Camp Kengi

Check out the SUPER AWESOME sign that Donna and Jay made for Ken for his B-day!!!!!!!

It's our new Camp Kengi sign!!!

How frickin' cool is that?????

WE LOVE IT!!!!!

We knew that we needed a sign for our new property...now named Camp Kengi, but the sign was sadly very low on the priority list in our hectic lives.

Thanks to Donna and Jay we have a Kick A** sign now!!!!

WOOOOOO HOOOOOOOO!

Rafting with my Sista*s

After MULTIPLE phone calls from my big sis, urging me to play hookey on Wednesday to go rafting...I took a deep breathe and decided to throw responsibility to the wind (only for the day) and do it!!!

So me and all my sisters headed to Yakima River with my adorable nephews to go float the river for the day!!!!

Hip-man Dallas told us about his job choices...at 15 he has an oppurtunity to work at a fast food place which is a 10 minute walk from his house or at Fred Meyer which is a 20 minute walk from his house. Of course we all encouraged Fred Meyer because of the potential for growth...but at 15 years old, pretty sure the extra 10 minutes of sleep sounds more worthwhile to him. Isn't it amazing that stuff you thought was important at 15 versus in your adulthood?

Then there was cutie pie Ross who knew one verse to one song and sang it over and over and over and over. Sometimes loud, sometimes quiet, but always the same and over and over again.

Along the way , trying to distract him with food, we offered almonds. He KNEW he did NOT like almonds. Then after one, he decided he wanted the whole bag of them all to himself!!!

WooHoooo, we broadend the food horizon for one little guy!

Poor Jacque...what a trooper she was. The weekend before, she was out with us at Camp Kengi and got talked into eating a raw oyster. Well, guess what...turns out the beach was closed due to biotoxins!!!! The poor girl needed to be near a restroom everyday for the entire week. She managed to make it through the 2 hour float...but I am sure it wasn't easy for her!!! You're such a trooper Jacque.

Then there was Karla...no complaining, no singing of the same verse of a song, no upset tummy...just there to enjoy the float. Many people in our family never saw the day coming that her and I would be in the same room together, but it was absolutely fabulous to be able to be with all my sisters. As for Karla and I, what is in the past is now in the past and getting to hang out with her again was like not a day had gone by since we last saw eachother.

It must be a sister bond thing!

And then there's me. I was on safety patrol (of course, I just can't take a day off of responsibility completely!) and litter patrol (NO CIGARETTE BUTTS IN THE RIVER!)

I had a GREAT TIME! The weather was perfect and with my spf 45, I managed to float a river for the first time without a sunburn-that is a good thing!

I can't wait for our big family float in a couple weeks!!!!!

4th of July Weekend

4th of July was a blast this year, as always! Our neighbors, Lisa and Derick, had ping pong tournaments and that ended up being a super great time! Ken and I each lost our tournaments :( but that's OK!

Ken and Jaime, of course, wrestled and Jaime was one hurting girl by the end of that. It sounds like they have finally called a truce to their long standing wrestling matches!The boys decided to try out some arm wrestling tournaments-can you say 'sore arms'?We were all having so much fun that the next time I looked at the clock it was 3:30 in the morning! HOLEY CRAP! Off to bed I went, and at 5:30 in the morning, Ken looked at his watch and finally hit the hay. I have NO IDEA what we were thinking staying up that late!!! I will tell you, it became abundantly clear that we couldn't bounce back like we could when we were younger...Ken and I were two very tired puppies the next day!

Then it was the part of the weekend I have been looking forward to for months! Putting all the bunnies together to form a colony instead of having them in seperate cages! I started getting them all spayed over the course of the last few months and waiting until they were all healed. This was the weekend, the bunnies and I were ready.

What a tiring job it was...Ken and I totally gutted the original Bundo, dug out all the old gravel and dirt and put down wire and new gravel. Then I added the hinding boxes and tubes to play in, then I added the bunnies. It was a very very very rough go at first. LOTS of fighting!

So I put them all in the back of the truck and Ken took us for a ride! This is meant to pretty much scare the dickens out of them so they will bond together out of fear. The bond was very temporary and the fighting continued. I woke up hourly to check on them and break up fights throughout the night, and decided that sleeping in there would make it a bit easier, so in came the pillow, blanket and chair and there I slept.

Then came morning, when they are supposed to be dormant, and I was away from the Bundo. That's when the major fight occurred. I now have a bunny down, and two bunnies that are clearly the leaders. The last 36 hours has been stressful, but we seem to be making progress!

The reason for all this hassle is to make life better for the bunnies and us with all our camping trips and get aways. This way, they will get all the exercise they need and want, rather than sit in a cage for 2 straight days until we get home. In the long run it will be well worth the effort!