{T} is for Tesla?

So apparently you can make your abs look like the letter "T"....for what purpose I have no idea.

Back to School 2019

It is hard to believe that it is time to head back to school already but whether I'm ready for it or not, apparently school is in session.

This year we have a college student, a high school student, a middle school student and an elementary student.  That sounds exhausting!

5th Grade @ Boones Ferry Primary

T is 11 years old

his teacher is Ms. Maghini

when he grows up he wants to be a PHYSICAL THERAPIST

favorite book...HARRY POTTER & THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN

favorite food...PANCAKES

favorite sport...BASKETBALL

7th Grade @ Wood Middle School

J is 12 years old

when he grows up he wants to be a DOCTOR

favorite class...SCIENCE & WELLNESS

favorite book...THE HUNGER GAMES

favorite food...PIZZA

favorite sport...TRACK & BASKETBALL

11th Grade @ Wilsonville High School

C is 16 years old

when he grows up he wants to be a PHYSICAL THERAPIST

favorite class...AP PSYCHOLOGY

favorite book...MICHAEL VEY

favorite food...PIZZA

favorite sport...BASKETBALL

FRESHMAN YEAR @ Utah State University

K is 18 years old

when she grows up she wants to be an ELEMENTARY ED TEACHER

favorite class...MATH

favorite book...THE HELP

favorite food...WATERMELON

favorite sport...RUNNING & VOLLEYBALL

{C} will work for MONEY

C had a very lucrative summer and we are pleased with all the opportunities he had to work hard.

His many job included....

little league umpire

yard work for our next door neighbor

house manager for the Street of Dreams home show

farm hand at Holy Star Farm

(I don't generally get pics of C working so I was glad when these were sent to me by his employer when she was expressing appreciation for him on one particularly hot and sweaty day)

{J} we all scream for ice cream

J enjoyed a second summer working with the middle-school-run ice cream company, "Jr Scoops".

I LOVE their tent that says "I will NOT eat bad ice cream".  Pretty sound advice if you ask me.

Take a peak at that flavor board and you will see that they take the tagline to heart....there is no bad ice cream being served by Jr Scoop.

J worked in the kitchen a couple of times this summer making ice cream (he is now considered an experienced maker and works solo on his kitchen assignments) and he also volunteered as a scooper for about eight summer events....everything from community fairs to concerts in the park to corporate events.  Every time that I would pick up J from an event I would have the club mentor or the parent volunteer just rave about J and his hard work and dependability and his pleasant personality and how they rely on him so much as a leader.
So proud of him and this opportunity to be doing something fun while learning real life skills.

Rich and I volunteered to be parent helpers at a couple of the events and this was the concert crowd at the concert in the park that I volunteered at.  Huge crowd for the concert and huge crowd for ice cream....a perfect night all the way around.

BFF Afternoon

After I got K all settled into her apartment I spent a couple more days in Utah...one day with my parents and one day with my lifelong (cause life starts in Jr High, right?) friend Melanie.

We grabbed a yummy bite to eat at the DoDo in Salt Lake and then we headed to Park City to ride the Alpine Slide.  I grew up in Utah and lived there for 24 years and I had never ridden the Alpine Slide.  I guess you are never too old to make something right and so make it right we did.

It was a great afternoon and so fun for the two of us to catch up after crazy busy summers and each of us dropping off our oldest child to out-of-state colleges. 

{K} she has a new address

K has officially moved into her USU residence...she is a college girl!!!

I flew down to help her move in and it was a really fun day spent unpacking all of her boxes, doing some shopping, decorating her room and I got to meet a couple of her roommates.

After a long, productive day I went to say goodbye and it hit me that it was "GOODBYE"!!!

She's moved out!!!

I held it together, put on a smile, gave her a huge hug and only cried a little bit once I drove away.  (and I'm only crying a little bit as I type this)  

As much as it is hard to let her grow up and out, I am so proud of her and the enthusiasm she has for this next stage of life makes it a bit easier to allow her the wings to fly.

So many holes....

Evidently Sunday dinners are a lot more interesting when I'm out of town....

Charlie & the Chocolate Factory

 I had two very handsome dates last night to go see the Broadway tour performance of 

"Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".

So much TIME, so LITTLE to do...STRIKE THAT, REVERSE IT

Girls Trip to NYC...wrap up

Our NYC has come to an end...so sad!

We had plans to attend the Good Morning America Concert Series in Central Park but otherwise had a wide open day until our evening flights.  I gave the day to K and told her to fill it with whatever she wanted to do that we hadn't done yet.

Keith Urban was the GMA performer and K and I were both willing to wake up early to see him!  He sounded great and we loved being there but the whole "concert series" is really just the crowd being led along for two hours with promises of a concert in exchange for 3-4 songs.....so, in other words, we could have slept in and still caught the "concert" and not been there for the first two hours of cheering for the GMA cameras.

K wanted to see the NYC Public Library so that was our next stop after Keith Urban.  Along with the library, we stopped into a bakery and grabbed a slice of Brownie NYC Cheesecake (yum!) and walked 5th Avenue, admiring all the fancy shops.

This entire week K was very aware of different landmarks that she had seen in movies.  In fact, while in NYC we watched part of Home Alone and all of Enchanted because of their NYC scenery.  Well, on our last day of the trip K decided she just HAD to go to the Central Park Zoo because of the movie Madagascar.  So Central Park Zoo it was but it turns out that there are no zebras, lions, giraffes or hippos in the Central Park Zoo.  Probably the biggest disappointment of the week.

With just a couple of hours in NYC K chose her last activity to be swimming at the public pool within Central Park.  She is my water girl and she had been pining after the pool ever since seeing it on our bike ride on Sunday.  From there we grabbed some pizza, grabbed our bags and off we went to the airport.

After saying our "goodbyes" at our separate airport gates I got this text from K...her phone tracked our steps all week and for the six days we were together we walked 60 miles!!!

Thanks for a great week K.  NYC has never been so fun!  

Love you tons!!!

Girls Trip to NYC....Governor's Island & High Line

For all the rain yesterday, today blessed us with warmth and sunshine and as such, we enjoyed being outdoors all day.

We started the day catching the ferry to Governor's Island.  The island has a long history of military uses and has only been a National park and open to the public for less than 20 years.  In recent years it has undergone lots of transformation with the addition of parks and ball fields.  It is a delightful destination when you are looking for a break from the city and I am so glad that a friend that lives in the city gave us the suggestion to go visit.  

The kayaks were not open because the dock is being rebuilt so no kayaking for us.  Fortunately there were lots of bikes available to rent so we rode all over the island, exploring and enjoying beautiful views of Manhattan and Liberty Island from differing viewpoints.  When we finished on the bikes we hiked up to the top of Hammock Hill and just relaxed.  

We kind of ended up island jumping all morning.  

After Governor's Island we returned to Manhattan long enough to then take the Staten Island Ferry to Staten Island.  The ferry ride gave us a great view of Liberty Island and so we opted to call that good and not take a ferry to Liberty Island upon returning to Manhattan.

For having been to NYC multiple times, I was surprised at the number of things that we saw that were new to me.  One of those new explorations was the High Line.
The high line used to be an elevated freight line that was turned into a public park in the last 10 years or so.  It was really cool!  We walked the length of it, soaked our feet in a water feature and grabbed an ice cream treat.

By the time we reached Hudson Yards, we had walked a TON! and K was definitely done.  I really wanted to explore the Vessel but I hadn't known that we needed to get tickets ahead of time and I didn't want to explore it enough to wait around for 1 1/2 hours until there were ticket times available.

As we prepared to call it a night, we realized that we just happened to be within three blocks of a grocer that sold Roti so we made that our last trek of the day.  We picked up a little Roti for K and I to share and a lot of Roti to take home to Rich.  We then went back to our Airbnb and just crashed!