This Is The Day

Friday, September 11, 2026

Thursday, September 10, 2026

Lake Time!

We finally got Peanut to the lake! She has been so busy this summer that she had only been to the lake the week of VBS at the very beginning of the summer.

But she finally made it out and because she came that brought all the teenagers! 4 other families met us there so we had 11 kids this time instead of just Ms. B and I and the 3 we've been taking. Us moms had as much fun as the kids just hanging out on the beach talking. Ms. K took this one.

Lou had been using my phone to do her Duolingo and I thought she brought it in the car but she didn't so I had to use the family phone to get pictures and apparently didn't notice that the lens was dirty so all these pictures look a little fuzzy. :P

The kids had so much fun swimming and hanging out on the mat.

My friend J got these next three and the video. Kayak gang!

Several times they would line up on the beach hill and run down into the water. :)

So fun!

Em was serious about building in the sand and brought a full size shovel! They made a huge hole and even made sand steps to get down in it!

Such a fun group!

Ms. K took this one as well.

We are blessed with good friends!

We will miss these summer days!

Wednesday, September 9, 2026

Themepark!

We had a wonderful time at our annual themepark day! N got to come with us...his first time there! And the O girls got to join us again.

Everyone was excited and headed straight for the roller coasters!

Lou and I did too...just the one in kiddie land. :)

I don't know what I'm going to do once she graduates from kiddie land! Maybe I'll just stay home. :P Even the kiddie coaster makes me nauseous, WITH Dramamine on board! She did the train.

And drove me around in an antique car, and I went with her on the Ferris Wheel! I had never been on one before but it didn't make me sick at all so I was happy.

The Froggy ride is always one of her favorites.

Although it looked like it was making her stomach drop a lot more than it used to! She keeps clutching at her stomach in this video.

After a while we met up with the others.

And they went on some of the rides with us. I was happy to relinquish my seat to A. :)

We found J and saw a lot of other people from camp running around including Peaches cabin leader. At this point T and the big kids went over to the waterpark side.

The youngest three and I did the antique cars again.

And they rode all the rides Lou had already done.

We also did the Tilt n' Whirl, the carousel, and visited the candy shop. I didn't get any pictures, but we went to a show for the first time! They have a magic show at different times of the day, but this was the first year in a long time I'd seen that the parrot show was back.

A, E, and D and I went to that and it was so neat! They had birds of all sizes, little tiny ones, up to ones that head-to-tail-feathers were 3 feet long! They had a bunch of neat tricks they could do and we really enjoyed it! Then it was time for an ice cream break!

The rest made it back from the water park.

And then we headed back over to coaster alley where the older kids all rode some of the crazier rides like this giant drop one!

And this one which spins around while the entire thing goes back and forth like a pendulum until it finally goes over center and then around a few times. Last year I remember hearing on the news that there was a perfectly balanced set of people and they ended up getting stuck in this position for over three minutes before it finally fell back down! Boo is dead center on the white arm with N and Peanut on either side. She says this is her favorite ride and N said it ended up being his favorite too!

We had a wonderful day and made it home exhausted but happy!

See you next year roller coasters!

Tuesday, September 8, 2026

Peanut's Teenager Trip! - Part 2

Saturday morning we slept in after a rough night..I think the people above us were letting their kids have a party until midnight. :P We hit the continental breakfast and then walked back to the main part of town to the shops. We spent over an hour in the Christmas store looking at the thousands of ornaments!

Peanut loved all the different ornament styles and options. We let her pick one and she chose a red and white polka dotted mushroom. They also had several of these giant wreaths.

Our main event of the day was seeing a play! Leavenworth is famous for their summer theater and they did not disappoint! We saw a musical comedy called Anything Goes. It was so cute and they did a fabulous job.

It was set in the 30's on a cruise liner and was about an average guy who was trying to win back the heart of a debutante who was now engaged to a Lord that her mother wanted her to marry for the fortune and prestige.

There were also several hilarious characters, like a thief who was pretending to be a priest, and a famous singer who was first in love with the average guy but then ended up falling in love with the Lord. There were so many neat sets and SO MANY costume changes...I don't know how they kept them all straight! There were tons of great songs and several really neat numbers with amazing choreography. We really enjoyed it!!

Meanwhile back at home...we left poor Noni with these sickie babes. Whoops. They had started coming down with a cold the day before we left but I guess it hit them hard that weekend because she sent pictures of both of them napping during the day which they never do anymore.

I guess they did perk up later.

These are the little chicks we raised this past Spring! They are already full grown chickens!

But back to Leavenworth...we found this cute shop called the Gingerbread Factory. It must have been run by Christians because they had lots of bible verses displayed as well as dozens of Gingerbread houses. These are just a few. Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Hanzel, and Gretel, The Three Little Pigs. They had every Disney movie covered.

Peanut found her favorite thing there...a chocolate croissant.

We did some more shopping and then headed to the nearby city to hit some Goodwill stores. Peanut found a few things that fit the dress code for her school. I forgot to mention that morning she found a super nice leather, motorcycle jacket at the Leavenworth thrift store. I looked them up and they normally sell for $200-$250 and she got it for $20! Best find of the weekend for sure! She got some other things at the two Goodwill stores we found and then we had Mexican food for dinner. Frozen yogurt wrapped up the night!

Sunday we slept in again, grabbed some cereal from the hotel breakfast and then packed up and checked out. We hit a few more stores and got a giant pretzel for Boo, and cookies for the little ones. We stopped into the Snow Cave because it looked fun and found Finn and Eddie the Yeti's...so funny!

Then we walked back the other way, passing our hotel...we were on the second floor.

To the Leavenworth Adventure Park!

She was super excited about riding the Alpine Slide. We went two times. You could control the speed of your car and the first time I was between her and T but I guess I went too slow and made T have to slow down for me. :P Peanut must have gone full speed the whole time because I didn't even catch a glimpse of her on the way down even though I only started 80 feet behind her!

I went last the second time and tried to go faster. I definitely liked going slow better where I could enjoy the beautiful mountain scenery. The second time I was going too fast to do anything but hang on and try to brace for the curves. :P Peanut and Daddy loved the zipping down the mountain!