Mother's Day Camping '12

A couple months ago I received an email with a special two nights for the price of one at all KOA campsites for Mother's Day week-end.  Normally the weather in May can still be pretty cold so I hesitated but then saw that they have little cabins!  They ranged in price based on the amenities.  Ours was the bottom of the line.  A bed and a set of bunks, a space heater and a light.  We did have a little porch with an awesome swing, fire pit and picnic table. 

After I spent two days hawking my wares at our garage sale, we dragged everything into the garage and tossed all the camping stuff into the truck and headed north to Illinois.



This was our neighbors dog that Chris fell in love with.

This is Acacia, still not getting up after who knows how
many hours of sleeping!

Chris decided if you cook the same bacon in a pan (not the microwave)
that it tastes different.

We were getting a kick out of how this doggie was sitting in his seat!



This place had one of these super awesome jumping pillow things! 
If you have not tried one ... you should!



This is our little swing!

Our first bike ride.  This is a rails to trails trail.  Very cool with lots
of old train stuff along the way.

We found this old truck buried in the woods. 
The bed of the truck was about 100 feet away!

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We explored tons of old falling down buildings and found some weird stuff.

The bike trail runs along the back side of this building.

This was at a different find on our trail.

I peeked inside a busted window on the basement and saw this road sign.

Here are my camping troopers ... in the cabin, on my bed, watching a movie!!

I dragged them from the cabin for an ice cream social

and and trailer ride around the camp site - where we were shot at with marshmallow shooters!!

Can't say no to a S'more ... although Chris does not like
his marshmallow toasted

Sunday morning was a pancake breakfast!!



Well, I had to do the pillow jumper at least once!!



Here is a little movie of us jumping!!



Day two bike ride was 5+ miles from the IL boarder up into WI!



The way to WI I had to distract Chris with "gamer" talk the entire
way or he is sure his lungs would have exploded.



But, on the return trip, the promise of "playing games on
dad's cell phone put a lot of energy into him!!
So, a total of about 10+ miles round trip!



All in all a very nice Mother's Day week end!

Mom's Flute Concert '12

Acacia has a band assignment this year that was to teach a parent that has no musical talent what so ever, how to play her instrument.  I was the winner.  I had to have at least 5 formal lessons and learn 3 songs and then perform on stage with the other parents.  This proved to be SOOOO much harder than I thought.  I had to keep a diary of each lesson and this was turned into the band teacher.  I had to catch myself several times keeping it G rated!!  Hand cramps and headaches after each lesson.  But, in the end I think I played "ok".  I still can't read music and had to look at the note, then find what it converted to on the top of page and then see how that converted into my finger placement. 

The actual concert sounded terrible.  We really sucked it up.  But, we did go through with it and the kids seems to be amused which was the goal.

As promised ... here are a few photos taken from my flute performance!!  Unfortunately, I was on stage behind the tallest and burliest men, playing their instruments so you can not see me on stage at all.  Randy has the only audio of this event and honestly, I do not think anyone really wants to hear it.  But, if you do, let me know and I'll see if Randy can send me a file to load here.

How lucky are you ...  click below to see the different songs we played ...  Make sure to turn you volume WAY up!!  I am in the second row.  You can't really see me too well.  You can kind of see my legs ....

Click to hear me play

Click to hear more

Soccer Tournement '12

Many soccer tournaments with this team. This was our first over night trip. The girls were all so fired up for this. Their first game was at 8a, so Acacia and I were up at 5a to drive there. They played great and won. Then we went and checked into the hotel. Turns out the hotel we stayed at was pretty much ALL Oregon soccer teams. Boys, girls and all ages. They were running around the place like they owned it. If anyone was staying there for anything other than soccer, I feel really bad for them. For some reason, Acacia did not want any part of the running around. She literally crawled into bed and watched TV all day. We had our second game that evening and then the running around continued. But, Acacia still stayed in bed. Sunday AM their first game was at 7:45a. They won! That meant that they are in the semi finals but not for another several hours. Back to the hotel to shower and check out. As we are loading up the car the storms moved in! I mean - BIG crazy massive thunder and lightning. Word leaked around that the tourney was postponed but since we did not know for sure we headed back to the fields in case it cleared and they were to play their next game. We pulled up to the fields just in time to see a bolt of lightning come down from the clouds and strike the fields!! BOOM!! Just crazy!! So, lesson learned! When they say clear the fields as someone saw lightning .... you clear the fields! 15 minutes later every one's cell phones were going off. Tournament has been cancelled. So no one wins! Too bad as I think we would have placed at least second and that would have been great for the team! Oh well. Time to drive home in this. At one point the car in front of me went through a HUGE puddle and sent a wave of water onto the van. It was as if I just did a nose dive into a lake. Freakiest thing not being able to see anything at all while driving. But, we all made it home safe. I wish I knew what was going on with Acacia. Her teammates really had a great time running all over and messing around. Oh well. I guess we will see how the next tournament goes.