Thar's Gold In Them Thar Hills!

The day after the air races we headed out to Virginia City, NV. I had picked up a brochure in the hotel lobby and thought it looked interesting. As neither Doug nor I had ever heard of the place, we were amazed to learn what a big history this "little" city had. The Comstock Lode was discovered there in 1859. Gold mixed with high quality silver ore was recovered in such huge quantities that it turned many prospectors into millionaires over night. Apparently over $400,000,000 was mined from there and it was said that Virginia City had the richest silver strike in the world. At its heyday, it had over 30,000 residents, a 6-story hotel with an elevator, and was said to have financed the building of San Francisco. The wealth of the Hearst family supposedly started here as well, financed by $400 borrowed money.
We arrived there early before a lot was open or the crowds really poured in. We really enjoyed walking around and looking at all of the architecture and Doug was surprised that there were so many buildings still occupied even though there were huge cracks running through a large portion of them. While meandering around, we came across the Virginia City Mercantile. It was filled with barrels of candy and marbles. There were old signs and posters and pretty much anything you could imagine. There was just a lot to see and do. My friend Trish tells me there's a train ride you can take with an "attempted robbery" by gun-toting outlaws but we missed that one. We also left before the mine tour opened.

It's beautiful country up that way. The girls enjoyed the drive there as we wound higher and higher. Anna kept saying, "You can see the whole world from up here." Lauren was worried we were going to tumble off the hill and said numerous times, "Guys, we shouldn't be up here!" :) Back in Reno, we decided to pick up lunch on our way back to the hotel. As we were unfamiliar with the area, we decided to take a gamble on a Mexican restaurant that was looking a bit seedy on the outside because I had a hankering for a chimichanga. We walked back out pretty quickly though as where they seated us had a desert and cactus display with half-eaten tortilla chips and french fries covered in ketchup. We had seen a "Hawaiian-style Cheeseburger" place up the road so we decided to give that a go. It was very busy and people were super friendly. All the kids got leis, and fruity drinks with parasols. Anna and Lauren were pretty funny because they kept negotiating each parasol that came to the table. I think Lauren ended up with most of them at the end of the day. We had an awesome plate of nachos and decent burgers. The best part though was that everything was free. That's right, you heard me...FREE. We noticed there was a sign on the door that read, "Staff training in progress." We didn't think too much about it and went on in. Apparently the place wasn't even opening until the following day and we just lucked into a trial run and a complimentary meal. How cool is that?

Reno Air Races

Believe it or not, we are still here and still going strong. It seems like it's been forever since I posted last. I have a ton of posts to catch up on but it's just been nuts around here lately. We've had the entire interior of our house painted. The painters will be finished today! Everything's been in disarray. We'll get the upstairs back together tonight but then we're starting a carpentry project downstairs and it will be chaos once again.

In the meantime, here are a few pictures from our trip to the Air Races in Reno, Nevada, two weekends ago. To be honest, I had never even heard of the air races but it turned out to be really spectacular. There were some of the most beautiful planes I had ever seen there...racing and on display. We got there on Friday to avoid the crowds and it was just perfect....although hot, hot, hot. We started the day by watching Patty Wagstaff.

Then we took a stroll through several of the display areas with the old....

...and the new.
We watched a few races...
...and took a break for a little kid-style fun.

Lauren even learned to do back-flips.

Since the sun, heat, and noise were such factors, we tried to keep everyone protected. Sunglasses for the girls...

And a hat for Jake.

We made sure that Anna and Lauren wore headsets.

And for Jacob, we trimmed some adult ear plugs and used band-aids to hold them in place.
They worked great until he realized they were there.

We tried headsets.

They didn't last long.

We finally resorted to covering his ears whenever the planes flew by. He actually didn't seem to mind this option and so I spent a lot of time with my hands over his ears.
I'm finding it increasingly difficult to get a good picture of all three kids at the same time. I saw the opportunity for a cool shot here with the planes flying in the background. The planes were in the middle of a race so I had everyone get ready to smile when they came back around. As you can see, this first take was not the one. I had about 256 more similar to this one.

I finally got this one and although it isn't anywhere near great, at least everyone is looking at the camera. Granted they all have racoon eyes, are squinting, and if you notice...there are no planes in the background at all! Oh well, I tried.

We ended the day with the Blue Angels. The kids really seemed to get a kick out of them but after the show was over, they were content to head back to the hotel for a little pool time. It was a really nice day!

No stinky toes!

Lauren had her first soccer class this past Wednesday.

Her coach told the kids there were only three rules in soccer:
1) No hands!

2) No stinky toes. Kick with the inside of your foot.

3) Have fun!

Lauren was the only girl out of the 6 kids there. I'm proud to say that she held her own. One little boy must have thought they were playing football as he tackled Lauren three times. Finally, after the third knockdown she got up and yelled at him, "STOP KNOCKING ME DOWN! And STOP kicking my ball!!" He continued to mess with her and I was worried for a while she was going to take him out for good but the coach finally put a stop to it. They learned a few techniques at the beginning of the class and then divided into teams for a little action. Lauren was on the red team and she told me later they called themselves the "Bully team". She said it was their job to take the ball away from the nice kids. I heard her tell one of her teammates, "That blue team sure is fast!"The kids kept taking water breaks and during one break she told me she was upset because she hadn't gotten a goal. Only one little boy from the blue team had managed a goal during the whole practice period. I told her she was doing great and to keep up the good work and she would get there. Finally in the last few seconds of her lesson, she got the ball and was making a good run of it. I thought she was going to get it in but the coach blew the whistle to end practice. She had a lot of fun and I can't wait to see her play some more!!

Trust in the Lord and Do Good

You all know that Lauren started preschool this month. You may or may not know that it is a Christian preschool which means that in addition to the regular curriculum, there are also bible studies and chapel. Lauren's been coming home singing bible verses and handing out "church" stickers. She gave us all some to wear this past Sunday that said things like, "Sing His Praise", and "God Rocks!". We were having breakfast the other morning and Lauren said, "Do you know what my teacher keeps saying?" I told her I didn't. In a high pitched voice, Lauren said, "Trust in the Lord and Do Good!". "Oh really," I said. "That's a nice thing to say." Lauren shook her head "no" and said, "Well, I'm not going to do that." Obviously, she needs more time in chapel.

She did get in trouble for the first time last week. Her teacher mentioned that Lauren had shoved a little girl and had to go to time out. When I asked Lauren about it, she told me, "She wouldn't get out of my way even though I asked her nicely. I told my teacher I was sorry but she told me I STILL had to go to W-time out." Apparently the class has an alphabet carpet and the "W" is the time-out spot. I am very proud of Lauren though. She seems to be doing really well overall. She loves class and her teacher. I think being in class is building her self-esteem and I'm impressed with how much she's already learning. So far, so good!

Milestones

I can't believe all the milestones we've reached in the past few days...Lauren with no training wheels, Anna with a loose tooth, and now this...Jacob is pulling himself up to a standing position!! You can see how pleased he is with himself. It's the cutest thing ever! Enjoy a little baby standing action!

What's your house?

Do you ever feel like the Wicked Witch of the East? I wake up every day with great intentions but I normally have someone unhappy with me sometimes before I even get out of bed. I also have a tendency to get crushed daily....granted it isn't by a falling house. In my case, it tends to be laundry but I'm pretty sure it hurts just as much as the house did. I can't seem to get out from under it. All of this springs from the fact that I just finished reading "Wicked". It's really a fun book. We read "The Wizard of Oz" to Anna and Lauren this summer and all enjoyed it immensely. I picked up "Wicked" thinking we would read the Witch's side of the story but by the second page I quickly realized that this was NOT a kid-friendly novel. I continued to read it though and now have a totally different impression of the Witch of the West. I would love to go see the musical. It's playing in San Francisco currently. I just can't figure out how to get away with only my hubby, and without the peanut gallery and my loads of laundry to see it. Have you guys read "Wicked"? What did you think? What's your house?

Happy Labber Day! (belated)

On Monday I found a note Anna had written that said, "Happy Labber Day!!" I thought I would share the sentiment with all of you (although belated). For our mini-holiday, we headed out to Bridgeport with friends to enjoy the afternoon. Doug and Ruth stayed behind at the house as Doug was under the weather and we had painters over working on the interior.

I had planned to take pictures of the kids and packed a suburban load of props. It didn't quite work out that way, however. I just took a handful of shots. This one in particular cracked me up. Ryan is showing the girls his "6-pack". :) We had a little picnic and the kids played around in the water. We explored a bit and panned for gold. We also checked out the beautiful covered bridge where Lauren managed to lose one of her flip-flops. It slipped in between the slats and floated away. I have to hand it to her. It's really rocky out there but she hobbled around the rest of the afternoon on only one shoe and didn't complain a bit. It was a nice, relaxing day. What did you guys do??

Conversations with the Peanut Gallery

The latest and greatest from our little crew...

At the grocery store, I told the girls they could pick out a treat. They thought about it for a few minutes and then each grabbed a mini-container of whoppers. They came running up to me saying, "Mommy, we want whOOpers. We want whOOpers!"

On the way home from church a few Sundays ago, we ran into an apparent motorcycle convention. The motorcycles were heading in the opposite direction and just kept coming. After several minutes, I started counting. At 630 bikes, I finally called it quits. There must have been at least 2,000 of them...no exaggeration. The girls got a huge kick out of it and kept wondering where they were going. Doug said they were probably on their way to a dog party. :) A few days after, Lauren mentioned that she thought she knew what was happening. According to her, one of the motorcycle guys called and said he knew where they could get their bikes washed. Apparently they were all on their way to get cleaned up.

Anna has been having issues trying to decide when it is or is not appropriate to mess with her nose. I've tried to give her guidance...repeatedly. After a day full of reminders to not pick her nose, she finally told me that it was just too much "responsibility" but she was trying hard to do the right thing.

The girls were having a snack and I heard Anna reading the ingredients to Lauren. When I walked back into the room, Lauren said, "Mommy, somebody made it taste real but it's pretend!!" Anna said, "Yea, it's artificially flavored."

I received a phone call from my neighbor at 0645 the other morning. "Sandy," she said, "Lauren is ding dong ditching us (ringing the doorbell and running away)." I nearly had a cow. I ran outside and saw Lauren slipping back through the gate, in her underwear mind you! I asked her what she was doing and she said she was just looking around. I reprimanded her for being outside in the front yard alone, for lying, for bothering our neighbors, and for not having clothes on while doing all of those things. Later in the day, I apologized profusely to my neighbor only to find out that this hadn't been the first time. It had happened 3 times the day before and numerous times prior to that. To top it all off, I learned that she had been doing it to 3 of our neighbors off and on for almost 2 weeks!!!!!! We have a latch on our front door so she can't get out without us knowing but what we didn't realize was the latch on the gate to the back yard was broken. She, however, knew it and would just slip out whenever she felt like it. Well, Doug fixed the latch and put a lock on it. Next she'll probably climb the fence. She scaled a 6-foot fence at our last house to "pet" the neighbor's dog so I'm not discounting it. Anyway, she got into a lot of trouble over this particular incident. I called all the neighbors to apologize and spent a lot of time telling Lauren again and again why it was so dangerous for her to have done what she was doing. After many explanations, I asked her to tell me why what she did was wrong. She responded, "Cause some bad guys might get me and take me to their secret code and turn me into a robot." Apparently, more explaining is required.

Lauren's Big Week

It's been a big week for our little Lauren. On Tuesday, we got to visit her new school for an open house. We met her teacher and some of her classmates. We also completed a little scavenger hunt to find different parts of the classroom.
Her class raises money each month to buy food, clothing, and medical treatment for a child the class adopts from Africa through the Rescue African Children Ministry. Here she is painting her "piggy" bank so she can bring it home and save a little money.


On Wednesday, she rode her bike with NO training wheels for the first time ever!


On Thursday, she started preschool. I had been feeling a bit bad that she was only headed into preschool while her friends on either side of us were headed to kindergarten. Since her birthday is in January, she missed the age cutoff. Doug made me feel better though when he commented, "This will be good for her. She needs to work on her social skills. At least this way if she's pounding people everyday and gets expelled, it won't be as bad as if she were expelled from kindergarten." I love that about Doug....he's always finding the silver lining!
Here she is signing herself into class.

She also adds her own "animal" card to the cubbies to show she's in class for the day.

Congratulations to our baby!