Turning 8

This is it.

My last one to turn eight.

My baby girl is growing fast.

Look out, world.  Here she comes!

Moving without moving

The weather this year has been abnormal at best.  

A warm winter.

A dry, sunny spring.

And now a hot, cloudless summer.

I feel like I've moved to a new state.  

But I haven't moved.

I'm not complaining.

Just wondering when the weather will return to regularly scheduled programming.

Racin'

Let the competition begin!  

Wait, there's always a competition in our house.

So, duke it out on the race track!

Can you see the twinkle in Kyle's eyes?  Yeah, he's excited to whoop up on his siblings.

Dallin took the corner too hard and spun out.

Karina's putt-putt car 

Grant's face is priceless here!  

He knows Kyle's right behind him and Grant's giddy with excitement to stay in front.  

Mariah and Karina carpooling

The kids really enjoyed their time on the track and I loved watching them!  They're personalities shine through, even when they race and it's really fun to see.  

Lil' aviators

In June, the boys got to go flying through the Young Eagles program.  It's a great program where local pilots take the boys up in their airplane for about a 20 minute flight to show them a bit about aviation and possibly get them interested in flying.

Grant, Kyle, and Dallin all got to go this year and they loved it.  They even got to fly the plane themselves when they were in the air!

Cavin'

We took an extra day to travel home from California so we could take the scenic route.  We headed over Mt. Lassen (which is a beautiful drive) and stopped in Burney to eat hamburgers and milkshakes at the local Alpine restaurant.  Yum!  Then we stopped to see Burney Falls.

After that we headed to the Lava Beds National Monument at the northernmost part of California just south of Tule Lake.  This park is AMAZING!  It has over 700 caves in the park and they've mapped over 20 for the general public to explore.  They are awesome!  If there is anything my kids like, it's rocks to climb and a good cave to explore, and they certainly got their fill here.  

Each cave has it's own features that make it unique.  It was fascinating to climb into each one to discover what might be different and new from the last cave.  We learned that no two caves are alike.  We bought a book at the visitor's center that told the history and features of each cave, so we could educate ourselves about where we were headed.  It was really fun.

Some caves started out as holes in the ground.  

Others had larger, more traditional openings.  This opening to Skull Cave was enormous!  For scale, look at Grant and Kyle standing toward the center and right of this photo.  

Same cave opening--opposite view, from the inside out.

Skull Cave goes deep into the ground and then doubles back onto itself to a large room with an ice floor.  There is still ice on the floor, although at a much lower level than in years past.  

Two caves we visited had cave drawings, or pictographs.  REAL pictographs!  I have no idea what they meant, but they were cool!

 This was Valentine Cave and had lots of different chutes and rooms to explore.  

Grant, Kyle and Karina were our cave scouts.  When the ceiling started to drop down too low for Jason and I to continue, our little scouts would move ahead and tell us what was further down the cave.  They loved crawling around in the earth and even found a few different routes to take out of the cave.

This is the terrain through which we trekked to many of the caves.  

This is the terrain where rattlesnakes live.  

This is where I heard my first rattlesnake in the wild.  

And this is where we stepped and stomped and hollered to make sure the rattlesnake 

stayed far away from our feet.

Along with the caves, the park also includes a historical area where the Modoc Indians fought the US Army for their land.  Capt Jack's Stronghold is where the Modoc War between 60 Modocs and over 600 US Army men took place.  The Modocs held off the soldiers for over 6 months and were only defeated when their water supply was cut off.  Much of their success was due to their knowledge of the geography of the land and their position on a small but strategic hill with natural fortress-like characteristics.

We took a walking tour of the stronghold and it was truly amazing to learn of what took place there and to be able to walk in the same places the Modocs walked and fought.  It's a sad history of this people, but I was grateful to learn of it.

4th of July

It was HOT in California this year.  But, then, it was HOT in Oregon too, so there was no escaping it.  That's why we love swimming in Grandma and Grandpa Richards' pool to keep us cool.

We took a detour on our way to California and headed to central Oregon to pick up Dallin from scout camp.  We stayed in a beautiful cabin in Sisters and enjoyed some relaxing time there before we were on our way.

Uncle Brandon joined us for our trip.  He always keeps things fun with his crazy jokes, silly antics, and back-seat dance parties.

We enjoyed our family time and we especially enjoyed connecting with family from afar who came to join us for a day.  It was lovely to form new relationships and spend time together.

Awakening

My blogging brain is starting to awaken from its slumber.  

It's time to begin chronicling our lives again.

A huge gap will exist where I left off, but I must pick up and start again.

Life was too busy for a long while.  So busy I could hardly think straight.  

Blogging, amongst other things, took the back burner.

But recently I've felt the urge to document and write again.

It must mean that life is normalizing and my space 

for creativity and personal reflection is beginning to flow.

I'm glad for that.