Beaches & Baseball

I love Disney, and I also love the other fun things that are around town once you're there. Our favorite place to go eat is Popeye's Chicken. We eat there twice every time we go. Something about their chicken strips and cajun red beans and rice that I love. I also love to go shopping at Sketchers. Don't know why the shoes are so much cooler in cali? Not like there's not sketcher stores here, right? HAHA.

I also like the beach. We had the opportunity to meet an old friend & neighbor, Kristen at her stompin ground this time... Laguna Beach. We met at a cozy little restaurant on the beach, it was gorgeous! You could overlook the beach from our table on the patio. She looks great, and it was fun to catch up with her.

Another one of our loves is baseball. We really like the Dodgers, but since they were on the road last week, we saw the Angels.

Funny story with our tickets!! We bought them from stub hub. We got a great deal on some great seats. They were row WC. Come to find out, when we got to the stadium and tried to find the seats, they were on the wheelchair row, and seats didn't exist. They were just spaces where you bring your own wheelchair. NICE!! Luckily the usher showed us to an empty row where we could sit, so it all worked out.

Note to self: Never buy seats on the wheelchair row! They are BYOC (Bring your own chair). The angels had a great game and it was fun just being there.

A Quick Jaunt...

... to my favorite place!!

Well, after our 1200 mile round trip drive over to Montana, the next day we turned and headed out on the road again for my favorite place... Disney!

Charley's parents were flying out for a short three day trip, and we (ok, mostly I) wanted to tag along. I felt like it would be good to get Charley out of the house. We left after work Tuesday night and drove through the night to get to the airport in time to pick up the inlaws Wednesday morning from the airport.

This is the very first ride we went on! I've decided it's my new favorite attraction. I even had to take a picture of the score, or Charley would never admit that I beat him. (Twice for that matter). LOL.

It was three short days in Disney, but we sure had a good time. It was definately HOTTER than we thought it would be, but still worth it. A lot of the rides were closed down for refurbishing, and they were also getting haunted mansion & space mountain ready for Halloween.

I love Disney!! It's so much fun, no matter what age you are. This time was a little unique. Four adults and no children. It's a different park when you don't have kids with you. Although we missed the kids, it's still so much fun to just get a few days away.

As long as I can keep going back to Disneyland, I'll be a happy camper! (And we will live Happily ever after!!

Labor Day in Montana

Charley's family reunions are usually Labor day weekend. Normally everyone meets in Filer and goes white water rafting and then to the Filer Fair. This year, everyone headed to Montana. Charley's oldest brother, James purchased property in Montana and invited everyone to come see the property & camp. This year everyone was able to make it except for Danne's family & a few of the grandchildren. There were 29 total Blackwoods there!

Here are some pictures that were taken on James's property. It was huge and the view was awesome. They are planning to build a cabin on it, but for now, it's nature.


After, we all headed to a campground to spend the weekend. Nate was excited to go camping since he hasn't been for a few years. He also knew there would be several cousins for him to play with, and he couldn't wait to sleep in a tent. He thinks that's "real camping" since we've been spoiled and have taken the trailer the last several years. Here's a picture of the tent we borrowed from Craig & Heather. It was HUGE! Sleeping in a tent actually wasn't that bad! Good thing we had air mattresses! We had a total of 5 tents, a tent trailer, a large RV motorhome, and one corner of the campground to ourselves. There was so much to do! Nate & some of the boy cousins spent a lot of time playing with Heath's dogs:
They played catch:

We shot BB guns

Charley tried to burn his fingers off:

And of course, we don't go anywhere without our laptops:

We even had a family picture taken. This is everyone assembling in one place for the picture.

Luckily Travis had his tripod & camera there so we could set the timer. Everyone had to gather around to make sure we got "ONE" good shot.

Here's a picture of some of the kids. (Keep in mind I have 5 of these pictures, but this is the one where everyone is looking). This is Braden, Brogan, Peyton, Nate, Jordan, Mylie, & Madison.

We ended up leaving Sunday afternoon. (We were going to leave town again Tuesday and needed to get home so I could work two days). We had passed "Blackwood Road" on the way in and wanted to stop by on the way out and take a picture, so we did. (Actually, Charley wanted to steal the sign, but he couldn't reach it!!).

We left early enough so we could drive through Yellowstone Park on the way. Although we got there just before dark, the drive was beautiful. There is so much wildlife, and they come right up to your cars!
We also stopped at Old Faithful and watched it "erupt" It was dark, but it was still neat to watch. I haven't been there since I was a child, and this was Nate's first visit to Yellowstone. Definately something you need more than a few hours to drive around. We're going to add it to our list of places we want to go camping.

It really was a great weekend. A lot of driving (1200 miles total in two days) but it was well worth it to spend time with the Blackwood family.

HOT Day? Perfect Day for Raging Waters...

A friend of ours (Thanks Polly!) was able to get us discount tickets at the last minute to go to Raging Waters. It was so hot yesterday that it sounded like the perfect thing to do! It was so much fun to see & spend time with the Butterfields!



Lauren & Holly have been to Raging Waters several times, but Nate has only been once. The last time he was there it was JetBlue day and it was sooo crowded that he really didn't get to do much but lay in the lazy river and the wave pool. This time was different. We were there right when they opened so the kids got to ride several of the rides before it got busy. Charley and I mostly spectated.

But, this picture is of Charley and I racing down Rampage. Charley thinks he won this one, but I'll let you be the judge. Yes, that is me (way ahead of him) on the left hand side of the picture, and him just coming off the slide. (HA ha).

The kids had a great time! It's hard sometimes to get them all together in one place, but when we do, they have such a great time together... You can even see some of the sibling rivalry starting to surface lol... (aka Holly loves to pick on Nate, but Nate loves the attention from an older sister). Just ask Nate how many times she pushed him in the pool or down the slide... (Don't worry, Charley got her back!).

And one group shot of the kids when we finally got them all in one place! It was such a great way to end the summer. Dan & Jake start school tomorrow, and Lauren starts high school on Wednesday.... wowza, good luck Lauren!! (Holly and Nate are on year round and went back at the end of July).

Hit & Run, Ouch!

So the Honda has now experienced it's first accident... As Charley was on his way to get his allergy shot, in the lovely 35th South traffice, somebody pulled out in front of him and he rear ended them. It was a Ford explorer, and when the lady got out of the car, noticed she didn't have any body damage, and drove off. She didn't speak english and left VERY quickly... Hmmm. It may (or may not) be a blessing in disguise that she left the scene. Since Charley is the one that hit from behind, he is automatically at fault, and we may have been responsible for her car also. But, since she left the scene, it was considered a hit and run.

Charley, and Nate were the only ones in the car, and they are both fine. Poor Nate, this is his 4th accident in his short 9 years of life. The car is driveable, but there's a large dent in the front bumper, hood and fender on the passenger side. Guess we're going to get to work on the insurance & estimates...

Weekend Getaway...

We haven't been to Idaho for quite a while, so we decided to go last weekend. We didnt' have the kids, but there was a pageant going on in Glenns Ferry that Charley's parents wanted to go to since it was the last year the pageant was going to be held.

We left late Friday night after a BBQ at the park, so we didn't get to Filer until around midnight. We spend the night at Charley's parents then drove to Glenns Ferry saturday morning. Once we got to Glenns Ferry, there was so much traffic that we missed the pageant. It was ok though, we still had a good time. These cute benches were along side the road once we go to town, so we made Charley and his dad jump on one for a picture! (They are such good sports!).

Later in the afternoon we met up with Carlos & Denise in Twin Falls. Carlos had to work late Friday, so they left early Saturday morning. As soon as they got into town we went to see the scenic Shoshone Falls.

We also met up with the family for a birthday dinner Saturday night. (Happy Birthday Danne!). Then it was off for an evening camping at Miracle hot Springs. Miracle has these awesome camping domes that we stayed in. Very affordable, and nice! They have heat and electricity, a bbq grill, patio, chairs and tables, with lots of trees and privacy. We definately want to stay there again!! They also have the natural hot springs heated pool, and the private hot tubs that you can reserve by the hour.

See this awesome hand shaped chair next to the camp dome? They were so funny! We all had to get our picture taken in them. (They are actually pretty comfortable to sit in too!!).

After visiting with the rest of the family on Sunday, it was time to drive back home. It's always fun when we go to Idaho. It's close enough to go for the weekend, but far enough that you feel like you are getting away.

New Wheels... For Nate...

I am so proud of Nate. He has been earning money this summer to buy a new bike. His old bike is getting too small for him, but I explained to him that we didn't have the money to just go buy a bike right away. His birthday is in December so that wasn't a very good alternative either.

So, he's been doing odd jobs around the house, and volunteering to help out while he was off track to earn a dollar here and there. I told him I would pay half. He has been riding his bike to school and we have been going on nightly bike rides as a family, so the motivation was to get a new bike quick!

While we were at Walmart the other day, they had this bike on the scratch n dent rack. The only think wrong it is the vinyl was coming up from under the seat. Well, we just happened to have a new bike seat at home not being used... Perfect! It was 35% off for that reason only.

I now have a large ziplock bag full of quarters, dimes, nickels & pennies...

The Boys Turn Three...

Erin's boys celebrated their third birthday today! Wow, these boys have sure grown up fast! They are so tall it makes it hard to believe they are only 3! I don't get to see them very often, so it was so much fun to go up to Heber to celebrate with them today.

We started on the Heber Creeper. It was a three hour round trip train ride down the Provo Canyon. This was Charley's first time on the Heber Railroad, and I haven't ridden it since I was little. Nate has ridden before with my parents but he didn't really remember it.

I think Nate got bored on the way back...

Until the robbers came on the train at the very end & made everyone put their hands up

Then we went back to the park in Midway where we had sandwiches, cupcakes & the boys opened their gifts. This is Bailee trying to show them how many fingers to hold up... (At first they had up all 10. LOL). And then a group shot of everyone that attended. (Minus Jamie who is taking the picture).