Music Camp / Father's Day / Covenant Men

I'm catching up for the week, so here it goes.

Em had music camp for three days last week. It was themed and she had so much fun.

First was 50's day. This ended up being Emily's favorite era. While I was fixing her hair and tying the scarf, she said, "Did you wear this in the 50's?". Um, sweet child, I was born in 1973!


One of our neighbors has an old car, so he brought it over for pictures at the end of the day. Super fun!




Then, it was 70's day. This was either hippie or disco. We went hippie since we don't have any gogo boots around. Who am I kidding, I have gogo boots, but they aren't Em's size! But, look at my girl. She is stunning. She was made for headbands and crimped hair. Gorgeous.



Then, it was off to the 80's. Now, this decade, I was alive for. So, I was trying to get her to do huge hair and lots of bracelets and color in her hair. But, Em is modest and just wanted minimal 80's. There was nothing minimal about the 80's, but that's my girl, and that's okay.


Today was Father's Day. I walked out of the bedroom, grabbed David's gift bag and my camera and was ready to celebrate. Um, my camera doesn't work. What???? It would turn on, but I was getting an error and the flash wouldn't come up. It wouldn't even snap a photo! No!!!!!!!!!! We went ahead with gifts and cards with my little point and shoot.

I always struggle since David's birthday is a week before. I never have enough gift ideas. But, we went minimal and David's fine with that. The kids filled in some funny Q and A's about Dad.






Then, we headed to church for David's Covenant Men ceremony. Basically, he's been in a men's group at church for a year. Each month, he had to read a book and fill out a workbook and do lots of soul searching. It's about being a better husband, father, and man in general. He spent so much time on this, and I'm so proud of him.

Each man is given a sword and plaque. Here are the swords. This would be the only decent photo I take with this camera.

=

Oh, here's David walking through the swords on his way to the stage. Ugh, dang you point and shoot. His picture was on the screens too, which I missed when we were there, but I can kind of make it out now.


Ugh, I miss my expensive camera.


Ugh, lighting, you always mess with me.



We got home and I was able to get the camera to work, but the flash doesn't work. I know any good photographer doesn't even use the flash on the camera. But, I'm not a good photographer. So, I am going to buy an external flash and pray that fixes the problem.

But, I did get these nice photos of David.




And Ben liked the sword. It's a real sword, so it is getting mounted on the wall or something since the kids would play samarai and kill each other with it.


Then, I made David chocolate cake and lasagna. I hope he had a good day. He truly is such a wonderful father. I know everyone says that, but seriously, I had the best Dad growing up (still do! Love you Daddy) and it's no wonder that I married an amazing man who became an unbelievable Dad.

We are so lucky.

Speaking of lucky, the kids are going to camp at church this week. Monday through Thursday 9-3. Lucky me! :)

David's Birthday and A Weekend With Friends

We started the weekend celebrating David's birthday. Just a few cards and gifts. You know, nothing says happy birthday like some new work shirts and Dockers.



Then, we headed to Payson for a camping trip with our friends. I say camping, but we have a cabin. It's kind of bare bones in that you have to bring your own bedding and towels and the stove doesn't work. But, hey, it has electricity and air conditioning. For us, it felt like a resort.

David was doing some trick where he puts a lit match in his mouth and then it goes out and he blows out the smoke. The kids thought it was pretty cool. This is as close as my husband gets to smoking. Well, other than him being smokin' hot. ;)



We basically all stay in different cabins. Several families join together and get the bigger cabins. So, we do all the cooking and everything in those. The boys got busy getting in trouble. I was just waiting for Ben to fall or Noah to go in that nasty water. But, they didn't.



It was funny though...Noah was climbing that white rail. Well, he was going around the outside. He came to the tree that Ben was on and decided to swing on the branch. Then, he realized he couldn't get back to the rail. We were chatting with our friends and I hear this little "help me". I ran to the rail and held him up. David ran around and got him. It was like a two foot drop, but Noah didn't know that. It was hysterical. We were in action in seconds.

Just a few friends were there, so we headed to the creek.







Then, all the kids kept going up the creek and we couldn't see them, so we sent Aunt Pam after them since she was the only adult with water shoes. Thanks, Aunt Pam!

The boys made a surf board.


Me and Pam.


Everyone brings food. We have themed meals, like Mexican and people sign up for main dish, side, etc. It was David's birthday and one of the girls brought key lime pie. It was soooo good. We sang to David.


Ben was telling David some story that had like 27 chapters.


And the kids were obsessed with the crawdads again.


The next day, we headed to the deeper part of the creek.




There was a lot more water this year, than last. This is how it works all weekend. You just kind of all help each other with kids. The Dads had an assembly line going passing kids down this steep part. It's so fun.

So, all the kids get passed down and I look down and Noah is half way up the hill. David had to go get him.

Here are all the kids swimming.


The water wasn't too cold, but it did have teeny tiny leeches in it. They were about 1/2 inch long. And after a swim, you'd have a couple on you. My kids thought it was a little gross, but it didn't stop them from swimming. I'm going to show them Stand By Me sometime and they will really get grossed out.

Ben used the waterfall as a slide, about 100 times.


If Ben could make money jumping rocks, he would. He loves it.


So, Noah had to follow Ben and was proud he made it over there by himself.


It was so different this year. Maybe my kids are just growing up or they are just getting more outdoorsy or both. But, they were awesome and needed little to no help doing anything.

They have a ropes obstacle course at the camp too, which was super fun.


Even Noah made it across without any help.

And you know David had to try it. He's a 44 year old kid.




And then it rained for a few hours. No surprise there. If you want it to rain in Arizona, just invite us camping. Luckily, we just went back to our cabin and rested. It was nice.


We were resting and Aunt Pam was doing another sangria.


The sun came out and there was more playing.


And drinking for Pam.... :)


We made another trip down to the watering hole that afternoon. The next morning, we did some ziplining.


It was time to go. We have a group photo, but we only used one persons camera, so I'll have to put that up here when we get it. On the way home, we decided to head to this place called Water Wheel Falls in Payson. Why not try a different swimming place on the way home. So, I read about it and it said it was 1/4 mile to the falls. Um, I don't think that person knows how to measure. It was closer to a mile and completely like rock climbing the whole way. That wasn't the problem. We were cool with the hike. We weren't okay with the fact that I just grabbed one bottle of water for all of us and no hats.

It looks nice, right?




What you can't tell from the photos is that it was so hot outside. I'm talking 90's and humid and the sun was beating down. Well, we can just get in the water, right? Wrong. The water was like Titanic cold. We were either going to suffer from heat stroke or hypothermia. Either way, it was nuts. We had to use the water to splash on our heads and neck, but there was no way we could get in it. We aren't wimps either. We ocean swim when the water is in the high 50's. This water felt like an ice bath. The only reason it wasn't frozen is because it was moving and close to 100 outside.

We made it back to the car alive and downed water and lemonade. Then, this happened, shocker, right? Ben was on his DS.



It was another great weekend. But, I'm glad we aren't going anywhere for almost 3 weeks.