Field Trips and More

We have been so busy the last two weeks that we have worn out our children, as is evidenced by the picture below:

Jenna fell asleep "reading" her book. She was very tired.


I missed updating last week because we were on our way home from my nephew's baptism. It was awesome to be there for it. I cannot believe he is already 8. Thanks for a great weekend, family.

The last two weeks have been busy. I am going to let the pictures tell the story. Beware, there are a lot of them.

Jenna's preschool took a field trip to a local apple orchard called "Carter's Mountain." Jared and I went with her. We had a great time. We went to "Apple School" - where we learned about apples, took a hayride, had a yummy snack, picked apples, and got mini pumpkins.

Jared, Jenna, and Amanda at Carter's Mountain


Jenna and Jared showing off their mini pumpkins at Carter's Mountain. I swear that it is impossible to get multiple children to look at the camera and smile at the same time.




Looking out over Charlottesville from Carter's Mountain


Jared and Jenna enjoying apple cider doughnuts and apple cider. Yum!


Jenna, the apple worm


Jared the apple worm


Picking Apples




"We're off to see the Wizard, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz..." I love this picture, but every time I look at it, I think of Dorothy skipping down the yellow brick road. :)


Kevin had a field trip this week to see the play "Room on the Broom." Unfortunately, only two parents from his entire class could attend, so I didn't get to go. He had a good time. It was his first experience with live theater. Since I didn't go, there are no pictures. However, Kevin has been busy with some other things the last couple of weeks that I did get pictures of:

Kevin, on his own, decided to write a letter to President Obama about a concern of his. We are proud of our activist son! :)


In case you can't read it, it says "Why do Bus Drivers have seat belts, but students do not?"


Speaking of Kevin's latest accomplishments, this is what he did during our General Conference a couple of weeks ago. Neither of us showed him how to do this. It is not correct, but it is pretty good for just making it up on his own. I think the time has definitely come to start teaching him piano.


My parents stopped by for a quick visit last week on their way to my brother's house (my sister and her husband were here too, but I don't have any pictures of them). I asked my dad to take a look at a light that wasn't working. Jared decided to "help." If you look at the ceiling, you will notice that the light from the flashlight is not exactly where it should be. :) The best part about this, though, is that the bulb was burnt out, and that is why the light didn't work. I thought I had checked that... My bad. :$


Our children, and their parents, have been enjoying the wonderful fall weather (until the last few days, where did the 40s and 50s come from???? What happened to the 60s and 70s?):

Jenna enjoying our back yard.


Jared enjoying our hammock.


I love Jared's smile in this picture. He looks so innocent, doesn't he? Check out the next picture to see what his "innocent" swinging did to his sister.


This is the result of Jared and Jenna swinging at the same time. Jenna was swinging high and fast, but straight. Jared thought it would be a good idea to swing to the side instead of forward. Jenna enjoyed a nice black eye for about a week. Lovely.


Derek decided that we should take the kids for a drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway to see the beautiful fall trees. We are about a week or two too early, but today was the only free Saturday we will have for a little while. It was still very beautiful. We drove through part of the Shenandoah National Park. We all loved it (except for the part about it being 42 degrees). We stopped at most of the overlooks along the way, so the kids were able to get out and run around. I can't wait to go back in the spring. If you click on any of the pictures with the mountains in the background, you will probably be able to see all the colors in the trees on the mountains. Beautiful!

Jenna and Jared enjoying the Appalachian Trail. Kevin and I stayed in the car because it was so cold.


Derek, Amanda, Jared and Kevin. Jenna took this picture. She did a good job.


Our attempt at a family picture with the beautiful background. Apparently Kevin doesn't want people to know he is associated with us. I can't really blame him. We are pretty odd.


Kevin and Jenna. I love the face Jenna is making.


Jenna, Kevin, and Jared. Again, Jenna's face is awesome. She must have learned to make faces like that from her dad...just kidding.


Amanda and Jared walking through the woods. This is a great picture. Good job Derek!


Jenna


Jared


Jenna enjoying her picnic lunch. She and Derek lasted the longest outside for lunch. It was too cold for the rest of us.


Jenna


Jenna's moment of Zen:

Jenna was singing "The Star Spangled Banner" the other day. She sang several of the words incorrectly, but my favorite was her replacement of "And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,..." She said "And the rockets' red glare, and the burning in hell,..."

My favorite mixed up word for the week:

Jenna keeps asking us for more "spitachios." She means "pistachios." :)

D.C. Ragnar 2009

Last weekend Derek and I ran D.C Ragnar. This was a 199.3 mile relay race that went from Cumberland, Maryland, to Washington D.C. The race started Friday morning at 10a. Our team finished Saturday evening after 5p (after having a runner get lost for 1 1/2 hours, so we actually ran a lot faster than what our finishing time is listed as). Our team consisted of 12 runners, divided into two vans. We were in Van 1. Each runner runs 3 legs. The legs range anywhere from 2.4 miles to over 10 miles. Runners can pick which set of legs they will run, but the miles are preassigned and cannot be switched. In other words, runner 1 will run legs 1, 13, and 25. Runner 2 runs 2, 14, and 26, and so on through all 12 runners. Derek was runner 2. He ran 8.8 miles, then 4.8 miles, then another 9 miles, for a total of about 23 miles. I had much easier legs. I ran about 6.8 miles, then 3.1 miles and then 2.9 miles, for a total of about 13 miles. Overall our van did 97 of the 199.3 miles.

This is the second year we have done D.C. Ragnar. Last year was the first year for the race in D.C. (there are other Ragnar relays all over the country - we ran one in Utah before we moved last year). This year was much smoother than last year. Overall we had a great time. It is a very challenging and rewarding race. We hope to be able to run it every year we live here. A big thanks to our wonderful friends for watching our children!!!

Here are the pictures. You'll notice we didn't take any pictures after the first set of legs, until we were all finished with our legs. I guess we were a little tired and distracted.

Here is van 1 of our team waiting for the race to start (Wess, Matt, Kim, Mandy, Amanda, and Derek):


Mandy, Kim and Derek waiting for the race to start


Our start. They actually started about 20 teams every hour from 8am to 4p. We started at 10a.


Here is Derek waiting to start his first leg.


Derek in the middle of his first leg. (I am in the background because I had just offered him a drink).


Derek at the end of his first leg. He handed off to Mandy.


Amanda waiting for the start of her first leg.


Mandy handed off to Amanda.


Amanda kicking it in to hand off to Matt.


Our team after we finished all three of our legs each. We were very happy to be done.

Traditions

Derek and I just ran our almost 200 mile relay race this weekend. It was great. I am too tired to post about it right now (plus I don't have any pictures yet). Instead I have some random pictures of some of our Sunday traditions. Every Sunday Derek makes us pancakes and eggs. We all love this tradition. It is a nice break for me, and they are delicious. We also have adopted a dessert only on Sundays and Mondays policy (thanks for the idea Steph!). Whoever is in charge of the lesson for Family Home Evening that week gets to choose the dessert. Today Derek chose homemade ice cream. We got a soft serve ice cream maker for Christmas. Yummy! We have been experimenting to try and get just the recipe just right. We came pretty close today.

I am off to bed now. Enjoy the pictures:

Here is a picture of Derek making the pancakes. He makes them from scratch, and they are so good!


The kids love to have sprinkles on their ice cream. I thought the leaves were fitting for this time of year.


Jared enjoying his ice cream


Jenna enjoying her ice cream


This is an old picture that I never posted. Our children love to read, and be read to. For a while we would try and end our dinners by 6:45p so that Derek could read to them before bed. I think that we will start that again.

Camping

Our children LOVE to camp. (Me, not so much, but I do enjoy the outdoors and being with my family, so I go). We have been promising them that we would take them camping all summer. We have been so busy that we haven't had the time. We finally made it happen this weekend (Friday to Saturday). We went to Pocahontas State Park (one of Virginia's many state parks). It was a great camping place. The weather was great, and because of the time of year, not many people were there. My sister, Rachel, and her husband, David, and their little boy, Levi, came up Saturday morning to hike and play. They almost camped with us, but decided they wouldn't get enough sleep, so they just joined us Saturday morning. We had a great time with them. Thanks for meeting up with us! Overall it was a great trip. We didn't get nearly enough sleep, but that is to be expected. I think next year we will try to go for a 3 day/2 night camping trip. We shall see. Enjoy the pictures!

Breakfast! Derek made us eggs over the camp fire. We had mini bagels and bananas too. Derek and I actually put the eggs on our bagels, and they were really good.



Jared could not decide whether he wanted to be inside the tent or outside the tent. It was particularly annoying because he wasn't good about taking off his shoes before going into the tent. They tent was full of sand from his shoes.


Since Julie requested pictures of me, I asked Kevin to take a picture of Derek and me. He did a pretty good job. Be careful what you ask for though, because now you are stuck with pictures of me camping. :)


Jenna and Mom. Love that face, Jenna!


Derek and Jared roasting a marshmallow for s'mores. They were doing this after breakfast. We tried to make them the night before. The wood was damp though, so it didn't burn well on Friday night. We made a couple of s'mores, but then the fire died. Derek was able to get a really good fire going on Saturday morning, so we let the kids make s'mores then. Good parenting, I know. :)


Jenna, Levi, Derek, David, Jared, and Kevin on the hike. Rachel and I were taking the pictures.


Hiking! Sorry the picture is blurry. I wanted to include it because it is the only picture I have of Rachel (even if it is from behind).


The park was beautiful. I love the beauty of the Eastern United States.



Some family pictures.



This is my absolute favorite picture from the trip. I think I might make it sepia, print it and frame it. We shall see.


After we went hiking, we played at the park at the campground. The kids had a great time running around, going down the slide, playing tag, playing pirates (a favorite game lately), and zooming down the pretend zip line.

Jenna playing


Kevin was trying to avoid the camera, but I caught him. :)


Jared enjoying the slide



Derek enjoyed the fake zip line too. :)


Kevin loved this thing. He spent a lot of time on it.

Oddball Tournament 2009

We are very blessed to have awesome neighbors. Kevin, Jenna, and Jared spend a lot of time playing with our neighbors. The children next door are very smart and creative children. A few weeks ago they brought a flyer to our door announcing the first annual "Oddball Tournament." They explained that Oddball was a game they made up. Over the next couple of weeks they taught our children and the children across the street how to play the game. They also taught Jenna, and the little girl across the street (Jenna's best friend), some cheers, as they were going to be the cheerleaders. Kevin was on Team Alaska Bears with the boy next door. The other team was Team Aerodynamics with the girl next door and boy across the street. The kids have really been looking forward to this tournament.

Unfortunately, I was in D.C. for the day with some women from our church, so I didn't get to see it. Derek was there and took all the pictures. Since he is out right now, I will do my best to guess what the pictures are, based on what they told me. All that I know about Oddball is that you can use any part of your body except your hands. Our neighbors went all out for the tournament. They made shirts for the players and pom-poms for the cheerleaders. One of the mothers made cookies and brought medals for all the kids. It was a great day for them. Below are the pictures (and sorry Julie, no pictures or me again, since I wasn't there...maybe next week). I think that Kevin's team won, but I don't know for sure, and it really doesn't matter.

Kevin playing the game:




Even though this picture is blurry, I really like it. It is a great picture of Kevin giving his all.


Jenna and our neighbor doing a cheer. Jared would also do the cheers off to the side. Very cute, I heard.


More cheering. I know this is blurry, but I thought it was a great jump by Jenna.


I love this picture. I am guessing that this is at the end of one of Jared's cheers. Derek did a great job capturing this.


Jared was the equipment manager. They did a good job coming up with a role for everyone. Here he is holding the ball.


These are the awesome cookies our neighbor made. She is the world's best cookie maker. We LOVE her cookies. We are going to gain a lot of weight living by her. :)


As you can tell by their faces, the kids had a blast. I am really grateful we have such awesome neighbors for our children to play with.