Spring Break- camping day 2

Tuesday was our second day of camping at Natural Bridge State Park. It was chilly in the night, right around 50 I think, but not too cold. Cold enough that we enjoyed a campfire for much of the morning. The children also enjoyed having scooter races up and down the road by the campsite. The neighbors on one side of us took off early in the morning. The campers on the other side were kind of funny I thought. They slept in a tent, but ate all of their meals at the lodge cafeteria! :) They were gone much of the day as well, out canoe-ing on the red river. It was a dad and his 2 sons which were probably like 7 and 9. Before we headed out for some hiking the kids and I played most of a game of Yahtzee! We like it because really we can all play and even the little ones enjoy it!

Evan liked helping Brian roll his dice at the table. He came and went though.

Amber liked to help me roll! And yes, we had powdered donuts for breakfast that morning. :) Can't you see the remains of that on Amber's face?!?

Weston's very first turn he rolled a Yahtzee. He rolled a full house first, but he didn't want to take that. I guess is was a good thing he didn't listen to me, but decided to do his own thing. Otherwise, he might not have gotten his Yahtzee's!

Brian found some seriously HUGE wild onions earlier in the morning. We thought that you would like to see these Grandma Whitley!!

After our game, we headed out away from the state park to try a few other trails in the red river gorge that led to other arches. At the trail head of the first place we went to, we ran into a family from the other ward that our boys go to cub scouts with!! When it came to hiking, Evan always started out strong. But usually by about 15 or so minutes into it, he was done. Our backpack carrier doesn't really have a good harness for children as active as Evan to be in since it is old and we got it at a resale shop ages ago when Brian was little. Last year, Evan could climb out of it. That mean that on these hikes that lasted for hours, Barth and I carried him. Boy were my arms sore by the time we were done camping!!! :)

Heading out on the hike. Evan adores Weston! They looked too cute walking hand in hand up the trail.

The first hike we went on that day ended up being a little over 5 miles! The kids did great (even Evan who slept on Barth's shoulder for part of the time) but were ready for a rest by the end of it.

Along the way we saw some wild irises! So pretty!!

Once we got back to camp, it was time to play in the creek!!! It got up to just below 80 on this day. The water was freezing, but the kids didn't mind. We camped here on Labor day weekend when Evan turned 1 and Amber turned 3. The kids had so much fun playing in the creek that time, that they begged us to take them back to the same place this time when we said that we were going camping. This area of the campground didn't have water or electricity, but there was potable water right across the street from our camp by the creek so it was all good!

By the time the afternoon was done, all 5 of the kiddos were soaked through and through!!! They had so much fun catching crawdads and playing games in the freezing cold water though. Barth and I just enjoyed relaxing and watching them play.

Each one of the children kept their Sunny Delight bottle from breakfast so that they could keep their treasures in them.

Oh the combined joys of being a child and camping!! There is nothing like being happy to spend hours and hours playing and having fun with not a care in the world!!!!

They played till dinner time at dusk! Barth and I were having hobo dinners, but the kids just wanted hot dogs. Good thing hot dogs cook fast because, right afterwards we had terrible storms roll in with tons of bad weather all night long!!! The kids got to eat their dinner, but our dinner was ruined by the rain killing our coals!! We had to settle for crackers for dinner! It can't be camping if you don't have a few adventures like that, can it? :D

Spring Break- camping day 3

Wednesday was day three of our camping adventure. The night before we had a night of storms with lots of rain, wind, thunder and lightening. They started up at about 8 and finally finished by 3 or 4 in the morning. Thankfully we stayed relatively dry. Wednesday morning was overcast, and the forecast called for rain, so we decided to drive the scenic Red River Gorge loop that day and go to the nature center and a few other places along the river. We found this great little canoe launch spot where we all had a great time playing in the sand and tossing stones into the river. Most of us stayed dry, but I think that Evan's pants were pretty well soaked by the time we left there.

We found all sorts of cool stones there. Weston and I had contests to see who could skip their stone the farthest and get the most skips on the river. We were pretty even at 3 to 4 skips per stone. Then Barth had to come and join in and show us all up!! :) He could skip his stone all the way across to the other side with like 6 or 7 skips! I still don't know how he can do that!!!

Brian found a little sandy area that he played in for a bit. The last time we came here was over Labor Day weekend and the leaves were all on the trees. It was much more shady than it was this time with the trees just getting leaves on them. It it still a gorgeous area though, no matter what time of year you go! I was just glad that it was fairly warm.

Amber and the stick that she found there at the boat launch site. And she is obviously giving me the most fake smile ever!!!! Silly girl. I got the capris that she is wearing from a box of clothes that we had received from our neighbor a while ago that is just now fitting her. When she put them on, she was adamant that they were boy clothes and not for girls because they were not pink or frilly!!! :) I am glad that I have a girl that likes pink and frilly!!!

I was surprised at how quiet the area that we were in was. It was a peaceful afternoon. We spent the morning hiking some trails that were off of this loop too, but I didn't get any pictures of that.

Barth and the boys had a contest going. Barth wanted to see if they could throw a rock all the way across to the other side of the river. By the time we left, both boys had made the throw. You can see here that Evan's legs are caked in mud!! :) Good thing we were camping and I had extra clothes!!!

After playing by the river, we drove out to a lookout where we could see the gorge and some of the arches in the area. It was pretty. We couldn't stay long though because a huge storm was rolling in and I didn't want to get caught out of the cliff face in that kind of weather.

Look closely, there is one main arch right in the center and then one in the bottom right hand corner! It really is such a pretty area.

Oh how I love my little Aaron!! Every time we would go someplace new, Aaron would pause and say, "Take a picture of me here Mommy!" :) Here Aaron is wearing a school shirt from our walk-a-thon. The funny thing about that, is that, while we were at an observation, learning center place (it was indoors) that was along the driving loop that we stopped at, we saw one of the reading recovery type teachers from school. None of my kids have ever had her, but we see her everyday at check out time when I come and sign the kids out to pick them up. We were walking around at this learning place when I hear, "Oh! It's the Yorke's!!" and I turn to see Mrs Coleman standing there!! We had gotten there first, but when she and her family came in, her daughter had seen Aaron in his school shirt and ran to her mom to tell her that there was someone there from school!! They had been camping over the weekend at another state park close by, and had gone to stay in the lodge at the state park we were camping in the night before. :)

Here is Brian pointing out something across the gorge from our spot. You can see the nasty clouds rolling in. As we headed out from here, the rain and storms began. We got back to camp and the kids played for just a bit before more thunder and lightening struck up. At that point, since it was getting close to dinner, and I was sure that there was really no way we were going to be able to get a fire started in a downpour, we decided to head out in the van to go find some dinner!! We found a Dairy Queen and took our time on dinner. By the time we got back, it was just rain, and not thundering. That meant we donned raincoats and played for a while before heading to bed for another rainy and chilly night. Still, it was great day and not too terrible of a night either!

Happy Easter

We had a wonderful Easter day yesterday here at home after a week gone for our Spring Break. I have lots of pictures to blog from this last week, but today I am getting our house back in order after having been gone all week long and doing lots and lots of laundry!!! :) Happy Easter! We hope yours was as wonderful as ours!

For Liam- part 2- our trash pick-up

Okay Liam, here is what it looks like when they come and pick up the trash at our house here in Kentucky! I hope you enjoy it!! Love- Aunt Kristie

For Liam- Our recycle pick-up

Today is recycle day at our house. So Liam, here is a video just for you of our recycle pick-up. We were on our way to the park when he came by this morning. I hope you like it!

Sick

I am in need to a good post here on my blog, I know. And really, this Winter has been an amazingly wonderfully healthy one here at our house. I think our best winter in like 5 years. But, right before Momma left to go back to TX, Brian got sick. He was followed by Amber and then Evan. The virus has run several days of a high fever with a cough and runny nose. Brian's then went to his ear. Amber and Evan seemed to be over it finally on Friday, since neither one was running a fever, but now Evan's is back. I guess that if it continues on tomorrow, I will take him in. His temp was 103 to 104 till Thursday and then back up to 102 yesterday and today. Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully this is the end of all of this. I am really hoping that Aaron and Weston, who have not yet gotten it, will stay healthy! With sick kids for over a week, my house is in need of a good clean that hopefully I can get in tomorrow. That and a few bazillion loads of laundry that need to be done!! Hopefully tomorrow I can get up some pictures from when my mom came to visit us for her Spring Break!! :) Oh yeah, and only 1 more week of school till we are off for Spring Break!!!! Hooray!!!! We are looking forward to a partial week of camping (all the sites were booked up past Thursday due to good Friday and the Easter weekend) and then a short trip up to see Columbus, OH! We are excited to have a break. And to think that once we get back, the children will have just over a month of school till we are done for the summer!!!! Hooray for the Spring time! :)

Afternoon at the park

We have had some seriously crazy weather lately, but also some really nice and warm weather too. (Okay not as warm as Texas, but still warm for us!) Right after we had the snow, we had more nice weather with temps right around 60. So, the other day after school, we walked over to the park by our house for some afternoon fun in the sun. These pictures were all taken with my phone, and for some reason, they come out huge. And out of order! Oh well! Weston was such a nice brother that afternoon, playing with all the boys, but especially nice to Evan. Weston played with him and showed him all sorts of things. They went on a pine cone hunt while Aaron and Brian were climbing the trees.

Do you see my little Brian monkey way up in that tree? He and Aaron got quite high in their climbing. They like to climb the pine trees because they are so easy to climb with all the branches. Aaron and Brian spent most of their time at the park in the trees.

Brian did play on the equipment too though. He and Aaron and Weston had fun on the slides together.

Evan is so big and independent now. He had a great time climbing and sliding. A few times he wanted to be on the swings, but mostly he was happy to climb. It was the first time in a llllooooonnnnnggggg time that I was able to just sit and watch if I wanted, or be the troll under the bridge if I wanted, or whatever. I had no little baby to hold and look after. :) And no, I am not making any announcement right now. I did have a miscarriage this past fall for those that may not have known that, and yes, we do want one more, but for right now, we are good and happy with the way things are! :)

Can you see Brian up there in the tree? I was zoomed in for this picture. He was actually really high up there!!

This was actually on the trip home (like I said, the pictures are out of order). All the bigger children rode their bikes to the park. I was pushing Evan in the stroller. They are so good when we are out. They always wait for me to say it is okay to go when they get to the stop sign. :) They looked so happy and sweet waiting there that I had to snap a picture! I guess that the next time we go, I will have to take my bike and trailer. Since everyone else was on their bikes, they were way faster than me this time.

The boys playing on the slide and having a grand time.

Amber climbing and playing. She played with Evan a lot of the time. Those 2 are good friends.

Aaron had lots of fun sliding down the slide and then climbing back up it.

He always enjoys the fire pole at the park. This time he climbed back up it too! He must be related to the Whitleys!!! :D

Aaron up in the tree. He couldn't go quite as high as Brian, but almost! He has some good muscles. Don't let his size fool you, he is very strong!! I keep thinking that I should put him in gymnastics.

It was such a great and fun afternoon. I love it when it warms up and Spring is on the way. Those are some of my favorite days! I love to go for walks and to the park with my kiddos! The days when they will all go with me and have fun are numbered, so I will enjoy them while they last!!!!!

Snow!

This morning we woke up to a fresh layer of snow on the ground. Perhaps even the most snow we have had all winter long. And to think that just a few days ago it was almost 70 and we were having tornadoes!!! :P Crazy weather. Of course, they didn't predict this much snow, so we had a few inches. The streets were still quite warm from all the unusually warm weather that we have had, so they were clear. That meant that the older boys didn't get to play in it. Right after taking everyone to school this morning, Evan, Amber and I suited up and went out to play! It was a perfect morning in the snow. :)
First we did a little bit of sledding.

Even Evan could work the sled pretty good on his own.

We are always thankful that Auntie M went to school in Idaho so that she could then give us all of her left over hats and scarves. We use them every winter!! :)

Amber made a lovely snow angel.

Evan loved to throw snowballs at me. Over, and over, and over again! Look at that mischievous grin right before he attacked me with that snowball in his little hands. :)

"I'm gonna get you Mommy!" says Evan.

Then we headed out back to check out all the snow on the deck.

It was the perfect snow for building a snowman! It seems like the snow is usually too dry here for snowman building, but really this snow was perfect. Amber helped me roll the parts of the snowman. She did a good job.

Here we are with our finished snowman! We ended up using mini pepperonis for the eyes, mouth and buttons. :) We stayed out for about an hour and had such a good time. Too bad most of the snow will probably be melted by the time the bigger boys get home. But at least we had a fun morning together!

The tornado that missed us

Here is the tornado that we were in the path of on Friday afternoon. It ended up passing just over 10 miles to our south thankfully. We feel very, very blessed that it didn't hit us!

All good

For those who may have been following the crazy weather up here by us today, I wanted to let you know that we are a-okay!!! This afternoon there were 3 tornadoes that came very close to us! We spent most of an hour in our basement. We feel blessed that we were not touched when there were so many all around us. Towns just across the river in Indiana were totally wiped out by the storms that were supposed to come right over us but went just barely to our south. My heart goes out to those that were not as lucky as us. It was a crazy, intense afternoon and I am glad it is over!!! We will be sure to offer up lots of prayers of thanks tonight that we remained safe!