Spontaneous

I'm not even sure if I have any readers left, but I wanted to post about our adventures yesterdays. I LOVE to be spontaneous and with our current situation right now we have been stuck inside the house almost all summer with a few exceptions and we are all going stir crazy. So yesterday we decided to get in the truck and see where it took us and try to spend very little or no money at all. We packed a little lunch, ate in the car and hit the road. It took us FOREVER, and I mean 45 minutes, to get out of town. Not for being slow, but because of construction or something going on on north river road that turns into 43. By the time we actually got on the interstate the kids had already asked where we were going 20 times. All I could tell them was I had no idea and if they thought of something or saw something to tell us and we would stop. Wait, I did have one thing on my mind and that was Jamba Juice!!! Thanks to Renay I had a coupon and could get double for the price of one. :-) But other than that we had no other plans. We saw the signs for the dairy farm so the boys asked if we could stop. I explained that we couldn't afford to go into the barns but that we could stop and play on the trampoline thing and maybe get some ice cream to share....and thats what we did! It gave them some time to run some energy off and it was fun! Oh, and not to mention they have the BEST ice cream! The best part was there was NO WHINING or fighting!! YAY!! We then loaded back up in the truck and hit the road for some of my favorite drink...Jamba Juice!!! :-) If there's one thing that puts a smile on my face its Jamba Juice...I know it seems silly, but I love that stuff and its healthy too. We ran into a problem though once we got the Juice...we didn't know what to do next. Okay, so its not a problem, but we were stumped. We had obviously been in the house way too long. LOL. We saw a sign for a candy factory, but couldn't find it. Then we saw a sign for dunes and thought hmmm, why not, lets try to find them. So I looked up the best I could on my phone, seeing as I didn't have an address and found close enough directions and we hit the road again. After many stops, and turnarounds because of security checkpoints, haha, we finally found the Dunes only to find out that it cost to get in, duh, because its a state park. We knew that there were other beach fronts close by that were free so we opted to go to those instead. In the meantime we walked a trail that took us to a highway, saw a train pull up and stop and saw a conductor. Oh, and we got to stand under the electric wires and listen to the buzzing sound they make. YIKES! While the kids thought it was cool, I on the other hand couldn't get over how dangerous it was. It was quite the adventure! When we finally hit the beaches the kids were excited! Now remember that none of this was planned so we had NO beach toys or proper swimwear, but we made do with what was there, what we had and had a blast. The kids rolled up their shorts, got a little wet...ok Mason got a lot wet, and laughed a ton! There was one problem though, I didn't have camera and hadn't taken any pictures along the way. So I took out my phone and snapped a few shots and we called it a day.
You cant see it in this picture but you could see the Chicago Skyline from the beach! The kids kept going, "Its ChiCAgo!!" It was cute!Isaac with his eyes closed. :-) I'd have noticed had I had a real camera with me. lol
Mason is a fish out of water!! He loves the beach and says he wants to live there someday.
Speaking of a fish out of the water...Haha!The boys were collecting rocks on our walk. Weston had so many in his pockets that his pants were falling down. Hahaha! :-)It was a great end to a great day!!!

2009 4H Fair

Many of you probably already saw this on facebook, but I wanted to post it here mainly for my pleasure. :-) Yesterday was judging day for Masons rabbits. We were told it would start at 10am and so we figured we would get there about 9 so that Mason could get Dixie and Joe ready. What we weren't told, and failed to realize, was that he wouldn't be showing he breeds until later that day. We stood around waiting and waiting and waiting only to hear the judges are going to take a lunch break and then we'll resume back. We ended up not showing until way after lunch time! Don't get me wrong it was good for him to see what had to be done, ask tons of question (okay I was the one asking questions but still) and get prepared, or nervous. Haha. I never knew how much went into the judging. There are so many classes in each different breed that depending on how many are being shown in that breed it can take over an hour! Crazy I know! Then we had entered Dixie in the fur contest which meant she had to go back on the table after ALL the regular judging was done...boy was that chaotic! Then we were told because Joe took Best of Breed he had to back up for Best of 4 Class, what we failed to realize becasue the comment sheet was all messed up was that Dixie needed to be up there too. So you had tons of kids standing around holding several rabbits for about 20 minutes. It was quite entertaining! :-) I stood behind all of them holding Dixie for the judge so I was in the middle of all of it. It came down to Dixie and 2 others, but because we didn't realize that Dixie won Best of Breed and needed to be up there we didn't groom her. The judge told us, and everyone else for that matter, that it was such a hard one to judge and it came down to the nitty gritty, she was talking about Dixie. :-) It was so close that she had to find some flaw between them and because we didn't know Dixie was supposed to be up there we didn't groom her, so she got elimanted for her bottom being matted and wet. We were told though that there was nothing technicaly wrong with her and Mason had a great Holland Lop! So that made it all better. :-) Mason handled it extremely well when he didn't place for the fur class and the Best of 4 Class...I was completely shocked and underestimated him.
Not bad for his first year of 4H!!

I am so proud of you Mason!! You did a great job all day and all your hard work paid off!! WAY TO GO!!!