First Father-Son Outing

On Friday, June 26th, I took Benjamin to his first ever Father-and-Son outing. It's pretty interesting how things come full circle. I grew up going to the Father-and-Son outing with my Dad and brothers. We always had a good time and made good memories, which is something I want to pass onto my kids.

We went to a place called Celebration Park, which was about 20 miles south of our house. It was an interesting place to go camping; for what it lacked in trees (cause there wasn't any) it made up in overgrown sagebrush.

All-in-all it was a good time and was the start of a new generation of passed down tradition. We listened to some anticlimactic ghost stories and a good message from our bishop. It seems that the highlights for Benjamin was making two fires (without any matches, accelerates, etc... -- that's right Kaylynn!) and pitching our tent in the middle of 3 very active army ant hills.

Until next year...

  

First Fishing Trip

On June 13th, I took Benjamin and Brittney fishing for their first times. Benjamin was pretty excited to go, he was in the backyard practicing his casting the night before. I woke Benjamin up early in the morning and we grabbed our stuff and headed over to Grandpa Colt's house so we could all ride together.

We went to Park Center Pond first, but evidently everyone else had the same idea. There was quite a few people there and only one or two of them actually caught anything. After several hours of not getting so much as a nibble we decided to pack it in.

I was pretty bummed that Benjamin was not able to catch his first fish, but on the way home we decided to try a place called Wilson Springs Pond in Nampa. On the way out to Nampa we stopped and picked up Brittney. By the time we got out to Wilson Springs Pond it had started raining, so I had to leave my camera gear in the truck. :-(

As it turns out we made a good choice to head out to Nampa because we ended up catch 6 rainbow trout: Benjamin caught 2, Brittney caught 1, I caught 1, and Grandpa caught 2 (technically 4, but he let Benjamin and Brittney each reel them in). We definitely had a great, something we'll be doing a lot more of! Below are some pictures from the trip, but only from the Park Center Pond because I didn't have my camera with me at Wilson Springs Pond.

Look, No Training Wheels!

On May 2, 2009 Brittney officially shed her training wheels and hasn't looked back since. She has wanted to ride without training wheels for a really long time. I ran behind her for a few minutes, but clearly she didn't need my help.

It's hard to believe we have all to quickly crossed another milestone. I'm going to miss this...

A Salute to Women Drivers

I was sent this video by a good friend of mine (thanks Don) and I couldn't resist putting it on here. I thought it was pretty funny, and scary accurate. haha It really is a wonder why guys' insurance is higher than women's.

Enjoy the aww inspiring skills demonstrated by these women drivers.

The Wrath of Hagen

The winter time is exceptionally hard for Hagen. He doesn't get the daily exercise he needs, so he has a lot of pent up energy with no outlet.

Yesterday after returning home we found a respectable size claw mark in the wall next to the trim (that he has slowly been ruining) from Hagen trying to claw his way through the wall. After cleaning up the first mess we had to leave again. I returned home before Kaylynn only to find sheetrock laying on the floor and a rather decent size hole in the wall.

Long story short — Hagen has earned his exercise.

Looks like I get to replace the trim around the door, again, and now patch the hole in our wall. I'm sure glad I don't have to pay somebody to keep fix these little Hagen surprises.

Benjamin is 6 years old

It's hard for me to believe (and accept) that my little superman is 6 years old already. As a child I never understood why I would hear adults make comments like "where does all the time go", or "you're just growing up way to fast", and "I can't believe you are ___ years old already". Now, after having kids of my own I understand with such clarity these comments.

After the last couple of days Benjamin can cross off two milestones, he lost his first tooth the day before his birthday and he turned 6, which means he can no longer count his age on just one hand.

I remember when I turned six and thinking how big and grown up I must be because I had to show people how old I was with both hands -- Where does all the time go...

For Benjamin's birthday I took donut holes to his kindergarten class and had the opportunity to go to library with him and listen to a story. Luckily the librarian was able to finish the story before the fire alarm went off.

After the library and fire drill we went back into his classroom where he was crowned with his special birthday crown and he was told to pick 6 kids (since he turned 6) to be his candles (he is blowing them out at the end of the video). I didn't know they did anything like this in his class or else I would have brought my nice camera, however, in an effort to get 'something' I took some pictures and the video below with my cell phone.

Happy 6th birthday Superman!

Benjamin's First Tooth	Blowing out his candle
Benjamin getting his crown	Benjamin in his class

Christmas 2008

It's hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone already and that 2008 is officially over. This Christmas Kaylynn wanted to start a new Christmas tradition for her side of the family by introducing them to "Clementine", the Christmas Bear. This seemed to be the start of a tradition that was well taken by all the grandkids, and adults.

This video isn't exactly mind blowing but rather something I quickly edited together with some of the footage shot on Christmas day. Here's to the new year.