Ribs!!!

Anyone that knows my Uncle Bob knows he cooks dang good!  Dave started asking one day when "party" season was at my Aunt and Uncle's because he was craving my Uncle's ribs!  I told him now for a few months.  I was talking to my Aunt a few days later about canning and mentioned that we needed to bring out some ribs for Uncle Bob to cook up for us.  She mentioned that they had bought a bunch at the store because the store had mismarked them and they were super cheat (but still good!)  Dave was so lucky that the next weekend we were invited to come enjoy some good cooking. 

When my Uncle called Dave was in the shower so I told Gannon to go tell him we were going to have ribs tonight.  Gannon ran to the bathroom and could barely repeat back what I had said, but it was clear enough to hear "ribs".  All day Garrett and  Gannon talked about going to eat ribs!  It was so cute.  Garrett and Gannon are as much a fan of the ribs now as Dave.  I swear they both ate more than me. Keep lovin Uncle Bob's ribs!!!

It's always so fun to hang out at my Aunt and Uncle's with my cousins and all their kids, reminds me of all the fun times our family had growing up.  Finally our kids are old enough to not have to watch like a hawk and let them go play and they actually will, with the older kids.  Until Gannon comes out with a hair full of white mouse in his hair from Allison and a pair of scissors in his hand!!!  Okay, so we still need to watch them a little closer than we obviously were!  But, hey they had lots of fun.

First Day of School

This year the boys started at a new school, Merced Montessori.  Garrett attends the big school and right next door Gannon goes to the little school.  They were both VERY excited to start on Monday morning.  I thought Garrett would have a hard time since he has been at Gateway since he was three months old, but he did  quite well...for the first day!  Gannon I knew would just determine his mood off of Garrett's so he was good too. 

Day 2 was a lot harder.  They knew school meant a day without Mommy and Daddy and after being home for the summer with both of us it was a little harder.  All in all they love it and are doing very well. 

Family Trip

What we'll call a serious of unfortunate events took place leaving a ticket available for the Giants game that my parents and Taylor had planned to attend.  Taylor called and asked if I'd be interested ingoing.  Sure, I'd love a day in the city and to spend some time with the parentals!  It was a fun trip.   I can't remember the last time we did something with just the four of us.  Taylor and I rode like little kids in the backseat and watched a movie on the way up.  We went to the afternoon game, the weather was great, headed back to the hotel changed and headed to dinner.  We decided on Joe's Crab Shack for dinner and drinks.  It's so fun that Taylor can enjoy a nice adult beverage with the rest of us! 

The best part of the night was watching Taylor trying to hail a cab - when the car wasn't even a cab!!!

Lake Tahoe

Atwater FFA's office retreat was in Lake Tahoe this year so Dave and I planned a couple extra days to hang out prior the rest of the gang joining, making it a 4 day/5 night adventure.  This was the first time we've ever left the boys for this long and also the first time a babysitter has stayed overnight with them.  Courtney, our sitter, stayed on Sunday night and Aunt Shannon came up on Monday for the rest of the trip.  They boys had a blast with Aunt Shannon - see next post - and we had a great relaxing trip in Tahoe. 

Our usual, play cards, a movie, rest, play cards, lay in the sun, sleep in, play cards nice dinner out, play cards and even a nice bike ride....did I mention play cards!  All in all it was a fun time.  I made it to the gym everyday, worked on lesson plans, and enjoyed the quiet time while Dave was with the students.  Weird to have so much time to do whatever I wanted to with! 

The leadership students had a scavenger hunt with GPS devices that they split into teams and had to ride from one location to the next based on their longitude and latitude in the GPS.  At each location there was a box hidden with a clue to the next.  It was really fun to ride around with them.  Dave and I broke off at the end to add a few more miles to our ride (and a drink!)

Another Fair...Really!?!

The Sonoma County Fair was going while we were in the area so day 2 of our trip we headed to check it out.  A huge, nice fair!  We didn't go on any rides, just spend the day checking out the animals and playing in the different exhibits.  Horse racing is part of this fair so of course that was our first stop!  Gannon picked horse #4, but that was long shot so Daddy only bet $2 and guess which horse won the race....horse #4! Gannon is now in charge of picking the winners. 

It was nice to spend a day at the fair in 70+ degree weather and be able to enjoy the day without sweating to death. There were great kid play areas set up for the kids to play with things  and explore.  We had a great time. 

The Shouka Experience

Dave knows a trainer that still works at Marine World from when he was there so the boys were excited for a behind the scenes and special show with Shouka the Whale.  We arrived at the park just before lunch and our tour guide Garrett read the map to lead the way!

We grabbed lunch and rode a few rides prior to going to see the Shouka show. 

The shark exhibit was a huge favorite of both boys.  Riding the moving sidewalk through the exhibit was way too fun.  I think we went through ten times. 

We head over to the show, went in the back way to meet up with Dave's friend and we were seated in the "VIP" section!  The blue section in the picture above.  This is the area Shouka does her slide outs and NEVER splashes!!! Well, quite the VIP treatment - on the second command the trainer was off in throwing the ice for Shouka to go after and lets just say we were surprised there was any water left in the pool because we were absolutely SOAKED!!! The boys let out screaming cries of fear and the show was over for us.  Get me out of there with my two screaming scared boys!  Not to mention Dave had our video camera out and the entire soak fest was on film, well so we hoped!  Our camera is completely out of commission.  I was almost in tears because we hadn't back up the camera since Gannon was born.  This almost completely ruined the trip for me.  The thought that our film was all gone. Hard drive cameras are great, but not when they get wet.  No disk or tape to remove.  (see below for results)  Anyway, after the show the trainer apologized and brought Shouka out to apologize in person.  Garrett and Gannon were still SO scared that they didn't want anything to do with petting Shouka.  They do now talk about how Shouka came out and said sorry. See below. I don't think they are traumatized for life.

 Good thing we had brought water clothes for the boys, they needed a change after the Shouka Show!  Off to play in  some intended for play water.  Garrett was in heaven playing in the fountains. 

Right next to the fountain was Gannon's heaven - the helicopter ride!  He must have gone on it 4 times while Garrett played in the water. 

Gannon finally fell asleep for a much needed rest and hey I figured I lay down on the park bench too! 

 During nap time Garrett enjoyed a few rides alone - the red eyed tree frog and he could have played in the tree house below for hours!  He was in own little world for at least an hour on this play structure.  Super fun!

Mommy just couldn't visit an amusement park without squeezing a ride or two in so the boys played in the misters while I was on a ride.  I really need to go back with someone that will ride all these fun crazy rides with me. 

Camera update - Dave researched and found a video camera repair guy in Southern California that would take a look at our camera to see what or if anything could be salvaged.  He called a few days later and said he cleaned the camera, but it would cost more than a new camera to actually TRY to make it usable, but for $150 he could get it working to at least download the footage that was on it!!! What a bargain for priceless footage.  He said just plug it into the computer through it's docking station and we should be able to get the files.  Sure enough the camera doesn't work, but we were able to get our files off and transferred to disks!!! Thank God for this I would have been SUPER devastated if we lost all that precious film..