It's a Hurricane

This summer, Allie, Gabe and I had season passes to Hurricane Harbor in conjunction with our passes to Magic Mountain.  It was really fun.  We went there several times this summer.  Sometimes we would go to Hurricane Harbor for a few hours, then go over and ride a few rides at Magic Mountain, then go back to Hurricane Harbor to cool off, or vice versa.  It made the day very cool and flexible.
Our favorite areas of Hurricane Harbor was the Endless River and the Wave Pool.  Allie and Gabe named all of the exits along the river to improve communication.  We spent a lot of time floating around the river.  The wave pool was equally exciting.  The waves would go off rhythmically every 15 minutes.  They enjoyed staying near the wave producer and riding the swells up and down.  Sometimes they would go nearer the "shore" and body surf on the waves.  It is really fun and refreshing.
We didn't like waiting in line for rides, so we didn't go on them very often, but we did go on nearly every ride at some time.  Our favorite was the bonzai slides.  They were terrifying and exhilarating.  you started the ride standing in a large tube.  They closed the hatch, then a voice counted down and the floor dropped out from under me.  We dropped straight down the chute.  I have to admit, the anticipation of standing in the tube, waiting for the floor to drop out from under you was more stressful than the ride itself.  The ride was over very quickly, and before you knew it, you were spewing water out of your nose and mouth and back on solid ground.  It was very fun.

Beach Volleyball

For the first time, Jayd's highschool has joined a beach volleyball league.  So he is playing volleyball on the beach every Saturday for the month of September.  It has been really fun to go and watch his games.  The atmosphere on the beach is so much more relaxed than in the gym.  The players have to switch sides after every 7 points, and they often slap hands and exchange smiles and jokes as they pass one another.  They compliment each other when they had a great play, even though they may have lost the point.  The spectators are relaxed and casual.  It is a much different feeling, more like we are all just friends getting together to spend a day at the beach. 
There are only two players on a team, so they play a lot of volleyball.  They are almost guaranteed to hit the ball at least once for every point.  Even though this is the first time that Jayd's school has played on the beach, they are doing fairly well.  We expected to be overwhelmed by the more experienced competition, but Jayd has won 5 of his 6 matches so far.  With no expectations of success, winning a few games would have been exciting!  It is fun to see him playing so well and enjoying the competition. 

Trading Spaces

Since Maddie has departed, the greatly anticipated event of changing rooms has occurred.  With only 3 children in the house, they each have their own room.  The boys were thrilled since they have been sharing a room since Gabe was born.  They did not start moving the moment Maddie left, due to an edict from the Queen (Mom) That no movement would occur until Labor Day weekend.  But as soon as I returned from Utah, we started to move rooms.  Allie moved into Maddie's old room.  But she did not get Maddie's bed.  We moved Gabe's bunk beds back into Maddie's room.  Maddie's bed went into Jayd's room.  We realized that he has been sleeping in a bunk bed since he was 7 years old.  We decided that it was time for our 6'4" son to have a bed where he could actually sit up.  Gabe moved into Allie's old room with the king size bed.  He's not thrilled about this move.  He likes having his own space, but wishes that there was a little more space and a little less bed.  He is willing to bear these circumstances because he knows that once Jayd leaves next year, he will have the largest room in the house....but for now, that honor goes to Jayd.  Jayd quickly rearranged his room once the beds were settled.  He had apparently given a lot of thought to the arrangement, and it looks very comfortable, and spacious.  He is happy with his personal area.  Immediately upon completion of the move, Allie and Gabe began to build permanent forts in their rooms!  Aah, the joys of having your own room!

Flying Away and Back to the Nest

This week, I took my baby back to her birthplace, and left her there.  It was a bit sentimental to think that 18 years ago, she was born while we were living on campus at school, and now, she is returning a full fledged college student ready to try life on her own.
We had a great trip.  We stopped by the St. George Temple to do baptisms for the dead on the way there.  It was very sweet to be in the temple with Maddie.  Then we stayed with my parents in law for a night or two.  Then we were off to the dorms.  We moved all of her stuff into the apartment, then started making lists of things we wanted to add, and things that she forgot at home!  We had a good time cooking for ourselves, watching Netflix, and lots of shopping.  Maddie was a little timid with the shopping, she said, "Mom, this is really strange, you hate shopping.  I am not quite sure what to do."  But in the end, I felt comfortable leaving her there.  She was prepared to try things on her own.  I will miss her, but I know that it is where she is supposed to be.  The joy of watching her become independent is dwarfing my sadness that she is gone.

Magical Moments

Since I have a season pass to Magic Mountain, I was able to bring a friend for free during August.  So on Thursday, I took my best friend to Magic Mountain.  Jeff and I went on a date, no kids.  We had a great time.  We tried all the different soda flavors and went on several roller coaster rides.  Jeff was excited because he was finally able to go on Superman.  He has tried many times to go on that ride, but was thwarted by various events, the line was obscenely long, the ride was closed down, or no one would go with him.  This time, all three occured to some degree, the line was over an hour long, the ride broke down while we were in line, adding another 15 minutes to our wait time, and I would not go on the ride with him!  But I was willing to wait in line with him, and he really enjoyed the ride.  In addition, we went on Colossus for the last time.  It is a huge wooden roller coaster and they closed it this weekend.  It wasn't our favorite ride, and for the past few years, they ran the cars backwards most of the time, so I hadn't been on it for many years.  But after we went on it for the last time, we thought it was a pretty good ride, it had several great drops and was a very long ride.  I am glad we went on it for the last time.

No More White

This week, I painted the last white wall in my house.  That's right, there aren't any white walls left in my house.  It doesn't really seem like it because the trim, the doors and the ceilings are still white.  I didn't even really notice until Maddie pointed it out.  Then I had to run around the house and check, but it is true, it was the last white wall in the house.
Where was it?  The kids/guest/general bathroom of course. It really needed to be a different color since the whiteness of the wall and the ceiling made it look big and empty.  It is basically the same color as the hallway.  I haven't decided yet if I am going to paint under the chair rail.  I might paint it blue.  But after painting it, I decided to move the beach wall into the bathroom.  The pictures look right at home on that wall, and the shells will make lovely decorations.  I don't even miss the display in the living room.  The whole move was a good thing and has improved both rooms in my house.

Since we were working on the bathroom, we decided to remove the toilet for a day or two, then put it back on.......okay, not really.  That was not part of the remodel, Gabe flushed a handful of paper towels down, and it was the only way to get them out.  It was great fun (tongue in cheek) to explain to the Japanese student that the toilet was missing, and she would have to use our bathroom for the day.

Welcome from Japan

For the past two weeks, we have been hosting a foreign exchange student from Japan.  Her name is Hitomi.  So we have been doing all sorts of activities with the Japanese group, playing games, going swimming, and trying new foods.  We even took her to TP someone's house. 

She is a little camera shy, somewhat surprising, so I don't have a very good picture of her.  The whole things is really filling up our last days of summer with a plethora of activities.