Calvin and Hobbs Photo Op

I think the pics say it all. Isn't this what every parent thinks of when someone says, "Oh, your child is so cute/good!" ????

Wendover

Large cargo plane

We went to Wendover, camped, went to the BBQ contest, and toured the WW2 era air force base!

Imagine being 20,000 feet in the sky and depending on these controls

This is how excited Wayne and Pippy get about airplanes and helicopters. Penelope couldn't get enough.

Camping - somehow these pics got out of order and I am too lazy to deal with them.

World's most exciting campsite, courtesy of Wendover, NV

Sitting in the cockpit

At the top of the control tower! About 8 floors of steel stairs!

Wires in a plane. Imagine if it were your job to rewire something over the Atlantic Ocean!!

Wendo BBQ

We met our friends Brian, Tara, Ian, and Tana at Wendover for a BBQ contest. Brian and Tara have been doing this for 7 years! We came to watch help sample the BBQ!

Tana holding down the fort.

Ribs are done!

Once the meat is cut and strategically placed on a pretty bed of parsley, Brian carefully makes the walk to the judges. (Don't trip!!)

Contemplating love, life, and the pursuit of BBQ.

Here are some more BBQ teams. Everyone has their own unique and sometimes top secret way of doing things.

There were four different kinds of meat in the contest: Brisket, Ribs, Pulled Pork and Chicken. This was our favorite!!

Some cuddle time with Tara!

Flying Mice and Other Subjects Of Note

Why are children magnetically drawn to a pile of freshly swept dirt?

Is it a requirement for public swimming pools to have used band-aids everywhere? Penelope and I are taking parent-tot swimming lessons. Imagine 6 two year old's screaming while 8 parents try to imitate fish and use silly words to try to make their child blow bubbles. The other two children in the class are found at the bottom of the pool. You get the picture.

We had our friends Brad and Cori and Penelope's little pal, Leah, over for lunch. It is great to have friends that are in same misery boat as you. No one freaked out when on Penelope walked into the room with a dirty diaper around her ankles. And no one blinked when, at the table, I looked down to see I still had some of the diaper contents smeared on my forearm. Nice.

Wayne has turned into Mr. Fix It! You know those fancy refrigerators that actually make your ice for you and fill your cup with ice and water? Well, ours has that, it just isn't hooked up. After three years of Wayne complaining that there are never any ice cubes... After three years of telling Wayne that all he needs to do is to attach the ice cube maker hose to the wall... After three years, Wayne says to me, "You never told me I could just hook up the ice cube maker and it works?!" We are high-rollers now. We get ice water from our fridge any time we want.

One morning Wayne non-chalantly said to me, "So, there was a bird in our room last night." I looked at him for a minute, and then said, "NO, there was NOT a bird in our room."

"Oh yes," Wayne said, "There definitely was. I'm not sure what kind, small like a hummingbird but it didn't sound quite like one."

One of us is insane. Either it is Wayne because he is hallucinating, or me because if there really is a steathly bird somewhere in our house I will go insane. Because that means there is a bat in our house and bats are like flying mice, and we all know how I feel about mice.

RMR 2013

Helping dad get ready.

 Wayne ran with a team of 12 in the Ruby Mountian Relay.  The race is 184 miles in about 29 hours (they run through the night). Wayne did a 4.4 mile leg, a 7.1 mile leg, and one 1 mile leg. He had fun and Penelope and I went to cheer for him along the road.

Waiting to cheer - near a ranch in Lamoille

Waving

Wayne's teammates getting him water

Wayne is the one runner down the road. The 6 in foreground are a team from one of the local high schools. When their runner got to the bottom of this (rather steep!) hill, the team's van drove up and all of his teammates jumped out to encourage and run up the hill with him!

Finished with a 4 mile leg

The team van

Some Summer Pictures

Diva

Look! It's something green! The Nevada garden

Penelope the swinging maniac

Techy Kids

Penelope is in love with our neighbor's trampoline

Penelope tries to spray water like mom & dad by putting her entire hand over the spout - thus spraying herself completely

Love these buddies!

Penelope with Cheri F and Alissa H!

DINK's, OINK's and BPWK's

Today is the first day of my first attempt at potty training little P. After three hours I have used the restroom twice and Penelope is still holding it all in. Stop laughing.

In other news, it is official that Wayne and I have become Boring People With Kids. BPWK's are much different than the DINK's we once were (Dual Income No Kids), and some times OINK's (One Income No Kids.)

There is nothing wrong with being BPWK's, just that they can be, well, boring.

As DINK's, we were fun. We were rarely home and when we were we schemed exotic places we would go or who we could convince to go cliff diving with. With fewer possessions, we could pack and leave at a moments notice, or just go and wear the same clothes for a few days, buy new clothes, or go nude. KIDDING.

We would socialize with Wayne's overly intellectual friends. One such acquaintance's hobbies were clarinet and ballroom dancing. He got excited every year when he would go to adult ballroom dancing camp. This I am not kidding about. Typically when the engineering and academic sector of friends got into a hobby, it was actually more of an obsession. After getting into bicycling, one student put his life and schooling on hold while he headed to Northern Alaska to ride his bike to Cape Horn. Though conversation sometimes did hover around stale Ancient Chinese literature or the biquadratic equation, at least we never compared sizes and brands of diapers, or worse yet, what was found inside of those diapers.

As BPWK's, it's a good thing kids keep you busy and entertained. Weekends become long and babysitters few. We get excited about having coffee on the porch, instead of the kitchen. (Coffee? Seriously? We are getting old.)

On the Fourth of July, we had an exciting outing planned as we loaded up lawn chairs and three suitcases into the car and drove across town to meet another couple with a young child. We got out toys and drinks and waited for the parade! After an hour, we realized that we were in the wrong place and the parade was never coming. No big deal. "This was fun," we said to each other, "let's get together again!"

Today I find my self saying 'pee-pee' and  'baby, make pppppsssss sound on the potty!' and 'get candy for wee-wee!' Speaking of which, it looks like I have a mess to clean up. There is likely an inspirational anecdote I am supposed to insert here, like 'Enjoy the ride!' or 'It goes by so fast!' I'm going to skip that today and just remember there was a time when we were fun DINK's.

Ruby Crest Trail 2012

Here are pictures from the hike last year:

Ruby Crest Trail

Overland Lake

 Wayne did the Ruby Crest Trail again this year. It's a 38+ mile hike over the Ruby Mountains. Here are some awesome pics from the hike.