Air Museum

The boys and I were reminiscing about the warm days of summer today and Caleb brought up our trip to the beach. It was his favorite part of the summer and when I asked him what things he liked best about the beach, one thing he mentioned was the "place with all the planes" - the Air Museum.

I had never been to the museum myself and I honestly didn't think I would enjoy it that much. I figured I would sacrifice some of my time to do boy stuff and that way, my boys couldn't complain too much when we went and did some girl stuff - shopping. Little did I know just how cool the Air Museum was.

First of all, it's huge. Even from a distance.

Secondly, there are real airplanes everywhere - even on the entrance sign. The boys took one look at this and started whooping in the back seat. They also threw in a few machine gun sounds.

I walked into the gift shop and fell in love with all the hanging airplanes. They were just ... cool.

Can't you just picture a little boy's room with all these airplanes hanging from the ceiling?

Couldn't you just picture my bedroom with all these airplanes hanging from the celing?

No? Mark couldn't either when I suggested the idea.

Once you pay to actually go into the museum there are a ton of airplanes to look at but there are a lot of other things as well. Several artifacts from the first planes flown, as well as a written description so that people like me would understand exactly what I was looking at.

                                       

                 

The boys couldn't get enough of the planes and they wanted to look (and touch) every single one of them.



Then of course, they pretended to be flying every single one of them.

I kept staring up at the ceiling. The rafters are wood and they are amazingingly beautiful. I took picture after picture and still couldn't capture the sheer awesomeness of them. First of all, they are vast - you look up (and up and up) and all you can see is the same repeating pattern over and over. In some places you can see where birds nest and the sheer size of the place dwarfs everything in it. You just have to check it out for yourself sometime to see what I'm talking about. 

There is a special little room that contains hundreds of photographs. They show the structures being built step by step. It was truly amazing how that was accomplished. There were two structures originally and they have pictures that show the fire that destoyed the other bunker.

There are pictures of all different people - pilots, nurses, generals, engineers and even dogs. Under each picture there are words that help tell the story of what exactly was going on at the time.

The whole place is very friendly and happy. Each of the planes has their own personality and spunk.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Boomer

"Pleased to meet yuh ma'm"

Sidney

"Oh! I didn't see you standing there!"

Gumby

"Ya'll have a great day now!"

See what I mean? Very nice and friendly.

Then there were a few that were meant to intimidate the enemy like this one. (Owen's favorite)

This one showed how many combat missions it had been on. Every camel equaled 1 mission. This was Mark's favorite. It was tough, he said.

The Air Museum ended up creating great memories for all of us. Check it out sometime if you haven't already!

A different kind of list

Thanksgiving is always a time to reflect on the things in our life that we are most thankful for. Friends, family, the gift of salvation, jobs, and good health are always at the top of most peoples lists and while people will sometimes throw out more interesting things than others, I couldn't stop my mind from wandering this year while everyone was sharing the things they were thankful for.

I was in interesting and intelligent company but all the answers were the same - friends, family, the gift of salvation, jobs, and good health. After hearing that repeated 13 times in a row I was dying for someone to blurt out Tevo! or Great Sex! just to mix things up a little bit. Don't get me wrong - I am very, very thankful for the friends, family, etc. etc. etc. but I know I thank the Lord for those things every day and I really make an effort to not take them for granted. Therefore, on Thanksgiving, I shared things that I was "un-thankful" for because I told everyone that list was much shorter.

Here is my list of things I am "un-thankful" for:

1. My dog's dry winter skin - I love my dog. I do. But I swear if she wakes me up one more night chewing, licking, or scratching at her skin I will sell her to the naughty kid who lives down the street. I will always be having the most spectacular dreams where Bradley Cooper is giving me a full-body massage when suddenly he has to stop to scratch his skin. Then I will hear him licking it and just when my dream is morphing into a nightmare I wake up and realize it's Kye scratching and licking and chewing her skin. It sounds like this - CHEW,chew, CHEW, chew, CHEW, snarfle, snarfle, CHEW, chew, snarfle, snarfle (the snarfle sounds are because she has a hard time breathing while she chews), Lick, lick, Slurp, Slurp, Slurp, Slurp. It will be quiet for a few minutes and then the process will start all over again. To make matters worse, since it is completely dark I can't see what she is licking and chewing and my mind goes crazy with the thought of her doing that business any near her ... um, business. Call me silly, but I go a tiny-bit insano-in-my-braino when I am woken up to that. Kye is no longer welcome to sleep in the bedroom by me - I have kicked her out into the hallway and even though she sulks and pouts, I have not relented and let her back in.

P.S. Before you think me cruel, know that I (ok, Mark) has purchased all kinds of stuff to treat her skin and no, it is not helping one little bit.

2. My Mexican Middle - Two summers ago, my family and I ventured down to Arizona for a family reunion with all my mom's side of the family - my Mexican half. We drank tequila shots, danced to Mexican music, laughed at the gringos (Mark) and had a great 'ol time. (Just kidding on all of that but the dancing, drinking and having a great time part). During our stay there I noticed a few things about me and my female relatives. We all had the same body. No joke. There are no tall, thin women in my familia. They are all shorter, generous in the bosom, flat in the butt and round in the middle. It was the middle part I focused on. I have always wanted a flat, tiny little tummy but alas I have learned it is not in the cards for me. I guess you can't fight genetics - at least that's what I'm telling myself now that I have gained 3 pounds since Thursday.


Well, that's it. Not too long of a list but I'm not really a complainer. I could say that I am unthankful for the fact that all my college friends now live far away from me when I would rather them live right here in Pendleton (next door in fact!) but I think that they are living the best kind of lives right where they are at. I could be unthankful for the fact that winter is here but I do really enjoy seeing my kids get excited about the snow and there are always those 2-hour late starts that I love. There aren't too many things for me to be unthankful for really because the Lord takes care of me each and every day. I am blessed to have tons of friends, the best family ever, the gift of salvation, a job I love, and good enough health to still be able to do a somersault in the front room. What more could I possibly ask for?

We've got mail!

Last Saturday we had a family dinner here at our house that had several surprise guests. The boys got to play with their cousins Catherine and Elizabeth who they haven't seen in a looooong time and Aunt Andi and Uncle Josh stopped by too (those two even stayed the night with us - it was awesome!). There were grandparents, great grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. We all had a whopping great time eating soup and playing games and just simply visiting.

I love family dinners!

Do you know how many pictures I took of this awesome event?

Not a one.

I'm pathetic I know.

But, I did make sure to take out my camera a few days later when the boys came running to tell me that they had received letters in the mail from their Aunt Andi.

Owen had his out and open before you could say "orange you glad to see me" and he was thrilled. He kept saying "Look mama!" Mark read the letter to him and I snapped a picture of my monkey-bottom boy looking like a monkey. Literally.

Caleb was up next and he wasn't one to miss a beat. He plunked himself down on the couch lickety split and he started reading the letter to us.

Yup, you read that right. He's a reading machine now and loving everything about it.

My heart is happy.

The letters were perfect. Short, funny, and of course, sweet.

Thank you Aunt Andi!

Be looking for you return letters in the mail soon!

Wrestling

   When Mark and I married I knew that he had been a wrestler in his past. I didn't hold it against him or anything. I figured we could move past the fact that he used to wear a tight slicky suit that showed off certain parts of a man's anatomy while he sweated and rolled around on a mat that was infested with disgusting things like ringworm and staff with another guy. We would just never talk about it. Or think about it.

I am a forgiving kind of person after all.

Well, all was going fine and dandy until 2 weeks ago when Caleb brought home a paper from school talking about wrestling. Mark was very excited and practically hopping up and down ready to sign the boys up on the spot. I on the other hand, had a few reservations.

"What if they have to wrestle girls?"

"Caleb is NOT going to like to wrestle. In fact, he will probably cry."

"My babies will have to wear tight slicky suits that show off their privates (they are called privates for a reason -so they can remain that way!) while rolling around on a mat infested with disgusting stuff like ringworm and staff with other boys."

"I have a dislike of anything that begins with "wrest" and ends with "-ling."

Mark listened to all my objections and then said we should just give it a try for 4 practices and then, if they didn't like it, we never had to pursue it again. I agreed to the 4 practices since that sounded fair. (Plus you don't have to pay until practice #5. If it's free - it's me!)

I missed the first practice but I showed up eager and excited to see how things were going at the 2nd one. With my camera in hand I was amazed at how many kids were there. I lost count at 42 (they kept moving around on me) but they all seemed to be enjoying themselves. At first, it was a lot of do this, do that, contort your body like this, twist it like that. It all seemed foreign to me - I mean, I was still wrestling (Ha!) with the fact that people would do this sport on purpose.

Then while I was watching, I observed this:
                 One of my boys rolling around on the disease infested mat.


I blinked and then I saw:
                    Owen wrestling with a girl.

(I am all about girl power. Don't get me wrong. However, girls wrestling? Against boys? It goes against nature in my book.)

The next second I observed Caleb doing this.

All I needed at that moment was a ringworm to jump off the mat at me and a microphone to shout "I told you so!" into it. Then things would have been just as I pictured them.

As I turned to Mark to share my thoughts of how quitting wrestling would make our boys stronger and smarter men, Mark said "Keep looking."

So I did. And this time I saw, Caleb quickly wiping away his tears and giving us a thumbs up to show he was ok, Owen learning a thing or two from a girl (one of my former students as a matter of fact), and best of all,  both of them getting back in there and trying again. Also, I didn't see one single ringworm on any of the heads, arms, legs or other exposed body parts on the kids next to me.
When I looked through my pictures the next day I noticed something I had missed when I was taking the picture - Owen cheering his brother on. I had been so focused on finding the bad things in wrestling that I totally missed the good ones. Mainly, the boys were having fun - together. Learning new things. Working together. Making new friends.

I haven't completely changed my tune yet about wrestling but I am going to go ahead and be a little more open-minded about it. But only a little bit. And if any ringworm thinks to come home with either of them I will NOT be happy.

Nor will I show any mercy!

Ringworms beware!

Halloween 2010

I didn't take very many pictures this year but I think these two will give you a glimpse into our night of fun anyway!

What a night!