Summer actvities

It seems like every time I post I am apologizing for the last time and how long it has been, well no more. I got a lot of stuff going on, and when I don't, I want to relax. But enough has happened that I thought I should put something down so I don't forget about it.

My sister stayed after my brother and parents left for a few days and that was just long enough to go over to the car show at the hot rod cafe. Brenda and I stopped here on a whim last year and caught the festival so it was a must go this year based on the crazies we saw last year.
James also liked it and wore his skull and crossbones skull cap as well as his "chicks love me" shirt. I love carrying that kid around because everyone thinks he is so cute. He loved the burnouts and the cars.

Here is a jacked up old chevy doing a burnout. About every kind of car you can think of was there trying a burnout. Even ones that should not be. There was a old cop car, 1976 Ford LDT, and of course multiple rednecks in trucks. It was a feast for the eyes.

Not sure if you can see here, but the truck did a burnout until the tires blew up. He is riding on the rims here.

Summer has hit Greenacres and we have a couple thornless raspberry bushes which have provided more berries than we could possibly eat. It has been fun to pick them and then give them to friends. Everyone always appreciates it and they taste amazing

Here is 10min worth of picking.

After my sister left, Jim and Sandy needed another grandchild fix and came up for the weekend.

Yet another James and James picture. James is getting huge now...our James that is. I got a call the day Jim and Sandy showed up from my old boss asking if I could get out to the big oil spill in Montana. They work 7 days a week out there and I was not going to turn down good work so off I went, leaving Brenda with her parents for the weekend. I was out there for a week and while I was gone, Brenda was able to convince other visitors to come as well.

Laura did not have a lot going on and thought....why not go see Brenda. It probably helped that it was Brenda's birthday, but I think she wanted one last getaway before the school year starts.

Brenda said the kids had a great time.

I was able to some home the next weekend. Liberty lake had a car show that weekend and we saw this sweet ride. Someone put a lot of work into a bus...really?

Brenda always poses for picture whenever I ask her.

Yet another pose. They all were not weird cars, but I like to take pictures of the crazies.

Brenda and James then came with me on Monday out to Billings for the week. It was much nicer coming home to the hotel and seeing my wife and boy waiting for me. Working 10-12hr days zapped a lot of energy, but having those two waiting for me gets me energized.

One of my old co-workers from San Jose was there for the job, so we went out to dinner a couple of times and she loved to hold James.

Brenda and I also got to visit some of the sights and sounds of Billings. Here we are at the pictograph caves state park. The rock formations around that area reminded both of us of the thanksgivings we would spend in Utah...great scenery.

Amazing.

James was a great traveler and slept most of the 8hr drive

He is really starting to smile.

Brenda also got a chance to go see one of her old friends Colleen and her baby. I did not go because after a 8hr drive the day before, I was not going to drive 7hrs round trip to visit friends for the day. Plus I was tired and needed to get the bike out on the road...it is summer.

James is getting bigger and bigger and is weighing it at about 15lbs now...you can really feel it when you hold him.

I snapped this pic of him sleeping the other day. It does not get any better than that.

Besides Raspberries, the rest of our garden is growing like mad as well. I planted giant pumpkins and a few are going crazy big and should be quite the sight in a month or two. Potatoes, beans, onions, carrots, and Zucchini are a few of the major things growing like mad. We have a lot of Zucchini...A lot. I think even if I only ate all Zucchini for every meal there is still no way to keep up with the 6 plants we have. We put a bunch out in a box in the front yard with free sign on it and they go like hotcakes.

This pumpkin is growing about 1" in diameter every day. I should be huge by then end.

More amazing cuteness

Summer meals in our backyard are fun and we can sometime see the Spokane hot air balloon giving rides. This only makes Brenda want to go more and more, but I keep reminding her how much it costs and we have better, more practical things to do with our money...like pay for the house, or buy another motorcycle...

Here are a few videos I have uploaded of our fun.




I may convert my mower to do this



As promised last post...this is the funniest dancer I have ever seen. She is oblivious to anyone else and has the rhythm of a tennis shoe in a clothes dryer.



Safety is not the most important thing at an event like this. This car proceeded to do like 20 minutes worth of burnouts and donuts after I stopped the video. Notice the little concrete blocks keeping us safe. Those things did not make me feel any better so I stood behind some fat people to provide cushion if the car crashed into the blocks.

And last but not least is the boy. He is laughing and responding to us now which really makes us laugh and act like those "other" wacko parents who talk in baby talk and make weirdo faces in a feeble attempt to get some reaction from their kids.

Take two

Well here we go for part two. There is going to be a lot more pics in this post because I did not take them all. I downloaded pics from my brothers and sisters camera so I have a few....hundred.

The day my in-laws and wife's sister's family left, my brother and his family arrived. We thought it might be good to go around Tubbs hill, yet again. You will see a lot of redundancy with the events we chose, but why mess with what works.
Here are Delaney and Joey. These two kids pose for pictures without having to be asked. They are seemingly perfect angels and right before we left for the hike Joel asked them if they knew the number one rule of hiking. Being the great parent I am, I said it was staying away from the edge and staying close to an adult. I of course was wrong!?!? Delaney informed me that the number one rule of hiking is "not complaining that my knees hurt or my legs are tired". Can it get any cuter than that. True to the number one rule ...neither of them complained once.

Kids love throwing rocks, and so do adults.

Yet another pose that they just did without really having to be asked.

Then Grandma and Grandpa showed up and they started to play with the paddle boats my dad had made. We eventually moved it to the inflatable pool...instead of in the fish barrel.

Delaney loved to chase the chickens and we chased them so much that I asked if she would rather just go in the coop. She will try anything, and I mean anything, so in she went. This ended up being tons of fun for her and was the first thing she always asked to do about 5 seconds after saying good morning...every morning. Usually I made her wait until she was out of her PJ's before putting her in there.

Here she caught one. We did have fun asking her to catch them and then see how far she could throw them. That is hours of fun and she loved it. Very brave girl.

My brother is an avid fly fisherman and ties a lot of flies. Here is one he tied when he was here.

And this is where he got the material. You guessed it, we snagged a couple of feathers from this guy and tied up some flies.

Here is evidence that my sister-in-law can run...who would have thought?

We also got a chance to go up to Mt. Spokane. This was the first day of the season that you could drive to the top, so needless to say it was cool up there. My guests were freezing at those temps as they came from 95 degree weather.

Here we are as a family on the top.

My dad and nephew

That night my parents brought us to a cowboy supper show. Brenda and I did it last year with them and it was cool, but the kids loved it even more and we all had such a good time. Thanks mom and dad.

The kids loved the cowboys and cowgirls.

Sunday we went to Manito Park to view the flowers and then to Downtown Spokane.

The rose garden was in bloom and the smell up there was amazing.

Here is Brenda near a few of the bushes.

Here is my brothers family

Again...we went on the carousel.

Then we went on the gondola over the Spokane falls. That was fun, but the cabins of the gondola were fairly hot and I had to take my shirt off. I also had to rock the cabin once or twice

As I said....hot. I mean it had to be 90 in there. In Spokane the weather this year is cool and as I write this wile heat grips 90 percent of the country...Spokane is 75-80 and sunny.

and of course we went on the Radio Flyer wagon for a slide down the handle.

Then of course we went in the fountain again.

Monday we went to the beach in Coeur d'Alene. My dad was nice enough to rent a sailboat and although the wind was very light all day, we all had a great time out on it. The kids thought it was cool and I always like to screw around on boats.

Here we are heading out....notice the flat water. The oar was used more than we wanted it to be.

Then the next day I was able to round up 5 bikes and two kid trailers and off we went to the "route of the Hiawatha". This is a old railroad grade converted to bike trail. It runs like 15 miles all downhill, over 7 bridges, and through 10 tunnels. At the beginning of the route you go through a 2 mile tunnel which crosses the MT ID boarder underground.

Here is one of the views from the trail.

Here is my sister and sister-in-law on the tandem bike.

And two kids in the carrier. James was alone in the other and besides having dirt all over his face....he was fine.

Here we all next to the waterfall.

And the whole family....after 3 takes.

Check out those bridges, they are amazing.

And Brenda and I outside of one of the tunnels.

We loved hanging out in the backyard and are really liking the house this summer. Here was a rainbow which disappeared and reappeared 3 times this night.

Wednesday, Joel and I went fishing in ID. We had a great time and caught a lot fish. Mine were not that big, but we had a great time.

Here is the big dog of the trip.

Joey loved hanging out with the baby.

Well all said and done we had 18 guests over 2 weeks and a great summer. With the weather warming up a bit it really only feels like the beginning of summer....which I guess is the case up here.

Here is my niece chasing the chickens...this is her first time in the coop and she got a bit more aggressive after getting to know them.

I some good pics already for the next post and another video that cannot be missed....stay tuned.

Family....So this is why we bought a 5 bedroom house

I have decided to divide the families into a 2 part series even though they ran together and there was seemingly no division between the two. First Dan and Sarah came with their two girls Maggie and Abby. They were here for 2 days and then headed out to see Brenda parents.

We went for a hike around Tubbs hill with Dan and Sarah and the girls. This is a great hike and not all that far so it is great for kids
Then they taught James to play some sort of patty cake (not sure if this is right). He has a what the heck look on his face here, but he looked like he liked it.

Here are the girls at the park in Coeur d'Alene.

Then it was home for a swim in the pool and a swing on the swing. I am very glad I put that up. There were no injuries the whole time family was here which is amazing to me.

Here are the cousins.

4 days after Dan and Sarah left, Paula and Kevin (Lindsey and Landon as well) came in and then Dan and Sarah came back up along with Jim and Sandra. If you are keeping track of numbers....that is 13 bodies staying at our house (ourselves included). I guess that is why we bought a big house and it was a great time.

Here are the cousins loving the pool. I convinced them to do belly flops and still...no one got hurt.

Dinner on the table with the family was well worth the effort of building the table.

Here is a pick of all the cousins. Kids nowadays have got to get tired of taking pictures. With digital photos there is so much more freedom to take bad pics that we generally took 3-4 pics at every location. Maybe they like it, but I know I got 736 pics from the past two weeks and that is more than I will ever need.

Then we went to the beach in Coeur d'Alene on the 5th. It was kind of cool in the water, but a lot of fun and very relaxing.

Here are the kids eating some pop-ice. Big hit after water balloons.

Our neighbor brought his horse over to give the kids a ride on.

Then Landon got a chance. halfway through his ride the horse started to neigh and echo the one back in the stall. Not a good sign. Then Rocky jumped to the side and leaped ...but Landon held on tight. Kevin ran over and got him off with lots of crying and all of us were thankful no one got hurt. Needless to say that was the end of the horse rides...maybe not my best idea as an afterthought.

James looks happy here, but with women giving you a sponge bath....who wouldn't be.

We also had a chance to got to downtown Spokane and rode on the Carousel. It may seem lame, but it actually goes fast and you can grab rings if you are on the outer horses and throw them into a hole to ring the bell. Still does not sound cool, but I assure you it is fun.

Jim and Sandra along with James at the falls.

James did not like the ride as much as we did.

This was a scene repeated throughout the vacation and Paula really liked hanging out with a baby again. It was kind of nice to have family out and hand off the duties of holding James.

So that was the Elenbaas Family...the day they left, my family arrived....to be continued.