clifford.

Not only did I get to walk around downtown dressed like a famous cartoon pooch dancing like a crazy woman, waving at complete strangers, and scaring small children; but they paid me in BOOKS to do it!!! How awesome is that? (I did get 43 people to wave at me from cars, hugs from three people, made one little girl cry, and passed out 27 flyers. So it was a job well done) 

The kids have gotten books for rewards, books for trip incentives, and guess what they're getting for Christmas?

hint: it starts with a 'B' and rhymes with looks

Why July 11th is a cool day

Free slushies at 7 Eleven!!

Happy Birthday to them and thank you for the slushie!



sleeps seven

Our new house is absolutely wonderful. I am loving all the room we have everywhere.

Whereas, in the boys' old room, the one bunkbed filled their room to almost bursting, here, both the bunkbed and the full size loft bed fit comfortably. So now Garrett has the full size mattress as his and Owen has the bunkbeds. He likes to sleep on the bottom bunk though because it is closer to the nightlight; so the top bunk generally goes empty.

But as if it weren't enough to have one bed that was going unused in that room, for the past month both boys have taken to sleeping somewhere other than their perfectly comfortable beds. Their cool mommy set up a three man tent under the loft bed. How awesome is that?! I got serious 'Cool Mommy' points for that!

So now the big boys' room has a sleeping capacity of seven; even though only two little boys live there. You never know when five more boys might appear out of nowhere looking for a place to crash for the night.

Each night before crawling into his sleeping bag, Owen does pull ups to wear himself out. He can do about 10 before stopping...not too bad.

 We also painted their room last week: two walls are a dark bluey color and two are a light bluey/greeny color. The boys love it and so do I. While painting it I realized that color makes me happy.

Getting to sleep in the tent night after night makes my boys happy; and I already knew that them being happy makes me really happy!