Camping! Can you believe it?

Yes! We actually went camping for real last weekend! It was a very easy beginner camping trip to Arcadia Lake only 20 minutes from our house, but it was a big milestone for us. In the past 5 years our tent has never made it out of the living room. The kids were so excited and their enthusiasm was the thing that made the trip great. Dave and I both have memories of camping as a kid- and the experience is much different from the parent side. It is a lot more work. We arrived at our campsite late and even with rushing to get everything set up and ready we were still eating our hot dogs and roasting our marshmallows in the dark. Who knows how many bugs were sticking to our smores as we shoveled them in our mouths?

One thing was the same though, everything sounds creepier at night. As soon as everyone was all snuggled in and the kids were beginning to drift off to sleep. . . Dave and I heard footsteps outside our tent. And then a big CRUNCH. I guess when we cleaned up after our dinner in the dark we missed something- most likely a peanut or chip- and we had some visitors clean up the rest for us. It sure scared me for a while and Dave couldn’t even lay back down for a long time. When we got up in the morning Dave was telling the kids about the animal that we heard eating our leftovers at night and all the kids were guessing what kind of animal it might have been. “Raccoon, squirrel” suggested Grant. “”Skunk, beaver” suggested Nina. “Or a Hippo!” suggested Rachel. Yup, gotta watch out for those wild chip-eating Oklahoman hippos!

Our second wildlife experience occurred when Grant saw a baby lizard on the ground. Everybody gathered around it to see- it actually took a while before any of us realized that it was a plastic toy.

All in all, it was a pretty good experience. Nothing bad happened. Most things went smoothly, what more can you ask for in a camping trip?

Bird Mobile

Nina and Rachel and I made this cute bird mobile around Easter time. We have really enjoyed our little flock, but I can only handle decorations hanging around for about a month and now it is time for it to go. We wanted to immortalize it on our blog so saying goodbye would be easier, and so we would show off how cute and crafty we are.

Who Do You Think You Are?

I don't watch much TV. I don't think there's much I'm missing, and I'm busy enough as it is. But one show I do watch and have really enjoyed is "Who Do You Think You Are?" about celebrities looking into their family history. Particularly eye-opening/though-provoking were the episodes featuring Emmett Smith (Slavery) and Lisa Kudrow (Holocaust). A couple of the celebrities come across almost stereotypically- Missy and I would roll our eyes sometimes. But on the whole, it was interesting how normal they are. We particularly liked how Lisa Kudrow was really nervous about calling someone.

The last two episodes of the season are this Friday and next Friday, so take a look.

If you've missed the others, you can watch them free on Hulu.

April Fools Day 2010

A few April Fools events worthy of mention:

1)The "elementary school" called Grant in the morning and asked if he could be the substitute teacher for his class that day. It says a lot about Grant's opinion of himself that he agreed with no questions asked. I broke the news to him that it was a joke after he had already written out a schedule of what he was going to teach all day (I think he added a few extra recesses). He was a bit relieved, but also disappointed because I had told him that substitute teachers usually got paid. Funny thing- his teacher actually WAS absent!

2) Nina tricked Dave into believing that his new Droid cell phone had been delivered, when all it really was was a box with R2-D2 and C3-PO in it.

3) Grant got a lunch box full of baby food- including baby formula in his water bottle.

4) We had a crazy mixed up dinner- some of the menu included fried humming bird eggs, fried ostrich eggs, jello-ed drinks and cookies that looked a whole lot like fish sticks.

Easter

My girls and I had a visit with the Easter Bunny at the mall. Funny thing- the Easter Bunny is deaf! We were chatting with him for a while and the girls started signing to him and he signed back. It turns out that he knows sign language pretty well. He actually must be pretty good at lipreading because he understood us perfectly, but would reply in sign. So I guess it just means maybe he just can't speak. Well, after all, he is a bunny. . . who also lives in a giant teapot. Some parts of how we celebrate Easter just don't make much sense.
Here are my sweet Easter Chicks. They were not happy to have to pose for pictures when they wanted to start inhaling their Easter candy.

Sure, she may look all sweet and innocent, but our Meg is also known as the Destroyer of Pansies. Aren't Pansies edible flowers? I hope so. But the Destroyer of Pansies does not care if something is edible or not before she tries to eat it. Her other favorite things to nibble are bits of carpet, various strings and hairballs. Yum.

Are You Mad?

I saw this somewhere online some time ago (I didn't read it but just clipped the image to write about it later- it's from Newsweek). Just the headlines say a lot about our society. Call me crazy.

Fill Out Your Census Form and Send It!

For those of you that have not received or followed through with your 2010 Census Form, I am begging you to take care of that today. A report last night said only about 50% of households have sent them back. If you send it, it costs taxpayers 42 cents. If you don't they must be law knock on your door, so then you're costing taxpayers about $60.

Saving tax money aside, recently I've been spending a lot of time doing genealogy and leaning heavily on the federal census. It is an amazing resource. I hope your descendants won't need a census record to know who you are, but you never know...