Not Me Ghost, Rootbeer Drinking Contests, 4th of July, Splash Pad, Fishing

I opened the fridge the other morning and out of the corner of my eye I noticed the milk had some floaties in it.  Upon closer inspection it appears the 'Not Me' ghost has struck again.  No one seems to know who put their Cocoa Puffs inside the milk jug.  Ewwww.  I don't really like my milk with 'Essence of Cocoa Puffs' especially when I am making macaroni and cheese.  Yummy!

 Monday this week Matthew, Josh and Daniel had their Kids in the Park field trip to Classic Water Slides.  When I picked them up afterward they decided they wanted to go somewhere wet since they had their swimming suits already on.  We headed on over to the splash pad where everyone went crazy.  As we were pulling up I told Josh that he was not allowed to swing on the spinny tire swing since every time he does he spins until he barfs.  Much to my relief I was glad to see they had taken the spinny swing out of the playground.  Wahoo--that was one less thing I would have to worry about!  Here's Josh and Matthew playing in the water:

 Since I hadn't planned on going to the splash pad, Sarah and Noah did not have their swimming suits on.  At first Sarah said she couldn't play in the water without her suit on.  That lasted all of about five minutes until she started playing in the water.  I had a hard time reasoning with her of why she couldn't take her shirt off, though.  Thankfully she did leave it on, but it wasn't without a HUGE fight.  She still doesn't understand why girls are different and have to keep their shirts on....

Noah had a hard time getting wet without his swimming suit on, but he, like Sarah, overcame that.  Unfortunately, his shorts were a little big and when they got wet it was impossible to keep them up. The poor kid spent more time pulling up his drawers than he did playing, but he still seemed to have fun.  Here's a sweet gangsta low pants diaper shot: 

After a while Daniel decided he wanted to dry off so he put his towel in the middle of the playground and laid down on it.  It was a nice visit to the splash pad that seemed to wear everyone out.  Sa-weet!!!

 In helping to clean out my grandpa's house Aaron came into some fishing poles.  We have been wanting to get some, but it was nice to get some from my grandpa.  Aaron got them fish ready with some help from the boys.

 After that they then headed out to do some fishing by a fish pond near our house.  Daniel was excited to show off his sweet fishing skills.

 Josh caught the biggest catch of the day--a HUGE chunk of slimy, green moss.  He was pretty proud showing off his slimy, nasty catch:

They didn't catch any fish that trip, but they hope to try again in the near future.

When we moved into our house one of the sidewalk blocks had been cracked so the builder replaced it.  However, when they replaced it, it was in the middle of a freezing cold February.  Now that it has warmed up (especially this past week) the sidewalk has expanded in the heat.  The new piece they replaced has become the weakest link in the sidewalk so it buckled at the replaced piece.  Here is a picture of it, but this was in the evening after things have cooled off a bit.  When it is really hot it raises up high enough you can see underneath the sidewalk pieces.  It has been interesting to watch.  However, the kids have enjoyed their new bike ramp that changes with the temperature...

 I was in need of some new autism shirts for Matthew.  My friend Liz the same one that helped me make his previous autism shirts came to my rescue again.  Matthew now has a few new autism shirts.  I love these shirts because they answer a lot of questions about some of Matthew's bizarre behaviors and questions when we go out in public.  I have also had some parents come over and start up conversations because they have an autistic child as well.  I LOVE them!!  Thanks, Liz!!!

 We celebrated the 4th of July yesterday.  Aaron was going to take Josh out running early that morning, but Mother Nature had different plans.  It had rained all night before and it was still storming at 6 am so they weren't able to go.  Luckily, the storm passed so we headed over to the parade at 8:30 am.  Here we are waiting for the parade to start:

 After the parade we headed over to West Point Days.  They had all kinds of activities set up for the kids.  They had a bounce house/maze that the kids liked going on.  Matthew volunteered to help Noah through and we let him because that did not sound like much fun for Aaron and me.  Here's Matthew helping out Noah:

 They then had a bounce house.  In the picture if you look closely you can see Josh holding on to Noah's hands, Matthew, Sarah and Daniel.  Josh was nice enough to hold on to Noah because he couldn't stand up otherwise.  They had fun playing.

 They had a duck pond where you tried to scoop out as many ducks as you could with the net.  The more ducks you scooped the bigger prize you got.  Here's Josh taking his turn:

 They had a fishing booth not with real fish, though.  Here's Daniel casting his line to get his prize with Josh and Matthew waiting in line behind him for their turn:

 Sarah made sure she got her turn.  You can see my attempt at patriotic hair as well.  The star isn't quite proportional, but you can still tell it's a star so I think it was successful :).  I did have one mom stop me and ask if she could take a picture of it as well.  That was funny.

 They had a reptile area with lots of cages of different reptiles you could see.  The kids LOVED this tent.

 Noah loved all the cages.  We had to keep pulling him along because he would just sit and stare at all the snakes.  His favorite was the alligator, though.

 We then did some face painting.  Noah has such a short attention span that he got something really quick--a smiley face.

 Josh wanted to go all out and chose to get a white face with a huge blue Y on it.  He was pretty proud--not as proud as Aaron was, though.  I think Josh has sufficiently been brain washed about BYU by Aaron, but don't tell anyone :).

When it was Matthew's turn, Matthew insisted that the lady paint a Union Pacific emblem on his arm.  Thankfully she was willing and able to do just that.  Matthew was so excited!!  It matched his Union Pacific hat.  Again it is times like this that Matthew's shirt is very helpful!

 Sarah being the girly girl she is chose a butterfly.

 After face painting we headed over to the stage.  They happened to be doing a rootbeer drinking contest.  Luckily our bishop was the emcee so Matthew, Josh and Daniel all got to participate in the contest.  When they got up on stage they were given a warm 20 ounce rootbeer and told to drink it as fast as they could when they said go.  Whoever drank the most by the end of the minute was the winner.

Ready, set, CHUG-A-LUG!!

They didn't win, but they had fun trying--however, Josh informed me that he doesn't want to drink a rootbeer again for a LONG time.  I can't blame the poor kid--warm rootbeer just doesn't sound delicious and I got to learn that lesson myself.

 

After the kids contest they had an adult contest.  Aaron thought he was just hilarious and volunteered me.  Unluckily our bishop was the emcee and called me up.  DOH!!!  When all the adults were ready they handed us all a 2 liter of rootbeer to chug-a-lug.  Here I am in the very middle of the seats shooting Aaron some pretty crusty looks behind my sunglasses.  He was just laughing at me.  Good thing I love my husband!

 When it was time to chug-a-lug I went to open my warm 2 liter of rootbeer and it exploded everywhere.  That gave me a nice head start, but alas, there was no contest.  The guy that won almost drank the whole 2 liter.  Wow, I didn't even come close!!  When the contest was over, the winner was getting his prize when he barfed.  I guess the fizzy 2 liters of soda was more than his tummy could handle.  YUCK!!  Even though I lost, I was able to bring home a nice 2/3 full 2 liter of rootbeer to enjoy with my family later.  However, like Josh, I don't know if I will be able to drink rootbeer again for a while.

Here are all our family contestants showing off their post contest glory.  What you can't see is that I am covered from head to toe in rootbeer stickiness from having the 2 liter explode all over me right after I opened it.  Afterward we came home so I could have a shower.

While I was in the shower Aaron decided to set up a red neck version  of a slip and slide.  He got out some tarps and staked them in the ground.  He then covered it with water and dish soap to make it slippery.  Aaron was the first to try it out:

 The kids had fun playing on it all afternoon.

 Here's one of the funnier Josh poses as he was sliding down:

Afterward we had a hamburger dinner.  4th of July is a must grill day and things tasted good.  After dinner we set off our own Sidewalk of fire with our wimpy pack of grocery store fireworks.  The kids were all still impressed by them.

 We usually have gone to the Hot Rockin' 4th celebration in Ogden, but this year we decided to stay home instead.  After dinner we roasted marshmallows on the fire pit.  The kids made quite a few burnt offerings after catching a lot of their marshmallows on fire.  Good thing we bought a few packs of marshmallows.

 We then sat back and were amazed.  From our backyard we were able to see two different cities' firework shows.  It was awesome.  I had no idea we had such a great view from our very own backyard.  My phone takes horrible pictures, but from this you can get an idea of how awesome our view was from our backyard.  It was great!!

 Next year I think we will save the money again and stay home.  I loved watching the fireworks from our own backyard while we roasted marshmallows.  It was great!!