I am sorry I didn’t post for such a long time and thank you to everyone who checked in on me! I am fine, but busy and hoping to get back into a settled routine soon.
Since I last posted, we got two new pairs of glasses . . . one for Sweet Pea and one for Handsome Dude. Both of which are still accounted for.
Look at me and my bad self!
I took all the kids to a nearby amusement park without my husband.
*I’ll pause while you recover from the shock of my pure awesomeness*
I’ve had two delicious waffle cones filled with Moose Tracks ice cream, joined the family on one last, long camping trip for the year, finished all 1, 037 pages of Gone with the Wind, and have gotten two days of homeschool under my belt.
The thought of doing a complete 4-day camping recap has overwhelmed me, so I will instead just recap one part of the trip where we took a hike into a mountain lake.
The hike was pretty easy-just two miles.
Um . . . gross.
Notice anything different about my Handsome Dude?
Yes. He is now sporting a lovely blue cord around his pricey glasses.
Take that, Handsome Dude! No longer will I stand aside and watch you break/bend/lose/peanut-butter-i-fy your glasses.
Plan thwarted, Handsome Dude.
Plan thwarted.
The girls . . . getting ready for some fishing fun.
Also known as “Let’s fight and smack each other with fishing poles and tangle our lines so much that we make Dad sigh with defeat as he has to untangle our lines for us so we can fish and enjoy our fun-family-togetherness.”
Look! That’s Amy!
Amy and Jason made it all the way from wherever-it-is-they-dwell to wherever-it-is-we-dwell for this happening hike.
Amy is Jason’s girlfriend.
Jason is The Lumberjack’s youngest younger brother.
Remember Jason?
Keep up, people!
They are cute, are they not?
This is a lake that you have to hike up into the mountains to see.
It is quite lovely.
Quite.
And it would be the perfect beach for fellow readers who fear The Swimsuit, seeing as how there is no one else there.
Except maybe bears.
So, we are at this lake. And the menfolk decide to start fishing.
But the fish are small and this displeases them.
But they swallowed their pride and willingly posed for pictures.
Hark! Is that my husband?! Smiling?!
I guess pigs can now fly.
That’s Jack.
Jack is The Lumberjack’s brother-in-law.
Since The Lumberjack has boasted that his fish was at least 6 inches long, the other menfolk must work hard to ensure that they capture fish that are at least 7 inches long.
Look!
There’s Alex! Alex is The Lumberjack’s older younger brother.
Remember Alex?
I thought you might.
Poor Jack was trying to best The Lumberjack and mind his own business, when my daughter went over and convinced him to help her fish.
Here she is showing off her catch!
Can you see it? Can you see it?
Neither can I.
My photography skills amaze even myself.
Jack may have gotten the biggest catch of the day, however.
He got his lure on the line and right away an unwelcome guest jumped up and caught himself on the lure.
Look at me! I know what a lure is!
A lure is a fake, beady-eyed, nasty toy fish that fisherpeoples use to lure real fish to the hook of death!
Sadly, Jack captured a frog instead of a trophy fish.
Lest any of you are concerned, Jack removed the hook from the frog’s mouth and the frog happily hopped away.
Handsome Dude got really into fishing this time around.
Look at his face! I dare you, nay, I double-dog dare you to show me a boy more excited to be fishing.
Precious.
Simply precious.
So, we had our fishing fun and headed back to our rigs.
Yes. That’s right. I said rigs.
My poor boys got pooped on the way back.
So, my husband, in all his handsomeness, soldiered on with both of them on his back.
Oh, the muscles!
Please excuse me while I swoon.
***
Random Points of Interest I Think You Should Be Informed Of:
1) I do not fish.
2) Fish are nasty-wrong.
3) There were no suitable bathrooms on this hike.
4) Fact: Lumberjill does not and can not squat.
5) What is with fish eyes?
6) Frogs are also nasty-wrong.
7) As are snakes.
8) The only reason why I went on this hike was because everyone else was.
9) I am such a follower.
10) And I was promised an ice cream cone.
11) It was delicious.
Happy Wednesday!
So glad that you are back! I have missed you out here in the blogosphere!
Missed ya!
What flavor ice cream didst cause you to endure the aforementioned hike?
Moose Tracks, of course!!
I have been in Lumberjill withdrawal! Thanks for the post!
Oh, how I have missed thee!! Let me count thy ways…
Or not. That would take too much time and brain power; however, it does not lessen the fact that I missed you like crazy and checked every single day, sometimes twice, to see if you had posted yet.
It’s good to have you back, friend! Love the post, and really love that you integrated all those great classic photos into it. You are a blog Master.
So glad you’re back.
So sorry you had to go camping.
So impressed with your manly Lumberjack carrying two kids at once.
So glad I did not have to fish.
Yay, you’re back!
I think Handsome Dude is so happy about fishing is because he has his uber cool glasses on.
You’re the coolest. I hope the lumberjack appreciates you for being such a good sport.
I hate fishing. I hate fish.
I hate hate hate hate fish.
HATE
THE
FISH
And, I love moose tracks.
So glad you enjoyed your last camping trip of the year – and huge kudo’s to two days of home school!! I am so looking forward to the posts to come about that! I am sure you will include Huckleberries, Lumberjacks, and Naughty Pants on their first spelling test. Hey, maybe you could print out that picture of Jason and make a puzzle out of it!! Oh what fun to come!! Holla!!!!! (not the Dora kind of Holla-)
Ewwwww at that snake curled up there by the rock! I would have had to run and scream and then pass out! And oh my goodness that lake is beautiful! I would love to go there, especially since there would be no other people there to see me in the bathing suit! But seriously…it is gorgeous!
That spot by the lake looked beautiful! I miss living in that general area of these United States.
Was that vague enough? 😉
Also, does HD’s strap hold the glasses onto his face or just keep him from losing them? I would like for Derek to wear his sunglasses, yet he has no nose with which to hold them up.
For realz, you should should check out his flat little profile.
So that made me think that maybe if I cinched a strap tightly they might stay on his face…
Deep thoughts.
You can tighten the strap to hold snug around the head or use as a “necklace.”
But a super, manly, Handsome-Dude type of necklace, of course.
Glad you’re back, I checked in everyday! 🙂
I hate fish in any form.
I hate camping.
I love ice cream. 😉
Good job with the glasses strap! Looks like the camping and hiking were fun, except for the no bathroom part. That is why you swim….. :O Just kidding. or not! You haven’t lived till you have tried to go to the bathroom outside. In a dusty Field. And the wind is blowing vigorously. I’ll let you imagine the mud streaks that happen.
TA DA! She’s BAAAAAAAck!
Hope your break was restful and filled your mind with peace and joy…now back to the grindstone with you woman. However am I going to get my dose of “someone out there has days as nuts as mine, and I am not alone” if you don’t tell your marvelously woven tales of daily-ness to me? Really!?
Hooray!
I so missed you! I’m glad you’re back. I do not fish either. When we go out on the boat, they take me out for a pleasant little boat ride, and then politely suggest that I probably had better things that I wanted to do. Then they drop me off at the dock and disappear to go fishing for hours. I hate fishing. I hate snakes. I don’t get along well with most of nature. But I digress. I’m glad you’re back!!
Now, YOU deserve the title of wife of the year!
Fishermen and those of us who aren’t but love them anyway.
We must UNITE!
Welcome back… Fish are nasty, but I’d go for ice cream too!
omg how did Lumberjack carry both of those boys at the same time?!??!
Hi, Taylor… so glad you’re back.
I think you should know that I have to squat almost every time I spend a day working at the farm… with my inlaws right there. Its hard.
Marla @ http://www.asthefarmturns.wordpress.com
Glad you’re back!
You really must work on the fish/frog/snake attitude. Your boys may be too young right now, but believe you me, there will come a day when said fish/frog/snake creatures will be brought home with much joy and delight. And because you love your little dudes in all their boyishness, you will want to say yes. Even if it means finding a snake (a) missing from its designated home and (b) curled up around your nice, warm laptop power supply two stories down from where it started.
I’m just sayin’…
I could squat, but the fish thing? That I cannot do. When I was nine I dissected (or watched? Can’t remember too clearly.) a fish. Never again did I eat them. Well, not entirely true. When I met my husband’s parents, we were already engaged, and we had dinner at their house (where we were staying, I lived in VA, he lived in FL and I had never met his family, went to stay for a week or something). His dad is a deep-sea fisherman for fun, and they served fish he had caught…of course, I had to eat it. I think I ate a little. Then, there was a special dinner at the seminary where Mike went and we attended the dinner in honor of someone, and they served salmon! Mike leaned over and said,”I think that’s salmon.” I said,”I know!” I ate little bites along with the rice and veggies on my plate. It was a labor of love.
Father Knows (Travis) Best thinks the new photo header on this blog is mad cool.
Welcome back!!! Looks like a great time was had by all! 🙂 even you. 🙂 Moose tracks is good, but I am quite partial myself to tillamook mudslide icecream. Oh. Baybee. That is the ice cream I do unlikeable stuff for. 🙂 yuck yuck yuck to snakes and frogs. Fish, however, I find to be delish, however, those ones did not look to be worth the effort.
So glad you are back!!! I thought that maybe you were changing your blog again or that I lost the right link. I kept checking and I was starting to worry because it is so not like you to be quiet. Whew, now I can sigh in relief all is well with the world and your back!
By the way, the lake is stunning.
So happy that you’re back…I missed your wonderful sense of humor and the pictures of your adorable kids. Also, I think Ruralville must agree with LJ, I’ve never seen him “smile” so much!
So glad you’re back and bravo on the Amusement Park solo trip!
Have you seen any bears on your recent camping trips? Hubs and I would like to go this fall but there have been an awful lot of bear stories/sightings/’incidents’ recently, not to mention, coyotes. Makes me a teensy bit nervous. And my hubs does not have a small artillery stash like yours.
And that is why I missed you so.
You make me giggle and I love myself a good giggle.
I love the photos…
I love that you got ice cream…
I don’t love the snake…
Gross.
But most of all I love that you are back.
Don’t you just love a husband who’s willing to cart the kids on his back? Mine’s done that many a time and I’m imagining on our upcoming Disneyland trip it will be happening yet again. I have to leave both my hands free for funnel cake. He understands.
p.s. missed you during your hiatus.
🙂
Mindy
http://www.thesuburbanlife.com
Welcome back! Your blog is my happy spot in between reading for school.
I am very glad to see LJ smiling and your new banner is great!
I am totally with you on snakes. Nasty creatures…
Thanks for the photo of Jason (and Alex), I needed a smile today, and yes, Jason and Amy are lovely!
Hope your homeschooling is going well.
I’m a fan of Gone With the Wind, too! Also a fan of hikes. Not a fan of no decent bathrooms on hiking trails, though. I am also not a squatter. My goodness, we have a lot in common! 🙂
Hooray for the new blog header photo. Love all the photos. Looks like a beautiful lake, sorta like “ours”. So glad HD got a strap. He looks uber cool with it. Gee, glad you’re back, I needed my ‘fix’. Did you ever realize that the photo of Jason you always use looks like it has a shark in the background?
Lumberjill! My last two posts were on fishing…And the fact that I don’t do it! But I DO squat…I think it’s a prerequisite for living 26 miles from the nearest town, and your dad drops your 12 year old self off at the tractor in the morning and comes back to get you for lunch, and repeats the drill for afternoon…Yep. squatting and farming go hand in hand.